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THE    WORKS 


SAMUEL    TAYLOR    COLERIDGE, 


PROSE    AND    VERSE. 


COMPLETE 


IN  ONE  VOLUME 


PHILADELPHIA: 
THOMAS,    COWPERTHWAIT    &   CO. 

No.    253,    MARKET    STREET. 


1843. 


sec 


GIHON,  FAIRCHILD  AND  CO.  PRINTERS, 
6.  E.  Corner  of  Seventh  and  Market  St. 


ADVERTISEMENT 


OF    THE 


AMERICAN    PUBLISHERS. 


In  adding  to  our  edition  of  Coleridge's  Poems,  his  Prose  works,  we  have 
thought  proper  to  confine  the  collection  to  his  acknowledged  works,  as 
they  were  published  with  his  own  final  revision.  The  "  Table  Talk," 
"  Letters,  Conversations,  and  Recollections,"  and  the  "  Literary  Remains," 
published  ^since  his  decease,  afford  the  most  remarkable  specimens  of  what 
is  technically  called  "  book-making,"  which  have  appeared  in  modern 
times.  The  most  cursory  examination  of  them  must  satisfy  any  candid 
person  that  they  form  no  exception  to  the  general  rule  which  excludes 
such  compilations  from  a  permanent  place  in  any  collection  of  a  great 
author's  works.  They  are  made  up  chiefly  of  recollected  conversations, 
imperfect  notes  of  lectures,  and  notes  written  on  the  margins  of  the 
books  in  his  library.  Not  a  single  complete  treatise  —  not  even  a  finished 
essay,  can  be  found  in  the  volumes.  The  reader  will  therefore  not  be 
surprised  at  their  having  been  wholly  excluded  from  this  collection.  The 
same  principle  has  caused  the  exclusion  of  several  pamphlets  relating  to 
local  and  temporary  politics. 

(3) 


J&emoir  of  Samuel  £aelor  <£oltviXi&t. 


No  writer  of  the  age  was  more  the  theme  of 
panegyric  by  his  friends,  and  of  censure  by  his 
enemies,  than  Coleridge.  It  has  been  the  custom  of 
the  former  to  injure  him  by  extravagant  praise,  and 
of  the  latter  to  pour  upon  his  head  much  unmerited 
abuse.  Coleridge  has  left  so  much  undone  which 
his  talents  and  genius  would  have  enabled  him  to 
effect,  and  has  done  on  the  whole  so  little,  that  he 
has  given  his  foes  apparent  foundation  for  some 
of  their  vituperation.  His  natural  character,  how- 
ever, was  indolent ;  he  was  far  more  ambitious 
of  excelling  in  conversation,  and,  of  pouring  out 
his  wild  philosophical  theories  —  of  discoursing 
about 

Fix'd  fate,  free-will,  foreknowledge  absolute — 

the  mysteries  of  Kant,  and  the  dreams  of  meta- 
physical vanity,  than  "  in  building  the  lofty 
rhyme."  His  poems,  however,  which  have  been 
recently  collected,  form  several  volumes ; — and  the 
beauty  of  some  of  his  pieces  so  amply  redeems 
the  extravagance  of  others,  that  there  can  be  but 
one  regret  respecting  him,  namely,  that  he  should 
have  preferred  the  shortlived  perishing  applause 
bestowed  upon  his  conversation,  to  the  lasting 
renown  attending  successful  poetical  efforts.  Not 
but  that  Coleridge  may  lay  claim  to  the  praise  due 
to  a  successful  worship  of  the  muses;  for  as  long 
as  the  English  language  endures,  his  "  Genevieve" 
and  "  Ancient  Mariner"  will  be  read :  but  he  has 
been  content  to  do  far  less  than  his  abilities  clearly 
demonstrate  him  able  to  effect. 

Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  was  born  at  Ottery 
Saint  Mary,  a  town  of  Devonshire,  in  1773.  His 
father,  the  Rev.  Jolm'  Coleridge,  was  vicar  there, 
having  been  previously  a  schoolmaster  at  South 
Molton.  He  is  said  to  have  been  a  person  of  con- 
siderable learning,  and  to  have  published  several 
essays  in  fugitive  publications.  He  assisted  Dr. 
Kennicot  in  collating  his  manuscripts  for  a 
Hebrew  bible,  and,  among  other  things,  wrote 
a  dissertation  on  the  "  Aoyoj."  He  was  also 
the  author  of  an  excellent  Latin  grammar.  He 
died  in  1783,  at  the  age  of  sixty-two,  much 
regretted,  leaving  a  considerable  family,  of 
which  nearly  all  the  members  are  since  de- 
ceased. 

Coleridge  was  educated  at  Christ's  Hospital- 
school,  London.  The  smallness  of  his  father's 
living  and  large  family  rendered  the  strictest 
economy  necessary.  At  this  excellent  seminary 
he  was  soon  discovered  to  be  a  boy  of  talent,  ec- 
centric but  acute.  According  to  his  own  state- 
ment, the  master,  the  Rev.  J.  Bowyer,  was  a  severe 


disciplinarian  after  the  inane  practice  of  English 
grammar-school  modes,  but  was  fond  of  encour- 
aging genius,  even  in  the  lads  he  flagellated  most 
unmercifully.  He  taught  with  assiduity,  and  di- 
rected the  taste  of  youth  to  the  beauties  of  the 
better  classical  authors,  and  to  comparisons  of  one 
with  another.  "  He  habituated  me,"  says  Cole 
ridge,  "to  compare  Lucretius,  Terence,  and  above 
all  the  chaste  poems  of  Catullus,  not  only  with  the 
Roman  poets  of  the  so  called  silver  and  brazen 
ages,  but  with  even  those  of  the  Augustan  era ; 
and,  on  grounds  of  plain  sense  and  universal  logic, 
to  see  and  assert  the  superiority  of  the  former,  in 
the  truth  and  nativeness  both  of  their  thoughts  and 
diction.  At  the  same  time  that  we  were  studying 
the  Greek  tragic  poets,  he  made  us  read  Shak- 
speare  and  Milton  as  lessons  ;  and  they  were  the 
lessons  too  which  required  most  time  and  trouble 
to  bring  up,  so  as  to  escape  his  censure.  I  learned 
from  him  that  poetry,  even  that  of  the  loftiest,  and 
seemingly  that  of  the  wildest  odes,  had  a  logic  of 
its  own,  as  severe  as  that  of  science,  and  more 
difficult ;  because  more  subtle  and  complex,  and 
dependent  on  more  and  more  fugitive  causes.  In 
our  English  compositions  (at  least  for  the  last 
three  years  of  our  school  education)  he  showed  no 
mercy  to  phrase,  image,  or  metaphor,  unsupported 
by  a  sound  sense,  or  where  the  same  sense  might 
have  befen  conveyed  with  equal  force  and  dignity 
in  plainer  words.  Lute,  harp,  and  lyre,  muse, 
muses,  and  inspirations — Pegasus,  Parnassus  and 
Hippocrenc,  were  all  an  abomination  to  him.  In 
fancy,  I  can  almost  hear  him  now  exclaiming — 
'  Harp  !  harp !  lyre  !  pen  and  ink,  boy,  you  mean  ! 
muse,  boy,  muse !  your  nurse's  daughter,  you 
mean  !  Pierian  spring  !  O  ay  !  the  cloister  pump, 
I  suppose.'  "  In  his  "  Literary  Life,"  Coleridge 
has  gone  into  the  conduct  of  his  master  at  great 
length ;  and,  compared  to  the  majority  of  peda- 
gogues who  ruled  in  grammar-schools  at  that  time, 
he  seems  to  have  been  a  singular  and  most  honor- 
able exception  among  them.  He  sent  his  pupils  to 
the  university  excellent  Greek  and  Latin  scholars, 
with  some  knowledge  of  Hebrew,  and  a  consider- 
able insight  into  the  construction  and  beauties  of 
their  vernacular  language  and  its  most  distin- 
guished writers — a  rare  addition  to  their  classical 
acquirements  in  such  foundations. 

It  was  owing  to  a  present  made  to  Coleridge  of 
Bowles'  sonnets  by  a  school-fellow  (the  late  Dr. 
Middlcton)  while  a  boy  of  17,  that  he  was  drawn 
away  from  theological  controversy  and  wild  meta- 
physics to  the  charms  of  poetry.  He  transcribed 
these  sonnets  no  less  than  forty  times  in  eighteen 

5 


VI 


MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


months,  in  order  to  make  presents  of  them  to  his 
friends ;  and  about  the  same  period  he  wrote  his 
Ode  to  Chatterton.  "Nothing  else,"  he  says, 
"  pleased  me  ;  history  and  particular  facts  lost  all 
interest  in  my  mind."  Poetry  had  become  in- 
sipid ;  all  his  ideas  were  directed  to  his  favorite 
theological  subjects  and  mysticisms,  until  Bowles' 
sonnets,  and  an  acquaintance  with  a  very  agreeable 
family,  recalled  him  to  more  pleasant  paths,  com- 
bined with  perhaps  far  more  of  rational  pursuits. 

When  eighteen  years  of  age,  Coleridge  removed 
to  Jesus  College,  Cambridge.  It  does  not  appear 
that  he  obtained  or  even  struggled  for  academic 
honors.  From  excess  of  animal  spirits,  he  was 
rather  a  noisy  youth,  whose  general  conduct  was 
better  than  that  of  many  of  his  fellow-collegians, 
and  as  good  as  most :  his  follies  were  more  remark- 
able only  as  being  those  of  a  more  remarkable 
personage ;  and  if  he  could  be  accused  of  a  vice,  it 
must  be  sought  for  in  the  little  attention  he  was 
inclined  to  pay  to  the  dictates  of  sobriety.  It  is 
known  that  he  assisted  a  friend  in  composing  an 
essay  on  English  poetry  while  at  that  University  ; 
that  he  was  not  unmindful  of  the  muses  himself 
while  there  ;  and  that  he  regretted  the  loss  of  the 
leisure  and  quiet  he  had  found  within  its  precincts. 

In  the  month  of  November,  1793,  while  laboring 
under  a  paroxysm  of  despair,  brought  on  by  the 
combined  effects  of  pecuniary  difficulties  and  love 
of  a  young  lady,  sister  of  a  school-fellow,  he  set 
off  for  London  with  a  party  of  collegians,  and 
passed  a  short  time  there  in  joyous  conviviality. 
On  his  return  to  Cambridge,  he  remained  but  a 
few  days,  and  then  abandoned  it  for  ever.  He 
again  directed  his  steps  towards  the  metropolis, 
and  there,  after  indulging  somewhat  freely  in  the 
pleasures  of  the  bottle,  and  wandering  about  the 
various  streets  and  squares  in  a  state  of  mind 
nearly  approaching  to  frenzy,  he  finished  by  enlist- 
ing in  the  15th  dragoons,  under  the  name  of  Cluin- 
berbacht.  Here  he  continued  some  time,  the 
wonder  of  his  comrades,  and  a  subject  of  mystery 
and  curiosity  to  his  officers.  While  engaged  in 
watching  a  sick  comrade,  which  he  did  night  and 
day,  he  is  said  to  have  got  involved  in  a  dispute 
with  the  regimental  surgeon ;  but  the  disciple  of 
Esculapius  had  no  chance  with  the  follower  of 
the  muses  ;  he  was  astounded  and  put  to  flight  by 
the  profound  erudition  and  astonishing  eloquence 
of  his  antagonist.  His  friends  at  length  found 
him  out,  and  procured  his  discharge. 

In  1794,  Coleridge  published  a  small  volume  of 
poems,  which  were  much  praised  by  the  critics  of 
the  time,  though  it  appears  they  abounded  in  ob- 
scurities and  epithets  too  common  with  young 
writers.  He  also  published,  in  the  same  year, 
while  residing  at  Bristol,  "  The  Fall  of  Robes- 
pierre, an  Historic  Drama,"  which  displayed  con- 
siderable talent.  It  was  written  in  conjunction 
with  Southcy;   and  what  is   remarkable  in  this 


composition  is,  that  they  began  it  at  7  o'clock  one 
evening,  finished  it  the  next  day  by  12  o'clock 
noon,  and  the  day  after,  it  was  printed  and  pub- 
lished. The  language  is  vigorous,  and  the  speeches 
are  well  put  together  and  correctly  versified. — 
Coleridge  also,  in  the  winter  of  that  year,  delivered 
a  course  of  lectures  on  the  French  revolution,  at 
Bristol. 

On  leaving  the  University,  Coleridge  was  full 
of  enthusiasm  in  the  cause  of  freedom,  and  occu- 
pied with  the  idea  of  the  regeneration  of  mankind. 
He  found  ardent  coadjutors  in  the  same  enthusi- 
astic undertaking  in  Robert  Lovcll  and  Robert 
Southey,  the  present  courtly  laureate.  This  youth- 
ful triumvirate  proposed  schemes  for  regenerating 
the  world,  even  before  their  educations  were  com- 
pleted ;  and  dreamed  of  happy  lives  in  aboriginal 
forests,  republics  on  the  Mississippi,  and  a  newly- 
dreamed  philanthropy.  In  order  to  carry  their 
ideas  into  effect  they  began  operations  at  Bristol, 
and  were  received  with  considerable  applause  by 
several  inhabitants  of  that  commercial  city,  which, 
however  remarkable  for  traffic,  has  been  frequently 
styled  the  Beeotia  of  the  west  of  England.  Here, 
in  179.5,  Coleridge  published  two  pamphlets,  one 
called  "  Consciones  ad  Populum,  or  addresses  to 
the  people  ;"  the  other,  "  A  protest  against  certain  - 
bills  (then  pending)  for  suppressing  seditious 
meetings." 

The  charm  of  the  political  regeneration  of  na 
tions,  though  thus  warped  for  a  moment,  was  not 
broken.  Coleridge,  Lovcll  and  Southev,  finding 
the  old  world  would  not  be  reformed  after  theii 
mode,  determined  to  try  and  found  a  new  one,  ii\ 
which  all  was  to  be  liberty  and  happiness.  The 
deep  woods  of  America  were  to  be  the  site  of  this 
new  golden  region.  There  all  the  evils  of  Eu- 
ropean society  were  to  be  remedied,  property  was 
to  be  in  common,  and  every  man  a  legislator.  Tho 
name  of  "  Pantisocracy"  was  bestowed  upon  the 
favored  scheme,  while  yet  it  existed  only  in  imagi- 
nation. Unborn  ages  of  human  happiness  present- 
ed themselves  before  the  triad  of  philosophical 
founders  of  Utopian  empires,  while  they  were 
dreaming  of  human  perfectibility : — a  harmless 
dream  at  least,  and  an  aspiration  after  better  things 
than  life's  realities,  which  is  the  best  that  can  be 
said  for  it.  In  the  midst  of  these  plans  of  vast 
import,  the  three  philosophers  fell  in  love  with 
three  sisters  of  Bristol,  named  Fricker  (one  of 
them,  afterwards  Mrs.  Lovell,  an  actress  of  the 
Bristol  theatre,  another  a  mantua-maker,  and  the 
third  kept  a  day-school),  and  all  their  visions  of 
immortal  freedom  faded  into  thin  air.  They  mar- 
ried, and  occupied  themselves  with  the  increase 
of  tire  corrupt  race  of  the  old  world,  instead  of 
peopling  the  new.  Thus,  unhappily  for  America 
and  mankind,  failed  the  scheme  of  the  Pantisoc- 
racy, on  which  at  one  time  so  much  of  human 
happiness  and  political  regeneration  was  by  its 


. 


MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


Vll 


founders  believed  to  depend.  None  have  revived 
the  phantasy  since ;  but  Coleridge  has  lived  to 
sober  down  his  early  extravagant  views  of  political 
freedom  into  something  like  a  disavowal  of  having 
held  them ;  but  he  has  never  changed  into  a  foe 
of  the  generous  principles  of  human  freedom, 
which  he  ever  espoused ;  while  Southey  has  be- 
come the  enemy  of  political  and  religious  freedom, 
the  supporter  and  advocate  of  arbitrary  measures 
in  church  and  state,  and  the  vituperator  of  all  who 
support  the  recorded  principles  of  his  early  years. 

About  this  time,  and  with  the  same  object, 
namely,  to  spread  the  principles  of  true  liberty, 
Coleridge  began  a  weekly  paper  called  "The 
Watchman,"  which  only  reached  its  ninth  num- 
ber, though  the  editor  set  out  on  his  travels  to  pro- 
cure subscribers  among  the  friends  of  the  doc- 
trines he  espoused,  and  visited  Birmingham, 
Manchester,  Derby,  Nottingham,  and  Sheffield, 
for  the  purpose.  The  failure  of  this  paper  was  a 
severe  mortification  to  the  projector.  No  ground 
was  gained  on  the  score  of  liberty,  though  about 
the  same  time  his  self-love  was  flattered  by  the 
success  of  a  volume  of  poems,  which  he  repub- 
lished, with  some  communications  from  his  friends 
Lamb  and  Lloyd. . 

Coleridge  married  Miss  Sarah  Fricker  in  the 
autumn  of  1795,  and  in  the  following  year  his 
eldest  son,  Hartley,  was  born.  Two  more  sons, 
Berkley  and  Derwent,  were  the  fruits  of  this  union. 
In  1797,  he  resided  at  Nether  Stowey,  a  village 
near  Bridgewater,  in  Somersetshire,  and  wrote 
there  in  the  spring,  at  the  desire  of  Sheridan,  a 
tragedy,  which  was,  in  1813,  brought  out  under 
the  title  of  "  Remorse :"  the  name  it  originally 
bore  was  Osorio.  There  were  some  circumstances 
in  this  business  that  led  to  a  suspicion  of  Sheridan's 
not  having  acted  with  any  great  regard  to  truth 
or  feeling.  During  his  residence  here,  Coleridge 
was  in  the  habit  of  preaching  every  Sunday  at  the 
Unitarian  Chapel  in  Taunton,  and  was  greatly 
respected  by  the  better  class  of  his  neighbors.  He 
enjoyed  the  friendship  of  Wordsworth,  who  lived 
at  Allfoxden,  about  two  miles  from  Stowey,  and 
was  occasionally  visited  by  Charles  Lamb,  John 
Thelwall,  and  other  congenial  spirits.  "  The 
Brook,"  a  poem  that  he  planned  about  this  period, 
was  never  completed. 

Coleridge  had  married  before  he  possessed  the 
means  of  supporting  a  family,  and  he  depended 
principally  for  subsistence,  at  Stowey,  upon  his 
literary  labors,  the  remuneration  for  which  could 
be  but  scanty.  At  length,  in  1798,  the  kind  patron- 
age of  the  late  Thomas  Wedgwood,  Esq.,  who 
granted  him  a  pension  of  100L  a-year,  enabled 
him  to  plan  a  visit  to  Germany ;  to  which  country 
he  proceeded  with  Wordsworth,  and  studied  the 
language  at  Ratzeburg,  and  then  went  to  Gottin- 
gen.     He  there  attended  the  lectures  of  Blumen- 


bach  on  natural  history  and  physiology,  and  the 
lectures  of  Eichhorn  on  the  New  Testament ;  and 
from  professor  Tychven  he  learned  the  Gothic 
grammar.  He  read  the  Minnesinger  and  the 
verses  of  Hans  Sachs,  the  Nuremberg  cobbler,  but 
his  time  was  principally  devoted  to  literature  and 
philosophy.  At  the  end  of  his  "  Biographia  Liter 
aria,"  Coleridge  has  published  some  letters,  which 
relate  to  his  sojourn  in  Germany.  He  sailed,  Sep- 
tember 16th,  1798,  and  on  the  19th  landed  at  Ham- 
burgh. It  was  on  the  20th  of  the  same  month 
that  he  says  he  was  introduced  to  the  brother  of 
the  great  poet  Klopstock,  to  professor  Ebeling, 
and  ultimately  to  the  poet  himself.  He  had  an 
impression  of  awe  on  his  spirits  when  he  set  out 
to  visit  the  German  Milton,  whose  humble  house 
stood  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  from  the  city  gate. 
He  was  much  disappointed  in  the  countenance  of 
Klopstock,  which  was  inexpressive,  and  without 
peculiarity  in  any  of  the  features.  Klopstock  was 
lively  and  courteous ;  talked  of  Milton  and  Glover, 
and  preferred  the  verse  of  the  latter  to  the  former, 
— a  very  curious  mistake,  but  natural  enough  in  a 
foreigner.  He  spoke  with  indignation  of  the  Eng- 
lish translations  of  his  Messiah.  He  said  his  first 
ode  was  fifty  years  older  than  his  last,  and  hoped 
Coleridge  would  revenge  him  on  Englishmen  by 
translating  his  Messiah. 

On  his  return  from  Germany,  Coleridge  went  to 
reside  at  Keswick,  in  Cumberland.  He  had  made 
a  great  addition  to  his  stock  of  knowledge,  and  he 
seems  to  have  spared  no  pains  to  store  up  what 
was  either  useful  or  speculative.  He  had  become 
master  of  most  of  the  early  German  writers,  or 
rather  of  the  state  of  early  German  literature.  He 
dived  deeply  into  the  mystical  stream  of  Teutonic 
philosophy.  There  the  predilections  of  his  earlier 
years  no  doubt  came  upon  him  in  aid  of  his 
researches  into  a  labyrinth  which  no  human  clue 
will  ever  unravel ;  or  which .  were  one  found  ca- 
pable of  so  doing,  would  reveal  a  mighty  nothing. 
Long,  he  says,  while  meditating  in  England,  had 
his  heart  been  with  Paul  and  John,  and  his  head 
with  Spinoza.  He  then  became  convinced  of  the 
doctrine  of  St.  Paul,  and  from  an  anti  trinitarian 
became  a  believer  in  the  Trinity,  and  in  Chris- 
tianity as  commonly  received  ;  or,  to  use  his  own 
word,  found  a  "  re-conversion."  Yet,  for  all  his 
arguments  on  the  subject,  he  had  better  have 
retained  his  early  creed,  and  saved  the  time  wasted 
in  travelling  back  to  exaclly  the  same  point  where 
he  set  out,  for  he  finds  that  faith  necessary  at  last 
which  he  had  been  taught,  in  his  church,  was 
necessary  at  his  first  outset  in  life.  His  arguments, 
pro  and  con,  not  being  of  use  to  any  of  the  com 
munity,  and  the  exclusive  property  of  their  owner, 
he  had  only  to  look  back  upon  his  laborious  trifling, 
as  Grotius  did  upon  his  own  toils,  when  death  was 
upon  him.      Metaphysics  are   most   unprofitable 

1 


vm 


MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


things ;  as  political  economists  say,  their  labors 
are  of  the  most  "  unproductive  class"  in  the  com- 
munity of  thinkers. 

The  next  step  of  our  poet  in  a  life  which  seems 
to  have  had  no  settled  object,  but  to  have  been 
steered  compassless  along,  was  to  undertake  the 
political  and  literary  departments  of  the  Morning 
Post  newspaper,  and  in  the  duties  of  this  situation 
he  was  engaged  in  the  spring  of  1802.  No  man 
-  was  less  fitted  for  a  popular  writer ;  and,  in  com- 
mon with  his  early  connexions,  Coleridge  seems 
to  have  had  no  fixed  political  principles  that  the 
public  could  understand,  though  he  perhaps  was 
able  to  reconcile  in  his  own  bosom  all  that  others 
might  imagine  contradictory,  and  no  doubt  he  did 
so  conscientiously.  His  style  and  manner  of 
writing,  the  learning  and  depth  of  his  disquisitions 
for  ever  came  into  play,  and  rendered  him  unin- 
telligible, or,  what  is  equally  fatal,  unreadable  to 
the  mass.  It  was  singular,  too,  that  he  disclosed 
in  his  biography  so  strongly  his  unsettled  political 
principles,  which  showed  that  he  had  not  studied 
politics  as  he  had  studied  poetry,  Kant,  and  the- 
ology. The  public  of  each  party  looks  upon  a 
political  writer  as  a  sort  of  champion  round  whom 
it  rallies,  and  feels  it  impossible  to  follow  the 
changeable  leader,  or  applaud  the  addresses  of  him 
who  is  inconsistent  or  wavering  in  principles :  it 
will  not  back  out  any  but  the  firm  unflinching 
partisan.  In  truth,  what  an  ill  compliment  do 
men  pay  to  their  own  judgment,  when  they  run 
counter  to,  and  shift  about  from  points  they  have 
declared  in  indelible  ink  are  founded  on  truth  and 
reason  irrefutable  and  eternal !  They  must  either 
have  been  superficial  smatterers  in  what  they  first 
promulgated,  and  have  appeared  prematurely  in 
print,  or  they  must  be  tinctured  with  something 
like  the  hue  of  uncrimsoned  apostasy.  The  mem- 
bers of  what  is  called  the  "Lake  School"  have 
been  more  or  less  strongly  marked  with  this  re- 
prehensible change  of  political  creed,  but  Coleridge 
the  least  of  them.  In  truth  he  got  nothing  by  any 
change  he  ventured  upon,  and,  what  is  more,  he 
expected  nothing ;  the  world  is  therefore  bound  to 
say  of  him  what  cannot  be  said  of  his  friends,  if  it 
be  true,  that  it  believes  most  cordially  in  his  sin- 
cerity— and  that  his  obliquity  in  politics  was 
caused  by  his  superficial  knowledge  of  them,  and 
his  devotion  of  his  high  mental  powers  to  different 
questions.  Notwithstanding  this,  those  who  will 
not  make  a  candid  allowance  for  him,  have  ex- 
pressed wonder  how  the  author  of  the  "  Consciones 
ad  Populum"  and  the  "  Watclunan,"  the  friend 
of  freedom,  and  one  of  the  founders  of  the  Pantis- 
ocracy,  could  afterwards  regard  the  drivelling  and 
chicanery  of  the  pettifogging  minister,  Perceval, 
as  glorious  in  British  political  history,  and  he 
himself  as  the  "best  and  wisest"  of  ministers! 
Although  Coleridge  avowed  his  belief  that  he 
was  not  calculated  for  a  popular  writer,  he  en- 


deavored  to  show  that  his  own  writings  in  the 
Morning  Post  were  greatly  influential  on  the  pub- 
lic mind.  Coleridge  himself  confessed  that  hie 
Morning  Post  essays,  though  written  in  defence 
or  furtherance  of  the  measures  of  the  government, 
added  nothing  to  his  fortune  or  reputation.  How 
should  they  have  been  effective,  when  their  writer, 
who  not  long  before  addressed  the  people,  and 
echoed  from  his  compositions  the  principles  of  free- 
dom and  the  rights  of  the  people,  now  wrote  with 
scorn  of  "  mob-sycophants,"  and  of  the  "  half-wit- 
ted vulgar  ?"  It  is  a  consolation  to  know  that  our 
author  himself  lamented  the  waste  of  his  manhood 
and  intellect  in  this  way.  What  might  he  not 
have  given  to  the  world  that  is  enduring  and  ad- 
mirable, in  the  room  of  these  misplaced  political 
lucubrations  !  Who  that  has  read  his  better  works 
will  not  subscribe  to  this  truth  ? 

His  translation  of  Schiller's  Wallenstein  may  be 
denominated  a  free  one,  and  is  finely  executed 
It  is  impossible  to  give  in  the  English  language  a 
more  effective  idea  of  the  work  of  the  great  Ger- 
man dramatist.  This  version  was  made  from  a 
copy  which  the  author  himself  afterwards  revised 
and  altered,  and  the  translator  subsequently  re- 
published his  version  in  a  more  correct  form,  with 
the  additional  passages  and  alterations  of  Schiller. 
This  translation  will  long  remain  as  the  most 
effective  which  has  been  achieved  of  the  works 
of  the  German  dramatists  in  the  British  tongue. 

The  censure  which  has  been  cast  upon  our  poet 
for  not  writing  more  which  is  worthy  of  his  repu- 
tation, has  been  met  by  his  enumeration  of  what 
he   has   done  in  all  ways   and   times ;    and,   in 
truth,  he  wrote  a  vast  deal   which   passed   un- 
noticed, upon  fleeting  politics,  and  in  newspaper 
columns,  literary  as  well  as   political.     To  the 
world  these  last  go  for  nothing,  though  the  author 
calculated  the  thought  and  labor  they  cost  him  at 
full  value.     He  conceded  something,  however,  to 
the  prevailing  idea  respecting  him,  when  he  said, 
"  On  my  own  account,  I  may  perhaps  have  had 
sufficient  reason  to  lament  my  deficiency  in  self- 
control,  and  the  neglect  of  concentrating  my  pow- 
ers to  the  realization  of  some  permanent  work.  But 
to  verse,  rather  than  to  prose,  if  to  either,  belongs 
'  the  voice  of  mourning,'  for 
Keen  pangs  of  love  awakening  as  a  babe 
Turbulent,  with  an  outcry  in  the  heart, 
And  fears  self-will'd  that  shunn'd  the  eye  of  hope. 
And  hope  that  scarce  could  know  itself  from  fear; 
Sense  of  past  youth,  and  manhood  come  in  vain, 
And  genius  given  and  knowledge  won  in  vain. 
And  all  which  I  had  cull'd  in  wood-walks  wild, 
And  all  which  patient  toil  had  rear'd,  and  all 
Commune  with  thee  had  open'd  out— but  flowers 
Strew'd  on  my  corpse,  and  borne  upon  my  bier, 
In  the  same  coffin,  for  the  selfsame  grave! 

S.  T.  C." 

In  another  part  of  his  works,  Coleridge  says, 
speaking  of  what  in  poetry  he  had  written,  "as  to 
myself,  I  have  published  so  little,  and  that  little 

8 


MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


IX 


of  so  little  importance,  as  to  make  it  almost  ludi- 
crous to  mention  my  name  at  all."  It  is  evident, 
therefore,  that  a  sense  of  what  he  might  have  done 
for  fame,  and  of  the  little  he  had  done,  was  felt 
by  the  poet ;  and  yet,  the  little  he  did  produce  has 
among  it  gems  of  the  purest  lustre,  the  brilliancy 
of  which  time  will  not  deaden  until  the  universal 
voice  of  nature  be  heard  no  longer,  and  poetry 
perish  beneath  the  dull  load  of  life's  hackneyed 
realities. 

The  poem  of  "  Christabcl,"  Coleridge  says,  was 
composed  in  consequence  of  an  agreement  with 
Mr.  Wordsworth,  that  they  should  mutually  pro- 
duce specimens  of  poetry  which  should  contain 
"  the  power  of  exciting  the  sympathy  of  the  reader, 
by  a  faithful  adherence  to  the  truth  of  nature,  and 
the  power  of  giving  the  interest  of  novelty  by 
the  modifying  colors  of  imagination.  The  sudden 
charm,  which  accidents  of  light  and  shade,  which 
moon-light  or  sun-set  diffused  over  a  known  and 
familiar  landscape,  appeared  to  represent  the  prac- 
ticability of  combining  both."  Further  he  ob- 
serves on  this  thought,  "  that  a  series  of  poems 
might  be  composed  of  two  sorts.  In  the  one,  the 
incidents  and  agents  were  to  be,  in  part  at  least, 
supernatural ;  and  the  excellence  to  be  aimed  at 
was  to  consist  in  the  interesting  of  the  affections 
by  the  dramatic  truth  of  such  emotions  as  would 
naturally  accompany  such  situations,  supposing 
them  real,  etc.  For  the  second  class,  subjects 
were  to  be  chosen  from  ordinary  life."  Thus,  it 
appears,  originated  the  poems  of  the  "Ancient 
Mariner,"  and  "  Christabel,"  by  Coleridge,  and 
the  "  Lyrical  Ballads"  of  Wordsworth. 

Perhaps  there  is  no  English  writer  living  who 
understood  better  than  Coleridge  the  elements  of 
poetry,  and  the  way  in  which  they  may  be  best 
combined  to  produce  certain  impressions.  His 
definitions  of  the  merits  and  differences  in  style 
and  poetic  genius,  between  the  earliest  and  latest 
writers  of  his  country,  are  superior  to  those  which 
any  one  else  has  it  in  his  power  to  make ;  for,  in 
truth,  he  long  and  deeply  meditated  upon  them, 
and  no  one  can  be  dissatisfied  by  the  reasons  he 
gives,  and  the  examples  he  furnishes,  to  bear  out 
his  theories  and  opinions.  These  things  he  did 
as  well  or  better  in  conversation  than  in  writing. 
His  conversational  powers  were  indeed  unrivalled, 
and  it  is  to  be  feared  that  to  excel  in  these,  he 
sacrificed  what  was  more  durable ;  and  that  he 
resigned,  for  the  pleasure  of  gratifying  an  attentive 
listening  circle,  and  pleasing  thereby  his  self-love 
by  its  applause,  much  that  would  have  delighted 
the  world.  His  flow  of  words,  delivery,  and  va- 
riety of  information  were  so  great,  and  he  found 
it  so  captivating  to  enchain  his  auditors  to  the  car 
of  his  triumphant  eloquence,  that  he  sacrificed  to 
this  gratification  what  might  have  sufficed  to 
confer  upon  him  a  celebrity  a  thousand  times 
more  to  be  coveted  by  a  spirit  akin  to  his  own. 


It  is  equally  creditable  to  the  taste  and  judgment 
of  Coleridge,  that  he  was  one  of  the  first  to  point 
out,  with  temper  and  sound  reasoning,  the  fallacy 
of  a  great  portion  of  Wordsworth's  poetic  theory, 
namely,  that  which  relates  to  low  life.  Words- 
worth contended  that  a  proper  poetic  diction  is  a 
language  taken  from  the  mouths  of  men  in  gene- 
ral, in  their  natural  conversation  under  the  influ- 
ence of  natural  feelings.  Coleridge  wisely  asserted, 
that  philosophers  are  the  authors  of  the  best  parts 
of  language,  not  clowns ;  and  that  Milton's  lan- 
guage is  more  that  of  real  life  than  the  language 
of  a  cottager.  This  subject  he  has  most  ably 
treated  in  chapter  17  of  his  Biographia  Literaria. 

Two  years  after  he  had  abandoned  the  Morning 
Post,  he  set  off  for  Malta,  where  he  most  unex- 
pectedly arrived  on  a  visit  to  his  friend  Dr.  Stodart, 
then  king's  advocate  in  that  island,  and  was  in- 
troduced  by  him  to  the  Governor,  Sir  Alexander 
Ball,  who  appointed  him  his  secretary.  He  re- 
mained in  the  island  fulfilling  the  duties  of  his 
situation,  for  which  he  seems  to  have  been  but 
indifferently  qualified,  a  very  short  period.  One 
advantage,  however,  he  derived  from  his  official 
employ  :  that  of  the  pension  granted  by  Govern- 
ment to  those  who  have  served  in  similar  situa- 
tions. On  his  way  home  he  visited  Italy ;  entered 
Rome,  and  examined  its  host  of  ancient  and  mod- 
ern curiosities,  and  added  fresh  matter  for  thought 
to  his  rapidly  accumulating  store  of  ideas.  Of 
this  visit  he  gives  several  anecdotes;  among  them 
one  respecting  the  horns  of  Moses  on  Michael 
Angelo's  celebrated  statue  of  that  lawgiver,  in- 
tended to  elucidate  the  character  of  Frenchmen. 
Coleridge  was  all  his  life  a  hater  of  France  and 
Frenchmen,  arising  from  his  belief  in  their  being 
completely  destitute  of  moral  or  poetical  feeling. 
A  Prussian,  who  was  with  him  while  looking  upon 
the  statue,  observed  that  a  Frenchman  was  the  only 
animal,  "  in  the  human  shape,  that  by  no  possi- 
bility can  lift  itself  up  to  religion  or  poetry."  A 
foolish  and  untrue  remark  on  the  countrymen  of 
Fenelon  and  Pascal,  of  Massillon  and  Corneille 
Just  then,  however,  two  French  officers  of  rank 
happened  to  enter  the  church,  and  the  Goth  from 
the  Elbe  remarked  that,  the  first  things  they  would 
notice  would  be  the  "horns  and  beard"  (upon  which 
the  Prussian  and  Coleridge  had  just  been  rearing 
theories  and  quoting  history),  and  that  the  associ- 
ations the  Frenchmen  would  connect  with  them 
"  would  be  those  of  a  he-goat  and  a  cuckold."  It 
happened  that  the  Prus-Goth  was  right :  the  offi 
cers  did  pass  some  such  joke  upon  the  figure. 
Hence,  by  inference,  would  the  poet  have  his 
readers  deduce  the  character  of  a  people,  whose 
literature,  science,  and  civilization  are  perhaps 
only  not  the  very  first  in  the  world. 

Another  instance  of  his  fixed  and  absurd  dislike 
of  every  thing  French,  occurred  during  the  de- 
livery of  a  course  of  Lectures  on  Poetry,  at  the 

9 


MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


Royal  Institution,  in  the  spring  of  1808 ;  in  one 
of  which  he  astonished  his  auditory  by  thanking 
his  Maker,  in  the  most  serious  manner,  for  so  or- 
dering events,  that  he  was  totally  ignorant  of  a 
single  word  of  "  that  frightful  jargon,  the  French 
language  !"  And  yet,  notwithstanding  this  public 
avowal  of  his  entire  ignorance  of  the  language, 
Mr.  Coleridge  is  said  to  have  been  in  the  habit, 
while  conversing  with  his  friends,  of  expressing 
the  utmost  contempt  for  the  literature  of  that 
country ! 

In  the  years  1809-10,  Mr.  Coleridge  issued 
from  Grasmere  a  weekly  essay,  stamped  to  be 
sent  by  the  general  post,  called  "  The  Friend." 
This  paper  lasted  for  twenty-seven  numbers,  and 
was  then  abruptly  discontinued ;  but  the  papers 
have  since  been  collected  and  enlarged  in  three 
small  volumes. 

In  the  year  1812,  Mr.  Coleridge,  being  in  Lon- 
don, edited,  and  contributed  several  very  interest- 
ing articles  to,  Mr.  Southey's  "  Omniana,"  in  two 
small  volumes.  In  the  year  1816,  appeared  the 
Biographical  Sketches  of  his  Literary  Life  and 
Opinions,  and  his  newspaper  Poems  re-collected 
under  the  title  of  "  Sibylline  Leaves." 

About  this  time  he  wrote  the  prospectus  of 
"  The  Encyclopaedia  Metropolitana,"  still  in  the 
course  of  publication,  and  was  intended  to  be  its 
editor  ;  but  this  final  mistake  was  early  discovered 
and  rectified. 

In  the  year  1816  likewise  was  published  by 
Mr.  Murray,  at  the  recommendation  of  Lord  By- 
ron, who  had  generously  befriended  the  brother 
(or  rather  the  father)  poet,  the  wondrous  ballad 
tale  of  "  Christabel."  The  author  tells  us  in  his 
preface  that  the  first  part  of  it  was  written  in  his 
great  poetic  year,  1797,  at  Stowey;  the  second 
part,  after  his  return  from  Germany,  in  1800,  at 
Keswick  :  the  conclusion  yet  remains  to  be  writ- 
ten !  The  poet  says,  indeed,  in  this  preface,  "  As 
in  my  very  first  conception  of  the  tale,  I  had  the 
whole  present  to  my  mind,  I  trust  that  I  shall  yet 
be  able  to  embody  in  verse  the  three  parts  yet  to 
come."  We  do  not  pretend  to  contradict  a  poet's 
dreams ;  but  we  believe  that  Mr.  Coleridge  never 
communicated  to  mortal  man,  woman,  or  child, 
how  this  story  of  witchcraft  was  to  end.  The 
poem  is,  perhaps,  more  interesting  as  a  fragment. 
For  sixteen  years  we  remember  it  used  to  be  re- 
cited and  transcribed  by  admiring  disciples,  till 
at  length  it  was  printed,  and  at  least  half  the 
charm  of  the  poet  was  broken  by  the  counterspell 
of  that  rival  magician,  Faust.  In  1818  was  pub- 
lished the  drama  of  Zapolya.  In  1825,  "Aids 
to  Reflection,  in  the  Formation  of  a  Manly  Char- 
acter, on  the  several  grounds  of  Prudence,  Mo- 


rality and  Religion ;  illustrated  by  select  passages 
from  our  older  Divines,  especially  from  Arch- 
bishop Leighton."  This  is  for  the  most  part  a 
compilation  of  extracts  from  the  works  of  the 
Archbishop. 

To  conclude  the  catalogue  of  Mr.  Coleridge's 
works,  in  1830  was  issued  a  small  volume  "On 
the  Constitution  of  the  Church  and  State,  accord- 
ing to  the  idea  of  each,  with  Aids  towards  a  right 
Judgment  on  the  late  Catholic  Bill." 

In  the  year  1828,  the  whole  of  his  poetical 
works,  including  the  dramas  of  Wallenstein 
(which  had  been  long  out  of  print),  Remorse,  and 
Zapolya,  were  collected  in  three  elegant  volumes 
by  Mr.  Pickering. 

The  latter  years  of  Mr.  Coleridge's  life  were 
made  easy  by  a  domestication  with  his  friend  Mr. 
Gillman,  the  surgeon  of  Highgate  Grove,  and  for 
some  years,  the  poet  deservedly  received  an  an- 
nuity from  his  Majesty  of  <£100  per  annum,  as 
an  Academician  of  the  Royal  Society  of  Litera- 
ture. But  these  few  most  honorable  pensions  to 
worn-out  veterans  in  literature  were  discontinued 
by  the  late  ministry.  Mr.  Coleridge  contributed 
one  or  two  erudite  papers  to  the  transactions  of 
this  Society.  In  the  summer  of  1828,  Mr.  Cole- 
ridge made  the  tour  of  Holland,  Flanders,  and  up 
the  Rhine  as  far  as  Bergen.  For  some  years  be- 
fore his  death,  he  was  afflicted  with  great  bodily 
pain ;  and  was  on  one  occasion  heard  to  say,  that 
for  thirteen  months  he  had  from  this  cause  walked 
up  and  down  his  chamber  seventeen  hours  each 
day.  He  died  on  the  25th  of  July,  1834,  having 
previously  written  the  following  epitaph  for  him- 
self: 

"Stop,  Christian  passer-by!  stop,  child  of  God  ! 
And  read  with  gentle  breast.     Beneath  this  sod 
A  poet  lies,  or  that  which  once  seem'd  he  — 
Oh,  lift  a  thought  in  prayer  for  S.  T.  C. ! 
That  he,  who,  many  a  year,  with  toil  of  breath, 
Found  death  in  life,  may  here  find  life  in  death! 
Mercy  for  praise  —  to  be  forgiven  for  fame, 
He  ask'd  and  hoped  through  Christ.    Do  thou  the 
same." 

This  is  perfection  —  worthy  of  the  author  of 
the  best  essay  on  epitaphs  in  the  English  lan- 
guage. He  was  buried  in  Highgate  Church.  He 
has  left  three  children,  namely,  Hartley,  Derwent, 
and  Sara.  The  first  has  published  a  volume  of 
poems,  of  which  it  is  enough  to  say  that  they  are 
worthy  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  verses  addressed  to 
him  at  "  six  years  old."  The  second  son  is  in 
holy  orders,  and  is  married  and  settled  in  the 
west  of  England  ;  and  the  poet's  daughter  is 
united  to  her  learned  and  lively  cousin,  Mr.  Henry 
Nelson  Coleridge,  the  author  of  "  Six  Months  in 
the  West  Indies."  This  young  lady  had  the  good 
10 


MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


XI 


fortune  to  be  educated  in  the  noble  library  on  the 
banks  of  the  Cumberland  Greta,  where  she  as- 
sisted her  accomplished  uncle  in  translating  from 
the  old  French  the  history  of  the  Chevalier  Bay- 
ard, and  from  the  Latin  the  account  of  the  Abi- 
pones,  or  Equestrian  Indians  of  South  America, 
by  the  Jesuit  Martin  Dobrizhofter  ;  both  of  which 
works  were  published  by  Mr.  Murray. 
"  But  of  bis  native  speech,  because  well  nigh 
Disuse  in  him  forgetfulness  had  wrought, 
In  Latin  he  composed  his  history, 
A  garrulous  but  a  lively  tale,  and  fraught 
With  matter  of  delight  and  food  for  thought ; 
And  if  he  could,  in  Merlin's  glass,  have  seen 
By  whom  his  tomes  to  speak  our  tongue  were  taught, 
The  old  man  would  have  been  as  pleased  (I  ween) 
As  when   lie  won   the  ear  of  that  great  empress 
queen." 

Southey's  Tale  of  Paraguay. 


The  following  brief  sketches  of  Coleridge's  char- 
acter are  selected  from  among  the  numerous 
notices  ichich  appeared  in  various  reviews  and 
periodicals  at  the  time  of  his  decease. 

"  As  a  great  poet,  and  a  still  greater  philoso- 
pher, the  world  has  hardly  yet  done  justice  to  the 
genius  of  Coleridge.  It  was  in  truth  of  an  order 
not  to  be  appreciated  in  a  brief  space.  A  far 
longer  life  than  that  of  Coleridge  shall  not  suffice 
to  bring  to  maturity  the  harvest  of  a  renown  like 
his.  The  ripening  of  his  mind,  with  all  its  golden 
fruitage,  is  but  the  seed-time  of  his  glory.  The 
close  and  consummation  of  his  labors  (grievous 
to  those  that  knew  him,  and  even  to  those  that 
knew  him  not,)  is  the  mere  commencement  of 
his  eternity  of  fame.  As  a  poet,  Coleridge  was 
unquestionably  great ;  as  a  moralist,  a  theologian, 
and  a  philosopher,  of  the  very  highest  class,  he 
was  utterly  unapproachahlc.  And  here,  gentle 
reader,  let  me  be  plainly  understood  as  speaking 
not  merely  of  the  present,  but  the  past.  Nay, 
more.  Seeing  that  the  eartli  herself  is  now  past 
her  prime,  and  gives  various  indications  of  her 
beginning  to  '  grow  grey  in  years,'  it  would,  per- 
haps, savour  more  of  probability  than  presump- 
tion, if  I  were  likewise  to  include  the  future.  It 
is  thus  that,  looking  both  to  what  is,  and  to  what 
has  been,  we  seem  to  feel  it,  like  a  truth  intuitive, 
that  we  shall  never  have  another  Shakspeare  in 
the  drama,  nor  a  second  Milton  in  the  regions  of 
Bublimer  song.  As  a  poet,  Coleridge  has  done 
enough  to  show  how  much  more  he  might  and 
could  have  done,  if  he  had  so  thought  fit.  It  was 
truly  said  of  him,  by  an  excellent  critic  and  ac- 
complished judge,  'Let  the  dullest  clod  that  ever 
vegetated,  provided  only  he  be  alive  and  hears,  be 
shut  up  in  a  room  with  Coleridge,  or  in  a  wood, 


and  subjected  ibr  a  few  minutes  to  the  ethereal 
influence  of  that  wonderful  man's  monologue,  and 
he  will  begin  to  believe  himself  a  poet.  The  bar- 
ren wilderness  may  not  blossom  like  the  rose ;  but 
it  will  seem,  or  rather  feel  to  do  so,  under  the  lus- 
tre of  an  imagination  exhaustless  as  the  sun.' 

"At  the  house  of  the  attached  friend,  under 
whose  roof  this  illustrious  man  spent  the  latter 
years  of  his  life,  it  was  the  custom  to  have  a  con. 
versazione  every  Thursday  evening.  Here  Cole- 
ridge was  the  centre  and  admiration  of  the  circle 
that  gathered  round  him.  He  could  not  be  other- 
wise than  aware  of  the  intellectual  homage  of 
which  he  was  the  object ;  yet  there  he  sate,  talk- 
ing and  looking  all  sweet  and  simple  and  divine 
things,  the  very  personification  of  meekness  and 
humility.  Now  he  spoke  of  passing  occurrences, 
or  of  surrounding  objects, — the  flowers  on  the  ta- 
ble, or  the  dog  on  the  hearth ;  and  enlarged  in 
most  familiar  wise  on  the  beauty  of  the  one,  the 
attachment,  the  almost  moral  nature  of  the  other, 
and  the  wonders  that  were  involved  in  each.  And 
now,  soaring  upward  with  amazing  majesty,  into 
those  sublimer  regions  in  which  his  soul  de- 
lighted, and  abstracting  himself  from  the  things 
.of  time  and  sense,  the  strength  of  his  wing  soon 
carried  him  out  of  sight.  And  here,  even  in  these 
his  eagle  flights,  although  the  eye  in  gazing  after 
him  was  dazzled  and  blinded,  yet  ever  and  anon 
a  sunbeam  would  make  its  way  through  the  loop- 
holes of  the  mind,  giving  it  to  discern  that  beau- 
tiful amalgamation  of  heart  and  spirit,  that  could 
equally  raise  him  above  his  fellow-men,  or  bring 
him  down  again  to  the  softest  level  of  humanity. 
'  It  is  easy,'  says  the  critic  before  alluded  to, — '  it 
is  easy  to  talk — not  very  difficult  to  speechify — 
hard  to  speak  ;  but  to  '  discourse'  is  a  gift  rarely 
bestowed  by  Heaven  on  mortal  man.  Coleridge 
has  it  in  perfection.  While  he  is  discoursing,  the 
world  loses  all  its  common-places,  and  you  and 
your  wife  imagine  yourselves  Adam  and  Eve, 
listening  to  the  affable  archangel  Raphael  in  the 
garden  of  Eden.  You  would  no  more  dream  of 
wishing  him  to  be  mute  for  awhile,  than  you 
would  a  river,  that  'imposes  silence  with  a  stilly 
sound.'  Whether  you  understand  two  consecu- 
tive sentences,  we  shall  not  stop  too  curiously  to 
enquire ;  but  you  do  something  better — you  feel 
the  whole,  just  like  any  other  divine  music.  And 
'tis  your  own  fault  if  you  do  not  "  a  wiser  and  a 
better  man  arise  to-morrow's  morn."  '  " 

The  Metropolitan. 

An  elaborate  and  admirable  critique  on  Cole- 
ridge's "  Poetical  Works,"  in  "  The  Quarterly 
Review,  No.  CHI.,"  written  just  before  his  death, 
opens  as  follows : 

11 


MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE. 


"  Idolized  by  many,  and  used  without  scruple 
by  more,  the  poet  of  '  Christabel'  and  the  '  An- 
cient Mariner'  is  but  little  truly  known  in  that 
common  literary  world,  which,  without  the  pre- 
rogative of  conferring'  fame  hereafter,  can  most 
surely  give  or  prevent  popularity  for  the  present. 
In  that  circle  he  commonly  passes  for  a  man  of 
genius  who  has  written  some  very  beautiful 
verses,  but  whose  original  powers,  whatever  they 
were,  have  been  long  since  lost  or  confounded  in 
the  pursuit  of  metaphysic  dreams.  We  ourselves 
venture  to  think  very  differently  of  Mr.  Coleridge, 
both  as  a  poet  and  a  philosopher,  although  we  are 
well  enough  aware  that  nothing  which  we  can 
say  will,  as  matters  now  stand,  much  advance  his 
chance  of  becoming  a  fashionable  author.  In- 
deed, as  we  rather  believe,  we  should  earn  small 
thanks  from  him  for  our  happiest  exertions  in 
such  a  cause  ;  for  certainly,  of  all  the  men  of  let- 
ters whom  it  has  been  our  fortune  to  know,  we 
never  met  any  one  who  was  so  utterly  regardless 
of  the  reputation  of  the  mere  author  as  Mr.  Cole- 
ridge— one  so  lavish  and  indiscriminate  in  the 
exhibition  of  his  own  intellectual  wealth  before 
any  and  every  person,  no  matter  who — one  so 
reckless  who  might  reap  where  he  had  most  pro- 
digally sown  and  watered.  '  God  knows,' — as  we 
once  heard  him  exclaim  upon  the  subject  of  his 
unpublished  system  of  philosophy, — 'God  knows, 
I  have  no  author's  vanity  about  it.  I  should  be 
absolutely  glad  if  I  could  hear  that  the  thing  had 
been  done  before  me.'  It  is  somewhere  told  of 
Virgil,  that  he  took  more  pleasure  in  the  good 
verses  of  Varius  and  Horace  than  in  his  own. 
We  would  not  answer  for  that ;  but  the  story  has 
always  occurred  to  us,  when  we  have  seen  Mr. 
Coleridge  criticising  and  amending  the  work  of  a 
contemporary  author  with  much  more  zeal  and 
hilarity  than  we  ever  perceived  him  to  display 
about  any  thing  of  his  own.  Perhaps  our  readers 
may  have  heard  repeated  a  saying  of  Mr.  Words- 
worth, that  many  men  of  this  age  had  done  won- 
derful things,  as  Davy,  Scott,  Cuvier,  &c. ;  but 
that  Coleridge  was  the  only  wonderful  man  he 
ever  knew.  Something,  of  course,  must  be  al- 
lowed in  this  as  in  all  other  such  cases  of  anti- 
thesis ;  but  we  believe  the  fact  really  to  be,  that 
the  greater  part  of  those  who  have  occasionally 


visited  Mr.  Coleridge  have  left  him  with  a  feeling 
akin  to  the  judgment  indicated  in  the  above  re- 
mark. They  admire  the  man  more  than  his 
works,  or  they  forget  the  works  in  the  absorbing 
impression  made  by  the  living  author.  And  no 
wonder.  Those  who  remember  him  in  his  more 
vigorous  days  can  bear  witness  to  the  peculiarity 
and  transcendent  power  of  his  conversational  elo- 
quence. It  was  unlike  any  thing  that  could  be 
heard  elsewhere ;  the  kind  was  different,  the  de- 
gree was  different ;  the  manner  was  different. 
The  boundless  range  of  scientific  knowledge,  the 
brilliancy  and  exquisite  nicety  of  illustration,  the 
deep  and  ready  reasoning,  the  strangeness  and 
immensity  of  bookish  lore,  were  not  all ;  the  dra- 
matic story,  the  joke,  the  pun,  the  festivity,  must 
be  added ;  and  with  these  the  clerical-looking 
dress,  the  thick  waving  silver  hair,  the  youthful- 
colored  cheek,  the  indefinable  mouth  and  lips,  the 
quick  yet  steady  and  penetrating  greenish-grey 
eye,  the  slow  and  continuous  enunciation,  and  the 
everlasting  music  of  his  tones, — all  went  to  make 
up  the  image  and  to  constitute  the  living  presence 
of  the  man." 

In  a  note  at  the  conclusion  of  the  number  of 
"The  Quarterly  Review"  from  which  the  pre- 
ceding passage  has  been  taken,  Mr.  Coleridge's 
decease  is  thus  mentioned : 

"  It  is  with  deep  regret  that  we  announce  the 
death  of  Mr.  Coleridge.  When  the  foregoing  ar- 
ticle on  his  poetry  was  printed,  he  was  weak  in 
body,  but  exhibited  no  obvious  symptoms  of  so 
near  a  dissolution.  The  fatal  change  was  sudden 
and  decisive  ;  and  six  days  before  his  death  he 
knew,  assuredly,  that  his  hour  was  come.  His 
few  worldly  affairs  had  been  long  settled  ;  and, 
after  many  tedious  adieus,  he  expressed  a  wish 
that  he  might  be  as  little  interrupted  as  possible. 
His  sufferings  were  severe  and  constant  till  within 
thirty-six  hours  of  his  end ;  but  they  had  no 
power  to  affect  the  deep  tranquillity  of  his  mind, 
or  the  wonted  sweetness  of  his  address.  His 
prayer  from  the  beginning  was,  that  God  would 
not  withdraw  his  Spirit ;  and  that  by  the  way  in 
which  he  would  bear  the  last  struggle,  he  might 
be  able  to  evince  the  sincerity  of  his  faith  in 
Christ.     If  ever  man  did  so,  Coleridge  did." 


12 


THE 


POETICAL    WORKS 


OF 


** 


u* 


13 


Contents 


Page 

MEMOIR  OF  SAMUEL  TAYLOR  COLERIDGE  v 

JUVENILE  POEMS 1 

Genevieve 2 

Sonnet,  to  the  Autumnal  Moon ib. 

Time,  Real  and  Imaginary,  an  Allegory  .  .  ib. 

Monody  on  the  death  of  Chatterton   ....  ib. 

Songs  of  the  Pixies 4 

The  Raven,  a  Christmas  Tale,  told  by  a 

Sehool-boy  to  his  little  Brothers  and  Sisters  5 

Absence :  a  Farewell  Ode  on  quitting  School 

for  Jesus  College,  Cambridge ib. 

Lines  on  an  Autumnal  Evening ib. 

The  Rose 6 

The  Kiss ib. 

To  a  Young  Ass — its  Mother  being  tethered 

near  it 7 

Domestic  Peace ib. 

The  Sigh &. 

Epitaph  on  an  Infant ib. 

Lines  written  at  the  King's  Arms,  Ross    .  .  ib. 

Lines  to  a  beautiful  Spring  in  a  Village  .  .  8 

Lines  on  a  Friend,  wrho  died  of  a  frenzy  fe- 
ver induced  by  calumnious  reports    .  .  .  ib. 

To  a  Young  Lady,  with  a  Poem  on  the  French 

Revolution ib. 

Sonnet. "  My  heart  has  thanked  thee,  Bowles ! 

for  those  soft  strains" 9 

"  As  late  I  lay  in  slumber's  shadowy 

vale" ib. 

"  Though  roused  by  that  dark  vizir, 

Riot  rude" ib. 

"  When  British  Freedom  for  a  hap- 
pier land" ib. 

"  It  was  some  spirit,  Sheridan !  that 

breathed" ib. 

"  O  what  a  loud  and  fearful  shriek 

was  there" ib. 

"  As  when  far  off  the  warbled  strains 

are  heard" 10 

"  Thou  gentle  look,  that  didst  my 

soul  beguile" ib. 

"  Pale  roamer  through  the  night ! 

thou  poor  forlorn  !" ib. 

"  Sweet  Mercy !  how  my  very  heart 

has  bled" ib. 

"  Thou  bleedest,  my  poor  heart !  and 

thy  distress" ib. 

To  the  Author  of  the  "  Robbers"  .  ib. 

Lines  composed  while  climbing  the  left  as- 
cent of  Brockley  Coomb,  Somersetshire, 

May,  1795 ib. 

Lines,  in  the  manner  of  Spenser 11 

imitated  from  Ossian ib. 

The  Complaint  of  Ninathoma ib. 

Lines,  imitated  from  the  Welsh ib. 

to  an  infant ib. 

in  answer  to  a  Letter  from  Bristol .  .  12 

to  a  Friend,  in  answer  to  a  melancholy 

Letter 13 


Page 
Religious  Musings ;  a  Desultory  Poem  ...  1 3 
The  Destiny  of  Nations;  a  Vision 17 

SIBYLLINE  LEAVES  :— 

I.    POEMS  OCCASIONED  BY  POLITICAL  EVENTS,  OR 
FEELINGS  CONNECTED  WITH  THEM. 

Ode  to  the  Departing  Year 21 

France  ;  an  Ode 23 

Fears  in  Solitude;  written  in  April,  1798, 

during  the  alarm  of  an  Invasion 24 

Fire,  Famine,  and  Slaughter ;  a  War  Eclogue  26 
Recantation — illustrated  in  the  Story  of  the 

Mad  Ox ....  27 

LT.    LOVE  POEMS. 

Introduction  to  the  tale  of  the  Dark  Ladie  28 
Lewti,  or  the  Circassian  Love  Chaunt  ...  29 
The  Picture,  or  the  Lover's  Resolution  .  .  30 
The  Night  Scene  ;  a  Dramatic  Fragment  .  31 
To  an  Unfortunate  Woman,  whom  the  Au- 
thor had  known  in  the  days  of  her  inno- 
cence    32 

To  an  Unfortunate  Woman  at  the  Theatre  33 

Lines,  composed  in  a  Concert-room ib. 

The  Keepsake ib 

To  a  Lady,  with  Falconer's  "  Shipwreck"  .  34 
To  a  Young  Lady,  on  her  Recovery  from  a 

Fever ib. 

Something  childish,  but  very  natural — writ- 
ten in  Germany ib. 

Home-sick — written  in  Germany ib. 

Answer  to  a  Child's  Question ib. 

The  Visionary  Hope ...  35 

The  Happy  Husband  ;  a  Fragment ib. 

Recollections  of  Love ib. 

On  Revisiting  the  Sea-shore  after  long  ab- 
sence    ib. 

The  Composition  of  a  Kiss 36 

III.    MEDITATIVE  POEMS. 

Hymn  before  Sun-rise,  in  the  Vale  of  Cha- 
mouny ib. 

Lines  written  in  the  Album  at  Elbingerode, 
in  the  Hartz  Forest 37 

On  observing  a  Blossom  on  the  1st  of  Feb- 
ruary, 1796 ib. 

The  Eolian  Harp— composed  at  Clevedon, 
Somersetshire ib. 

Reflections  on  having  left  a  Place  of  Retire- 
ment   38 

To  the  Rev.  Geo.  Coleridge  of  Ottery  St. 
Mary,  Devon — with  some  Poems   ....    39 

Inscription  for  a  Fountain  on  a  Heath  .  .  .    ib. 

A  Tombless  Epitaph 39 

This  Lime-tree  Bower  my  Prison 40 

To  a  Friend,  who  had  declared  his  intention 
of  writing  no  more  Poetry ib. 

To  a  Gentleman — composed  on  the  night 
after  his  Recitation  of  a  Poem  on  the 
Growth  of  an  Individual  Mind    ...     .41 
15 


XVI 


CONTENTS. 


Page 

The  Nightingale ;  a  Conversation  Poem .  •  42 

Frost  at  Midnight 43 

To  a  Friend,  together  with  an  unfinished 

Poem ib. 

The  Hour  when  we  shall  meet  again  ...  44 

Lines  to  Joseph  Cottle ib. 

IV.    ODES  AND  MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 

The  Three  Graves ;  a  Fragment  of  a  Sex- 
ton's Tale ib. 

Dejection;  an  Ode 48 

Ode  to  Georgiana,  Duchess  of  Devonshire     49 

Ode  to  Tranquillity 50 

To  a  Young  Friend,  on  his  proposing  to  do- 
mesticate with  the  Author ib. 

Lines  to  W.  L  Esq.,  while  he  sang  to  Pur- 
cell's  Music 51 

Addressed  to  a  Young  Man  of  Fortune, 
who  abandoned  himself  to  an  indolent 
and  causeless  Melancholy ib. 

Sonnet  to  the  River  Otter ib. 

composed  on  a  Journey  homeward  ; 

the  Author  having  received  intelligence 

of  the  Birth  of  a  Son,  Sept.  20,  1796  .  .     ib. 

Sonnet — To  a  Friend,  who  asked  how  I  felt 
when  the  Nurse  first  presented  my  In- 
fant to  me 52 

The  Virgin's  Cradle  Hymn ib. 

On  the  Christening  of  a  Friend's  Child  .  .     ib. 

Epitaph  on  an  Infant ib. 

Melancholy ;  a  Fragment ib. 

Tells  Birth-place — imitated  from  Stolberg     53 

A  Christmas  Carol ib. 

Human  Life,  on  the  Denial  of  Immortality     ib. 

The  Visit  of  the  Gods — imitated  from 
Schiller 54 

Elegy — imitated  from  Akenside's  blank 
verse  Inscriptions ib. 

Kubla  Khan  ;  or  a  Vision  in  a  Dream  ...     ib. 

The  Pains  of  Sleep 55 

Appendix. 

Apologetic  Preface  to  "  Fire,  Famine,  and 

Slaughter ib. 

THE  RIME  OF  THE  ANCIENT  MARINER    60 

CHRISTABEL 66 

REMORSE ;  a  Tragedy,  in  Five  Acts 73 

ZAPOLYA ;  a  Christmas  Tale. 

Part  I.  the  prelude,  entitled  "  the 
usurper's  fortune" 96 


Page 
Part  II.   the  sequel,  entitled  "the 
usurper's  fate" 102 

THE  PICCOLOMINI,  OR  THE  FIRST  PART 
OF  WALLENSTEIN  ;  a  Drama,  trans- 
lated from  the  German  of  Schiller  .  .     121 

THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN;  a  Tra- 
gedy, in  Five  Acts 168 

THE  FALL  OF  ROBESPIERRE ;  an  Historic 

Drama 203 

MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS:— 

PROSE  IN  RHYME  ;    OR  EPIGRAMS,  MORALITIES, 
AND  THINGS  WITHOUT  A  NAME. 

Love 212 

Duty  surviving  Self-love,  the  only  Sure 
Friend  of  Declining  Life;  a  Soliloquy  .213 

Phantom  or  Fact  ?  a  Dialogue  in  Verse  .  .    ib. 

Work  without  Hope ib. 

Youth  and  Age ib. 

A  Day-dream 214 

To  a  Lady,  offended  by  a  sportive  observa- 
tion that  women  have  no  souls    ....       ib. 

"  I  have  heard  of  reasons  manifold" ....    ib. 

Lines  suggested  by  the  Last  Words  of  Be- 
rengarius { J. 

The  Devil's  Thoughts ib. 

Constancy  to  an  Ideal  Object 215 

The  Suicide's  Argument,  and  Nature's  An- 
swer   j'5 

The  Blossoming  of  the  Solitary  Date-tree; 
a  Lament 216 

Fancy  in  Nubibus,  or  the  Poet  in  the 
Clouds H, 

The  Two  Founts ;  Stanzas  addressed  to  a 
Lady  on  her  recovery,  with  unblemished 
looks,  from  a  severe  attack  of  pain  .      .    ib. 

What  is  Life  ? 217 

The  Exchange ib. 

Sonnet,  composed  by  the  Sea-side,  October, 
1817 tb. 

Epigrams ib. 

The  Wanderings  of  Cain 218 

Allegoric  Vision 220 

The  Improvisatore,  or  "  John  Anderson,  my 
jo,  John" 222 

The  Garden  of  Boccaccio 224 

16 


THE 

POETICAL  WORKS 

OF 


Sutatttle  ipoettts* 


PREFACE. 


Compositions  resembling  those  here  collected  are 
not  unfrequently  condemned  for  their  querulous 
Egotism.  But  Egotism  is  to  be  condemned  then  only 
when  it  offends  against  time  and  place,  as  in  a  His- 
tory or  an,  Epic  Poem.  To  censure  it  in  a  Monody 
or  Sonnet  is  almost  as  absurd  as  to  dislike  a  circle 
for  being  round.  Why  then  write  Sonnets  or  Mono- 
dies ?  Because  they  give  me  pleasure  when  perhaps 
nothing  else  could.  After  the  more  violent  emotions 
of  Sorrow,  the  mind  demands  amusement,  and  can 
find  it  in  employment  alone :  but,  full  of  its  late  suf- 
ferings, it  can  endure  no  employment  not  in  some 
measure  connected  with  them.  Forcibly  to  turn 
away  our  attention  to  general  subjects  is  a  painful 
and  most  often  an  unavailing  effort. 

But  O  !  how  grateful  to  a  wounded  heart 
The  tale  of  Misery  to  impart — 
From  others'  eyes  bid  artless  sorrows  flow, 
And  raise  esteem  upon  the  base  of  Woe  ! 

Shaw. 
The  communicativeness  of  our  Nature  leads  us  to 
describe  our  own  sorrows  ;  in  the  endeavor  to  de- 
scribe them,  intellectual  activity  is  exerted ;  and 
from  intellectual  activity  there  results  a  pleasure, 
which  is  gradually  associated,  and  mingles  as  a  cor- 
rective, with  the  painful  subject  of  the  description. 
"  True ! "  (it  may  be  answered)  "  but  how  are  the 
Public  interested  in  your  sorrows  or  your  Descrip- 
tion V  We  are  forever  attributing  personal  Unities 
to  imaginary  Aggregates.  What  is  the  Public,  but  a 
term  for  a  number  of  scattered  individuals  ?  of  whom 
as  many  will  be  interested  in  these  sorrows,  as  have 
experienced  the  same  or  similar. 

Holy  be  the  lay 
Which  mourning  soothes  the  mourner  on  his  way. 

If  I  could  judge  of  others  by  myself,  I  should  not 
hesitate  to  affirm,  that  the  most  interesting  passages 
are  those  in  which  the  Author  develops  hre  own 
feelings  ?  The  sweet  voice  of  Cona*  never  sounds 
so  sweetly,  as  when  it  speaks  of  itself,-  and  I  should 
almost  suspect  that  man  of  an  unkindly  heart,  who 
could  read  the  opening  of  the  third  book  of  the  Para- 
dise Lost  without  peculiar  emotion.  By  a  Law  of  our 
Nature,  he,  who  labors  under  a  strong  feeling,  is 


•  Ossian. 
B2 


impelled  to  seek  for  sympathy ;  but  a  Poet's  feelings 
are  all  strong.  Quicquid  ainet  valde  amat.  Akenside 
therefore  speaks  with  philosophical  accuracy  when 
he  classes  Love  and  Poetry,  as  producing  the  same 
effects : 

Love  and  the  wish  of  Poets  when  their  tongue 
Would  teach  to  others'  bosoms,  what  so  charms 
Their  own. 

Pleasures  of  Imagination. 

There  is  one  species  of  Egotism  which  is  truly 
disgusting ;  not  that  which  leads  us  to  communicate 
our  feelings  to  others  but  that  which  would  reduce 
the  feelings  of  others  to  an  identity  with  our  own. 
The  Atheist,  who  exclaims  "  pshaw ! "  when  he 
glances  his  eye  on  the  praises  of  Deity,  is  an  Egotist : 
an  old  man,  when  he  speaks  contemptuously  of  Love- 
verses,  is  an  Egotist:  and  the  sleek  Favorites  of 
Fortune  are  Egotists,  when  they  condemn  all  "  mel- 
ancholy, discontented"  verses.  Surely,  it  would  be 
candid  not  merely  to  ask  whether  the  poem  pleases 
ourselves,  but  to  consider  whether  or  no  there  may 
not  be  others,  to  whom  it  is  well  calculated  to  give 
an  innocent  pleasure. 

I  shall  only  add,  that  each  of  my  readers  will,  I 
hope,  remember,  that  these  Poems  on  various  sub- 
jects, which  he  reads  at  one  time  and  under  the  in- 
fluence of  one  set  of  feelings,  were  written  at  differ- 
ent times  and  prompted  by  very  different  feelings ; 
and  therefore  that  the  supposed  inferiority  of  one 
Poem  to  another  may  sometimes  be  owing  to  the 
temper  of  mind  in  which  he  happens  to  peruse  it. 


My  poems  have  been  rightly  charged  with  a  pro- 
fusion of  double-epithets,  and  a  general  rurgidness 
I  have  pruned  the  double-epithets  with  no  sparing 
hand  ;  and  used  my  best  efforts  to  tame  the  swell 
and  glitter  both  of  thought  and  diction.*   This  latter 


*  Without  any  feeling  of  anger,  I  may  yet  be  allowed  to 
express  Borne  degree  of  surprise,  that  after  having  run  the 
critical  gauntlet  for  a  certain  class  of  faults,  which  I  had,  viz. 
a  too  ornate  and  elaborately  poetic  diction,  and  nothing  hav- 
ing come  before  the  judgment-seat  of  the  Reviewers  during 
the  long  interval,  I  should  for  at  least  seventeen  years,  quarter 
after  quarter,  have  been  placed  by  them  in  the  foremost  rank 
of  the  proscribed,  and  made  to  abide  the  brunt  of  abuse  and 
ridicule  for  faults  directly  opposite,  viz.  bald  and  prosaic  lan- 
guage, and  an  affected  simplicity  both  of  matter  and  manner 
— faults  which  assuredly  did  not  enter  into  the  character  of 
my  compositions. — Literary  Life,  i  51.  Published  1817 


2 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


fault  however  had  insinuated  itself  into  my  Religious 
Musings  with  such  intricacy  of  union,  that  some- 
times I  have  omitted  to  disentangle  the  weed  from 
the  fear  of  snapping  the  flower.  A  third  and  heavier 
accusation  has  been  brought  against  me,  that  of  ob- 
scurity ;  but  not,  I  think,  with  equal  justice.  An 
Author  is  obscure,  when  his  conceptions  are  dim 
and  imperfect,  and  his  language  incorrect,  or  unap- 
propriate,  or  involved.  A  poem  that  abounds  in 
allusions,  like  the  Bard  of  Gray,  or  one  that  imper- 
sonates high  and  abstract  truths,  like  Collins's  Ode 
on  the  poetical  character,  claims  not  to  be  popular — 
but  should  be  acquitted  of  obscurity.  The  deficiency 
is  in  the  Reader.  But  this  is  a  charge  which  every 
|x>et,  whose  imagination  is  warm  and  rapid,  must 
expect  from  his  contemporaries.  Milton  did  not 
escape  it ;  and  it  was  adduced  with  virulence  against 
Gray  and  Collins.  We  now  hear  no  more  of  it  : 
not  that  their  poems  are  better  understood  at  present, 
than  they  were  at  their  tirst  publication ;  but  their 
fame  is  established  ;  and  a  critic  would  accuse  him- 
self of  frigidity  or  inattention,  who  should  profess 
not  to  understand  them.  But  a  living  writer  is  yet 
subjudice;  and  if  we  cannot  follow  his  conceptions 
or  enter  into  his  feelings,  it  is  more  consoling  to  our 
pride  to  consider  him  as  lost  beneath,  than  as  soaring 
above  us.  If  any  man  expect  from  my  poems  the 
same  easiness  of  style  which  he  admires  in  a  drink- 
ing-song, for  him  I  have  not  written.  I/itelligibilia, 
non  intellect  um  adfero. 

I  expect  neither  profit  nor  general  fame  by  my 
writings  ;  and  I  consider  myself  as  having  been 
amply  repaid  without  either.  Poetry  has  been  to  me 
its  own  "  exceeding  great  reward  : "  it  has  soothed 
my  afflictions ;  it  has  multiplied  and  refined  my  en- 
joyments ;  it  has  endeared  solitude :  and  it  has  given 
me  the  habit  of  wishing  to  discover  the  Good  and 
the  Beautiful  in  all  that  meets  and  surrounds  me. 

S.  T.  C. 


JUVENILE   POEMS. 


GENEVIEVE. 

Maid  of  my  Love,  sweet  Genevieve ! 

In  beauty's  light  you  glide  along  : 

Your  eye  is  like  the  star  of  eve, 

And  sweet  your  voice,  as  seraph's  song. 

Yet  not  your  heavenly  beauty  gives 

This  heart  with  passion  soft  to  glow  : 

Within  your  soul  a  voice  there  lives ! 

It  bids  you  hear  the  tale  of  woe. 

When  sinking  low  the  sufferer  wan 

Beholds  no  hand  outstretch'd  to  save, 

Fair,  as  the  bosom  of  the  swan 

That  rises  graceful  o'er  the  wave, 

I  've  seen  your  breast  with  pity  heave, 

And  therefore  love  I  you,  sweet  Genevieve ! 


SONNET. 

TO    THE    AUTUMNAL   MOON. 

Mild  Splendor  of  the  various-vested  Night! 
Mother  of  wildly-working  visions!  hail! 
I  watch  thy  gliding,  while  with  watery  light 
Thy  weak  rye  glimmers  through  a  fleecy  veil 


And  when  thou  lovest  thy  pale  orb  to  shroud 
Behind  the  gather'd  blackness  lost  on  high  ; 
And  when  thou  dartest  from  the  wind-rent  cloud 
Thy  placid  lightning  o'er  the  awaken'd  sky. 
Ah  such  is  Hope  '  as  changeful  and  as  fair ! 
Now  dimly  peering  on  the  wistful  sight ; 
Now  hid  behind  the  dragon-wing'd  Despair 
But  soon  emerging  in  her  radiant  might, 
She  o'er  the  sorrow-clouded  breast  of  Care 
Sails,  like  a  meteor  kindling  in  its  flight. 


TIME,  REAL  AND  IMAGINARY. 

AN   ALLEGORY. 

On  the  wide  level  of  a  mountain's  head 
(I  knew  not  where,  but  't  was  some  faery  place 
Their  pinions,  ostrich-like,  for  sails  outspread, 
Two  lovely  children  run  an  endless  race, 

A  sister  and  a  brother  ! 

This  far  outstript  the  other ; 
Yet  ever  runs  she  with  reverted  face, 
And  looks  and  listens  for  the  boy  behind  : 

For  he,  alas  !    is  blind  ! 
O'er  rough  and  smooth  with  even  step  he  pass'd, 
And  knows  not  whether  he  be  first  or  last. 


MONODY  ON  THE  DEATH  OF 
CHATTERTON. 

0  what  a  wonder  seems  the  fear  of  death, 
Seeing  how  gladly  we  all  sink  to  sleep, 
Babes,  Children,  Youths  and  Men, 

Night  following  night  for  threescore  years  and  tet. 
But  doubly  strange,  where  life  is  but  a  breath 
To  sigh  and  pant  with,  up  Want's  rugged  steep. 

Away,  Grim  Phantom !  Scorpion  King,  away  . 

Reserve  thy  terrors  and  thy  stings  display 

For  coward  Wealth  and  Guilt  in  robes  of  state ! 

Lo !  by  the  grave  I  stand  of  one,  for  whom 

A  prodigal  Nature  and  a  niggard  Doom 

{That  all  bestowing,  this  withholding  all) 

Made  each  chance  knell  from  distant  spire  or  dome 

Sound  like  a  seeking  Mother's  anxious  call, 

Return,  poor  Child  !  Home,  weaiy  Truant,  home  ! 

Thee,  Chatterton !  these  unblest  stones  protect 
From  want,  and  the  bleak  freezings  of  neglect. 
Too  long  before  the  vexing  Storm-blast  driven, 
Here  hast  thou  found  repose !  beneath  this  sod  ! 
Thou !  O  vain  word !  thou  dwell'st  not  with  the  clod 
Amid  the  shining  Host  of  the  Forgiven 
Thou  at  the  throne  of  Mercy  and  thy  God 
The  triumph  of  redeeming  Love  dost  hymn 
(Believe  it,  0  my  soul !)  to  harps  of  Seraphim. 

Yet  oft,  perforce  ('t  is  suffering  Nature's  call,) 

1  weep,  that  heaven-born  Genius  so  shall  fall; 
And  oft,  in  Fancy's  saddest  hour,  my  soul 
Averted  shudders  at  the  poison'd  bowl. 

Now  groans  my  sickening  heart,  as  still  I  view 

Thy  corse  of  livid  hue  ; 
Now  indignation  checks  the  feeble  sigh, 
Or  flashes  through  the  tear  that  glistens  in  mine  pyo 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


Is  this  the  land  of  song-ennobled  line  ? 

Is  this  the  land,  where  Genius  ne'er  in  vain 

Pour'd  forth  his  lofty  strain  ? 
Ah  me !  yet  Spenser,  gentlest  bard  divine, 
Beneath  chill  Disappointment's  shade 
His  weary  limbs  in  lonely  anguish  laid. 

And  o'er  her  darling  dead 

Pity  hopeless  hung  her  head, 
While  "  'mid  the  pelting  of  that  merciless  storm," 
Sunk  to  the  cold  earth  Otway's  famish'd  form ! 

Sublime  of  thought,  and  confident  of  fame, 

From  vales  where  Avon  winds,  the  Minstrel*  came. 

Light-hearted  youth !  aye,  as  he  hastes  along, 

He  meditates  the  future  song, 
How  dauntless  ./Ella  fray'd  the  Dacian  foe  ; 

And  while  the  numbers  flowing  strong 

In  eddies  whirl,  in  surges  throng, 
Exulting  in  the  spirits'  genial  throe, 
In  tides  of  power  his  life-blood  seems  to  flow. 

And  now  his  cheeks  with  deeper  ardors  flame, 
His  eyes  have  glorious  meanings,  that  declare 
More  than  the  light  of  outward  day  shines  there, 
A  holier  triumph  and  a  sterner  aim ! 
Wings  grow  within  him ;  and  he  soars  above 
Or  Bard's,  or  Minstrel's  lay  of  war  or  love. 
Friend  to  the  friendless,  to  the  Sufferer  health, 
He  hears  the  widow's  prayer,  the  good  man's  praise ; 
To  scenes  of  bliss  transmutes  his  fancied  wealth, 
And  young  and  old  shall  now  see  happy  days. 
On  many  a  waste  he  bids  trim  gardens  rise, 
Gives  the  blue  sky  to  many  a  prisoner's  eyes ; 
And  now  in  wrath  he  grasps  the  patriot  steel, 
And  her  own  iron  rod  he  makes  Oppression  feel. 

Sweet  Flower  of  Hope  !  free  Nature's  genial  child ! 
That  didst  so  fair  disclose  thy  early  bloom, 
Filling  the  wide  air  with  a  rich  perfume ! 
For  thee  in  vain  all  heavenly  aspects  smiled ; 
From  the  hard  world  brief  respite  could  they  win — 
The  frost  nipp'd  sharp  without,  the  canker  prey'd 

within ! 
Ah  ■  where  are  fled  the  charms  of  vernal  Grace, 
And  Joy's  wild  gleams  that  lighten'd  o'er  thy  face  ? 
Youth  of  tumultuous  soul,  and  haggard  eye ! 
Thy  wasted  form,  thy  hurried  steps,  I  view, 
On  thy  wan  forehead  starts  the  lethal  dew, 
And  oh !  the  anguish  of  that  shuddering  sigh  ! 

Such  were  the  struggles  of  the  gloomy  hour, 

When  Care,  of  wither'd  brow, 
Prepar'd  the  poison's  death-cold  power: 
Already  to  thy  lips  was  raised  the  bowl, 
When  near  thee  stood  Affection  meek 
(Her  bosom  bare,  and  wildly  pale  her  cheek,) 
Thy  sullen  gaze  she  bade  thee  roll 
On  scenes  that  well  might  melt  thy  soul ; 
Thy  native  cot  she  flash'd  upon  thy  view, 
Thy  native  cot,  where  still,  at  close  of  day, 
.  eace  smiling  sate,  and  listen'd  to  thy  lay  ; 
Thy  Sister's  shrieks  she  bade  thee  hear, 
And  mark  thy  Mother's  thrilling  tear ; 

See,  see  her  breast's  convulsive  throe, 
Her  silent  agony  of  woe ! 
Ah !  dash  the  poison'd  chalice  from  thy  hand  ! 
And  thou  hadst  daxh'd  it,  at  her  soft  command, 


Avon,  a  river  near  Bristol;  the  birth-place  of  Cliatterton. 


But  that  Despair  and  Indignation  rose, 
And  told  again  the  story  of  thy  w:oes ; 
Told  the  keen  insult  of  the  unfeeling  heart ; 
The  dread  dependence  on  the  low-born  mind ; 
Told  every  pang,  with  which  thy  soul  must  smart. 
Neglect,  and  grinning  Scorn,  and  Want  combined  ! 
Recoiling  quick,  thou  bad'st  the  friend  of  pain 
Roll  the  black  tide  of  Death  through  every  freezing 
vein! 

Ye  woods  !  that  wave  o'er  Avon's  rocky  steep. 
To  Fancy's  ear  sweet  is  your  murmuring  deep ! 
For  here  she  loves  the  cypress  wreath  to  weave, 
Watching,  with  wistful  eye,  the  saddening  tints  of  evf> 
Here,  far  from  men,  amid  this  pathless  grove, 
In  solemn  thought  the  Minstrel  wont  to  rove, 
Like  star-beam  on  the  slow  sequester'd  tide 
Lone-glittering,  through  the  high  tree  branching  wide 
And  here,  in  Inspiration's  eager  hour, 
When  most  the  big  soul  feels  the  mastering  power. 
These  wilds,  these  caverns  roaming  o'er, 
Round  which  the  screaming  sea-gulls  soar, 
With  wild  unequal  steps  he  pass'd  along, 
Oft  pouring  on  the  winds  a  broken  song  : 
Anon,  upon  some  rough  rock's  fearful  brow 
Would  pause  abrupt — and  gaze  upon  the  waves 
below. 

Poor  Chatterton !  he  sorrows  for  thy  fate 

Who  would  have  praised  and  loved  thee,  ere  too 

late. 
Poor  Chatterton !  farewell !  of  darkest  hues 
This  chaplet  cast  I  on  thy  unshaped  tomb ; 
But  dare  no  longer  on  the  sad  theme  muse, 
Lest  kindred  woes  persuade  a  kindred  doom : 
For  oh  !  big  gall-drops,  shook  from  Folly's  wing, 
Have  blacken'd  the  fair  promise  of  my  spring ; 
And  the  stern  Fate  transpierced  with  viewless  dart 
The  last  pale  Hope  that  shiver'd  at  my  heart ! 

Hence,  gloomy  thoughts !    no  more  my  soul  shall 

dwell 
On  joys  that  were !  No  more  endure  to  weigh 
The  shame  and  anguish  of  the  evil  day, 
Wisely  forgetful !  O'er  the  ocean  swell 
Sublime  of  Hope  I  seek  the  cottaged  dell, 
Where  Virtue  calm  with  careless  step  may  stray  , 
And,  dancing  to  the  moon-light  roundelay. 
The  wizard  Passions  weave  a  holy  spell ! 

O  Chatterton !  that  thou  wert  yet  alive ! 

Sure  thou  wouldst  spread  the  canvas  to  the  gale, 

And  love  with  us  the  tinkling  team  to  drive 

O'er  peaceful  Freedom's  undivided  dale  ; 

And  we,  at  sober  eve,  would  round  thee  throng, 

Hanging,  enraptured,  on  thy  stately  song  ! 

And  greet  with  smiles  the  young-eyed  Poesy 

All  deftly  mask'd,  as  hoar  Antiquity. 

Alas  vain  Phantasies  !  the  fleeting  brood 
Of  Woe  self-solaced  in  her  dreamy  mood  ! 
Yet  will  I  love  to  follow  the  sweet  dream, 
Where  Susquehannah  pours  his  untamed  stream  ; 
And  on  some  hill,  whose  forest-frowning  side 
Waves  o'er  the  murmurs  of  his  calmer  tide, 
Will  raise  a  solemn  Cenotaph  to  thee, 
Sweet  Harper  of  time-shrouded  Minstrelsy  ! 
And  there,  soothed  sadly  by  the  dirgeful  wind. 
Muse  on  the  sore  ills  I  had  left  behind. 
13 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


SONGS  OF  THE  PIXIES. 


The  Pixies,  in  the  superstition  of  Devonshire,  are  a  race  of 
beings  invisibly  small,  and  harmless  or  friendly  to  man.  At  a 
small  distance  from  a  village  in  that  county,  half-way  up  a 
wood-covered  hill,  is  an  excavation  called  the  Pixies'  Parlor. 
The  roots  of  old  trees  form  its  ceiling  ;  and  on  its  sides  are 
innumerable  ciphers,  among  which  the  author  discovered  his 
own  cipher  and  those  of  his  brothers,  cut  by  the  hand  of  their 
childhood.    At  the  foot  of  the  hill  flows  the  river  Otter. 

To  this  place  the  Author  conducted  a  party  of  young  Ladies, 
during  the  Summer  months  of  the  year  1793  ;  one  of  whom, 
of  stature  elegantly  small,  and  of  complexion  colorless  yet 
clear,  was  proclaimed  the  Faery  Queen.  On  which  occasion 
the  following  irregular  Ode  was  written. 


I. 

Whom  the  untaught  Shepherds  call 

Pixies  in  their  madrigal, 
Fancy's  children,  here  we  dwell  : 

Welcome,  Ladies !  to  our  cell. 
Here  the  wren  of  softest  note 

Builds  its  nest  and  warbles  well ; 
Here  the  blackbird  strains  his  throat ; 

Welcome,  Ladies !  to  our  cell. 

II. 

When  fades  the  moon  all  shadowy-pale, 
And  scuds  the  cloud  before  the  gale, 
Ere  Morn  with  living  gems  bedight 
Purples  the  East  with  streaky  light, 
We  sip  the  furze-flower's  fragrant  dews 
Clad  in  robes  of  rainbow  hues  : 
Or  sport  amid  the  rosy  gleam, 
Soothed  by  the  distant-tinkling  team, 
While  lusty  Labor  scouting  sorrow 
Bids  the  Dame  a  glad  good-morrow, 
Who  jogs  the  accustom'd  road  along, 
And  paces  cheery  to  her  cheering  song. 

III. 

But  not  our  filmy  pinion 
We  scorch  amid  the  blaze  of  day, 
When  Noontide's  fiery-tressed  minion 
Flashes  the  fervid  ray. 
'  Aye  from  the  sultry  heat 
We  to  the  cave  retreat 
O'ercanopied  by  huge  roots  intertwined 
With  wildest  texture,  blacken'd  o'er  with  age  : 
Round  them  their  mantle  green  the  ivies  bind, 
Beneath  whose  foliage  pale, 
Fann'd  by  the  unfrequent  gale, 
We  shield  us  from  the  Tyrant's  mid-day  rage. 

IV. 
Thither,  while  the  murmuring  throng 
Of  wild-bees  hum  their  drowsy  song, 
By  Indolence  and  Fancy  brought, 
A  youthful  Bard,  "  unknown  to  Fame," 
vVooes  the  Queen  of  Solemn  Thought, 
And  heaves  the  gentle  misery  of  a  sigh, 
Gazing  with  tearful  eye, 
As  round  our  sandy  grot  appear 
Many  a  rudely-sculptured  name 
To  pensive  Memory  dear ! 
Weaving  gay  dreams  of  sunny-tinctured  hue, 
We  glance  before  his  view : 


O'er  his  hush'd  soul  our  soothing  witcheries  shed. 
And  twine  our  faery  garlands  round  his  head. 


When  Evening's  dusky  car, 

Crown'd  with  her  dewy  star, 
Steals  o'er  the  fading  sky  in  shadowy  flight, 

On  leaves  of  aspen  trees 

We  tremble  to  the  breeze, 
Veil'd  from  the  grosser  ken  of  mortal  sight 

Or,  haply,  at  the  visionary  hour, 
Along  our  wildly-bower'd  sequester'd  walk, 
We  listen  to  the  enamour'd  rustic's  talk ; 
Heave  with  the  heavings  of  the  maiden's  breast, 
Where  young-eyed   Loves  have   built  the'r  turtle 

nest; 
Or  guide  of  soul-subduing  power 
The  electric  flash,  that  from  the  melting  eye 
Darts  the  fond  question  and  the  soft  reply. 

VI. 

Or  through  the  mystic  ringlets  of  the  vale 
We  flash  our  faery  feet  in  gamesome  prank , 
Or,  silent-sandall'd,  pay  our  defter  court 
Circling  the  Spirit  of  the  Western  Gale, 
Where  wearied  with  his  flower-caressing  sport 
Supine  he  slumbers  on  a  violet  bank  ; 
Then  with  quaint  music  hymn  the  parting  gleam 
By  lonely  Otter's  sleep-persuading  stream ; 
Or  where  his  waves  with  loud  unquiet  song 
Dash'd  o'er  the  rocky  channel  froth  along ; 
Or  where,  his  silver  waters  smoothed  to  rest, 
The  tall  tree's  shadow  sleeps  upon  his  breast. 

VII. 

Hence,  thou  lingerer,  Light! 
Eve  saddens  into  Night. 
Mother  of  wildly-working  dreams  !  we  view 
The  sombre  hours,  that  round  thee  stand 
With  downcast  eyes  (a  duteous  band!) 
Their  dark  robes  dripping  with  the  heavy  dew. 
Sorceress  of  the  ebon  throne ! 
Thy  power  the  Pixies  own, 
When  round  thy  raven  brow 
Heaven's  lucent  roses  glow, 
And  clouds,  in  watery  colors  drest, 
Float  in  light  drapery  o'er  thy  sable  vest  : 
What  time  the  pale  moon  sheds  a  softer  day, 
Mellowing  the  woods  beneath  its  pensive  beam  : 
For  :mid  the  quivering  light 't  is  ours  to  play, 
Aye  dancing  to  the  cadence  of  the  stream. 

r 
VIII. 

Welcome,  Ladies!  to  the  cell 
Where  the  blameless  Pixies  dwell : 
But  thou,   sweet  Nymph  !    proclaim'd   our   Faery 
Queen, 
With  what  obeisance  meet 
Thy  presence  shall  we  greet  ? 
For  lo !  attendant  on  thy  steps  are  seen 
Graceful  Ease  in  artless  stole, 
And  white-robed  Purity  of  soul, 
With  Honor's  softer  mien ; 
Mirth  of  the  loosely-flowing  hair, 
And  meek-eyed  Pity  eloquently  fair, 

Whose  tearful  cheeks  are  lovely  to  the  view 
As  snow-drop  wet  with  dew. 
14 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


IX. 
Unboastful  maid !  though  now  the  Lily  pale 

Transparent  grace  thy  beauties  meek ; 
Yet  ere  again  along  the  empurpling  vale, 
The  purpling  vale  and  elfin-haunted  grove, 
Young  Zephyr  his  fresh  flowers  profusely  throws, 

We'll  tinge  with  livelier  hues  thy  cheek; 
And,  haply,  from  the  nectar-breathing  Rose 
Extract  a  blush  for  love ! 


THE  RAVEN. 

A    CHRISTMAS   TALE,    TOLD   BY  A  SCHOOL-BOY  TO    HIS 
LITTLE    BROTHERS    AND  SISTERS. 

Underneath  a  huge  oak  tree 

There  was,  of  swine,  a  huge  company, 

That  grunted  as  they  crunch'd  the  mast : 

For  that  was  ripe,  and  fell  full  fast. 

Then  they  trotted  away,  for  the  wind  grew  high : 

One  acorn  they  left,  and  no  more  might  you  spy. 

Next  came  a  raven,  that  liked  not  such  folly  : 

He  belong'd,  they  did  say,  to  the  witch  Melancholy ! 

Blacker  was  he  than  blackest  jet, 

Flew  low  in  the  rain,  and  his  leathers  not  wet. 

He  pick'd  up  the  acorn  and  buried  it  straight 

By  the  side  of  a  river  both  deep  and  great. 
Where  then  did  the  Raven  go  ? 
He  went  high  and  low, 

Over  hill,  over  dale,  did  the  black  Raven  go. 
Many  Autumns,  many  Springs 
Travell'd  he  with  wandering  wings : 
Many  Summers,  many  Winters — 
I  can't  tell  half  his  adventures 

At  length  he  came  back,  and  with  him  a  She, 
And  the  acorn  was  grown  to  a  tall  oak  tree. 
They  built  them  a  nest  in  the  topmost  bough, 
And  young  ones  they  had,  and  were  happy  enow. 
But  soon  came  a  woodman  in  leathern  guise, 
His  brow,  like  a  pent-house,  hung  over  his  eyes.  . 
He'd  on  ax  in  his  hand,  not  a  word  he  spoke, 
But  with  many  a  hem !  and  a  sturdy  stroke, 
At  length  he  brought  down  the  poor  Raven's  own 

oak. 
His  young  ones   were   kill'd ;    for  they  could  not 

depart, 
And  their  mother  did  die  of  a  broken  heart. 

The  boughs  from  the  trunk  the  woodman  did  sever ; 
And  they  floated  it  down  on  the  course  of  the  river. 
They  saw'd  it  in  planks,  and  its  bark  they  did  strip, 
And  with  this  tree  and  others  they  made  a  good  ship, 
The  ship  it  was  launch'd  ;  but  in  sight  of  the  land 
Such  a  siorm  there  did  rise  as  no  ship  could  with- 
stand. 
It  bulged  on  a  rock,  and  the  waves  rush'd  in  fast : 
The  old  Raven  flew  round  and  round,  and  caw'd  to 
the  blast 

He  heard  the  last  shriek  of  the  perishing  souls — 
See !  see !  o'er  the  topmast  the  mad  water  rolls ! 

Right  glad  was  the  Raven,  and  off  he  went  fleet. 
And  Death  riding  home  on  a  cloud  he  did  meet, 
And  he  thank'd  him  again  and  again  for  this  treat : 

They  had  taken  his  all,  and  Revenge  was  sweet ! 


ABSENCE. 

A  FAREWELL  ODE    ON    QUITTING    SCHOOL   FOR    JESUS 
COLLEGE,    CAMBRIDGE. 

Where  graced  with  many  a  classic  spoil 

Cam  rolls  his  reverend  stream  along, 

I  haste  to  urge  the  learned  toil 

That  sternly  chides  my  lovelorn  song  : 

Ah  me !  too  mindful  of  the  days 

Illumed  by  Passion's  orient  rays, 

When  Peace,  and  Cheerfulness,  and  Health 

Enrich'd  me  with  the  best  of  wealth. 

Ah  fair  delights  !  that  o'er  my  soul 
On  Memory's  wing,  like  shadows  fly ! 
Ah  Flowers !  which  Joy  from  Eden  stole 
While  Innocence  stood  smiling  by  ! — 
But  cease,  fond  heart !  this  bootless  moan  : 
Those  hours  on  rapid  pinions  flown 
Shall  yet  return,  by  Absence  crown'd 
And  scatter  lovelier  roses  round. 

The  Sun  who  ne'er  remits  his  fires 
On  heedless  eyes  may  pour  the  day : 
The  Moon,  that  oft  from  Heaven  retires. 
Endears  her  renovated  ray. 
What  though  she  leaves  the  sky  unblest 
To  mourn  awhile  in  murky  vest  ? 
When  she  relumes  her  lovely  light, 
We  bless  the  wanderer  of  the  night 


LINES  ON  AN  AUTUMNAL  EVENING. 

0  thou,  wild  Fancy,  check  thy  wing !  No  more 
Those  thin  white  flakes,  those  purple  clouds  explore  ! 
Nor  there  with  happy  spirits  speed  thy  flight 
Bathed  in  rich  amber-glowing  floods  of  light  ; 

Nor  in  yon  gleam,  where  slow  descends  the  day, 

With  western  peasants  hail  the  morning  ray ! 

Ah !  rather  bid  the  perish'd  pleasures  move, 

A  shadowy  train,  across  the  soul  of  Love ! 

O'er  Disappointment's  wintry  desert  fling 

Each  flower  that  wreathed  the  dewy  locks  of  Spring. 

When   blushing,    like    a    bride,  from    Hope's   trim 

bower 
She  leap'd,  awaken'd  by  the  pattering  shower. 
Now  sheds  the  sinking  Sun  a  deeper  gleam, 
Aid,  lovely  Sorceress  !  aid  thy  poet's  dream  ! 
With  fairy  wand  O  bid  the  Maid  arise, 
Chaste  Joyance  dancing  in  her  bright-blue  eyes ; 
As  erst  when  from  the  Muses'  calm  abode 

1  came,  with  Learning's  meed  not  unbestow'd  ; 
When  as  she  twined  a  laurel  round  my  brow, 
And  met  my  kiss,  and  half  return'd  my  vow. 
O'er  all  my  frame  shot  rapid  my  thrill'd  heart, 
And  every  nerve  confess'd  th'  electric  dart. 

0  denr  deceit!  I  see  the  Maiden  rise, 

Chaste  Joyance  dancing  in  her  bright-blue  eyes ! 
When  first  the  lark,  high  soaring,  swells  his  throat, 
Mocks  the  tired  eye,  and  scatters  the  wild  note, 

1  trace  her  footsteps  on  the  accustom'd  lawn, 
I  mark  her  glancing  'mid  the  gleam  of  dawn. 
When  the  bent  flower  beneath  the  night-dew  weep* 
And  on  the  lake  the  silver  lustre  sleeps, 

15 


6 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Amid  the  paly  radiance  soft  and  sad, 
She  meets  my  lonely  path  in  moon-beams  clad. 
With  her  along  the  streamlet's  brink  I  rove  ; 
With  her  I  list  the  vvarblings  of  the  grove  ; 
And  seems  in  each  low  wind  her  voice  to  float, 
Lone-whispering  Pity  in  each  soothing  note ! 

Spirits  of  Love  !  ye  heard  her  name !  obey 
The  powerful  spell,  and  to  my  haunt  repair. 
Whether  on  clustering  pinions  ye  are  there, 
Where  rich  snows  blossom  on  the  myrtle  trees, 
Or  with  fond  languishment  aroimd  my  fair 
Sigh  in  the  loose  luxuriance  of  her  hair  ; 
O  heed  the  spell,  and  hither  wing  your  way, 
Like  far-off  music,  voyaging  the  breeze! 

Spirits !  to  you  the  infant  Maid  was  given, 
Form'd  by  the  wondrous  alchemy  of  heaven! 
No  fairer  maid  does  Love's  wide  empire  know, 
No  fairer  maid  e'er  heaved  the  bosom's  snow. 
A  thousand  Loves  around  her  forehead  fly  ; 
A  thousand  Loves  sit  melting  in  her  eye  ; 
Love  lights  her  smile — in  Joy's  red  nectar  dips 
His  myrtle  flower,  and  plants  it  on  her  lips. 
She  speaks !  and  hark  that  passion- warbled  song — 
Still,  Fancy  !  still  that  voice,  those  notes  prolong, 
As  sweet  as  when  that  voice  with  rapturous  falls 
Shall  wake  the  soften'd  echoes  of  Heaven's  halls ! 

O  (have  I  sigh'd)  were  mine  the  wizard's  rod, 
Or  mine  the  power  of  Proteus,  changeful  god ! 
A  flower-entangled  arbor  I  would  seem, 
To  shield  my  Love  from  noontide's  sultry  beam : 
Or  bloom  a  Myrtle,  from  whose  odorous  boughs 
My  love  might  weave  gay  garlands  for  her  brows. 
When  twilight  stole  across  the  fading  vale, 
To  fan  my  love  I  'd  be  the  Evening  Gale ; 
Mourn  in  the  soft  folds  of  her  swelling  vest, 
And  flutter  my  faint  pinions  on  her  breast ! 
On  Seraph  wing  I  'd  float  a  Dream  by  night, 
To  soothe  my  Love  with  shadows  of  delight  :— 
Or  soar  aloft  to  be  the  Spangled  Skies, 
And  gaze  upon  her  with  a  thousand  eyes ! 

As  when  the  Savage,  who  his  drowsy  frame 
Had  bask'd  beneath  the  Sun's  unclouded  flame, 
Awakes  amid  the  troubles  of  the  air, 
The  skiey  deluge,  and  white  lightning's  glare — 
Aghast  he  scours  before  the  tempest's  sweep, 
And  sad  recalls  the  sunny  hour  of  sleep : — 
So  toss'd  by  storms  along  Life's  wildering  way, 
Mine  eye  reverted  views  that  cloudless  day, 
When  by  my  native  brook  I  wont  to  rove, 
While  Hope  with  kisses  nursed  the  Infant  Love. 

Dear  native  brook  !  like  Peace,  so  placidly 
Smoothing  through  fertile  fields  thy  current  meek ! 
Dear  native  brook  !  where  first  young  Poesy 
Stared  wildly-eager  in  her  noontide  dream! 
Where  blameless  pleasures  dimple  Quiet's  cheek, 
As  water-lilies  ripple  thy  slow  stream! 
Dear  native  haunis !  where  Virtue  still  is  gay, 
Where  Friendship's  fix'd  star  sheds  a  mellow'd  ray, 
Where  Love  a  crown  of  thornless  Roses  wears, 
Where  soften'd  Sorrow  smiles  within  her  tears ; 
And  Memory,  with  a  Vestal's  chaste  employ, 
Unceasing  feeds  the  lambent  flame  of  joy ! 


No  more  your  sky-larks  melting  from  the  sight 
Shall  thrill  the  attuned  heart-string  with  delight — 
No  more  shall  deck  your  pensive  Pleasures  sweet 
With  wreaths  of  sober  hue  my  evening  seat. 
Yet  dear  to  Fancy's  eye  your  varied  scene 
Of  wood,  hill,  dale,  and  sparkling  brook  between ! 
Yet  sweet  to  Fancy's  ear  the  warbled  song, 
That  soars  on  Morning's  wings  your  vales  among 

Scenes  of  my  Hope !  the  aching  eye  ye  leave, 
Like  yon  bright  hues  that  paint  the  clouds  of  eve ! 
Tearful  and  saddening  with  the  sadden'd  blaze. 
Mine  eye  the  gleam  pursues  with  wistful  gaze, 
Sees  shades  on  shades  with  deeper  tint  impend, 
Till  chill  and  damp  the  moonless  night  descend 


THE  ROSE. 


As  late  each  flower  that  sweetest  blows 
I  pluck'd,  the  Garden's  pride! 
Within  the  petals  of  a  Rose 
A  sleeping  Love  I  spied. 

Around  his  brows  a  beamy  wreath 
Of  many  a  lucent  hue ; 
All  purple,  glow'd  his  cheek,  beneath 
Inebriate  with  dew. 

I  softly  seized  the  unguarded  Power, 
Nor  scared  his  balmy  rest ; 
And  placed  him,  caged  within  the  flower, 
On  spotless  Sara's  breast. 

But  when  unweeting  of  the  guile 
Awoke  the  prisoner  sweet, 
He  struggled  to  escape  awhile, 
And  stamp'd  his  faery  feet 

Ah !  soon  the  soul-entrancing  sight 
Subdued  the  impatient  boy ! 
He  gazed !  he  thrill'd  with  deep  delight ! 
Then  clapp'd  his  wings  for  joy. 

"  And  O !  he  cried — "  Of  magic  kind 
What  charm  this  Throne  endear ! 
Some  other  Love  let  Venus  find— 
I'll  fix  my  empire  here." 


THE  KISS. 


One  kiss,  dear  Maid !  I  said  and  sigh'd- 
Your  scorn  the  little  boon  denied. 
Ah  why  refuse  the  blameless  bliss  ? 
Can  danger  lurk  within  a  kiss  ? 

Yon  viewless  Wanderer  of  the  vale. 
The  Spirit  of  the  Western  Gale, 
At  Morning's  break,  at  Evening's  closn 
Inhales  the  sweetness  of  the  Rose. 
And  hovers  o'er  the  uninjured  bloom 
Sighing  back  the  soft  perfume. 
Vigor  to  the  Zephyr's  wing 
Her  nectar-breathing  kisses  fling; 
16 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


And  He  the  glitter  of  the  Dew 
Scatters  on  the  Rose's  hue. 
Bashful,  lo !  she  bends  her  head, 
And  darts  a  blush  of  deeper  red ! 

Too  well  those  lovely  lips  disclose 
The  triumphs  of  the  opening  Rose  ; 
O  fair  !  O  graceful !  bid  them  prove 
As  passive  to  the  breath  of  Love. 
In  tender  accents,  faint  and  low, 
Well-pleased  I  hear  the  whisper'd  "  No!" 
The  whisper'd  "  No" — how  Utile  meant! 
Sweet  falsehood  that  endears  consent ! 
For  on  those  lovely  lips  the  while 
Dawns  the  soft-relenting  smile, 
And  tempts  with  feign'd  dissuasion  coy 
The  gentle  violence  of  Joy. 


TO  A  YOUNG  ASS. 

ITS   MOTHER   BEING   TETHERED   NEAR   IT. 

Poor  little  foal  of  an  oppressed  race ! 

I  love  the  languid  patience  of  thy  face : 

And  oft  with  gentle  hand  I  give  thee  bread, 

And  clap  thy  ragged  coat,  and  pat  thy  head. 

But  what  thy  dulled  spirits  hath  dismay'd, 

That  never  thou  dost  sport  along  the  glade  ? 

And  (most  unlike  the  nature  of  things  young) 

That  earthward  still  thy  moveless  head  is  hung  ? 

Do  thy  prophetic  fears  anticipate, 

Meek  Child  of  Misery !  thy  future  fate  ? 

The  starving  meal,  and  all  the  thousand  aches 

"  Which  patient  merit  of  the  unworthy  takes  ?" 

Or  is  thy  sad  heart  thrill'd  with  filial  pain 

To  see  thy  wretched  mother's  shorten'd  chain  ? 

And  truly,  very  piteous  is  he r  lot — 

Chain'd  to  a  log  within  a  narrow  spot 

Where  the  close-eaten  grass  is  scarcely  seen, 

While  sweet  around  her  waves  the  tempting  green ! 

Poor  Ass !  thy  master  should  have  learnt  to  show 

Pity — best  taught  by  fellowship  of  woe ! 

For  much  I  fear  me  that  he  lives  like  thee, 

Half  famish'd  in  a  land  of  luxury ! 

How  askingly  its  footsteps  hither  bend  ? 

It  seems  to  say,  "  And  have  I  then  one  friend  ?" 

Innocent  Foal !  thou  poor  despised  forlorn ! 

I  hail  thee  brother — spite  of  the  fool's  scorn ! 

And  fain  would  take  thee  with  me,  in  the  dell 

Of  peace  and  mild  equality  to  dwell, 

Where  Toil  shall  call  the  charmer  Health  his  Bride, 

And  Laughter  tickle  Plenty's  ribless  side ! 

How  thou  wouldst  toss  thy  heels  in  gamesome  play, 

And  frisk  about,  as  lamb  or  kitten  gay ! 

Yea !  and  more  musically  sweet  to  me 

Thy  dissonant  harsh  bray  of  joy  would  be, 

Than  warbled  melodies  that  soothe  to  rest 

The  aching  of  pale  fashion's  vacant  breast ! 


DOMESTIC  PEACE. 

Tell  me,  on  what  holy  ground 
May  Domestic  Peace  be  found  ? 
Halcyon  Daughter  of  the  skies, 
Far  on  fearful  wings  she  flies. 


From  die  pomp  of  sceptred  state, 
From  the  rebel's  noisy  hate. 
In  a  cottaged  vale  She  dwells 
Listening  to  the  Sabbath  bells ' 
Still  around  her  steps  are  seen 
Spotless  Honor's  meeker  mien, 
Love,  the  sire  of  pleasing  fears, 
Sorrow  smiling  through  her  tears, 
And,  conscious  of  the  past  employ, 
Memory,  bosom-spring  of  joy 


THE  SIGH. 

When  Youth  his  faery  reign  began 
Ere  sorrow  had  proclaim'd  me  man ; 
While  Peace  the  present  hour  beguiled, 
And  all  the  lovely  prospect  smiled ; 
Then,  Mary !  'mid  my  lightsome  glee 
I  heaved  the  painless  Sigh  for  thee. 

And  when,  along  the  waves  of  woe, 
My  harass'd  heart  was  doom'd  to  know 
The  frantic  burst  of  outrage  keen, 
And  the  slow  pang  that  gnaws  unseen ; 
Then  shipwreck'd  on  life's  stormy  sea, 
I  heaved  an  anguish'd  Sigh  for  thee  ! 

But  soon  reflection's  power  impress'd 
A  stiller  sadness  on  my  breast  ; 
And  sickly  hope  with  waning  eye 
Was  well  content  to  droop  and  die : 
I  yielded  to  the  stern  decree, 
Yet  heaved  a  languid  Sigh  for  thee ! 

And  though  in  distant  climes  to  roam, 
A  wanderer  from  my  native  home, 
I  fain  would  soothe  the  sense  of  Care 
And  lull  to  sleep  the  Joys  that  were ! 
Thy  Image  may  not  banish'd  be — 
Still,  Mary !  still  I  sigh  for  thee. 
June,  1794. 


EPITAPH  ON  AN  INFANT. 

Ere  Sin  could  blight  or  Sorrow  fade, 
Death  came  with  friendly  care  ; 

The  opening  bud  to  Heaven  convey'd, 
And  bade  it  blossom  there. 


LINES  WRITTEN  AT  THE  KING'S  ARMS 
ROSS. 

FORMERLY  THE  HOUSE  OF  THE  "  MAN  OF  ROSS." 

Richer  than  miser  o'er  his  countless  hoards, 

Nobler  than  kings,  or  king-polluted  lords, 

Here  dwelt  the  man  of  Ross !  O  Traveller,  hear ! 

Departed  merit  claims  a  reverent  tear. 

Friend  to  the  friendless,  to  the  sick  man  health, 

With  generous  joy  he  view'd  his  modest  wealth ; 

He  hears  the   widow's  heaven-breath'd    prayer  of 

praise, 
He  mark'd  the  shelter'd  orphan's  tearful  gaze, 
Or  where  the  sorrow-shrivell'd  captive  lay, 
Pours  the  bright  blaze  of  Freedom's  noontide  ray. 
j  Beneath  this  roof  if  thy  cheer'd  moments  pass, 
Fill  10  the  good  man's  name  one  gratelul  glass. 
IT 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


To  higher  zest  shall  Memory  wake  thy  soul, 
And  Virtue  mingle  in  the  ennobled  bowl. 
But  if,  like  me,  through  life's  distressful  scene, 
Lonely  and  sad,  thy  pilgrimage  hath  been  ; 
And  if  thy  breast  with  heart-sick  anguish  fraught, 
Thou  journeyest  onward  tempest-toss'd  in  thought ; 
Here  cheat  thy  cares !  in  generous  visions  melt, 
And  dream  of  goodness,  thou  hast  never  felt ! 


LINES  TO  A  BEAUTIFUL  SPRING  IN  A 
VILLAGE. 

Once  more,  sweet  Stream !  with  slow  foot  wander- 
ing near, 
I  bless  thy  milky  waters  cold  and  clear. 
Escaped  the  flashing  of  the  noontide  hours 
With  one  fresh  garland  of  Pierian  flowers 
(Ere  from  thy  zephyr-haunted  brink  I  turn) 
My  languid  hand  shall  wreath  thy  mossy  urn. 
For  not  through  pathless  grove  with  murmur  rude 
Thou  soothest  the  sad  wood-nymph,  Solitude ; 
Nor  thine  unseen  in  cavern  depths  to  well, 
The  Hermit-fountain  of  some  dripping  cell ! 
Pride  of  the  Vale !  thy  useful  streams  supply 
The  scatter'd  cots  and  peaceful  hamlet  nigh. 
The  elfin  tribe  around  thy  friendly  banks 
With  infant  uproar  and  soul-soothing  pranks, 
Released  from  school,  their  little  hearts  at  rest, 
Launch  paper  navies  on  thy  waveless  breast. 
The  rustic  here  at  eve  with  pensive  look 
Whistling  lorn  ditties  leans  upon  his  crook, 
Or,  starting,  pauses  with  hope-mingled  dread 
To  list  the  much-loved  maid's  accustom'd  tread  : 
She,  vainly  mindful  of  her  dame's  command, 
Loiters,  the  long-fill'd  pitcher  in  her  hand. 
Unboastful  Stream !  thy  fount  with  pebbled  falls 
The  faded  form  of  past  delight  recalls, 
What  time  the  morning  sun  of  Hope  arose, 
And  all  was  joy ;  save  when  another's  woes 
A  transient  gloom  upon  my  soul  imprest, 
Like  passing  clouds  impictured  on  thy  breast. 
Life's  current  then  ran  sparkling  to  the  noon, 
Or  silvery  stole  beneath  the  pensive  Moon : 
Ah !  now  it  works  rude  brakes  and  thorns  among, 
Or  o'er  the  rough  rock  bursts  and  foams  along  ! 


LINES  ON  A  FRIEND, 

WHO  DIED  OF  A  FRENZY    FEVER    INDUCED    BY  CALUM- 
NIOUS REPORTS. 

Edmund!  thy  grave  with  aching  eye  I  scan, 

And  inly  groan  for  Heaven's  poor  outcast — Man ! 

'T  is  tempest  all  or  gloom :  in  early  youth, 

If  gifted  with  the  Iihuriel  lance  of  Truth, 

We  force  to  start  amid  her  feign'd  caress 

Vice,  siren-hag !  in  native  ugliness  ; 

A  brother's  fate  will  haply  rouse  the  tear, 

And  on  we  go  in  heaviness  and  fear ! 

But  if  our  fond  hearts  call  to  Pleasure's  bower 

Some  pigmy  FoV.y  in  a  careless  hour, 

The  faithless  guest  shall  stamp  the  enchanted  ground 

And  mingled  forms  of  Misery  rise  around : 

Heart-fretting  Feor,  with  pallid  look  aghast, 

That  courts  the  future  woe  to  hide  the  past ; 


Remorse,  the  poison'd  arrow  in  his  side, 

And  loud  lewd  Mirth,  to  anguish  close  allied : 

Till  Frenzy,  fierce-eyed  child  of  moping  pain, 

Darts  her  hot  lightning  flash  athwart  the  brain. 

Rest,  injured  shade !  Shall  Slander  squatting  near 

Spit  her  cold  venom  in  a  dead  Man's  ear  ? 

'Twas  thine  to  feel  the  sympathetic  glow 

In  Merit's  joy,  and  Poverty's  meek  woe  ; 

Thine  all  that  cheer  the  moment  as  it  flies. 

The  zoneless  Cares,  and  smiling  Courtesies. 

Nursed  in  thy  heart  the  firmer  Virtues  grew, 

And  in  thy  heart  they  wither'd  !  Such  chill  dew 

Wan  indolence  on  each  young  blossom  shed  ; 

And  Vanity  her  filmy  net-work  spread, 

With  eye  that  roll'd  around,  in  asking  gaze, 

And  tongue  that  traffick'd  in  the  trade  of  praise. 

Thy  follies  such !  the  hard  world  mark'd  them  well 

Were  they  more  wise,  the  proud  who  never  fell  ? 

Rest,  injur'd  shade!  the  poor  man's  grateful  prayer 

On  heavenward  wing  thy  wounded  soul  shall  bear 

As  oft  at  twilight  gloom  thy  grave  I  pass, 

And  sit  me  down  upon  its  recent  grass, 

With  introverted  eye  I  contemplate 

Similitude  of  soul,  perhaps  of — Fate  ! 

To  me  hath  Heaven  with  bounteous  hand  assign'd 

Energic  Reason  and  a  shaping  mind, 

The  daring  ken  of  Truth,  the  Patriot's  part, 

And  Pity's  sigh,  that  breathes  the  gentle  heart. 

Sloth-jaundic'd  all !  and  from  my  graspless  hand 

Drop  Friendships   precious   pearls,   like   hour-glass 

sand. 
I  weep,  yet  stoop  not !  the  faint  anguish  flows, 
A  dreamy  pang  in  Morning's  feverish  doze. 

Is  this  piled  earth  our  being's  passless  mound  1 
Tell  me,  cold  grave !  is  Death  with  poppies  crown'd 
Tired  sentinel !  'mid  fitful  starts  I  nod, 
And  fain  would  sleep,  though  pillow'd  on  a  clod ! 


TO  A  YOUNG  LADY,  WITH  A  POEM  ON 
THE  FRENCH  REVOLUTION. 

Much  on  my  early  youth  I  love  to  dwell, 
Ere  yet  I  bade  that  friendly  dome  farewell. 
Where  first,  beneath  the  echoing  cloisters  pale, 
I  heard  of  guilt  and  wonder'd  at  the  tale ! 
Yet  though  the  hours  flew  by  on  careless  wing, 
Full  heavily  of  Sorrow  would  I  sing. 
Aye  as  the  star  of  evening  flung  its  beam 
In  broken  radiance  on  the  wavy  stream, 
My  soul  amid  the  pensive  twilight  gloom 
Mourn'd  with  the  breeze,  O  Lee  Boo!*  o'er  thy  tomb 
Where'er  I  wander'd,  Pity  still  was  near, 
Breathed  from  the  heart  and  glisten'd  in  the  tear  ■ 
No  knell  that  toll'd,  but  fill'd  my  anxious  eye. 
And  suffering  Nature  wept  that  one  should  die  !t 

Thus  to  sad  sympathies  I  soothed  my  breast, 
Calm,  as  the  rainbow  in  the  weeping  West : 
When  slumbering  Freedom  roused  with  high  disdain. 
With  giant  fury  burst  her  triple  chain ! 


*  Lee  Boo,  the  son  of  Abba  Thule,  Prince  of  the  Pelew  Isl- 
ands, came  over  to  England  with  Captain  Wilson,  died  of  the 
small-pox,  and  is  buried  in  Greenwich  church-yard.— See  Keate's 
Jlccount. 

T  Southey's  Retrospoct. 

18 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


Fierce  on  her  front  the  blasting  Dog-star  glow'd  ; 
Her  banners,  like  a  midnight  meteor,  flovv'd ; 
Amid  the  yelling  of  the  storm-rent  skies ! 
She  came,  ami  scatter'd  battles  from  her  eyes! 
Then  Exultation  waked  the  patriot  fire, 
And  swept  with  wilder  hand  the  Alcffan  lyre  : 
Red  from  the  tvrant's  wound  I  shook  the  lance, 
And  strode  in  joy  the  reeking  plains  of  France  ! 

Fallen  is  the  oppressor,  friendless,  ghastly,  low, 
And  my  heart  aches,  though  Mercy  struck  the  blow. 
With  wearied  thought  once  more  I  seek  the  shade, 
Where  peaceful  Virtue  weaves  the  myrtle  braid. 
And  0 !  if  eyes  whose  holy  glances  roll, 
Swift  messengers,  and  eloquent  of  soul ; 
If  smiles  more  winning,  and  a  gentler  mien 
Than  the  love-wilder'd  Maniac's  brain  hath  seen 
Shaping  celestial  forms  in  vacant  air, 
If  these  demand  the  impassion'd  poet's  care — 
If  Mirth  and  soften'd  Sense  and  Wit  refined, 
The  blameless  features  of  a  lovely  mind  ; 
Then  haplv  shall  my  trembling  hand  assign 
No  fading  wreath  to  beauty's  saintly  shrine. 
Nor,  Sara !  thou  these  early  flowers  refuse — 
Ne'er  lurk'd  the  snake  beneath  their  simple  hues ; 
No  purple  bloom  the  child  of  nature  brings 
From  Flattery's  night-shade ;  as  he  feels,  he  sings. 
September,  1792. 


SONNET. 


Content,  as  random  Fancies  might  inspire, 
If  his  weak  harp  at  times,  or  lonely  lyre 
He  struck  with  desultory  hand,  and  drew 
Somo  soften'd  tones  to  Nature  not  untrue. 

Bowles. 


My  heart  has  thank'd  thee,  Bowles !  for  those  soft 

strains, 
Whose  sadness  soothes  me,  like  the  murmuring 
Of  wild-bees  in  the  sunny  showers  of  spring  ! 
For  hence  not  callous  to  the  mourner's  pains 
Through  youth's  gay  prime  and  thornless  path  I 

went : 
And  when  the  mightier  throes  of  man  began, 
And  drove  me  forth,  a  thought-bewilder'd  man ! 
Their  mild  and  manliest  melancholy  lent 
A  mingled  charm,  such  a»  the  pang  consign'd 
To  slumber,  though  the  big  tear  it  renew'd ; 
Bidding  a  strange  mysterious  Pleasure  brood 
Over  the  wavy  and  tumultuous  mind, 
As  the  gTeat  Spirit  erst  with  plastic  sweep 
Moved  on  the  darkness  of  the  unform'd  deep. 


SONNET. 

As  late  I  lay  in  slumber's  shadowy  vale, 
With  wetted  cheek  and  in  a  mourner's  guise, 
I  saw  the  sainted  form  of  Freedom  rise  : 
She  spake!  not  sadder  moans  the  autumnal  gale  — 
"  Great  Son  of  Genius !  sweet  to  me  thy  name, 
Ere  in  an  evil  hour  with  alter'd  voice 
Thou  badst  Oppression's  hireling  crew  rejoice, 
Blasting  with  wizard  spell  my  laurell'd  fame. 
Yet  never.  Burke  !  thou  drank'st  Corruption's  bowl ! 
The  stormy  Pity  and  the  cherish'd  lure 
C 


Of  Pomp,  and  proud  Precipitance  of  soul 
Wilder \1  with  meteor  fires.     Ah  spirit  pure  ' 
That  error's  mist  had  left  thy  purged  eye : 
So  might  I  clasp  thee  with  a  mother's  joy ! 


SONNET. 


Though  roused  by  that  dark  Vizir,  Riot  rude 
Have  driven  our  Priest  over  the  ocean  swell  • 
Though  Superstition  and  her  wolfish  brood 
Bay  his  mild  radiance,  impotent  and  fell ; 
Calm  in  his  halls  of  brightness  he  shall  dwell  ' 
For  lo  !  Religion  at  his  strong  behest 
Starts  with  mild  anger  from  the  Papal  spell. 
And  flings  to  earth  her  tinsel-glittering  vest. 
Her  mitred  state  and  cumbrous  pomp  unholy  : 
And  Justice  wakes  to  bid  the  Oppressor  wail. 
Insulting  aye  the  wrongs  of  patient  Folly : 
And  from  her  dark  retreat  by  Wisdom  won, 
Meek  Nature  slowly  lifts  her  matron  veil 
To  smile  with  fondness  on  her  gazing  son ! 


SONNET. 

When  British  Freedom  for  a  happier  land 

Spread  her  broad  wings,  that  flutter'd  with  affright, 

Erskine  !  thy  voice  she  heard,  and  paused  her  flisrbl 

Sublime  of  hope !  For  dreadless  thou  didst  stand 

(Thy  censer  glowing  with  the  hallovv'd  flame  j 

A  hireless  Priest  before  the  insulted  shrine, 

And  at  her  altar  pour  the  stream  divine 

Of  unmatch'd  eloquence.     Therefore  thy  name 

Her  sons  shall  venerate,  and  cheer  thy  breast 

With  blessings  heavenward  breathed.      And  when 

the  doom 
Of  Nature  bids  thee  die,  beyond  the  tomb 
Thy  light  shall  shine  :  as  sunk,  beneath  the  West. 
Though  the  great  Summer  Sun  eludes  our  gaze. 
Still  burns  wide  Heaven  with  his  distended  blaze. 


SONNET. 

It  was  some  Spirit,  Sheridan  !  that  breathed 

O'er  thy  young  mind  such  wildly  various  power ! 

My  soul  hath  mark'd  thee  in  her  shaping  hour, 

Thy  temples  with  Hymettian  flow'rets  WTeathetT: 

And  sweet  thy  voice,  as  when  o'er  Laura's  bier 

Sad  music  trembled  through  Vauclusa's  glado; 

Sweet,  as  at  dawn  the  lovelorn  serenade 

That  wafts  soft  dreams  to  Slumber's  listening  <K7 

Now  patriot  rage  and  indignation  high 

Swell   the  full   tones !    And  now  thine    eye-bean.;- 

dance 
Meaning  of  Scorn  and  Wit's  quaint  revelry ! 
Writhes  inly  from  the  bosom-probing  glance 
The  Apostate  by  the  brainless  rout  adored, 
As  erst  that  elder  fiend  beneath  great  Michael's  sword 


SONNET. 


0  what  a  loud  and  fearful  shriek  was  there, 
As  though  a  thousand  souls  one  death-groan  poirr'd 
Ah  me  !  they  view'd  beneath  a  hireling's  swok! 
Fallen  Kosciusko!  Through  the  borfhen'd  a;r 
19 


10 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


(As  pauses  the  tired  Cossack's  barbarous  yell 

Of  triumph)  on  the  chill  and  midnight  gale 

Rises  with  frantic  burst  or  sadder  swell 

The  dirge  of  murder'd  Hope !  while  Freedom  pale 

Bends  in  such  anguish  o'er  her  destined  bier, 

As  if  from  eldest  time  some  Spirit  meek 

Had  gather'd  in  a  mystic  urn  each  tear 

That  ever  on  a  Patriot's  furrow'd  cheek 

Fit  channel  found ;  and  she  had  drain'd  the  bowl 

In  the  mere  wilfulness,  and  sick  despair  of  soul ! 


SONNET. 

As  when  far  off  the  warbled  strains  are  heard 
That  soar  on  Morning's  wing  the  vales  among, 
Within  his  cage  the  imprison'd  matin  bird 
Swells  the  full  chorus  with  a  generous  song : 
He  bathes  no  pinion  in  the  dewy  light, 
No  Father's  joy,  no  Lover's  bliss  he  shares, 
Yet  still  the  rising  radiance  cheers  his  sight ; 
His  Fellows'  freedom  soothes  the  Captive's  cares : 
Thou,  Fayette!  who  didst  wake  with  startling  voice 
Life's  better  sun  from  that  long  wintry  night, 
Thus  in  thy  Country's  triumphs  shalt  rejoice, 
And  mock  with  raptures  high  the  dungeon's  might: 
For  lo !  the  morning  struggles  into  day, 
And  Slavery's  spectres  shriek  and  vanish  from  the 
ray! 


SONNET. 

Thou  gentle  Look,  that  didst  my  soul  beguile, 
Why  hast  thou  left  me  ?  Still  in  some  fond  dream 
Revisit  my  sad  heart,  auspicious  Smile ! 
As  falls  on  closing  flowers  the  lunar  beam : 
What  time,  in  sickly  mood,  at  parting  day 
I  lay  me  down  and  think  of  happier  years; 
Of  joys,  that  glimmer'd  in  Hope's  twilight  ray, 
Then  left  me  darkling  in  a  vale  of  tears. 
O  pleasant  days  of  Hope — for  ever  gone ! 
Could  I  recall  you ! — But  that  thought  is  vain. 
Availeth  not  Persuasion's  sweetest  tone 
To  lure  the  fleet- wing'd  travellers  back  again: 
Yet  fair,  though  faint,  their  images  shall  gleam 
Like  the  bright  rainbow  on  a  willowy  stream. 


SONNET. 

Pale  Roamer  through  the  Night;  thou  poor  Forlorn! 
Remorse  that  man  on  his  death-bed  possess, 
Who  in  the  credulous  hour  of  tenderness 
Betray'd,  then  cast  thee  forth  to  Want  and  Scorn! 
The  world  is  pitiless:  the  Chaste  one's  pride, 
Mimic  of  Virtue,  scowls  on  thy  distress: 
Thy  loves  and  they,  that  envied  thee,  deride  : 
And  Vice  alone  will  shelter  wretchedness! 
O!  I  am  sad  to  think,  that  there  should  be 
Cold-bosom'd  lewd  ones,  who  endure  to  place 
Foul  offerings  on  the  shrine  of  Misery, 
And  force  from  Famine  the  caress  of  Love , 
May  He  shed  healing  on  the  sore  disgrace, 
He,  the  great  Comforter  that  rules  above ! 


SONNET. 

Sweet  Mercy  !  how  my  very  heart  has  bled 
To  see  thee,  poor  Old  Man !  and  thy  gray  hairs 
Hoar  with  the  snowy  blast:  while  no  one  cares 
To  clothe  thy  shrivell'd  limbs  and  palsied  head. 
My  Father!  throw  away  this  tatter'd  vest 
That  mocks  thy  shivering!  take  my  garment — use 
A  young  man's  arm!  I'll  melt  these  frozen  dews 
That  hang  from  thy  white  beard  and  numb  thy  breast. , 
My  Sara  too  shall  tend  thee,  like  a  Child : 
And  thou  shalt  talk,  in  our  fire-side's  recess, 
Of  purple  Pride,  that  scowls  on  Wretchedness. 
He  did  not  so,  the  Galileean  mild, 
Who  met  the  Lazars  turn'd  from  rich  men's  doors, 
And  call'd  them  Friends,  and  heal'd  their  noisome 
Sores ! 


SONNET. 

Thou  bleedest,  my  poor  Heart !  and  thy  distress 
Reasoning  1  ponder  with  a  scornful  smile, 
And  probe  thy  sore  wound  sternly,  though  the  while 
Swoln  be  mine  eye  and  dim  with  heaviness. 
Why  didst  tnou  listen  to  Hope's  whisper  bland  ? 
Or,  listening,  why  forget  the  healing  tale, 
When  Jealousy  with  feverish  fancies  pale 
Jarr'd  thy  fine  fibres  with  a  maniac's  hand? 
Faint  was  that  Hope,  and  rayless! — Yet  'twas  fair 
And  soothed  with  many  a  dream  the  hour  of  rest: 
Thou  shouldst  have  loved  it  most,  when  most  opprest 
And  nursed  it  with  an  agony  of  Care, 
Even  as  a  Mother  her  sweet  infant  heir 
That  wan  and  sickly  droops  upon  her  breast ! 


SONNET. 

TO    THE    AUTHOR    OF    THE   "  ROBBERS." 

Schiller!  that  hour  I  would  have  wished  to  die, 
If  through  the  shuddering  midnight  I  had  sent 
From  the  dark  dungeon  of  the  tower  time-rent 
That  fearful  voice,  a  famish'd  Father's  cry — 
Lest  in  some  after  moment  aught  more  mean 
Might  stamp  me  mortal!  A  triumphant  shout 
Black  Horror  scream'd,  and  all  her  goblin  rout 
Diminish'd  shrunk  from  the  more  withering  scene! 
Ah  Bard  tremendous  in  sublimity! 
Could  I  behold  thee  in  thy  loftier  mood 
Wandering  at  eve  with  finely  frenzied  eye 
Beneath  some  vast  old  tempest-swinging  wood ! 
Awhile  with  mute  awe  gazing  I  would  brood : 
Then  weep  aloud  in  a  wild  ecstasy! 


LINES 

COMPOSED   WHILE    CLIMBING    THE    LEFT    ASCENT    OF 
BROCKLEY  COOMB,  SOMERSETSHIRE,  MAY,  1795. 

With  many  a  pause  and  oft-reverted  eye 
I  climb  the  Coomb's  ascent :  sweet  songsters  near 
Warble  in  shade  their  wild- wood  melody : 
Far  off  the  unvarying  Cuckoo  soothes  my  ear. 
Up  scour  the  startling  stragglers  of  the  Flock 
That  on  green  plots  o'er  precipices  browse : 
From  the  forced  fissures  of  the  naked  rock 
The  Yew-tree  bursts!  Beneath  its  dark-green  boughs 
20 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


li 


('Mid  which  the  May-thorn  blends  its  blossoms  white) 
Where  broad  smooth  stones  jut  out  in  mossy  seats, 
T  rest : — and  now  have  gain'd  the  topmost  site. 
Ah  !  what  a  luxury  of  landscape  meets 
My  gaze  !  Proud  Towers,  and  Cots  more  dear  to  me, 
Elm-shadow'd  Fields,  and  prospect-bounding  Sea  ! 
Deep  sighs  my  lonely  heart    I  drop  tho  tear : 
Enchanting  spot !  O  were  my  Sara  here ! 


LINES 

IN   THE   MANNER    OF   SPENSER. 

0  Peace  !  that  on  a  lilied  bank  dost  love 
To  rest  thine  head  beneath  an  Olive  Tree, 

1  would,  that  from  the  pinions  of  thy  Dove 
One  quill  withouten  pain  ypluck'd  might  be  ! 
For  0  !  I  wish  my  Sara's  frowns  to  flee, 
And  fain  to  her  some  soothing  song  would  write, 
Lest  she  resent  my  rude  discourtesy, 
Who  vow'd  to  meet  her  ere  the  morning  light, 
But  broke  my  plighted  word — ah!  false  and  recreant 

wight ! 

Last  night  as  I  my  weary  head  did  pillow 
With  thoughts  of  my  dissever'd  Fair  engross'd, 
Chill  Fancy  droop'd  wreathing  herself  with  willow, 
As  though  my  breast  entomb'd  a  pining  ghost. 
"  From  some  blest  couch,  young  Rapture's  bridal 

boast, 
Rejected  Slumber !  hither  wing  thy  way  ; 
But  leave  me  with  the  matin  hour,  at  most ! 
As  night-closed  Floweret  to  the  orient  ray, 
My  sad  heart  will  expand,  when  I  the  Maid  survey." 

But  Love,  who  heard  the  silence  of  my  thought, 
Contrived  a  too  successful  wile,  I  ween : 
And  whisper'd  to  himself,  with  malice  fraught — 
"  Too  long  our  Slave  the  Damsel's  smiles  hath  seen  : 
To-morrow  shall  he  ken  her  alter'd  mien !" 
He  spake,  and  ambush'd  lay,  till  on  my  bed 
The  morning  shot  her  dewy  glances  keen, 
When  as  I  'gan  to  lift  my  drowsy  head — 
"  Now,  Bard  !  I  '11  work  thee  woe ! "  the  laughing 
Elfin  said. 

Sleep,  softly-breathing  God  !  his  downy  wing 
Was  fluttering  now,  as  quickly  to  depart ; 
When  twang'd  an  arrow  from  Love's  mystic  string, 
With  pathless  wound  it  pierced  him  to  the  heart. 
Was  there  some  magic  in  the  Elfin's  dart  ? 
Or  did  he  strike  my  couch  with  wizard  lance  ? 
For  straight  so  fair  a  Form  did  upwards  start 
(No  fairer  deck'd  the  Bowers  of  old  Romance) 
That  Sleep  enamour'd  grew,  nor  moved  from  his 
sweet  trance ! 

My  Sara  came,  with  gentlest  look  divine  ; 

Bright  shone  her  eye,  yet  tender  was  its  beam : 

I  felt  the  pressure  of  her  lip  to  mine ! 

Whispering  we  went,  and  Love  was  all  our  theme — 

Love  pure  and  spotless,  as  at  first,  I  deem, 

He  sprang  from  Heaven !  Such  joys  with  Sleep  did 

'bide, 
That  I  the  living  Image  of  my  Dream 
Fondly  forgot.    Too  late  I  woke,  and  sigh'd — 
'  O !  how  shall  I  behold  my  Love  at  eventide  ! ' 


IMITATED  FROM  OSSIAN. 

The  stream  with  languid  murmur  creeps, 

In  Lumin's  flowery  vale : 
Beneath  the  dew  the  Lily  weeps, 

Slow-waving  to  the  gale. 

"  Cease,  restless  gale  ! "  it  seems  to  say, 
"  Nor  wake  me  with  thy  sighing ! 

The  honors  of  my  vernal  day 
On  rapid  wing  are  flying. 

"  To-morrow  shall  the  Traveller  come 
Who  late  beheld  me  blooming : 

His  searching  eye  shall  vainly  roam 
The  dreary  vale  of  Lumin." 

With  eager  gaze  and  wetted  cheek 
My  wonted  haunts  along, 

Thus,  faithful  Maiden !  thou  shalt  seek 
The  Youth  of  simplest  song. 

But  I  along  the  breeze  shall  roll 
The  voice  of  feeble  power; 

And  dwell,  the  moon-beam  of  thy  soul, 
In  Slumber's  nightly  hour. 


THE  COMPLAINT  OF  NINATHOMA 

How  long  will  ye  round  me  be  swelling, 

O  ye  blue-tumbling  waves  of  the  Sea  ? 
Not  always  in  Caves  was  my  dwelling, 

Nor  beneath  the  cold  blast  of  the  Tree. 
Through  the  high-sounding  halls  of  Cathloma 

In  the  steps  of  my  beauty  I  stray'd ; 
The  Warriors  beheld  Ninathoma, 

And  they  blessed  the  white-bosom'd  Maid ! 

A  Ghost !  by  my  cavern  it  darted  ! 

In  moon-beams  the  Spirit  was  drest — 
For  lovely  appear  the  departed 

When  they  visit  the  dreams  of  my  rest ! 
But,  disturb'd  by  the  Tempest's  commotion, 

Fleet  the  shadowy  forms  of  Delight — 
Ah  cease,  thou  shrill  blast  of  the  Ocean ! 

To  howl  through  my  Cavern  by  Night 


IMITATED  FROM  THE  WELSH 

If,  while  my  passion  I  impart, 
You  deem  my  words  untrue, 

O  place  your  hand  upon  my  heart — 
Feel  how  it  throbs  for  you  ! 

Ah  no  !  reject  the  thoughtless  claim, 

In  pity  to  your  lover ! 
That  thrilling  touch  would  aid  the  flame 

It  wishes  to  discover. 


TO  AN  INFANT. 

Ah  cease  thy  tears  and  Sobs,  my  little  Life  ' 
I  did  but  snatch  away  the  unclasp'd  Knife  : 
Some  safer  Toy  will  soon  arrest  thine  eye, 
And  to  quick  Laughter  change  this  peevish  *  y  I 
21 


12 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Poor  Stumbler  on  the  rocky  coast  of  Woe, 
Tutor'd  by  Pain  each  source  of  Pain  to  know ! 
Alike  the  foodful  fruit  and  scorching  fire 
Awake  thy  eager  grasp  and  young  desire  ; 
Alike  the  Good,  the  111  offend  thy  sight, 
And  rouse  the  stormy  sense  of  shrill  affright! 
Untaught,  yet  wise!  'mid  all  thy  brief  alarms 
Thou  closely  clingest  to  thy  Mother's  arms, 
Nestling  thy  little  face  in  that  fond  breast 
Whose  anxious  heavings  lull  thee  to  thy  rest ! 
Man's  breathing  Miniature !  thou  makest  me  sigh — 
A  Babe  art  thou — and  such  a  thing  am  I ! 
To  anger  rapid  and  as  soon  appeased, 
For  trifles  mourning  and  by  triiles  pleased, 
Break  Friendship's  Mirror  with  a  techy  blow, 
Vet  snatch  what  coals  of  fire  on  Pleasure's  altar 
glow ! 

O  thou  that  rearest  with  celestial  aim 

The  future  Seraph  in  my  mortal  frame, 

Thrice-holy  Faith !  whatever  thorns  I  meet 

As  on  I  totter  with  unpractised  feet, 

Still  let  me  stretch  my  arms  and  cling  to  thee, 

Meek  Nurse  of  Souls  through  their  long  Infancy ! 


LINES 


WRITTEN  AT  SHURTON  BARS,  NEAR  BRIDGEWATER, 
SEPTEMBER,  1795,  IN  ANSWER  TO  A  LETTER 
FROM    BRISTOL. 


Good  verse  most  good,  and  bad  verse  then  seems  better 

Received  from  absent  friend  by  way  of  Letter. 

For  what  so  sweet  can  labor'd  lays  impart 

As  one  rude  rhyme  warm  from  a  friendly  heart? 

Anon. 


Nor  travels  my  meandering  eye 
The  starry  wilderness  on  high  ; 

Nor  now  with  curious  sight 
I  mark  the  glow-worm,  as  I  pass, 
Move  with  "  green  radiance  "  through  the  grass, 

An  emerald  of  light. 

0  ever  present  to  my  view  ! 
My  wafted  spirit  is  with  you, 

And  soothes  your  boding  fears  : 

1  see  you  all  oppress'd  with  gloom 
Sit  lonely  in  that  cheerless  room — 

Ah  me  !  You  are  in  tears  ! 

Beloved  Woman  !  did  you  fly 

Chill'd  Friendship's  dark  disliking  eye, 

Or  Mirth's  untimely  din  ? 
With  cruel  weight  these  trifies  press 
A  temper  sore  with  tenderness, 

When  aches  the  void  within. 

But  why  with  sable  wand  unbless'd 
Should  Fancy  rouse  within  my  breast 

Dim-visaged  shapes  of  Dread  ? 
Untenanting  its  beauteous  clay 
My  Sara's  soul  has  wing'd  its  way, 

And  hovers  round  my  head  ! 

[  felt  it  prompt  the  tender  Dream, 
When  slowly  sunk  the  day's  last  gleam ; 


You  roused  each  gentler  sense 
As,  sighing  o'er  the  Blossom's  bloom, 
Meek  Evening  wakes  its  soft  perfume 

With  viewless  influence. 

And  hark,  my  Love  !  The  sea-breeze  moans 
Through  yon  reft  house !  O'er  rolling  stones 

In  bold  ambitious  sweep, 
The  onward-surging  tides  supply 
The  silence  of  the  cloudless  sky 

With  mimic  thunders  deep. 

Dark  reddening  from  the  channell'd  Isle* 
(Where  stands  one  solitary  pile 

Unslated  by  the  blast) 
The  Watch-fire,  like  a  sullen  star 
Twinkles  to  many  a  dozing  Tar 

Rude   cradled  on  the  mast. 

Even  there — beneath  that  light-house  tower- 
In  the  tumultuous  evil  hour 

Ere  Peace  with  Sara  came, 
Time  was,  1  should  have  thought  it  sweet 
To  count  the  echoings  of  my  feet, 

And  watch  the  storm-vex'd  flame. 

And  there  in  black  soul-jaundiced  fit 
A  sad  gloom-pamper'd  Man  to  sit, 

And  listen  to  the  roar  : 
When  Mountain  Surges  bellowing  deep 
With  an  uncouth  monster  leap 

Plunged  foaming  on  the  shore. 

Then  by  the  Lighhiing's  blaze  to  mark 
Some  toiling  tempest-shatter'd  bark  ; 

Her  vain  distress-guns  hear ; 
And  when  a  second  sheet  of  light 
Flash'd  o'er  the  blackness  of  the  night — 

To  see  no  Vessel  there ! 

But  Fancy  now  more  gaily  sings  : 
Or  if  awhile  she  droop  her  wings. 

As  sky-larks  'mid  the  corn, 
On  summer  fields  she  grounds  her  breas'  : 
The  oblivious  Poppy  o'er  her  nest 

Nods,  till  returning  morn. 

O  mark  those  smiling  tears,  that  swell 
The  open'd  Rose  !  From  heaven  they  fell, 

And  with  the  sun-beam  blend. 
Bless'd  visitations  from  above, 
Such  are  the  tender  woes  of  Love 

Fostering  the  heart,  they  bend  ! 

When  stormy  Midnight  howling  round 
Beats  on  our  roof  with  clattering  sound, 

To  me  your  arms  you  '11  stretch  : 
Great  God  !  you  '11  say — To  us  so  kind, 
O  shelter  from  this  loud  bleak  wind 

The  houseless,  friendless  wretch ! 

The  tears  that  tremble  down  your  cheek. 
Shall  bathe  my  kisses  chaste  and  meek 


1  The  Holmes,  in  the  Bristol  Channel. 
22 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


13 


In  Pity's  dew  divine  ; 
And  from  your  heart  the  sighs  that  steal 
Shall  make  your  rising  bosom  feel 

The  answering  swell  of  mine  ! 

How  oft,  my  Love !  with  shapings  sweet 
I  paint  the  moment  we  shall  meet! 

With  eager  speed  I  dart — 
I  seize  you  in  the  vacant  air, 
And  fancy,  with  a  Husband's  care 

I  press  you  to  my  heart ! 

"T  is  said,  on  Summer's  evening  hour 
Flashes  the  golden-color'd  flower 

A  fair  electric  flame  : 
And  so  shall  flash  my  love-charged  eye 
When  all  the  heart's  big  ecstasy 

Shoots  rapid  through  the  frame ! 


LINES 

TO    A   FRIEND    IN   ANSWER    TO 
LETTER. 


A  MELANCHOLY 


Away,  those  cloudy  looks,  that  laboring  sigh, 
The  peevish  offspring  of  a  sickly  hour ! 
Nor  meanly  thus  complain  of  Fortune's  power, 
When  the  blind  Gamester  throws  a  luckless  die. 

Yon  setting  Sun  flashes  a  mournful  gleam 
Behind  those  broken  clouds,  his  stormy  train : 
To-morrow  shall  the  many-color'd  main 
In  brightness  roll  beneath  his  orient  beam ! 

Wild,  as  the  autumnal  gust,  the  hand  of  Time 
Flies  o'er  his  mystic  lyre :  in  shadowy  dance 
The  alternate  groups  of  Joy  and  Grief  advance. 
Responsive  to  his  varying  strains  sublime ! 

Bears  on  its  wing  each  hour  a  load  of  Fate  ; 
The  swain,  who,  lull'd  by  Seine's  mild  murmurs,  led 
His  weary  oxen  to  their  nightly  shed, 
To-day  may  rule  a  tempest-troubled  State. 

Nor  shall  not  Fortune  with  a  vengeful  smile 
Survey  the  sanguinary  Despot's  might, 
And  haply  hurl  the  Pageant  from  his  height, 
Unwept  to  wander  in  some  savage  isle. 

There,  shiv'ring  sad  beneath  the  tempest's  frown, 
Round  his  tir'd  limbs  to  wrap  the  purple  vest ; 
And  mix'd  with  nails  and  beads,  an  equal  jest! 
Barter,  for  food,  the  jewels  of  his  crown. 


\  RELIGIOUS  MUSINGS; 

A  DESULTORY  POEM, 
WRITTEN    ON   THE    CHRISTMAS    EVE    OF    1794. 

This  is  the  time,  when  most  divine  to  hear, 

The  voice  of  Adoration  rouses  me, 

As  with  a  Cherub's  trump :  and  high  upborne, 

Yea,  mingling  with  the  Choir,  I  seem  to  view 

The  vision  of  the  heavenly  multitude, 

Who  bvmn'd  the  song  of  Peace  o'er  Bethlehem's 

fields! 
Yet  thou  more  bright  than  all  the  Angel  blaze, 
That  harbinger'd  thy  birih,  Thou,  Man  of  Woes  ! 
C2 


Despised  Galilccan !  For  the  Great 
Invisible  (by  symbols  only  seen) 
With  a  peculiar  and  surpassing  light 
Shines  from  the  visage  of  the  oppress'd  good  Man 
When  heedless  of  himself  the  scourged  Saint 
Mourns  lor  the  Oppressor.    Fair  the  vernal  Mead, 
Fair  the  high  Grove,  the  Sea,  the  Sun,  the  Stars ; 
True  impress  each  of  their  creating  Sire ! 
Yet  nor  high  Grove,  nor  many-color'd  Mead, 
Nor  the  green  Ocean  with  his  thousand  Isles, 
j\or  the  starr'd  Azure,  nor  the  sovran  Sun, 
E  'er  with  such  majesty  of  portraiture 
Imaged  the  supreme  beauty  uncreate, 
As  thou,  meek  Savior !  at  the  fearful  hour 
When  thy  insulted  Anguish  wing'd  the  prayer 
Harp'd  by  Archangels,  when  they  sing  of  Mercy ! 
Which  when  the   Almighty  heard  from  fortli   liis 

Throne, 
Diviner  light  fill'd  Heaven  with  ecstasy  ! 
Heaven's  hymnings  paused     and  Hell  her  yawning 

mouth 
Closed  a  brief  moment. 

Lo\ely  was  the  death 
Of  Him  whose  life  was  love !  Holy  with  power 
He  on  the  thought-benighted  sceptic  beam'd 
Manifest  Godhead,  melting  into  day 
What  floating  misls  of  dark  Idolatry 
Broke  and  misshaped  the  Omnipresent  Sire  : 
And  first  by  Fear  uncharm'd  the  drowsed  Soul.* 
Till  of  its  nobler  nature  it  'gan  feel 
Dim  recollections  :  and  thence  soar'd  to  Hope, 
Strong  to  believe  whate'er  of  mystic  good 
The  Eternal  dooms  for  his  immortal  Sons. 
From  Hope  and  firmer  Faith  to  perfect  Love 
Attracted  and  absorb'd :  and  centred  there 
God  only  to  behold,  and  know,  and  feel, 
Till  by  exclusive  Consciousness  of  God 
All  self-annihilated  it  shall  make 
God  its  Identity .-  God  all  in  all ! 
We  and  our  Father  one  ! 

And  bless'd  are  they, 
Who  in  this  fleshly  World,  the  elect  of  Heaven, 
Their  strong  eye  darting  through  the  deeds  of  Men, 
Adore  with  stedfast  unpresuming  gaze 
Him  Nature's  Essence,  Mind,  and  Energy ! 
And  gazing,  trembling,  patiently  ascend 
Treading  beneath  their  feet  all  visible  things 
As  steps,  that  upward  to  their  Father's  Throne 
Lead  gradual — else  nor  glorified  nor  loved. 
They  nor  Contempt  embosom  nor  Revenge  . 
For  they  dare  know  of  what  may  seem  deform 
The  Supreme  Fair  sole  Operant :  in  whose  sight 
All  things  are  pure,  his  strong  controlling  Love 
Alike  from  all  educing  perfect  good. 
Theirs  too  celestial  courage,  inly  arm'd — 
Dwarfing  Earth's  giant  brood,  what  time  they  muse 
On  their  great  Father,  great  beyond  compare  ! 
And  marching  onwards  view  high  o'er  their  heads 
His  waving  Banners  of  Omnipotence. 

Who  the  Creator  love,  created  might 

Dread  not :  within  their  tents  no  terrors  walk. 


*  To  T$ot]tov  iirjpriKaaiv  a;  rroXXwv 
Ocwv  tiioTrjTas- 

Damas.  de  Myst.  ALg^.l. 

23 


14 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


For  they  are  holy  things  before  the  Lord, 

Aye  unprofaned,  though  Earth  should  league  with 

Hell ; 
God's  Altar  grasping  with  an  eager  hand, 
Fear,  the  wtld-visaged,  pale,  eye-starting  wretch, 
Sure-refuged  hears  his  hot  pursuing  fiends 
\rell  at  vain  distance.    Soon  refreshed  from  Heaven, 
He  calms  the  throb  and  tempest  of  his  heart. 
His  countenance  settles  ;  a  soft  solemn  bliss 
Swims  in  his  eye — his  swimming  eye  upraised  : 
And  Faith's  whole  armor  glitters  on  his  limbs! 
And  thus  transfigured  with  a  dread  less  awe, 
A  solemn  hush  of  soul,  meek  he  beholds 
All  things  of  terrible  seeming :  yea,  unmoved 
Views  e'en  the  immitigable  ministers 
That  shower  down  vengeance  on  these  latter  days. 
For  kindling  with  intenser  Deity 
From  the  celestial  Mercy-seat  they  come, 
And  at  the  renovating  Wells  of  Love 
Have  fill'd  their  Vials  with  salutary  Wrath, 
To  sickly  Nature  more  medicinal 
Than  what  soft  balm  the  weeping  good  man  pours 
!  nto  the  lone  despoiled  traveller's  wounds ! 

Thus  from  the  Elect,  regenerate  through  faith, 
Pass  the  dark  Passions  and  what  thirsty  Cares 
Drink  up  the  spirit  and  the  dim  regards 
Self-centre.    Lo  they  vanish !  or  acquire 
New  names,  new  features — by  supernal  grace 
Enrobed  with  light,  and  naturalized  in  Heaven. 
As  when  a  shepherd  on  a  vernal  morn 
Through  some  thick  fog  creeps  timorous  with  slow 

foot, 
Darkling  he  fixes  on  the  immediate  road 
His  downward  eye:  all  else  of  fairest  kind 
Hid  or  deform'd.    But  lo !  the  bursting  Sun ! 
Touch'd  by  the  enchantment  of  that  sudden  beam, 
Straight  the  black  vapor  melteth,  and  in  globes 
Of  dewy  glitter  gems  each  plant  and  tree  ; 
On  every  leaf,  on  every  blade  it  hangs ! 
Dance  glad  the  new-born  intermingling  rays, 
And  wide  around  the  landscape  streams  with  glory! 

There  is  one  Mind,  one  omnipresent  Mind, 

Omnific.    His  most  holy  name  is  Love. 

Truth  of  subliming  import !   with  the  which 

Who  feeds  and  saturates  his  constant  soul, 

He  from  his  small  particular  orbit  flies 

With  bless'd  outstarting !  From  Himself  he  flies, 

Stands  in  the  Sun,  and  with  no  partial  gaze 

Views  all  creation ;  and  he  loves  it  all, 

And  blesses  it,  and  calls  it  very  good  ! 

This  is  indeed  to  dwell  with  the  Most  High! 

Cherubs  and  rapture-trembling  Seraphim 

Can  press  no  nearer  to  the  Almighty's  Throne. 

But  that  we  roam  unconscious,  or  with  hearts 

Unfeeling  of  our  universal  Sire, 

And  that  in  his  vast  family  no  Cain 

Injures  uninjured  (in  her  best-aim'd  blow 

Victorious  Murder  a  blind  Suicide), 

Haply  for  this  some  younger  Angel  now 

Looks  down  on  Human  Nature :  and,  behold ! 

A  sea  of  blood  bestrew'd  with  wrecks,  where  mad 

Embattling  Interests  on  each  other  rush 

With  unhelm'd  rage  ! 

'T  is  the  sublime  of  man, 
Our  noontide  Majesty,  to  know  ourselves 


Parts  and  proportions  of  one  wondrous  whole ! 
This  fraternizes  Man,  this  constitutes 
Our  charities  and  bearings.    But  't  is  God 
Diffused  through  all,  that  doth  make  all  one  whole , 
This  the  worst  superstition,  him  except 
Aught  to  desire,  Supreme  Reality! 
The  plenitude  and  permanence  of  bliss ! 

0  Fiends  of  Superstition  !    not  that  oft 

The  erring  Priest  hath  stain'd  with  brother's  blood 
Your  grisly  idols,  not  for  this  may  wrath 
Thunder  against  you  from  the  Holy  One ! 
But  o'er  some  plain  that  steameth  to  the  sun, 
Peopled  with  Death  ;  or  where  more  hideous  Trade 
Loud-laughing  packs  his  bales  of  human  anguish  :• 

1  will  raise  up  a  mourning,  O  ye  Fiends  ! 

And  curse  your  spells,  that  film  the  eye  of  Faith, 

Hiding  the  present  God  ;  whose  presence  lost, 

The  moral  world's  cohesion,  we  become 

An  anarchy  of  Spirits  !  Toy-bewitch'd, 

Made  blind  by  lusts,  disherited  of  soul, 

No  common  centre  Man,  no  common  sire 

Knoweth  !  A  sordid  solitary  thing, 

'Mid  countless  brethren  with  a  lonely  heart 

Through  courts  and  cities  the  smooth  Savage  roams, 

Feeling  himself,  his  own  low  Self  the  whole  ; 

When  he  by  sacred  sympathy  might  make 

The  whole  one  Self!  Self  that  no  alien  knows! 

Self,  far  diffused  as  Fancy's  wing  can  travel ! 

Self,  spreading  still !  Oblivious  of  its  own, 

Yet  all  of  all  possessing!  This  is  Faith! 

This  the  Messiah's  deslin'd  victory  ! 

But  first  offences  needs  must  come !  Even  now* 

(Black  Hell  laughs  horrible — to  hear  the  scoff!) 

Thee  to  defend,  meek  Galilasan !  Thee 

And  thy  mild  laws  of  love  unutterable, 

Mistrust  and  Enmity  have  burst  the  bands 

Of  social  Peace  ;  and  listening  Treachery  lurks 

With  pious  Fraud  to  snare  a  brother's  life ; 

And  childless  widows  o'er  the  groaning  land 

Wail  numberless ;  and  orphans  weep  for  bread ; 

Thee  to  defend,  dear  Savior  of  Mankind  ! 

Thee,  Lamb  of  God  !    Thee,  blameless  Prince  of 

Peace ! 
From  all  sides  rush  the  thirsty  brood  of  War ! 
Austria,  and  that  foul  Woman  of  the  North, 
The  lustful  Murderess  of  her  wedded  Lord  ! 
And  he,  connatural  Mind  !  whom  (in  their  songs 
So  bards  of  elder  time  had  haply  feign'd) 
Some  Fury  fondled  in  her  hate  to  man, 
Bidding  her  serpent  hair  in  mazy  surge 
Lick  his  young  face,  and  at  his  mouth  inbreathe 
Horrible  sympathy  !  And  leagued  with  these 
Each  petty  German  princeling,  nursed  in  gore ! 
Soul-harden'd  barterers  of  human  blood  ! 


*  January  21st,  1794,  in  the  debate  on  the  Address  to  his 
Majesty,  on  the  speech  from  the  Throne,  the  Earl  of  Guild- 
ford moved  an  Amendment  to  the  following  effect: — "That 
the  House  hoped  his  Majesty  would  seize  the  earliest  oppor- 
tunity to  conclude  a  peace  with  France,"  etc.  This  motion 
was  opposed  by  the  Duke  of  Portland,  who  "  considered  the 
war  to  be  merely  grounded  on  one  principle — the  preservation 
of  the  Christian  Religion."  May  30th,  1794,  the  Duke  of 
Bedford  moved  a  number  of  Resolutions,  with  a  view  to  the 
Establishment  of  a  Peace  with  France.  He  was  opposed 
(among  others)  by  Lord  Abingdon  in  these  remarkable  words: 
"  The  best  road  to  Peace,  my  Lords,  is  War !  and  War  car- 
ried on  in  the  same  manner  in  which  we  are  taught  to  worship 
our  Creator,  namely,  with  all  our  souls,  and  with  all  our 
minds,  and  with  all  our  hearts,  and  with  all  our  strength." 
24 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


15 


Death's  prime  Slave -merchants !  Scorpion- whips  of 

Fate! 
Nor  least  in  savagery  of  holy  zeal, 
Apt  for  the  yoke,  the  race  degenerate, 
Whom  Britain  erst  had  blush'd  to  call  her  sons  ! 
Thee  to  defend  the  Moloch  Priest  prefers 
The  prayer  of  hate,  and  bellows  to  the  herd 
That  Deity,  Accomplice  Deity 
In  the  fierce  jealousy  of  waken'd  wrath 
Will  go  lbrth  with  our  armies  and  our  fleets, 
To  scatter  the  red  ruin  on  their  foes? 
O  blasphemy  !  to  mingle  fiendish  deeds 
With  blessedness ! 

Lord  of  unsleeping  Love,* 
From  everlasting  Thou  !  We  shall  not  die. 
These,  even  these,  in  mercy  didst  thou  form, 
Teachers  of  Good  through  Evil,  by  brief  wrong 
Making  Truth  lovely,  and  her  future  might 
Magnetic  o'er  the  fix'd  untrembling  heart. 

In  the  primeval  age  a  dateless  while 
The  vacant  Shepherd  wander'd  with  his  flock, 
Pitching  his  tent  where'er  the  green  grass  waved. 
But  soon  Imagination  conjured  up 
An  host  of  new  desires  :  with  busy  aim, 
Each  for  himself,  Earlh's  eager  children  toil'd. 
So  Property  began,  two-streaming  fount, 
Whence  Vice  and  Virtue  flow,  honey  and  gall. 
Hence  the  soft  couch,  and  many-color'd  robe, 
The  timbrel,  and  arch'd  dome  and  costly  feast, 
With  all  the  inventive  arts,  that  nursed  the  soul 
To  forms  of  beauty,  and  by  sensual  wants 
Unsensualized  the  mind,  which  in  the  means 
Learnt  to  forget  the  grossness  of  the  end, 
Best  pleasured  with  its  own  activity. 
And  hence  Disease  that  withers  manhood's  arm, 
The  dagger'd  Envy,  spirit-quenching  Want, 
Warriors,  and  Lords,  and  Priests — all  the  sore  ills 
That  vex  and  desolate  our  mortal  life. 
Wide-wasting  ills !  yet  each  the  immediate  source 
Of  mightier  good.    Their  keen  necessities 
To  ceaseless  action  goading  human  thought 
Have  made  Earth's  reasoning  animal  her  Lord  ; 
And  the  pale-featured  Sage's  trembling  hand 
Strong  as  an  host  of  armed  Deities, 
Such  as  the  blind  Ionian  fabled  erst. 

From  Avarice  thus,  from  Luxury  and  War 

Sprang    heavenly    Science  ;     and    from    Science 

Freedom. 
O'er  waken'd  realms  Philosophers  and  Bards 
Spread  in  concentric  circles  :  they  whose  souls, 
Conscious  of  their  high  dignities  from  God, 
Brook  not  Wealth's  rivalry  !  and  they  who  long 
Enamour 'd  with  the  charms  of  order  hate 
The  unseemly  disproportion  :  and  whoe'er 
Turn  with  mild  sorrow  from  the  victor's  car 
And  the  low  puppetry  of  thrones,  to  muse 
On  that  blest  triumph,  when  the  patriot  Sage 
Call'il  the  red  lightnings  from  the  o'er-rushing  cloud, 
And  dash'd  the  beauteous  Terrors  on  the  earth 
Smiling  majestic.    Such  a  phalanx  ne'er 
Measured  firm  paces  to  the  calming  sound 
Of  Spartan  flute !  These  on  the  fated  day, 


*  Art  thou  not  from  everlasting.  O  Lord,  mine  Holy  one  1 
We  shall  not  die.  O  Lord,  thou  hast  ordained  them  for  judg- 
ment, m.—Habakkuk. 


When,  stung  to  rage  by  Pity,  eloquent  men 

Have  roused  with  pealing  voice  unnumber'd  tribes 

That  toil  and  groan  and  bleed,  hungry  and  blind 

These  hush'd  awhile  with  patient  eye  serene, 

Shall  watch  the  mad  careering  of  the  storm  ; 

Then  o'er  the  wild  and  wavy  chaos  rush 

And  tame  the  outrageous  mass,  with  plastic  might 

Moulding  Confusion  to  such  perfect  forms, 

As  erst  were  wont,  bright  visions  of  the  day  ! 

To  float  before  them,  when,  the  Summer  noon, 

Beneath  some  arch'd  romantic  rock  reclined, 

They  felt  the  sea-breeze  lift  their  youthful  locks ; 

Or  in  the  month  of  blossoms,  at  mild  eve, 

Wandering  with  desultory  feet  inhaled 

The  wafted  perfumes,  and  the  rocks  and  woods 

And  many-tinted  streams  and  setting  Sun 

With  all  his  gorgeous  company  of  clouds 

Ecstatic  gazed  !  then  homeward  as  they  stray'd 

Cast  the  sad  eye  to  earth,  and  inly  mused 

Why  there  was  Misery  in  a  world  so  fair. 

Ah  far  removed  from  all  that  glads  the  sense, 

From  all  that  softens  or  ennobles  Man, 

The  wretched  Many !    Bent  beneath  their  loads 

They  gape  at  pageant  Power,  nor  recognize 

Their  cots'  transmuted  plunder !  From  the  tree 

Of  Knowledge,  ere  the  vernal  sap  had  risen 

Rudely  disbranch'd  !  Blessed  Society  ! 

Fitliest  depictured  by  some  sun-scorch'd  waste, 

Where  oft  majestic  through  the  tainted  noon 

The  Simoom  sails,  before  whose  purple  pomp 

Who  falls  not  prostrate  dies !  And  where  by  night 

Fast  by  each  precious  fountain  on  green  herbs 

The  lion  couches  ;  or  hyena  dips 

Deep  in  the  lucid  stream  his  bloody  jaws  ; 

Or  serpent  plants  his  vast  moon-glittering  bulk. 

Caught  in  whose  monstrous  twine  Behemoth*  yells 

His  bones  loud-crashing  ! 


O  ye  numberless, 
Whom  foul  Oppression's  ruffian  gluttony 
Drives   from  life's   plenteous   feast !    O  thou    poor 

WTetch, 
Who  nursed  in  darkness  and  made  wild  by  want, 
Roamest  for  prey,  yea  thy  unnatural  hand 
Dost  lift  to  deeds  of  blood !  O  pale-eyed  form, 
The  victim  of  seduction,  doom'd  to  know 
Polluted  nights  and  days  of  blasphemy  ; 
Who  in  lothed  orgies  with  lewd  wassailers 
Must  gaily  laugh,  while  thy  remember'd  home 
Gnaws  like  a  viper  at  thy  secret  heart ! 
O  aged  Women  !  ye  who  weekly  catch 
The  morsel  toss'd  by  law-forced  Charity, 
And  die  so  slowly,  that  none  call  it  murder ! 
O  lothely  Suppliants !  ye,  that  unreceived 
Totter  heart-broken  from  the  closing  gates 
Of  the  full  Lazar-house  :  or,  gazing,  stand 
Sick  with  despair !  O  ye  to  Glory's  field 
Forced  or  ensnared,  who,  as  ye  gasp  in  death, 
Bleed  with  new  wounds  beneath  the  Vulture's  beak 
O  thou  poor  Widow,  who  in  dreams  dost  view 
Thy  Husband's  mangled  corse,  and  from  short  doze 
Start'st  with  a  shriek  ;  or  in  thy  half-thatch'd  col 
Waked  by  the  wintry  night-storm,  wet  and  cold, 
Cow'rst  o'er  thy  screaming  baby  !  Rest  awhile 


*  Behemoth,  in  Hebrew,  signifies  wild  beasts  in  general. 
Some  believe  it  is  the  elephant,  some  the  hippopotamus;  some 
affirm  it  is  the  wild  bull.  Poetically,  it  designates  any  large 
quadruped. 

25 


16 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Children  of  Wretchedness !  More  groans  must  rise. 
More  blood  must  stream,  or  ere  your  wrongs  be  full. 
Yet  is  the  day  of  Retribution  nigh : 
The  Lamb  of  God  hath  open'd  the  fifth  seal  : 
And  upward  rush  on  swiftest  wing  of  fire 
The  innumerable  multitude  of  wrongs 
By  man  on  man  inflicted  !  Rest  awhile, 
Children  of  Wretchedness  !  The  hour  is  nigh  ; 
And  lo !  the  Great,  the  Rich,  the  Mighty  Men, 
The  Kings  and  the  Chief  Captains  of  the  World, 
With  all  that  fix'd  on  high  like  stars  of  Heaven 
Shot  baleful  influence,  shall  be  cast  to  earth, 
Vile  and  down-trodden,  as  the  untimely  fruit 
Shook  from  the  fig-tree  by  a  sudden  storm. 
Even  now  the  storm  begins :  *  each  gentle  name, 
Faith  and  meek  Piety,  with  fearful  joy 
Tremble  far-off — for  lo !  the  Giant  Frenzy, 
Uprooting  empires  with  his  whirlwind  arm, 
Mocketh  high  Heaven  ;  burst  hideous  from  the  cell 
Where  the  old  Hag,  unconquerable,  huge, 
Creation's  eyeless  drudge,  black  Ruin,  sits 
Nursing  the  impatient  earthquake. 


O  return  ! 
Pure  Faith !  meek  Piety !  The  abhorred  Form 
Whose  scarlet  robe  was  stiff  with  earthly  pomp, 
Who  drank  iniquity  in  cups  of  gold, 
Whose  names  were  many  and  all  blasphemous, 
Hath  met  the  horrible  judgment !  Whence  that  cry? 
The  mighty  army  of  foul  Spirits  shriek'd 
Disherited  of  earth !  For  she  hath  fallen 
On  whose  black  front  was  written  Mystery  ; 
She  that  reel'd  heavily,  whose  wine  was  blood  ; 
She  that  work'd  whoredom  with  the  Demon  Power, 
And  from  the  dark  embrace  all  evil  things 
Brought  forth  and  nurtured :  mitred  Atheism : 
And  patient  Folly  who  on  bended  knee 
Gives  back  the  steel  that  stabb'd  him  ;    and  pale 

Fear 
Hunted  by  ghastlier  shapings  than  surround 
Moon-blasted  Madness  when  he  yells  at  midnight ! 
Return,  pure  Faith !  return,  meek  Piety ! 
The  kingdoms  of  the  world  are  yours :  each  heart, 
Self-govern'd,  the  vast  family  of  Love 
Raised  from  the  common  earth  by  common  toil, 
Enjoy  the  equal  produce.    Such  delights 
As  float  to  earth,  permitted  visitants ! 
When  in  some  hour  of  solemn  jubilee 
The  massy  gates  of  Paradise  are  thrown 
Wide  open,  and  forth  come  in  fragments  wild 
Sweet  echoes  of  unearthly  melodies, 
And  odors  snatch'd  from  beds  of  Amaranth, 
And  they,  that  from  the  crystal  river  of  life 
Spring  up  on  freshen'd  wing,  ambrosial  gales  ! 
The  favor'd  good  man  in  his  lonely  walk 
Perceives  them,  and  his  silent  spirit  drinks 
Strange  bliss  which  he  shall  recognize  in  heaven. 
And  such  delights,  such  strange  beatitude 
Seize  on  my  young  anticipating  heart 
When  that  blest  future  rushes  on  my  view ! 
For  in  his  own  and  in  his  Fathers  might 
The  Savior  comes !  While  as  the  Thousand  Years 
Lead  up  their  mystic  dance,  the  Desert  shouts ! 
Old  Ocean  claps  his  hands  !  The  mighty  Dead 
Rise  to  new  life,  whoe'er  from  earliest  time        » 


With  conscious  zeal  had  urged  Love's  wondrous  plan, 
Coadjutors  of  God.    To  Milton's  trump 
The  high  Groves  of  the  renovated  Earth 
Unbosom  their  glad  echoes  :  inly  hush'd, 
Adoring  Newton  his  serener  eye 
Raises  to  heaven :  and  he  of  mortal  kind 
Wisest,  he*  first  who  mark'd  the  ideal  tribes 
Up  the  fine  fibres  through  the  sentient  brain. 
Lo !  Priestley  there,  Patriot,  and  Saint,  and  Sage, 
Him,  full  of  years,  from  his  loved  native  land 
Statesmen  blood-stain'd  and  Priests  idolatrous 
By  dark  lies  maddening  the  blind  multitude 
Drove  with  vain  hate.    Calm,  pitying,  he  retired, 
And  mused  expectant  on  these  promised  years. 

0  years  !  the  blest  pre-eminence  of  Saints ! 

Ye  sweep  athwart  my  gaze,  so  heavenly  bright, 
The  wings  that  veil  the  adoring  Seraph's  eyes, 
What  time  he  bends  before  the  Jasper  Throne.t 
Reflect  no  lovelier  hues  !  yet  ye  depart, 
And  all  beyond  is  darkness !  Heights  most  strange, 
Whence  Fancy  falls,  fluttering  her  idle  wing. 
For  who  of  woman  born  may  paint  the  hour, 
When  seized  in  his  mid  course,  the  Sun  shall  wane 
Making  noon  ghastly  !  Who  of  woman  born 
May  image  in  the  workings  of  his  thought, 
How  the  black-visaged,  red-eyed  Fiend  outstretch'dt 
Beneath  the  unsteady  feet  of  Nature  groans, 
In  feverish  slumbers — destin'd  then  to  wake, 
When  fiery  whirlwinds  thunder  his  dread  name 
And  Angels  shout,  Destruction !  How  his  arm 
The  last  great  Spirit  lifting  high  in  air 
Shall  swear  by  Him,  the  ever-living  One, 
Time  is  no  more  ! 

Believe  thou,  O  my  soul 
Life  is  a  vision  shadowy  of  Truth  ; 
And  vice,  and  anguish,  and  the  wormy  grave, 
Shapes  of  a  dream !  The  veiling  clouds  retire, 
And  lo !  the  Throne  of  the  redeeming  God 
Forth  flashing  unimaginable  day, 
Wraps  in  one  blaze  earth,  heaven,  and  deepest  hell 

Contemplant  Spirits !  ye  that  hover  o'er 
With  untired  gaze  the  immeasurable  fount 
Ebullient  with  creative  Deity  ! 
And  ye  of  plastic  power,  that  interfused 
Roll  through  the  grosser  and  material  mass 
In  organizing  surge  !  Holies  of  God  ! 
(And  what  if  Monads  of  the  infinite  mind) 

1  haply  journeying  my  immortal  course 

Shall  sometime  join  your  mystic  choir?  Till  then 

I  discipline  my  young  noviciate  thought 

In  ministries  of  heart-stirring  song, 

And  aye  on  Meditation's  heavenward  wing 

Soaring  aloft  I  breathe  the  empyreal  air 

Of  Love,  omnific,  omnipresent  Love, 

Whose  day-spring  rises  glorious  in  my  soul 

As  the  great  Sun,  when  he  his  influence 

Sheds  on  the  frost-bound  waters — The  glad  stream 

Flows  to  the  ray,  and  warbles  as  it  flows. 


*  Alluding  to  the  French  Revolution. 


*  David  Hartley. 

t  Rev.  Chap.  iv.  v.  2  and  3. — And  immediately  1  was  in  the 
Spirit:  and  behold,  a  Throne  was  set  in  Heaven,  and  one  sat 
on  the  throne.  And  he  that  sat  was  to  look  upon  like  a  jasper 
and  sardine  stone,  etc. 

t  The  final  Destruction  impersonated. 

26 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


17 


THE  DESTINY  OF  NATIONS. 


Auspicious  Reverence!  Hush  all  meaner  song, 
Ere  we  the  deep  preluding  strain  have  pour'd 
To  the  Great  Father,  only  Rightful  King, 
Eternal  Father !  King  Omnipotent ! 
The  Will,  the  Word,  the  Breath, — the  Living  God. 

Such  symphony  requires  best  instrument. 
Seize,  then !  my  soul !  from  Freedom's  trophied  dome, 
The  Harp  which  hangeth  high  between  the  Shields 
Of  Brutus  and  Leonidas !  With  that 
Strong  music,  that  soliciting  spell,  force  back 
Earths  free  and  stirring  spirit  that  lies  entranc'd. 

For  what  is  Freedom,  but  the  unfetter'd  use 
Of  all  the  powers  which  God  for  use  had  given? 
But  chiefly  this,  him  First,  him  Last  to  view 
Through  meaner  powers  and  secondary  things 
Effulgent,  as  through  clouds  that  veil  his  blaze. 
For  all  that  meets  the  bodily  sense  I  deem 
Symbolical,  one  mighty  alphabet 
For  infant  minds  ;  and  we  in  this  low  world 
Placed  with  our  backs  to  bright  Reality, 
That  we  may  learn  with  young  unwounded  ken 
The  substance  from  its  shadow.     Infinite  Love,    ■ 
WTiose  latence  is  the  plenitude  of  All, 
Thou  with  retracted  Beams,  and  Self-eclipse 
Veiling,  revealest  thine  eternal  Son. 

But  some  there  are  who  deem  themselves  most  free 
When  thev  within  this  gross  and  visible  sphere 
Chain  down  the  winged  thought,  scoffing  ascent, 
Proud  in  their  meanness :  and  themselves  they  cheat 
With  noisy-  emptiness  of  learned  phrase, 
Their  subtle  fluids,  impacts,  essences, 
Self-working  tools,  uncaus'd  effects,  and  all 
Those  blind  Omniscient*,  those  Almighty  Slaves, 
Untenanting  creation  of  its  God. 


But  properties  are  God  :  the  naked  mass 
(If  mass  there  be,  fantastic  Guess  or  Ghost) 
Acts  only  by  its  inactivity. 
Here  we  pause  humbly.     Others  boldlier  think 
That  as  one  body  seems  the  aggregate 
Of  Atoms  numberless,  each  organized  ; 
So,  by  a  strange  and  dim  similitude, 
Infinite  myriads  of  self-conscious  minds 
Are  one  all-conscious  Spirit,  which  informs 
With  absolute  ubiquity  of  thought 
(His  one  eternal  self-affirming  Act .') 
All  his  involved  Monads,  that  yet  seem 
"With  various  province  and  apt  agency 
Each  to  pursue  its  own  self-centering  end. 
Some  nurse  the  infant  diamond  in  the  mine  ; 
Some  roll  the  genial  juices  through  the  oak; 
Some  drive  the  mutinous  clouds  to  clash  in  air, 
And  rushing  on  the  storm  with  whirlwind  speed, 
Yoke  the  red  lightning  to  their  volleying  car. 
Thus  these  pursue  their  never-varying  course, 
No  eddy  in  their  stream.     Others,  more  wild, 
With  complex  interests  weaving  human  fates, 
Duteous  or  proud,  alike  obedient  all, 
Evolve  the  process  of  eternal  good. 
3 


And  what  if  some  rebellious,  o'er  dark  realms 
Arrogate  power  ?  yet  these  train  up  to  God, 
And  on  the  rude  eye,  unconfirm'd  for  day, 
Flash  meteor-lights  better  than  total  gloom. 
As  ere  from  Lieule-Oaive's  vapory  head 
The  Laplander  beholds  the  far-off  Sun 
Dart  his  slant  beam  on  unobeying  snows, 
While  yet  the  stern  and  solitary  Night 
Brooks  no  alternate  sway,  the  Boreal  Morn 
With  mimic  lustre  substitutes  its  gleam, 
Guiding  his  course  or  by  Niemi  lake 
Or  Balda-Zhiok,*  or  the  mossy  stone 
Of  Solfar-kapper.t  while  the  snowy  blast 
Drifts  arrowy  by,  or  eddies  round  his  sledge, 
Making  the  poor  babe  at  its  mother's  backf 
Scream  in  its  scanty  cradle :  he  the  while 
Wins  gentle  solace  as  with  upward  eye 
He  marks  the  streamy  banners  of  the  North, 
Thinking  himself  those  happy  spirits  shall  join 
Who  there  in  floating  robes  of  rosy  light 
Dance  sportively.     For  Fancy  is  the  Power 
That  first  unsensualizes  the  dark  mind, 
Giving  it  new  delights  ;  and  bids  it  swell 
With  wild  activity  ;  and  peopling  air, 
By  obscure  fears  of  Beings  invisible, 
Emancipates  it  from  the  grosser  thrall 
Of  the  present  impulse,  teaching  Self-control, 
Till  Superstition  with  unconscious  hand 
Seat  Reason  on  her  throne.     Wherefore  not  vain, 
Nor  yet  without  permitted  power  impress'd, 
I  deem'd  those  legends  terrible,  with  which 
The  polar  ancient  thrills  his  uncouth  throng; 
Whether  of  pitying  Spirits  that  make  their  moan 
O'er  slaughter'd  infants,  or  that  Giant  Bird 
Vuokho,  of  whose  rushing  wings  the  noise 
Is  Tempest,  when  the  unutterable  shaped 
Speeds  from  the  mother  of  Death,  and  utters  once 
That  shriek,  which  never  Murderer  heard  and  lived. 
Or  if  the  Greenland  Wizard  in  strange  trance 
Pierces  the  untravell'd  realms  of  Ocean's  bed 
(Where  live  the  innocent,  as  far  from  cares 
As  from  the  storms  and  overwhelming  waves 
Dark  tumbling  on  the  surface  of  the  deep), 
Over  the  abysm,  even  to  that  uttermost  cave 
By  misshaped  prodigies  beleaguer'd,  such 
As  Earth  ne'er  bred,  nor  Air,  nor  the  upper  Sea. 

There   dwells  the   Fury  Form,   whose   unheard 
name 
With  eager  eye,  pale  cheek,  suspended  breathj 


*  Balda  Zhiok  ;  i.  e.  mons  altitudinis,  the  highest  mountain 
in  Lapland. 

t  Solfar  Kapper ;  capitium  Solfar,  hie  locus  omnium  quot- 
quot  veterum  Lapponum  superstitio  sacrificiis  religiosoquecul- 
tui  dedicavit.celebratissimus  erat,  in  parte  sinus  australis  situs 
semimilliaris  spatio  a  maridistans.  Ipse  locus,  quemcunositatis 
gratia  aliquando  me  invisisse  memini,  duabus  prealtis  lapidibus, 
sibi  invicem  oppositis,  quorum  alter  musco  circumdatus  erat, 
constabat. — Leemius  De  Lapponibus. 

X  The  Lapland  Women  carry  their  infants  at  their  back  in  a 
piece  of  excavated  wood,  which  serves  them  for  a  cradle. 
Opposite  to  the  infant's  mouth  there  is  a  .hole  for  it  to  breathe 
through. — Mirandum  prorsus  est  el  vix  credibile  nisi  cui  tridisset 
contigit.  Lappones  hyeme  iter  facientes  per  vastas  montes.  per- 
que  horrida  et  invia  tesqua,  eo  presertim  tempore  quo  omnia 
perpetuis  nivibus  obtecta  sunt  et  nives  ventis  agitantur  et  in 
gyros  aguntur,  viam  ad  destinata  loca  absque  errore  invenire 
posse,  lactantem  autem  infantem  si  quern  habeat,  ipsa  mater 
in  dorso  bajulat,  in  excavato  ligno  (Gieed'k  ipsi  vocant)  quod 
pro  cunis  utuntur:  in  hoc  infans  pannis  et  pelUbus  convolutm 
colligatus  }acet.-*-Leemius  De  Lapponibus. 

§  Jaibme  Aibrao. 

27 


18 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


And  lips  half-opening  with  the  dread  of  sound, 
Unsleeping  Silence  guards,  worn  out  with  fear, 
Lest,  haply  escaping  on  some  treacherous  blast, 
The  fateful  word  let  slip  the  Elements, 
And  frenzy  Nature.     Yet  the  wizard  her, 
Arm'd  with   Torngarsuck's*  power,    the    Spirit   of 

Good, 
Forces  to  unchain  the  foodful  progeny 
Of  the  Ocean's  stream. — Wild  phantasies!  yet  wise, 
On  the  victorious  goodness  of  High  God 
Teaching  Reliance,  and  Medicinal  Hope, 
Till  from  Bethabra  northward,  heavenly  Truth, 
With  gradual  steps  winning  her  difficult  way, 
Transfer  their  rude  Faith  perfected  and  pure. 

If  there  be  Beings  of  higher  class  than  Man, 
I  deem  no  nobler  province  they  possess, 
Than  by  disposal  of  apt  circumstance 
To  rear  up  Kingdoms:  and  the  deeds  they  prompt, 
Distinguishing  from  mortal  agency. 
They  choose  their  human  ministers  from  such  states 
As  still  the  Epic  song  half  fears  to  name, 
Repell'd  from  all  the  Minstrelsies  that  strike 
The  Palace-roof  and  soothe  the  Monarch's  pride. 

And  such,  perhaps,  the  Spirit,  who  (if  words 
Wirness'd  by  answering  deeds  may  claim  our  Faith) 
Held  commune  with  that  warrior-maid  of  France 
Who  scourged  the  Invader.     From  her  infant  days, 
With  Wisdom,  Mother  of  retired  Thoughts, 
Her  soul  had  dwelt ;  and  she  was  quick  to  mark 
The  good  and  evil  thing,  in  human  lore 
Undisciplined.     For  lowly  was  her  Birth, 
And  Heaven  had  doom'd  her  early  years  to  Toil, 
That  pure  from  Tyranny's  least  deed,  herself 
Unfear'd  by  Fellow-natures,  she  might  wait 
On  the  poor  Laboring  man  with  kindly  looks, 
And  minister  refreshment  to  the  tired 
Way-wanderer,  when  along  the  rough-hewn  Bench 
The  sweltry  man  had  stretch'd  him,  and  aloft 
Vacantly  watch'd  the  rudely  pictured  board 
Which  on  the  Mulberry-bough  with  welcome  creak 
Swung  to  the  pleasant  breeze.     Here,  too,  the  Maid 
Learnt  more  than  Schools  could  teach:  Man's  shift- 
ing mind, 
His  Vices  and  his  Sorrows !  And  full  oft 
At  Tales  of  cruel  Wrong  and  strange  Distress 
Had  wept  and  shiver'd.     To  the  tottering  Eld 
Still  as  a  Daughter  would  she  run :  she  placed 
His  cold  Limbs  at  the  sunny  Door,  and  loved 
To  hear  him  story,  in  his  garrulous  sort, 
Of  his  eventful  years,  all  come  and  gone. 

So  twenty  seasons  past.     The  Virgin's  Form, 
Active  and  tall,  nor  Sloth  nor  Luxury 
Had  shrunk  or  paled.     Her  front  sublime  and  broad, 
Her  flexile  eye-brows  wildly  hair'd  and  low, 
And  her  full  eye,  now  bright,  now  unillum'd, 
Spake  more  than  Woman's  Thought ;  and  all  her 
face 

*  They  call  the  Good  Spirit  Torngarsuck.  The  other  great 
but  malignant  spirit  is  a  nameless  Female;  Bhe  dwells  under 
the  sea  in  a  great  house,  where  she  can  detain  in  captivity  all 
the  animals  of  the  ocean  by  her  magic  power.  When  a  dearth 
befalls  the  Greenlanders,  an  Angekok  or  magician  must  under- 
take a  journey  thither.  He  passes  through  the  kingdom  of 
K)uls,  over  an  horrible  abyss  into  the  Palace  of  this  phantom, 
»nd  by  his  enchantments  causes  the  captive  creatures  to  ascend 
Jireetly  to  the  surface  of  the  ocean. — See  Crantz'  Hist,  of 
Greenland,  vol.  i.  206. 


Was  moulded  to  such  features  as  declared 
That  Pity  there  had  oft  and  strongly  work'd, 
And  sometimes  Indignation.     Bold  her  mien, 
And  like  a  haughty  Huntress  of  the  woods 
She  mov'd  :  yet  sure  she  was  a  gentle  maid  ! 
And  in  each  motion  her  most  innocent  soul 
Beam'd  forth  so  brightly,  that  who  saw  would  say 
Guilt  was  a  thing  impossible  in  her ! 
Nor  idly  would  have  said — for  she  had  lived 
In  this  bad  World  as  in  a  place  of  Tombs, 
And  touch'd  not  the  pollutions  of  the  Dead. 

'Twas  the  cold  season,  when  the  Rustic's  eye 
From  the  drear  desolate  whiteness  of  his  fields 
Rolls  for  relief  to  watch  the  skiey  tints 
And  clouds  slow  varying  their  huge  imagery ; 
When  now,  as  she  was  wont,  the  healthful  Maid 
Had  left  her  pallet  ere  one  beam  of  day 
Slanted  the  fog-smoke.     She  went  forth  alone. 
Urged  by  the  indwelling  angel-guide,  that  oft, 
With  dim  inexplicable  sympathies 
Disquieting  the  Heart,  shapes  out  Man's  course 
To  the  predoom'd  adventure.     Now  the  ascent 
She  climbs  of  that  steep  upland,  on  whose  top 
The  Pilgrim-Man,  who  long  since  eve  had  watch'd 
The  alien  shine  of  unconcerning  Stars, 
Shouts  to  himself,  there  first  the  Abbey-lights 
Seen  in  Neufchatel's  vale ;  now  slopes  adown 
The  winding  sheep-track  vale-ward  :  when,  behold 
In  the  first  entrance  of  the  level  road 
An  unattended  Team !  The  foremost  horse 
Lay  with  stretch'd  limbs ;  the  others,  yet  alive, 
But  stiff  and  cold,  stood  motionless,  their  manes 
Hoar  with  the  frozen  night-dews.     Dismally 
The  dark-red  down  now  glimmer'd ;  but  its  gleams 
Disclosed  no  face  of  man.     The  Maiden  paused, 
Then  hail'd  who  might  be  near.     No  voice  replied. 
From  the  thwart  wain  at  length  there  reach'd  her 

ear 
A  sound  so  feeble  that  it  almost  seem'd 
Distant :  and  feebly,  with  slow  effort  push'd, 
A  miserable  man  crept  forth  :  his  limbs 
The  silent  frost  had  eat,  scathing  like  fire. 
Faint  on  the  shafts  he  rested.     She,  meantime, 
Saw  crowded  close  beneath  the  coverture 
A  mother  and  her  children — lifeless  all, 
Yet  lovely !  not  a  lineament  was  marr'd — 
Death  had  put  on  so  slumber-like  a  form ! 
It  was  a  piteous  sight ;  and  one,  a  babe, 
The  crisp  milk  frozen  on  its  innocent  lips, 
Lay  on  the  woman's  arm,  its  little  hand 
Stretch'd  on  her  bosom. 


Mutely  questioning, 
The  Maid  gazed  wildly  at  the  living  wretch. 
He,  his  head  feebly  turning,  on  the  group 
Look'd  with  a  vacant  stare,  and  his  eye  spoke 
The  drowsy  pang  that  steals  on  worn-out  anguish. 
She  shudder'd  :  but,  each  vainer  pang  subdued, 
Quick  disentangling  from  the  foremost  horse 
The  rustic  bands,  with  difficulty  and  toil 
The  stiff  cramp'd  team  forced  homeward.     There 

arrived, 
Anxiously  tends  him  she  with  healing  herbs, 
And  weeps  and  prays — but  the  numb  power  of  Death 
Spreads  o'er  his  limbs  ;  and  ere  the  noontide  hour, 
The  hovering  spirits  of  his  Wife  and  Babes 
Hail  him  immortal !  Yet  amid  his  pangs, 
28 


JUVENILE  POEMS. 


19 


With  interruptions  long  from  ghastly  throes, 
His  voice  had  falter'd  out  this  simple  tale. 

The  Village,  where  he  dwelt  an  Husbandman, 
By  sudden  inroad  had  been  seized  and  fired 
Late  on  the  yester-evening.    With  his  wife 
And  little  ones  he  hurried  his  escape. 
They  saw    the    neighboring   Hamlets   flame,    they 

heard 
Uproar  and  shrieks !  and  terror-struck  drove  on 
Through  unfrequented  roads,  a  weary  way  ! 
But  saw  nor  house  nor  cottage.    All  had  quench'd 
Their  evening  hearth-fire  :  for  the  alarm  had  spread. 
The  air  clipt  keen,  the  night  was  fang'd  with  frost, 
And  they  provisionless !  The  weeping  wife 
111  hush'd    her   children's   moans  ;    and  still    they 

moan'd, 
Till  Fright  and  Cold  and  Hunger  drank  their  life. 
They  closed  their  eyes  in  sleep,  nor  knew  't  was 

Death. 
He  only,  lashing  his  o'er-wearied  team, 
Gain'd  a  sad  respite,  till  beside  the  base 
Of  the  high  hill  his  foremost  horse  dropp'd  dead. 
Then  hopeless,  strengthless,  sick  for  lack  of  food, 
He  crept  beneath  the  coverture,  entranced, 
fill  waken'd  by  the  maiden. — Such  his  tale. 

Ah  !  suffering  to  the  height  of  what  was  suffer'd, 
Stung  with  too  keen  a  sympathy,  the  Maid 
Brooded  with  moving  lips,  mute,  startful,  dark ! 
And  now  her  flush'd  tumultuous  features  shot 
Such  strange  vivacity,  as  fires  the  eye 
Of  misery  Fancy-crazed  !    and  now  once  more 
Naked,  and  void,  and  fix'd,  and  all  within 
The  unquiet  silence  of  confused  thought 
And  shapeless  feelings.     For  a  mighty  hand 
Was  strong  upon  her,  till  in  the  heat  of  soul 
To  the  high  hill-top  tracing  back  her  steps, 
Aside  the  beacon,  up  whose  smoulder'd  stones 
The  tender  ivy-trails  crept  thinly,  there, 
Unconscious  of  the  driving  element, 
Yea,  swallowed  up  in  the  ominous  dream,  she  sate 
Ghastly  as  broad-eyed  Slumber  !  a  dim  anguish 
Breathed  from  her  look!  and  still,  with  pant  and  sob, 
Inly  she  toil'd  to  flee,  and  still  subdued, 
Felt  an  inevitable  Presence  near. 

Thus  as  she  toil'd  in  troublous  ecstasy,1 
An  horror  of  great  darkness  wrapt  her  round, 
And  a  voice  uttered  forth  unearthly  tones, 
Calming  her  soul, — "  O  Thou  of  the  Most  High 
Chosen,  whom  all  the  perfected  in  Heaven 
Behold  expectant 

[The  following  fragments  were  intended  to  form  part  of  the 
Poem  when  finished.] 

"  Maid  beloved  of  Heaven  ! " 
{To  her  the  tutelary  Power  exclaim'd) 
"  Of  Chaos  the  adventurous  progeny 
Thou  seest ;  foul  missionaries  of  foul  sire, 
Fierce  to  regain  the  losses  of  that  hour 
When  Love  rose  glittering,  and  his  gorgeous  wings 
Over  the  abyss  flutter'd  with  such  glad  noise, 
As  what  time  after  long  and  pestful  calms, 
With  slimy  shapes  and  miscreated  life 
Poisoning  the  vast  Pacific,  the  fresh  breeze 
Wakens  the  merchant-sail  uprising.     Night 
A  heavy  unimaginable  moan 


Sent  forth,  when  she  the  Protoplast  beheld 
Stand  beauteous  on  Confusion's  charmed  wave. 
Moaning  she  fled,  and  entered  the  Profound 
That  leads  with  downward  windings  to  the  Cave 
Of  darkness  palpable,  Desert  of  Death 
Sunk  deep  beneath  Gehenna's  massy  roots. 
There  many  a  dateless  age  the  Beldame  lurk'd 
And  trembled ;  till  engender'd  by  fierce  Hate, 
Fierce  Hate  and  gloomy  Hope,  a  Dream  arose, 
Shaped  like  a  black  cloud  mark'd  with  streaks  of 

fire. 

It  roused  the  Hell-Hag  :  she  the  dew  damp  wiped 
From  off  her  brow,  and  through  the  uncouth  maze 
Retraced  her  steps  ;  but  ere  she  reach'd  the  mouth 
Of  that  drear  labyrinth,  shuddering  she  paused, 
Nor  dared  re-enter  the  diminish'd  Gulf. 
As    through   the   dark   vaults   of  some   moulder'd 

Tower 

(Which,  fearful  to  approach,  the  evening  Hind 
Circles  at  distance  in  his  homeward  way) 
The  winds  breathe  hollow,  deem'd  the  plaining  groan 
Of  prison'd  spirits ;  with  such  fearful  voice 
Night  murmur'd,  and  the  sound  through  Chaos  went 
Leap'd  at  her  call  her  hideous-fronted  brood ! 
A  dark  behest  they  heard,  and  rush'd  on  earth  ; 
Since  that  sad  hour,  in  Camps  and  Courts  adored, 
Rebels  from  God,  and  Monarchs  o'er  Mankind  ! " 


From  his  obscure  haunt 
Shriek'd  Fear,  of  Cruelty  the  ghastly  Dam, 
Feverish  yet  freezing,  eager-paced  yet  slow, 
As  she  that  creeps  from  forth  her  swampy  reeds, 
Ague,  the  biform  Hag !  when  early  Spring 
Beams  on  the  marsh-bred  vapors. 


"  Even  so  "  (the  exulting  Maiden  said) 
"  The  sainted  Heralds  of  Good  Tidings  fell, 
And  thus  they  witness'd  God  !  But  now  the  clouds 
Treading,  and  storms  beneath  their  feet,  they  soar 
Higher,  and  higher  soar,  and  soaring  sing 
Loud  songs  of  Triumph !  O  ye  spirits  of  God, 
Hover  around  my  mortal  agonies  !" 
She  spake,  and  instantly  faint  melody 
Melts  on  her  ear,  soothing  and  sad,  and  slow, — 
Such  Measures,  as  at  calmest  midnight  heard 
By  aged  Hermit  in  his  holy  dream, 
Foretell  and  solace  death  ;  and  now  they  rise 
Louder,  as  when  with  harp  and  mingled  voice 
The  white-robed*  multitude  of  slaughter'd  saints 
At  Heaven's  wide-open'd  portals  gratulant 
Receive  some  martyr'd  Patriot.    The  harmony 
Entranced  the  Maid,  till  each  suspended  sense 
Brief  slumber  seized,  and  confused  ecstasy. 

At  length  awakening  slow,  she  gazed  around : 
And  through  a  Mist,  the  relic  of  that  trance 
Still  thinning  as  she  gazed,  an  Isle  appear'd, 
Its  high,  o'er-hanging,  white,  broad-breasted  cliffs, 
Glass'd  on  the  subject  ocean.    A  vast  plain 
Stretch'd  opposite,  where  ever  and  anon 


*  Revel,  vi.  9,  11.  And  when  he  had  opened  the  fifth  seal,  I 
saw  under  the  altar  the  souls  of  them  that  were  slain  for  the 
word  of  God,  and  for  the  testimony  which  they  held.  And 
white  robes  were  given  unto  every  one  of  them,  and  it  was 
said  unto  them  that  they  should  rest  yet  for  a  little  season, 
until  their  fellow  servants  also  and  their  brethren,  that  should 
be  killed  as  they  were,  should  be  fulfilled. 

29 


20 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


The  Plow-man,  following  sad  his  meagre  team, 
Turn'd  up  fresh  sculls  unstartled,  and  the  bones 
Of  fierce  hate-breathing  combatants,  who  there 
All  mingled  lay  beneath  the  common  earth, 
Death's  gloomy  reconcilement !  O'er  the  Fields 
Slept  a  fair  form,  repairing  all  she  might, 
Her  temples  Alive-wreathed  ;  and  where  she  trod 
Fresh  flowerets  rose,  and  many  a  foodful  herb. 
But  wan  her  cheek,  her  footsteps  insecure, 
And  anxious  pleasure  beam'd  in  her  faint  eye, 
As  she  had  newly  left  a  couch  of  pain, 
Pale  Convalescent !  (yet  some  time  to  rule 
With  power  exclusive  o'er  the  willing  world, 
That  bless'd  prophetic  mandate  then  fulfill'd, 
Peace  be  on  Earth !)    A  happy  while,  but  brief, 
She  seem'd  to  wander  with  assiduous  feet, 
And  heal'd  the  recent  harm  of  chill  and  blight, 
And  nursed  each  plant  that  fair  and  virtuous  grew 

But  soon  a  deep  precursive  sound  moan'd  hollow : 
Black  rose  the  clouds,  and  now  (as  in  a  dream) 
Their   reddening   shapes,   transformed   to   Warrior- 
hosts, 
Coursed  o'er  the  Sky,  and  battled  in  mid-air. 
Nor  did  not  the  large  blood-drops  fall  from  Heaven 
Portentous !  while  aloft  were  seen  to  float, 
Like  hideous  features  booming  on  the  mist, 
Wan  Stains  of  ominous  Light !  Resign'd,  yet  sad, 
The  fair  Form  bowed  her  olive-crowned  Brow, 
Then  o'er  the  plain  with  oft-reverted  eye 
Fled  till  a  Place  of  Tombs  she  reach'd,  and  there 
Within  a  ruined  Sepulchre  obscure 
Found  Hiding-place. 

The  delegated  Maid 
Gazed  through  her  tears,  then  in  sad  tones  exclaim'd, 
"  Thou  mild-eyed  Form  !  wherefore,  ah  !  wherefore 

fled? 
The  power  of  Justice,  like  a  name  all  Light, 
Shone  from  thy  brow ;  but  all  they,  who  unblamed 
Dwelt  in  thy  dwellings,  call  thee  Happiness. 
Ah  !  why,  uninjured  and  unprofited, 
Should  multitudes  against  their  brethren  rush? 
Whv  sow  they  guilt,  still  reaping  Misery  ? 
Lenient  of  care,  thy  songs,  O  Peace !  are  sweet, 
As  after  showers  the  perfumed  gale  of  eve, 
That  flings  the  cool  drops  on  a  feverous  cheek  : 
And  gay  the  grassy  altar  piled  with  fruits. 
But  boasts  the  shrine  of  Damon  War  one  charm, 
Save  that  with  many  an  orgie  strange  and  foul, 
Dancing  around  with  interwoven  arms, 
The  Maniac  Suicide  and  Giant  Murder 
Exult  in  their  fierce  union  ?  I  am  sad, 
And  know  not  why  the  simple  Peasants  crowd 
Beneath  the  Chieftains'  standard!"  Thus  the  Maid. 


To  her  the  tutelary  Spirit  replied  : 
"  When  Luxury  and  Lust's  exhausted  stores 
No  more  can  rouse  the  appetites  of  Kings  ; 
When  the  low  flattery  of  their  reptile  Lords 
Falls  flat  and  heavy  on  the  accustom'd  ear ; 
When  Eunuchs  sing,  and  Fools  buffoonery  make, 
And  Dancers  writhe  their  harlot-limbs  in  vain ; 
Then  War  and  all  its  dread  vicissitudes 
Pleasingly  agitate  their  stagnant  Hearts  ; 
Its  hopes,  its  fears,  its  victories,  its  defeats, 
Insipid   Royalty's  keen  condiment  ! 
Therefore  uninjured  and  unprofited 


(Victims  at  once  and  Executioners), 
The  congregated  Husbandmen  lay  waste 
The  Vineyard  and  the  Harvest.    As  long 
The  Bothnic  coast,  or  southward  of  the  Line, 
Though  hush'd  the  Winds  and  cloudless  the  high 

Noon, 
Yet  if  Leviathan,  weary  of  ease, 
In  sports  unwieldy  toss  his  Island-bulk, 
Ocean  behind  him  billows,  and  before 
A  storm  of  waves  breaks  foamy  on  the  strand. 
And  hence,  for  times  and  seasons  bloody  and  dark, 
Short  Peace  shall  skin  the  wounds  of  causeless  War 
And  War,  his  strained  sinews  knit  anew, 
Still  violate  the  unfinish'd  works  of  Peace. 
But  yonder  look  !  for  more  demands  thy  view ! " 
He  said :  and  straightway  from  the  opposite  Isle 
A  Vapor  sailed,  as  when  a  cloud,  exhaled 
From  Egypt's  fields  that  steam  hot  pestilence. 
Travels  the  sky  for  many  a  trackless  league, 
Till  o'er  some  Death-doom'd  land,  distant  in  vain, 
It  broods  incumbent.    Forthwith  from  the  Plain, 
Facing  the  Isle,  a  brighter  cloud  arose, 
And  steer'd  its  course  which  way  the  Vapor  went. 

The  Maiden  paused,  musing  what  this  might  mean. 
But  long  time  pass'd  not,  ere  that  brighter  cloud 
Rerurn'd  more  bright ;  along  the  plain  it  swept : 
And  soon  from  forth  its  bursting  sides  emerged 
A  dazzling  form,  broad-bosom'd,  bold  of  eye, 
And  wild  her  hair,  save  where  with  laurels  bound. 
Not  more  majestic  stood  the  healing  God, 
When  from  his  bow  the  arrow  sped  that  slew 
Huge  Python.    Shriek'd  Ambition's  giant  throng. 
And  with  them  hiss'd  the  Locust-fiends  that  crawl'd 
And  glitter'd  in  Corruption's  slimy  track. 
Great  was  their  wrath,  for  short  they  knew  their 

reign ; 
And  such  commotion  made  they,  and  uproar, 
As  when  the  mad  Tornado  bellows  through 
The  guilty  islands  of  the  western  main, 
What  time  departing  from  their  native  shores, 
Eboe,  or  Koromantyn's*  plain  of  Palms, 


*  The  slaves  in  the  West- Indies  consider  death  as  a  passport 
to  their  native  country.  This  sentiment  is  thus  expressed  in 
the  introduction  to  a  Greek  Prize-Ode  on  the  Slave-Trade,  of 
which  the  ideas  are  better  than  the  language  in  which  they 
are  conveyed. 

Si  okotov  -zv\a$,  Qavart,  trpo\ciKU>v 
Ef  yevoi  (rircv&ois  vrro^tv^dev  Ato.' 
Ov  faiaQri  crt  ytvvtov  ctrapaypoi ; 

Ov8'  o\o\vyn<i>t 

AAAa  Kai  kvkAoicti  %opoiTviroiai 
K'atrparuyv  XaPf  <pofitp°S  f£J/  ia°l 
AAA'  opuii  KXcvBcpig.  avvotKtis, 

"Srvyvc  Tvpavvc ! 
AacKtot;  t-Kti  TtTtpvytcoi  ctjai 
A  !   $a\a<jciov  Kadopuivrcs  oiSpa 
KiQtpoir\ayTois  viro  nocff'  avaai 

Xlarpi&  iff'  aiav. 

Ev0a  pav  ~E.pa.oai  'E.pipptvnotv 
A/i$i  Ttriyrjatv  Kirpivtov  vtt'  aAircov, 
Octct'utto  Pporoi;  inadov  Pporai,  ra 
Aua  \eyovai. 

LITERAL   TRANSLATION. 

Leaving  the  Gates  of  Dnrkneps,  O  Death  !  hastrn  thou  tn  a 
Race  yokod  with  Misery  !   Thou  wilt  not  be  received  vvun 
30 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


21 


The  infuriate  spirits  of  the  Murder'd  make 
Fierce  merriment,  and  vengeance  ask  of  Heaven. 
Warm'd  with  now  influence,  the  unwholesome  plain 
Sent  up  its  foulest  fogs  to  meet  the  Morn  : 
The  Sun  that  rose  on  Freedom,  rose  in  blood ! 

"  Maiden  beloved,  and  Delegate  of  Heaven ! " 
fTo  her  the  tutelary  Spirit  said) 
'  Soon  shall  the  Morning  struggle  into  Day, 
The  stormy  Morning  into  cloudless  Noon. 
Much  hast  thou  seen,  nor  all  canst  understand — 
But  this  be  thy  best  Omen — Save  thy  Country  ! " 


lacerations  of  cheeks,  nor  with  funeral  ululation — but  with 
ending  dances  and  the  joy  of  songs.  Thou  art  terrible  indeed, 
yet  thou  dwellest  with  Liberty,  stern  Genius!  Borne  on  thy 
dark  pinions  over  the  swelling  of  ocean,  they  return  to  their 
native  country.  There,  by  the  side  of  Fountains  beneath 
Citron-groves,  the  lovers  tell  to  their  beloved  what  horrors, 
being  Men,  they  had  endured  from  Men. 


Thus  saying,  from  the  answering  Maid  he  paos'd, 
And  with  him  disappear'd  the  Heavenly  Vision. 

"  Glory  to  Thee,  Father  of  Earth  and  Heaven  ' 
All-conscious  Presence  of  the  Universe  ! 
Nature's  vast  Ever-acting  Energy  ! 
In  Will,  in  Deed,  Impulse  of  All'to  All ! 
Whether  tlry  love  with  unrefracted  ray 
Beam  on  the  Prophet's  purged  eye,  or  if 
Diseasing  realms  the  enthusiast,  wild  of  thought 
Scatter  new  frenzies  on  the  infected  throng, 
Thou  both  inspiring  and  predooming  both. 
Fit  instruments  and  best,  of  perfect  end  : 
Glory  to  Thee,  Father  of  Earth  and  Heaven!" 

And  first  a  landscape  rose, 
More  wild  and  waste  and  desolate  than  where 
The  white  bear,  drifting  on  a  field  of  ice, 
Howls  to  her  sunder'd  cubs  with  piteous  rage 
And  savage  agony. 


SbittgUiue  Hcafoes* 


I.  POEMS  OCCASIONED  BY  POLITICAL 
EVENTS  OR  FEELINGS  CONNECTED 
WITH  THEM. 


When  I  have  borne  in  memory  what  has  tamed 

Great  nations,  how  ennobling  thoughts  depart 

When  men  change  swords  for  legeis,  and  desert 

The  student's  bower  for  gold,  some  fears  unnamed 

I  had,  my  country  '.  Am  I  to  be  blamed  1 

But,  when  I  think  of  Thee,  and  what  Thou  art. 

Verily,  in  the  bottom  of  my  heart, 

Of  those  unfilial  fears  I  am  ashamed. 

But  dearly  must  we  prize  thee  ;  we  who  find 

In  thee  a  bulwark  of  the  cause  of  men  ; 

And  I  by  my  affection  was  beguiled. 

What  wonder  if  a  poet,  now  and  then, 

Among  the  many  movements  of  his  mind. 

Felt  for  thee  as  a  Lover  or  a  Child. 

Wordsworth. 


ODE  TO  THE  DEPARTING  YEAR.* 

lot),  iov,  u>  S>  naicd, 
Yn   av  pt  leivo;  ipdopavrtta;  vovos 
Erpobt?,  rapdotjtiiv  (ppoiptot;  iiprjfiiot;. 
****** 
T6  piWov  r]%ct.     Kal  ai)  prjv  ird%ci  Ttapuiv 
'A.yav  y'  aXrjOopavTiv  p   ipets. 

/Eschyl.  Agam.  1225. 


ARGUMENT. 

The  Ode  commences  with  an  Address  to  the  Divine 
Providence,  that  regulates  into  one  vast  harmony  all 
the  events  of  lime,  however  calamitous  some  of  them 


*  This  Ode  was  composed  on  the  24th,  25th,  and  26th  days 
of  December,  179C  :  and  was  first  published  on  the  last  day  of 
that  year. 

D 


may  appear  to  mortals.  The  second  Strophe  cr.ll" 
on  men  to  suspend  their  private  joys  and  sorrows 
and  devote  them  for  a  while  to  the  cause  of  humar 
nature  in  general.  The  first  Epode  speaks  of  the 
Empress  of  Russia,  who  died  of  an  apoplexy  on  the 
17th  of  November,  1796;  having  just  concluded  a 
subsidiary  treaty  with  the  Kings  combined  agains; 
France.  The  first  and  second  Antistrophe  describe 
the  Image  of  the  Departing  Year,  etc.  as  in  a  vision 
The  second  Epode  prophesies,  in  anguish  of  spirit, 
the  downfall  of  this  country. 


I. 

Spirit  who  sweepest  the  wild  Harp  of  Time  .' 
It  is  most  hard,  with  an  untroubled  ear 
Thy  dark  inwoven  harmonies  to  hear! 
Yet,  mine  eye  fix'd  on  Heaven's  unchanging  clime, 
Long  when  I  listen'd,  free  from  mortal  fear, 
With  inward  stillness,  and  submitted  mind  ; 
When  lo !  its  folds  far  waving  on  the  wind, 
I  saw  the  train  of  the  Departing  Year  ! 
Starting  from  my  silent  sadness, 
Then  with  no  unholy  madness, 
Ere  yet  the  enter'd  cloud  foreclosed  my  sight, 
I  raised   the  impetuous  song,  and  solemnized    his 
flight. 

II. 

Hither,  from  the  recent  tomb, 
From  the  prison's  direr  gloom, 
From  Distemper's  midnight  anguish  ; 
And  thence,  where  Poverty  doth  waste  and  languish, 
Or  where,  his  two  bright  torches  blending, 

Love  illumines  manhood's  maze  ; 
Or  where,  o'er  cradled  infants  bending, 
Hope  has  fix'd  her  wishful  gaze, 
Hither,  in  perplexed  dance, 
Ye  Woes  !  ye  young-eyed  Joys !  advance  ' 
31 


22 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


By  Time's  wild  harp,  and  by  the  hand 
Whose  indefatigable  sweep 
Raises  its  fateful  strings  from  sleep, 
I  bid  you  haste,  a  mix'd  tumultuous  band ! 
From  every  private  bower, 

And  each  domestic  hearth, 
Haste  for  one  solemn  hour  ; 
And  with  a  loud  and  yet  a  louder  voice, 
O'er  Nature  struggling  in  portentous  birth 

Weep  and  rejoice  ! 
Still  echoes  the  dread  Name  that  o'er  the  earth 
Let  slip  the  storm,  and  woke  the  brood  of  Hell : 

And  now  advance  in  saintly  Jubilee 
Justice  and  Truth !  They  too  have  heard  thy  spell. 
They  too  obey  thy  name,  Divines!  Liberty ! 


III. 

I  mark'd  Ambition  in  his  war-array ! 

I  heard  the  mailed  Monarch's  troublous  cry — 
"  Ah!  wherefore  does  the  Northern  Conqueress  stay! 
Groans  not  her  chariot  on  its  onward  way  ?" 
Fly,  mailed  Monarch,  fly  ! 
Stunn'd  by  Death's  twice  mortal  mace, 
No  more  on  Murder's  lurid  face 
The  insatiate  hag  shall  gloat  with  drunken  eye  ! 
Manes  of  the  unnumber'd  slain  ! 
Ye  that  gasp'd  on  Warsaw's  plain ! 
Ye  that  erst  at  Ismail's  tower, 
When  human  ruin  choked  the  streams, 

Fell  in  conquest's  glutted  hour, 
'Mid  women's  shrieks  and  infants'  screams  ! 
Spirits  of  the  uncoffln'd  slain, 

Sudden  blasts  of  triumph  swelling, 
Oft,  at  night,  in  misty  train, 

Rush  around  her  narrow  dwelling  ! 
The  exterminating  fiend  is  fled — 

(Foul  her  life,  and  dark  her  doom) 
Mighty  armies  of  the  dead 

Dance  like  death-fires  round  her  tomb! 
Then  with  prophetic  song  relate, 
Each  some  tyrant-murderer's  fate ! 


IV. 

Departing  Year  !  't  was  on  no  earthly  shore 
My  soul  beheld  thy  vision  !  Where  alone, 
Voiceless  and  stern,  before  the  cloudy  throne, 
Aye  Memory  sits:  thy  robe  inscribed  with  gore, 
With  many  an  unimaginable  groan 

Thou  storied'st  thy  sad  hours  !  Silence  ensued, 
Deep  silence  o'er  the  ethereal  multitude, 
Whose   locks   with   wreaths,   whose   wreaths  with 
glories  shone. 
Then,  his  eye  wild  ardors  glancing, 
From  the  choired  Gods  advancing, 
The  Spirit  of  the  Earth  made  reverence  meet, 
And  stood  up,  beautiful,  before  the  cloudy  seat. 


Throughout  the  blissful  throng, 

Hush'd  were  harp  and  song  : 
Till  wheeling  round  the  throne  the  Lampads  seven 

(The  mystic  Words  of  Heaven), 

Permissive  signal  make  : 
The  fervent  Spirit  bow'd,  then  spread  his  wings  and 


"  Thou  in  stormy  blackness  throning 

Love  and  uncreated  Light, 
By  the  Earth's  unsolaced  groaning, 
Seize  thy  terrors,  Arm  of  might ! 
By  Peace  with  profFer'd  insult  sacred, 
Masked  Hate  and  envying  Scorn  ! 
By  Years  of  Havoc  yet  unborn ! 
And  Hunger's  bosom  to  the  frost-winds  bared ! 
But  chief  by  Afric's  wrongs, 

Strange,  horrible,  and  foul  !  „ 

By  what  deep  guilt  belongs 
To  the  deaf  Synod,  '  full  of  gifts  and  lies ' ' 
By  Wealth's  insensate  laugh !  by  Torture's  howl .' 
Avenger,  rise  ! 
For  ever  shall  the  thankless  Island  scowl, 
Her  quiver  full,  and  with  unbroken  bow  ?        „ 
Speak!  from  thy  storm-black  Heaven,  O  speak  aloud  ! 

And  on  the  darkling  foe 
Open  thine  eye  of  fire  from  some  uncertain  clcud  ! 

O  dart  the  flash !  O  rise  and  deal  the  blow  f 
The  past  to  thee,  to  thee  the  future  cries ! 

Hark !  how  wide  Nature  joins  her  groans  Kv«w  ! 
Rise,  God  of  Nature !  rise." 


VI. 

The  voice  had  ceased,  the  vision  fled  ; 
Yet  still  I  gasp'd  and  reel'd  with  dread. 
And  ever,  when  the  dream  of  night 
Renews  the  phantom  to  my  sight, 
Cold  sweat-drops  gather  on  my  limbs  ; 

My  ears  throb  hot ;  my  eye-balls  start ; 
My  brain  with  horrid  tumult  swims  ; 
Wild  is  the  tempest  of  my  heart  ; 
And  my  thick  and  struggling  breath 
Imitates  the  toil  of  Death  ! 
No  stronger  agony  confounds 

The  Soldier  on  the  war-field  spread, 
When  all  foredone  with  toil  and  wounds. 

Death-like  he  dozes  among  heaps  of  dead 
(The  strife  is  o'er,  the  day-light  fled, 

And  the  night-wind  clamors  hoarse ! 
See  !  the  starting  wretch's  head 

Lies  pillow'd  on  a  brother's  corse !) 


VII. 

Not  yet  enslaved,  not  wholly  vile, 
O  Albion !  O  my  mother  Isle  ! 
Thy  valleys,  fair  as  Eden's  bowers, 
Glitter  green  with  sunny  showers ; 
Thy  grassy  uplands'  gentle  swells 

Echo  to  the  bleat  of  flocks 
(Those  grassy  hills,  those  glittering  dells 

Proudly  ramparted  with  rocks) ; 
And  Ocean,  'mid  his  uproar  wild 
Speaks  safety  to  his  island-child  ! 

Hence,  for  many  a  fearless  age 

Has  social  Quiet  loved  thy  shore  ! 
Nor  ever  proud  Invader's  rage 
Or  sack'd  thy  lowers,  or  stain'd  thy  fields  with  gor>- 


VIII. 

Abandon'd  of  Heaven !  mad  Avarice  thy  guide. 
At  cowardly  distance  yet  kindling  with  pride — 
32 


SIBYLLLNE  LEAVES. 


2'.i 


'Mid  thy  herds  and  thy  com-fields  secure  thou  hast 

stood, 
And  join'd  the  wild  yelling  of  Famine  and  Blood  ! 
The  nations  curse  thee  !  They  with  eager  wondering 

Shall  hear  Destruction,  like  a  Vulture,  scream  ! 

Strange-eyed  Destruction!  who  with  many  a  dream 
Of  central  fires  through  nether  seas  upthundering 

Soothes  her  fierce  solitude  ;  yet,  as  she  lies 
By  livid  fount,  or  red  volcanic  stream, 

If  ever  to  her  lidless  dragon-eyes, 

O  Albion!  thy  predestin'd  ruins  rise, 
The  fiend-hag  on  her  perilous  couch  doth  leap, 
Muttering  distemper'd  triumph  in  her  charmed  sleep. 

IX. 

Away,  my  soul,  away  ! 
In  vain,  in  vain,  the  Birds  of  warning  sing — 
And  hark !  I  hear  the  famish'd  brood  of  prey 
Flap  their  lank  pennons  on  the  groaning  wind! 
Away,  my  soul,  away  ! 
I,  unpartaking  of  the  evil  thing, 
With  daily  prayer  and  daily  toil 
Soliciting  for  food  my  scanty  soil, 
Have  wail'd  my  country  with  a  loud  lament. 
Now  I  recentre  my  immortal  mind 

In  the  deep  sabbath  of  meek  self-content ; 
Cleans'd  from  the  vaporous  passions  that  bedim 
God's  Image,  sister  of  the  Seraphim. 


FRANCE. 


I. 

Ye  Clouds !  that  far  above  me  float  and  pause, 

Whose  pathless  march  no  mortal  may  control ! 

Ye  Ocean- Waves  !  that,  wheresoe'er  ye  roll, 
Yield  homage  only  to  eternal  laws ! 
Ye  Woods !  that  listen  to  the  night-birds'  singing, 

Midway  the  smooth  and  perilous  slope  reclined, 
Save  when  vour  own  imperious  branches  swinging, 

Have  made  a  solemn  music  of  the  wind  ! 
Where,  like  a  man  beloved  of  God, 
Through  glooms,  which  never  woodman  trod, 

How  oft,  pursuing  fancies  holy, 
My  moonlight  way  o'er  flowering  weeds  I  wound, 

Inspired,  beyond  the  guess  of  folly, 
By  each  rude  shape  and  wild  unconquerable  sound ! 
O  ye  loud  Waves !  and  O  ye  Forests  high ! 

And  O  ye  Clouds  that  far  above  me  soar'd ! 
Thou  rising  Sun !  thou  blue  rejoicing  Sky  ! 

Yea,  every  thing  that  is  and  will  be  free ! 

Bear  witness  for  me,  wheresoe'er  ye  be, 

With  what  deep  worship  I  have  still  ador'd 
The  spirit  of  divinest  Liberty. 

II. 

When  France  in  wrath  her  giant-limbs  uprear'd, 
And  with  that  oath,  which  smote  air,  earth  and  sea, 
Stamp'd  her  strong  foot  and  said  she  would  be  free, 

Bear  witness  for  me,  how  I  hoped  and  fear'd ! 

With  what  a  joy  my  lofty  gratulation 
Unaw'd  I  sang,  amid  a  slavish  band : 

And  when  to  whelm  the  disenchanted  nation, 
Like  fiends  embattled  by  a  wizard's  wand, 


The  Monarchs  march'd  in  evil  day, 
And  Britain  joined  the  dire  array ; 

Though  dear  her  shores  and  circling  ocean, 
Though  many  friendships,  many  youthful  loves 

Had  Bwoln  the  patriot  emotion, 
And  flung  a  magic  light  o'er  all  her  hills  and  groves; 
Yet  still  my  voice,  unalter'd,  sang  defeat 

To  all  that  braved  the  tyrant-quelling  lance, 
And  shame  too  long  delay'd  and  vain  retreat! 
For  ne'er,  O  Liberty!  with  partial  aim 
I  dimm'd  thy  light  or  damp'd  thy  holy  flame  ; 

But  bless'd  the  paeans  of  deliver'd  Fiance, 
And  hung  my  head  and  wept  at  Britain's  name. 

III. 

"  And  what,"  I  said, "  though  Blasphemy's  loud  screj  t  r  ■ 
With  that  sweet  music  of  deliverance  strove! 
Though  all  the  fierce  and  drunken  passions  wove 
A  dance  more  wild  than  e'er  was  maniac's  dream 

Ye  storms,  that  round  the  dawning  east  assembled: 
The  Sun  was  rising,  though  he  hid  his  light ! 

And  when,    to  soothe  my  soul,  that  hoped  ar.d 
trembled, 
The   dissonance  ceased,  and    all  seem'd  calm  ant 
bright ; 
When  France  her  front  deep-scarr'd  and  gory 
Conceal'd  with  clustering  wreaths  of  glory ; 

When,  insupportably  advancing, 
Her  arm  made  mockery  of  the  warrior's  tramp; 

While  timid  looks  of  fury  glancing, 
Domestic  treason,  crush'd  beneath  her  fatal  stamp, 
Writhed  like  a  wounded  dragon  in  his  gore ; 

Then  I  reproach'd  my  fears  that  would  not  flee ; 
"  And  soon,"  I  said,  "  shall  Wisdom  teach  her  lore 
In  the  low  huts  of  them  that  toil  and  groan ! 
And,  conquering  by  her  happiness  alone, 

Shall  France  compel  the  nations  to  be  free, 
Till  Love  and  Joy  look  round,  and  call  the  Earth 
their  own." 

IV. 

Forgive  me,  Freedom  !  O  forgive  those  dreams  ! 

I  hear  thy  voice,  I  hear  thy  loud  lament, 

From  bleak  Helvetia's  icy  caverns  sent — 
I  hear  thy  groans  upon  her  blood-stain'd  sireams! 

Heroes,  that  for  your  peaceful  country  perish'd 
And  ye  that,  fleeing,  spot  your  mountain-snows 

With  bleeding  wounds;  forgive  me  that  I  cherish'H 
One  thought  that  ever  bless'd  your  cruel  foes! 

To  scatter  rage,  and  traitorous  guilt, 

Where  Peace  her  jealous  home  had  built , 
A  patriot  race  to  disinherit 
Of  all  that  made  their  stormy  wilds  so  dear ; 

And  with  inexpiable  spirit 
To  taint  the  bloodless  freedom  of  the  mountaineer— 
O  France,  that  mockest  Heaven,  adulterous,  blind, 

And  patriot  only  in  pernicious  toils  ! 
Are  these  thy  boasts,  Champion  of  human-kind  ? 

To  mix  with  Kings  in  the  low  lust  of  sway, 
Yell  in  the  hunt,  and  share  the  murderous  prey ; 
To  insult  the  shrine  of  Liberty  with  spoils 

From  Freemen  torn ;  to  tempt  and  to  betray  ? 


The  Sensual  and  the  Dark  rebel  in  vain, 
Slaves  by  their  own  compulsion !  In  mad  game 
They  burst  their  manacles  and  wear  the  name 

Of  Freedom,  graven  on  a  heavier  chain  ! 
33 


24 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


O  Liberty !  with  profitless  endeavor 
Have  I  pursued  thee,  many  a  weary  hour  ; 

But  thou  nor  swell'st  the  victor's  strain,  nor  ever 
Didst  breathe  thy  soul  in  forms  of  human  power. 
Alike  from  all,  howe'er  they  praise  thee 
(Not  prayer  nor  boastful  name  delays  thee), 

Alike  from  Priestcraft's  harpy  minions, 
And  factious  Blasphemy's  obscener  slaves, 
Thou  speedest  on  thy  subtle  pinions, 
The  guide  of  homeless  winds,  and  playmates  of  the 

waves ! 
And  there  I  felt  thee ! — on  that  sea-cliff's  verge, 

Whose  pines,  scarce  travell'd  by  the  breeze  above, 

Had  made  one  murmur  with  the  distant  surge ! 

Yes,  while  I  stood  and  gazed,  my  temples  bare, 

And  shot  my  being  through  earth,  sea,  and  air, 

Possessing  all  things  with  intensest  love, 

O  Liberty !  my  spirit  felt  thee  there. 

February,  1797. 


FEARS  IN  SOLITUDE. 

WRITTEN    IN    APRIL,    1798,    DURING    THE    ALARM    OF 
AN    INVASION. 

A  green  and  silent  spot,  amid  the  hills, 

A  small  and  silent  dell !  O'er  stiller  place 

No  sinking  sky-lark  ever  poised  himself 

The  hills  are  heathy,  save  that  swelling  slope, 

Which  hath  a  gay  and  gorgeous  covering  on, 

All  golden  with  the  never-bloomless  furze, 

Which  now  blooms  most  profusely ;  but  the  dell, 

Bathed  by  the  mist,  is  fresh  and  delicate 

As  vernal  corn-field,  or  the  unripe  flax, 

When,  through  its  half-transparent  stalks,  at  eve, 

The  level  Sunshine  glimmers  with  green  light. 

Oh!  'tis  a  quiet  spirit-healing  nook! 

Which  all,  melhinks,  would  love  ;  but  chiefly  he, 

The  humble  man,  who,  in  his  youthful  years, 

Knew  just  so  much  of  folly,  as  had  made 

His  early  manhood  more  securely  wise ! 

Here  he  might  lie  on  fern  or  wither'd  heath, 

While  from  the  singing-lark  (that  sings  unseen 

The  minstrelsy  that  solitude  loves  best), 

And  from  the  Sun,  and  from  the  breezy  Air, 

Sweet  influences  trembled  o'er  his  frame ; 

And  he,  with  many  feelings,  many  thoughts, 

Made  up  a  meditative  joy,  and  found 

Religious  meanings  in  the  forms  of  nature ! 

And  so,  his  senses  gradually  wrapt 

In  a  half-sleep,  he  dreams  of  better  worlds, 

And  dreaming  hears  thee  still,  O  singing-lark! 

That  singest  like  an  angel  in  the  clouds ! 


My  God !  it  is  a  melancholy  thing 
For  such  a  man,  who  would  full  fain  preserve 
His  soul  in  calmness,  yet  perforce  must  feel 
For  all  his  human  brethren — O  my  God ! 
It  weighs  upon  the  heart,  that  he  must  think 
What  uproar  and  what  strife  may  now  be  stirring 
This  way  or  that  way  o'er  these  silent  hills — 
Invasion,  and  the  thunder  and  the  shout, 


And  all  the  crash  of  onset ;  fear  and  rage, 

And  undetermined  conflict — even  now. 

Even  now,  perchance,  and  in  his  native  isle ; 

Carnage  and  groans  beneath  this  blessed  Sun ! 

We  have  offended,  Oh !  my  countrymen  ! 

We  have  offended  very  grievously, 

And  been  most  tyrannous.     From  east  to  west 

A  groan  of  accusation  pierces  Heaven ! 

The  wretched  plead  against  us ;  multitudes 

Countless  and  vehement,  the  Sons  of  God, 

Our  Brethren  !  Like  a  cloud  that  travels  on, 

Steam'd  up  from  Cairo''!  swamps  of  pestilence, 

Even  so,  my  countrymen !  have  we  gone  forth 

And  borne  to  distant  tribes  slavery  and  pangs, 

And,  deadlier  far,  our  vices,  whose  deep  taint 

With  slow  perdition  murders  the  whole  man, 

His  body  and  his  soul !  Meanwhile,  at  home, 

All  individual  dignity  and  power 

Ingulf'd  in  Courts,  Committees,  Institutions, 

Associations  and  Societies, 

A  vain,  speech-mouthing,  speech-reporting  Guild, 

One  Benefit-Club  for  mutual  flattery, 

We  have  drunk  up,  demure  as  at  a  grace, 

Pollutions  from  the  brimming  cup  of  wealth  ; 

Contemptuous  of  all  honorable  rule, 

Yet  bartering  freedom  and  the  poor  man's  life 

For  gold,  as  at  a  market !  The  sweet  words 

Of  Christian  promise,  words  that  even  yet 

Might  stem  destruction  were  they  wisely  preach 'd. 

Are  mutter'd  o'er  by  men,  whose  tones  proclaim 

How  flat  and  wearisome  they  feel  their  trade: 

Rank  scoffers  some,  but  most  too  indolent 

To  deem  them  falsehoods  or  to  know  their  truth. 

Oh !  blasphemous !  the  book  of  life  is  made 

A  superstitious  instrument,  on  which 

We  gabble  o'er  the  oaths  we  mean  to  break  ; 

For  all  must  swear — all  and  in  every  place, 

College  and  wharf,  council  and  justice-court ; 

All,  all  must  swear,  the  briber  and  the  bribed, 

Merchant  and  lawyer,  senator  and  priest, 

The  rich,  the  poor,  the  old  man  and  the  young  ; 

All,  all  make  up  one  scheme  of  perjury, 

That  faith  doth  reel ;  the  very  name  of  God 

Sounds  like  a  juggler's  charm ;  and,  bold  with  joy, 

Forth  from  his  dark  and  lonely  hiding-place, 

(Portentous  sight !)  the  owlet  Atheism, 

Sailing  on  obscene  wings  athwart  the  noon, 

Drops  his  blue-fringed  lids,  and  holds  them  close, 

And  hooting  at  the  glorious  Sun  in  Heaven, 

Cries  out,  "  Where  is  it?" 

Thankless  too  for  peace 
(Peace  long  preserved  by  fleets  and  perilous  seas), 
Secure  from  actual  warfare,  we  have  loved 
To  swell  the  war-whoop,  passionate  for  war  ! 
Alas !  for  ages  ignorant  of  all 
Its  ghastlier  workings  (famine  or  blue  plague, 
Battle,  or  siege,  or  flight  through  wintry  snows), 
We,  this  whole  people,  have  been  clamorous 
For  war  and  bloodshed ;  animating  sports, 
The  which  we  pay  for  as  a  thing  to  talk  of, 
Spectators  and  not  combatants  ?  No  guess 
Anticipative  of  a  wrong  unfelt, 
No  speculation  or  contingency, 
However  dim  and  vague,  too  vague  and  dim 
To  yield  a  justifying  cause ;  and  forth 
(StuiTd  out  with  big  preamble,  holy  names. 
34 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


And  adjurations  of  the  God  in  Heaven), 

We  send  our  mandates  for  the  certain  death 

Of  thousands  and  ten  thousands !  Boys  and  girls, 

And  women,  that  would  groan  to  see  a  child 

Pull  off  an  insect's  leg,  all  read  of  war, 

The  best  amusement  for  our  morning-meal ! 

The  poor  wretch,  who  has  learnt  his  only  prayers 

From  curses,  who  knows  scarcely  words  enough 

To  ask  a  blessing  from  his  Heavenly  Father, 

Becomes  a  fluent  phraseman,  absolute 

And  technical  in  victories  and  defeats, 

And  all  our  dainty  terms  for  fratricide  ; 

Terms  which  we  trundle  smoothly  o'er  our  tongues 

Like  mere  abstractions,  empty  sounds,  to  which 

We  join  no  feeling  and  attach  no  form ! 

As  if  the  soldier  died  without  a  wound ; 

As  if  the  fibres  of  this  godlike  frame 

Were  gored  without  a  pang ;  as  if  the  wretch, 

Who  fell  in  battle,  doing  bloody  deeds, 

Pass'd  off  to  Heaven,  translated  and  not  kill'd  : 

As  though  he  had  no  wife  to  pine  for  him, 

No  God  to  judge  him !  Therefore,  evil  days 

Are  coming  on  us,  O  my  countrymen ! 

And  what  if  all-avenging  Providence, 

Strong  and  retributive,  should  make  us  know 

The  meaning  of  our  words,  force  us  to  feel 

The  desolation  and  the  agony 

Of  our  fierce  doings ! 


Spare  us  yet  awhile, 
Father  and  God !  O !  spare  us  yet  awhile ! 
Oh !  let  not  English  women  drag  their  flight 
Fainting  beneath  the  burthen  of  their  babes, 
Of  the  sweet  infants,  that  but  yesterday 
Laugh'd  at  the  breast !  Sons,  brothers,  husbands,  all 
Who  ever  gazed  with  fondness  on  the  forms 
Which  grew  up  with  you  round  the  same  fire-side, 
And  all  who  ever  heard  the  sabbath-bells 
Without  the  infidel's  scorn,  make  yourselves  pure ! 
Stand  forth  :  be  men !  repel  an  impious  foe, 
Impious  and  false,  a  light  yet  cruel  race, 
Who  laugh  away  all  virtue,  mingling  mirth 
With  deeds  of  murder ;  and  still  promising 
Freedom,  themselves  too  sensual  to  be  free, 
Poison  life's  amities,  and  cheat  the  heart 
Of  faith  and  quiet  hope,  and  all  that  soothes 
And  all  that  lifts  the  spirit .'  Stand  we  forth ; 
Render  them  back  upon  the  insulted  ocean. 
And  let  them  toss  as  idly  on  its  waves 
As  the  vile  sea-weed,  which  some  mountain-blast 
Swept  from  our  shores !  And  oh !  may  we  return 
Not  with  a  drunken  triumph,  but  with  fear, 
Repenting  of  the  wrongs  with  which  we  stung 
So  fierce  a  foe  to  frenzy ! 

I  have  told, 
0  Britons !  O  my  brethren !  I  have  told 
Most  bitter  truth,  but  without  bitterness. 
Nor  deem  my  zeal  or  factious  or  mistimed ; 
For  never  can  true  courage  dwell  with  them, 
Who,  playing  tricks  with  conscience,  dare  not  look 
At  their  owti  vices.     We  have  been  too  long 
Dupes  of  a  deep  delusion !  Some,  belike, 
Groaning  with  restless  enmity,  expect 
All  change  from  change  of  constituted  power ; 
As  if  a  Government  had  been  a  robe, 

D2 


On  which  our  vice  and  wretchedness  were  tagg'd 

Like  fancy  points  and  fringes,  with  the  robe 

Pull'd  off  at  pleasure.     Fondly  these  attach 

A  radical  causation  to  a  few 

Poor  drudges  of  chastising  Providence, 

Who  borrow  all  their  hues  and  qualities 

From  our  own  folly  and  rank  wickedness, 

Which  gave  them  birth  and  nursed  them.     Others, 

meanwhile, 
Dote  with  a  mad  idolatry  ;  and  all 
Who  will  not  fall  before  their  images, 
And  yield  them  worship,  they  are  enemies 
Even  of  their  country ! 

Such  have  I  been  deem'd — 
But,  O  dear  Britain !  0  my  Mother  Isle  ! 
Needs  must  thou  prove  a  name  most  dear  and  lioiy 
To  me,  a  son,  a  brother,  and  a  friend, 
A  husband,  and  a  father !  who  revere 
All  bonds  of  natural  love,  and  find  them  all 
Within  the  limits  of  thy  rocky  shores. 

0  native  Britain  !  O  my  Mother  Isle  ! 

How  shouldst  thou  prove  aught  else  but  deat  and 

holy 
To  me,  who  from  thy  lakes  and  mountain-hills. 
Thy  clouds,  thy  quiet  dales,  thy  rocks  and  seas, 
Have  drunk  in  all  my  intellectual  life, 
All  sweet  sensations,  all  ennobling  thoughts, 
All  adoration  of  the  God  in  nature, 
All  lovely  and  all  honorable  things, 
Whatever  makes  this  mortal  spirit  feel 
The  joy  and  greatness  of  its  future  being  ? 
There  lives  nor  form  nor  feeling  in  my  soul 
Unborrow'd  from  my  country.     O  divine 
And  beauteous  island  !  thou  hast  been  my  sole 
And  most  magnificent  temple,  in  the  which 

1  walk  with  awe,  and  sing  my  stately  songs, 
Loving  the  God  that  made  me ! 

May  my  fears, 
My  filial  fears,  be  vain !  and  may  the  vaunts 
And  menace  of  the  vengeful  enemy 
Pass  like  the  gust,  that  roar'd  and  died  away 
In  the  distant  tree :  which  heard,  and  only  heard 
In  this  low  dell,  bow'd  not  the  delicate  grass. 


But  now  the  gentle  dew-fall  sends  abroad 
The  fruit-like  perfume  of  the  golden  furze : 
The  light  has  left  the  summit  of  the  hill, 
Though  still  a  sunny  gleam  lies  beautiful, 
Aslant  the  ivied  beacon.     Now  farewell, 
Farewell,  awhile,  O  soft  and  silent  spot ! 
On  the  green  sheep-track,  up  the  heathy  hill. 
Homeward  I  wind  my  way ;  and  lo !  recall'd 
From  bodings  that  have  well-nigh  wearied  me, 
I  find  myself  upon  the  brow,  and  pause 
Startled  !  And  after  lonely  sojourning 
In  such  a  quiet  and  surrounding  nook, 
This  burst  of  prospect,  here  the  shadowy  main, 
Dim-tinted,  there  the  mighty  majesty 
Of  that  huge  amphitheatre  of  rich 
And  elmy  fields,  seems  like  society — 
Conversing  with  the  mind,  and  giving  it 
A  livelier  impulse  and  a  dance  of  thought ! 
And  now,  beloved  Stowey!  I  behold 
Thy  church-tower,  and,  methinks,  the  four  huge  elms 
35 


26 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Clustering,  which  mark  the  mansion  of  my  friend, 
And  close  behind  them,  hidden  from  my  view, 
is  my  own  lowly  cottage,  where  my  babe 
And  my  babe's  mother  dwell  in  peace !  With  light 
And  quicken'd  footsteps  thitherward  I  tend, 
Remembering  thee,  O  green  and  silent  dell ! 
And  grateful,  that,  by  nature's  quietness 
And  solitary  musings,  all  my  heart 
Is  soften'd,  and  made  worthy  to  indulge 
Love,  and  the  thoughts  that  yearn  for  human-kind. 
Nether  Stowey,  April  28th,  1798. 


FIRE,  FAMINE,  AND  SLAUGHTER. 

A  WAR  ECLOGUE. 

WITH  AN  APOLOGETIC  PREFACE.* 


The  Scene  a  desolated  Tract  in  La  Vendie.  Famine 
is  discovered  lying  on  the  ground ;  to  her  enter  Fire 
and  Slaughter. 


famine. 
Sisters  !  sisters !  who  sent  you  here  1 

SLAUGHTER  {to  FIRE). 

I  will  whisper  it  in  her  ear. 


No !  no !  no ! 
Spirits  hear  what  spirits  tell : 
Twill  make  a  holiday  in  Hell. 

No!  no!  no! 
Myself,  I  named  him  once  below, 
And  all  the  souls,  that  damned  be, 
Leap'd  up  at  once  in  anarchy, 
Clapp'd  their  hands  and  danced  for  glee. 
They  no  longer  heeded  me  ; 
But  laugh 'd  to  hear  Hell's  burning  rafters 
Unwillingly  re-echo  laughters ! 

No !  no !  no ! 
Spirits  hear  what  spirits  tell ! 
T  will  make  a  holiday  in  Hell ! 

FAMINE. 

Whisper  it,  sister !  so  and  so ! 
In  a  dark  hint,  soft  and  slow. 

SLAUGHTER. 

Letters  four  do  form  his  name— 
And  who  sent  you  ? 

BOTH. 

The  same!  the  same! 

SLAUGHTER. 

He  came  by  stealth,  and  unlock'd  my  den, 
And  I  have  drunk  the  blood  since  then 
Of  thrice  three  hundred  thousand  men. 


Who  bade  you  do  it? 


SLAUGHTER. 

The  same!  the  same! 


•  Sea  Appendix  to  "  Sibylline  Leaves. 


Letters  four  do  form  his  name. 
He  let  me  loose,  and  cried  Halloo ! 
To  him  alone  the  praise  is  due. 


Thanks,  sister,  thanks!  the  men  have  bled, 

Their  wives  and  their  children  faint  for  bread. 

I  stood  in  a  swampy  field  of  battle ; 

With  bones  and  sculls  I  made  a  rattle, 

To  frighten  the  wolf  and  carrion  crow, 

And  the  homeless  dog — but  they  would  not  go. 

So  off  I  flew;  for  how  could  I  bear 

To  see  them  gorge  their  dainty  fare? 

I  heard  a  groan  and  a  peevish  squall, 

And  through  the  chink  of  a  cottage-wall — 

Can  you  guess  what  I  saw  there  ? 

BOTH. 

Whisper  it,  sister!  in  our  ear. 


A  baby  beat  its  dying  mother. 

I  had  starved  the  one,  and  was  starving  the  other ! 


Who  bade  you  do't? 

FAMINE. 

The  same!  the  same! 
Letters  four  do  form  his  name. 
He  let  me  loose,  and  cried  Halloo! 
To  him  alone  the  praise  is  due. 

FIRE. 

Sisters!  I  from  Ireland  came! 

Hedge  and  corn-fields  all  on  flame, 

I  triumph'd  o'er  the  setting  sun! 

And  all  the  while  the  work  was  done 

On  as  I  strode  with  my  huge  strides, 

I  flung  back  my  head  and  I  held  my  sides, 

It  was  so  rare  a  piece  of  fun 

To  see  the  swelter'd  cattle  run 

With  uncouth  gallop  through  the  night, 

Scared  by  the  red  and  noisy  light! 

By  the  light  of  his  own  blazing  cot 

Was  many  a  naked  rebel  shot: 

The  house-stream  met  the  flame  and  hiss'd, 

While  crash!  fell  in  the  roof,  I  wist, 

On  some  of  those  old  bedrid  nurses, 

That  deal  in  discontent  and  curses. 


Who  bade  you  do't? 

FIRE. 

The  same!  the  same! 
Letters  four  do  form  his  name. 
He  let  me  loose,  and  cried  Halloo! 
To  him  alone  the  praise  is  due. 


He  let  us  loose,  and  cried  Halloo ! 
How  shall  we  yield  him  honor  due? 


Wisdom  comes  with  lack  of  food, 
I  '11  gnaw,  1  '11  gnaw  the  multitude, 


36 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


27 


Till  the  cup  of  rage  o'erbrim  : 

They  shall  seize  him  and  his  brood — 

SLAUGHTER. 

They  shall  tear  him  limb  from  limb ! 

FIRE. 

0  thankless  beldames  and  untrue ! 
And  is  this  all  that  you  can  do 
For  him  who  did  so  much  for  you? 
Ninety  months  he,  by  my  troth ! 
Hath  richly  cater'd  for  you  both ; 
And  in  an  hour  would  you  repay 

An  eight  years'  work  ? — Away !  away ! 

1  alone  am  faithful !  I 
Cling  to  him  everlastingly. 

1796. 


RECANTATION 

ILLUSTRATED  IN  THE  STORY  OF  THE  MAD  OX. 

An  Ox,  long  fed  with  musty  hay, 

And  work'd  with  yoke  and  chain, 
Was  turn'd  out  on  an  April  day, 
When  fields  are  in  their  best  array, 
And  growing  grasses  sparkle  gay, 
At  once  with  sun  and  rain. 

The  grass  was  fine,  the  sun  was  bright, 

With  truth  I  may  aver  it ; 
The  Ox  was  glad,  as  well  he  might, 
Thought  a  green  meadow  no  bad  sight, 
And  frisk'd  to  show  his  huge  delight, 

Much  like  a  beast  of  spirit 

"  Stop,  neighbors !  stop !  why  these  alarms  ? 

The  Ox  is  only  glad." 
But  still  they  pour  from  cots  and  farms- 
Halloo  !  the  parish  is  up  in  arms 
(A  hoaxing  hunt  has  always  charms), 

Halloo!  the  Ox  is  mad. 

The  frighted  beast  scamper'd  about, 
Plunge  !  through  the  hedge  he  drove — 

The  mob  pursue  with  hideous  rout, 

A  bull-dog  fastens  on  his  snout, 

He  gores  the  dog,  his  tongue  hangs  out — 
He 's  mad,  he  's  mad,  by  Jove ! 

"  Stop,  neighbors,  stop!"  aloud  did  call 

A  sage  of  sober  hue, 
But  all  at  once  on  him  they  fall, 
And  women  squeak  and  children  squall, 
"  What !  would  you  have  him  toss  us  all  ? 

And,  damme !  who  are  you  ? " 

Ah,  hapless  sage  !  his  ears  they  stun, 

And  curse  him  o'er  and  o'er — 
"  You  bloody-minded  dog !  "  (cries  one,) 
"  To  slit  your  windpipe  were  good  fun — 
'Od  bl —  you  for  an  impious*  son 
Of  a  Presbyterian  w — re  ! 


*  One  of  the  many  fine  word9  which  the  most  uneducated 
had  about  this  time  a  constant  opportunity  of  acquiring  from 

the  sermons  in  the  pulpit,  and  the  proclamations  on  the 

corners. 


"  You  'd  have  him  gore  the  parish-priest, 

And  run  against  the  altar — 
You  Fiend!" — The  sage  his  warnings  ceased, 
And  North,  and  South,  and  West,  and  East, 
Halloo !  they  follow  the  poor  beast, 

Mat,  Dick,  Tom,  Bob,  and  Walter. 

Old  Lewis,  't  was  his  evil  day, 

Stood  trembling  in  his  shoes  ; 
The  Ox  was  his — what  could  he  say  ? 
His  legs  were  sthTen'd  with  dismay, 
The  Ox  ran  o'er  him  'mid  the  fray, 

And  gave  him  his  death's  bruise. 

The  frighted  beast  ran  on — but  here, 
The  Gospel  scarce  more  true  is — 

My  muse  stops  short  in  mid-career — 

Nay !  gentle  reader !  do  not  sneer, 

I  cannot  choose  but  drop  a  tear, 
A  tear  for  good  old  Lewis. 

The  frighted  beast  ran  through  the  town, 

All  follow'd,  boy  and  dad, 
Bull-dog,  Parson,  Shopman,  Clown, 
The  Publicans  rush'd  from  the  Crown, 
"  Halloo !  hamstring  him  !  cut  him  down ! ' 

They  drove  the  poor  Ox  mad. 

Should  you  a  rat  to  madness  tease, 

Why  even  a  rat  might  plague  you : 
There  's  no  philosopher  but  sees 
That  rage  and  fear  are  one  disease — 
Though  that  may  burn  and  this  may  freeze 
They're  both  alike  the  ague. 

And  so  this  Ox,  in  frantic  mood, 

Faced  round  like  any  Bull — 
The  mob  turn'd  tail,  and  he  pursued, 
Till  they  with  fright  and  fear  were  stew'd, 
And  not  a  chick  of  all  this  brood 

But  had  his  belly-full. 

Old  Nick's  astride  the  beast,  't'is  clear — 

Old  Nicholas  to  a  tittle ! 
But  all  agree  he  'd  disappear, 
Would  but  the  parson  venture  near, 
And  through  his  teeth,  right  o'er  the  steer 

Squirt  out  some  fasting-spittle.t 

Achilles  was  a  warrior  fleet, 

The  Trojans  he  could  worry — 
Our  parson  too  was  swift  of  feet, 
But  show'd  it  chiefly  in  retreat ! 
The  victor  Ox  scour'd  down  the  street, 

The  mob  fled  hurry-skurry. 

Through  gardens,  lanes,  and  fields  new-plow'd, 
Through  his  hedge  and  through  her  hedge. 

He  plunged  and  toss'd,  and  bellow'd  loud, 

Till  in  his  madness  he  grew  proud 

To  see  this  helter-skelter  crowd, 

That  had  more  wrath  than  courage. 


t  According  to  the  superstition  of  the  West  Countries,  if  you 
meet  the  Devil,  you  may  either  cut  him  in  half  with  a  straw,  or 
you  may  cause  him  instantly  to  disappear  by  spitting  over  his 
horns. 

37 


28 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Alas !  to  mend  the  breaches  wide 

He  made  for  these  poor  ninnies, 
They  all  must  work,  whate'er  betide, 
Both  days  and  months,  and  pay  beside 
(Sad  news  for  Avarice  and  for  Pride) 

A  sight  of  golden  guineas. 

But  here  once  more  to  view  did  pop 

The  man  that  kept  his  senses. 
And  now  he  cried — "  Stop,  neighbors !  stop ! 
The  Ox  is  mad  !   I  would  not  swop, 
No,  not  a  school-boy's  farthing  top 

For  all  the  parish  fences. 

"  The  Ox  is  mad !  Ho !  Dick,  Bob,  Mat! 

What  means  this  coward  fuss  ? 
Ho !  stretch  this  rope  across  the  plat — 
*T  will  trip  him  up — or  if  not  that, 
Why,  damme  !  we  must  lay  him  flat — 

See,  here 's  my  blunderbuss ! " 

"  A  lying  dog!  just  now  he  said, 

The  Ox  was  only  glad, 
Let 's  break  his  Presbyterian  head !  " — 
"  Hush!"  quoth  the  sage,  "  you've  been  misled, 
No  quarrels  now — let's  all  make  head — 

You  drove  the  poor  Ox  mad!" 

As  thus  I  sat  in  careless  chat, 

With  the  morning's  wet  newspaper, 

In  eager  haste,  without  his  hat, 

As  blind  and  blundering  as  a  bat, 

In  came  that  fierce  aristocrat, 
Our  pursy  woollen  draper. 

And  so  my  Muse  perforce  drew  bit, 

And  in  he  rush'd  and  panted : — 
"  Well,  have  you  heard  ?  " — "  No !  not  a  whit." 
"  What !  han't  you  heard  ? " — Come,  out  with  it ! " 
"  That  Tierney  votes  for  Mister  Pitt, 

And  Sheridan 's  recanted." 


II.  LOVE  POEMS. 


Quas  humilia  tenero  stylus  olim  effudit  in  fflvo. 

Perlegis  hie  lacrymas,  et  quod  pharetratus  acuta 

Ille  puer  puero  fecit  mihi  cuspide  vulnus, 

Omnia  paulatim  consumit  longior  ;rtas, 

Vivendoque  Bimul  mojimur,  rapimurque  manendo. 

lspe  mihi  collatusenim  non  ille  videbor: 

Frons  alia  est,  moresque  alii,  nova  mentis  imago, 

Voxque  aliud  sonat — 

Pectore  nunc  gelido  calidos  miseremur  amantes, 

Jamque  arsisse  pudet.    Veteres  tranquilla  tumultus 

Mens  horret  relegensque  alium  putat  ista  locutum. 

Petrarch. 


INTRODUCTION  TO  THE  TALE  OF  THE 
DARK  LADIE. 

The  following  Poem  is  intended  as  the  introduction  to  a 
somewhat  longer  one.  The  use  of  the  old  Ballad  word  I.adie  for 
Lady,  is  the  only  piece  of  obsoleteness  in  it ;  and  as  it  is  pro- 
fessedly a  tale  of  ancient  times,  I  trust  that  the  affectionate 
lovers  of  venerable  antiquity  [as  Camden  says]  will  grant  me 
their  pardon,  and  perhaps  may  be  induced  to  admit  a  forco 
and  propriety  in  it.  A  heavier  objection  may  be  adduced 
against  the  author,  thnt  in  these  times  of  fear  and  expectation, 
when  novelties  explode  around  us  in  all  directions,  ho  should 


presume  to  offer  to  the  public  a  silly  tale  of  old-fashioned  lore: 
and  five  years  ago,  I  own  I  should  have  allowed  and  felt  the 
force  of  this  objection.  But,  alas  !  explosion  has  succeeded 
explosion  so  rapidly,that  novelty  itself  ceases  to  appear  new,  atid 
it  is  possible  that  now  even  a  simple  story, wholly  uninspired  with 
politics  or  personality,  may  find  some  attention  amid  the  hub- 
bub of  revolutions,  as  to  those  who  have  remained  a  long  time 
by  the  falls  of  Niagara,  the  lowest  wh  ispering  becomes  distinct 
ly  audible.  S.  T.  C 

Dec.  21. 1799. 


O  leave  the  lily  on  its  stem; 

0  leave  the  rose  upon  the  spray; 
O  leave  the  elder  bloom,  fair  maids! 

And  listen  to  my  lay. 

A  cypress  and  a  myrtle-bough 

This  morn  around  my  harp  you  twined 
Because  it  fashion'd  mournfully 

Its  murmurs  in  the  wind. 

And  now  a  Tale  of  Love  and  Woe, 
A  woful  Tale  of  Love  I  sing  ; 

Hark,  gentle  maidens,  hark!  it  sighs 
And  trembles  on  the  string. 

But  most,  my  own  dear  Genevieve, 
It  sighs  and  trembles  most  for  thee ! 

0  come,  and  hear  what  cruel  wrongs 
Befell  the  Dark  Ladie. 

Few  Sorrows  hath  she  of  her  own, 
My  hope,  my  joy,  my  Genevieve! 

She  loves  me  best,  whene'er  I  sing 
The  songs  that  make  her  grieve. 

All  thoughts,  all  passions,  all  delights, 
Whatever  stir  this  mortal  frame, 

All  are  but  ministers  of  Love, 
And  feed  his  sacred  flame. 

Oh  f  ever  in  my  waking  dreams, 

1  dwell  upon  that  happy  hour, 
When  midway  on  the  mount  I  sate, 

Beside  the  ruin'd  tower. 

The  moonshine,  stealing  o'er  the  scene, 
Had  blended  with  the  lightsof  eve; 

And  she  was  there,  my  hope,  my  joy, 
My  own  dear  Genevieve! 

She  lean'd  against  the  armed  man, 
The  statue  of  the  armed  knight  ; 

She  stood  and  listen'd  to  my  harp, 
Amid  the  ling'ring  light 

1  play'd  a  sad  and  doleful  air, 

I  sang  an  old  and  moving  story— 
An  old  rude  song,  that  fitted  well 
That  ruin  wild  and  hoary. 

She  listen'd  with  a  flitting  blush, 

With  downcast  eyes  and  modest  grace ; 

For  well  she  knew,  I  could  not  choose 
But  gaze  upon  her  face. 

I  told  her  of  the  Knight  that  wore 
Upon  his  shield  a  burning  brand ; 

And  how  for  ten  long  years  he  woo'd 
The  Ladie  of  the  Land : 

38 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


29 


I  told  her  how  he  pined  :  and  all ! 

The  deep,  the  low,  the  pleading  tone 
With  which  I  sung  another's  love, 

Interpreted  my  own. 

She  listen'd  with  a  flitting  blush  ; 

With  downcast  eyes,  and  modest  grace  ; 
And  she  forgave  me,  that  I  gazed 

Too  fondly  on  her  face ! 

But  when  I  told  the  cruel  scorn 

That  crazed  this  bold  and  lonely  Knight, 
And  how  he  roam'd  the  mountain-woods, 

Nor  rested  day  or  night; 

And  how  he  eross'd  the  woodman's  paths, 
Through  briers  and  swampy  mosses  beat ; 

How  boughs  rebounding  scourged  his  limbs, 
And  low  stubs  gored  his  feet ; 

That  sometimes  from  the  savage  den, 

And  sometimes  from  the  darksome  shade, 

And  sometimes  starting  up  at  once 
In  green  and  sunny  glade  ; 

There  came  and  look'd  him  in  the  face 
An  Angel  beautiful  and  bright  ; 

And  how  he  knew  it  was  a  Fiend, 
This  miserable  Knight ! 

And  how,  unknowing  what  he  did, 

He  leapt  amid  a  lawless  band, 
And  saved  from  outrage  worse  than  death 

The  Ladie  of  the  Land ! 

And  how  she  wept,  and  clasp'd  his  knees ; 

And  how  she  tended  him  in  vain — 
And  meekly  strove  to  expiate 

The  scorn  that  crazed  his  brain  : 

And  how  she  nursed  him  in  a  cave  ; 

And  how  his  madness  went  away, 
When  on  the  yellow  forest-leaves 

A  dying  man  he  lay  ; 

His  dying  words — but  when  I  reach'd 
That  tend'rest  strain  of  all  the  ditty, 

My  falt'ring  voice  and  pausing  harp 
Disturb'd  her  soul  with  pity ! 

All  impulses  of  soul  and  sense 

Had  thrill'd  my  guiltless  Genevieve ; 

The  music  and  the  doleful  tale, 
The  rich  and  balmy  eve; 

And  hopes  and  fears  that  kindle  hope, 

An  undistinguishable  throng, 
And  gentle  wishes  long  subdued, 

Subdued  and  cherish'd  long  ! 

She  wept  with  pity  and  delight, 

She  blush 'd  with  love  and  maiden-shame; 
And,  like  the  murmurs  of  a  dream, 

I  heard  her  breathe  my  name. 

saw  her  bosom  heave  and  swell, 
Heave  and  swell  with  inward  sighs — 
I  could  not  choose  but  love  to  see 
Her  gentle  bosom  rise. 


Her  wet  cheek  glow'd  :  she  stept  aside. 
As  conscious  of  my  look  she  stepp'd  ; 

Then  suddenly,  with  tim'rous  eye, 
She  flew  to  me  and  wept. 

She  half  inclosed  me  with  her  arms, 
She  press'd  me  with  a  meek  embrace  ; 

And  bending  back  her  head,  look'd  up, 
And  gazed  upon  my  face. 

*T  was  partly  love,  and  partly  fear, 
And  partly  't  was  a  bashful  art, 

That  I  might  rather  feel  than  see 
The  swelling  of  her  heart. 

I  calm'd  her  fears,  and  she  was  calm, 
And  told  her  love  with  virgin  pride  ; 

And  so  I  won  my  Genevieve, 
My  bright  and  beauteous  bride. 

And  now  once  more  a  tale  of  woe, 

A  woeful  tale  of  love  I  sing : 
For  thee,  my  Genevieve !  it  sighs, 

And  trembles  on  the  string. 

When  last  I  sang  the  cruel  scorn 

That  crazed  this  bold  and  lonely  Knight, 

And  how  he  roam'd  the  mountain-woods, 
Nor  rested  day  or  night ; 

I  promised  thee  a  sister  tale 

Of  man's  perfidious  cruelty  : 
Come,  then,  and  hear  what  cruel  wrong 

Befell  the  Dark  Ladie. 


LEWTI,  OR  THE  CIRCASSIAN 
LOVE-CHAUNT. 

At  midnight  by  the  stream  I  roved, 
To  forget  the  form  I  loved. 
Image  of  Lewti !  from  my  mind 
Depart ;  for  Lewti  is  not  kind. 

The  moon  was  high,  the  moonlight  gleam 

And  the  shadow  of  a  star 
Heaved  upon  Tarnaha's  stream  ; 

But  the  rock  shone  brighter  far, 
The  rock  half-shelter'd  from  my  view 
By  pendent  boughs  of  tressy  yew — 
So  shines  my  Lewti's  forehead  fair, 
Gleaming  through  her  sable  hair. 
Image  of  Lewti !  from  my  mind 
Depart ;  for  Lewti  is  not  kind. 

I  saw  a  cloud  of  palest  hue, 

Onward  to  the  moon  it  pass'd ; 
Still  brighter  and  more  bright  it  grew. 
With  floating  colors  not  a  few, 

Till  it  reach'd  the  moon  at  last  : 
Then  the  cloud  was  wholly  bright 
With  a  rich  and  amber  light ! 
And  so  with  many  a  hope  I  seek 

And  with  such  joy  I  find  my  Lewti : 
And  even  so  my  pale  wan  cheek 

Drinks  in  as  deep  a  flush  of  beauty ! 
Nay,  treacherous  image !  leave  my  mind, 
If  Lewti  never  will  be  kind. 

39 


30 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


The  little  cloud — it  floats  away, 

Away  it  goes ;  away  so  soon  ? 
Alas !  it  has  no  power  to  stay  : 
Its  hues  are  dim,  its  hues  are  gray — 

Away  it  passes  from  the  moon ! 
How  mournfully  it  seems  to  fly, 

Ever  fading  more  and  more, 
To  joyless  regions  of  the  sky — 

And  now  't  is  whiter  than  before  ! 
As  white  as  my  poor  cheek  will  be, 

When,  Lewti !  on  my  couch  I  lie, 
A  dying  man  for  love  of  thee. 
Nay,  treacherous  image  !  leave  my  mind — 
And  yet  thou  didst  not  look  unkind. 

I  saw  a  vapor  in  the  sky, 

Thin,  and  white,  and  very  high ; 
I  ne'er  beheld  so  thin  a  cloud  : 

Perhaps  the  breezes  that  can  fly 

Now  below  and  now  above, 
Have  snaleh'd  aloft  the  lawny  shroud 

Of  Lady  fair — that  died  for  love. 
For  maids,  as  well  as  youths,  have  perish'd 
From  fruitless  love  too  fondly  cherish'd. 
Nay,  treacherous  image  !  leave  my  mind — 
For  Lewti  never  will  be  kind. 

Hush !  my  heedless  feet  from  under 
Slip  the  crumbling  banks  for  ever : 

Like  echoes  to  a  distant  thunder, 
They  plunge  into  the  gentle  river. 

The  river-swans  have  heard  my  tread, 

And  startle  from  their  reedy  bed. 

O  beauteous  Birds !  methinks  ye  measure 
Your  movements  to  some  heavenly  tune  ! 

0  beauteous  Birds !  't  is  such  a  pleasure 
To  see  you  move  beneath  the  moon, 

1  would  it  were  your  true  delight 
To  sleep  by  day  and  wake  all  night. 

I  know  the  place  where  Lewti  lies, 
When  silent  night  has  closed  her  eyes : 

It  is  a  breezy  jasmine-bower, 
The  nightingale  sings  o'er  her  head  : 

Voice  of  the  Night !  had  I  the  power 
That  leafy  labyrinth  to  thread, 
And  creep,  like  thee,  with  soundless  tread, 
I  then  might  view  her  bosom  white 
Heaving  lovely  to  my  sight, 
As  these  two  swans  together  heave 
On  the  gently  swelling  wave. 

Oh !  that  she  saw  me  in  a  dream, 

And  dreamt  that  I  had  died  for  care  ; 

All  pale  and  wasted  I  would  seem, 
Yet  fair  withal,  as  spirits  are ! 

I  'd  die  indeed,  if  I  might  see 

Her  bosom  heave,  and  heave  for  me  ! 

Soothe,  gentle  image  !  soothe  my  mind  ! 

To-morrow  Lewti  may  be  kind. 
1795. 


THE  PICTURE,  OR  THE  LOVER'S 
RESOLUTION. 

Through  weeds  and  thorns,  and  matted  underwood 
I  force  my  way ;  now  climb,  and  now  descend 


O'er  rocks,  or  bare  or  mossy,  with  wild  foot 
Crushing  the  purple  whorls ;  while  oft  unseen. 
Hurrying  along  the  drifted  forest-leaves, 
The  scared  snake  rustles.  Onward  still  I  toil, 
I  know  not,  ask  not  whither!  A  new  joy, 
Lovely  as  light,  sudden  as  summer  gust, 
And  gladsome  as  the  first-born  of  the  spring, 
Beckons  me  on,  or  follows  from  behind, 
Playmate,  or  guide !    The  master-passion  quell'd, 
I  feel  that  I  am  free.    With  dun-red  bark 
The  fir-lrees,  and  the  unfrequent  slender  oak, 
Forth  from  this  tangle  wild  of  bush  and  brake 
Soar  up,  and  form  a  melancholy  vault 
High  o'er  me,  murmuring  like  a  distant  sea. 

Here  Wisdom  might  resort,  and  here  Remorse  ; 
Here  too  the  lovelorn  man  who,  sick  in  soul, 
And  of  this  busy  human  heart  aweary, 
Worships  the  spirit  of  unconscious  life 
In  tree  or  wild-flower. — Gentle  Lunatic ! 
If  so  he  might  not  wholly  cease  to  be, 
He  would  far  rather  not  be  that,  he  is  ; 
But  would  be  something,  that  he  knows  not  of, 
In  winds  or  waters,  or  among  the  rocks ! 

But  hence,  fond  wretch  !  breathe  not  contagion 
here  ! 
No  myrtle-walks  are  these  :  these  are  no  groves 
Where  Love  dare  loiter !   If  in  sullen  mood 
He  should  stray  hither,  the  low  stumps  shall  gore 
His  dainty  feet,  the  brier  and  the  thorn 
Make  his  plumes  haggard.    Like  a  wounded  bird 
Easily  caught,  ensnare  him,  O  ye  Nymphs, 
Ye  Oreads  chaste,  ye  dusky  Dryades  ! 
And  you,  ye  Earlh-winds  !  you  that  make  at  morn 
The  dew-drops  quiver  on  the  spiders'  webs ! 
You,  O  ye  wingless  Airs  !  that  creep  between 
The  rigid  stems  of  heath  and  bitten  furze, 
Within  whose  scanty  shade,  at  summer-noon, 
The  mother-sheep  hath  worn  a  hollow  bed — 
Ye,  that  now  cool  her  fleece  with  dropless  damp, 
Now  pant  and  murmur  with  her  feeding  lamb. 
Chase,  chase  him,  all  ye  Fays,  and  elfin  Gnomes ! 
With  prickles  sharper  than  his  darts  bemock 
His  little  Godship,  making  him  perforce 
Creep  through  a  thorn-bush  on  yon  hedgehog's  back 

This  is  my  hour  of  triumph !  I  can  now 
With  my  own  fancies  play  the  merry  fool, 
And  laugh  away  worse  folly,  being  free. 
Here  will  I  seat  myself,  beside  this  old, 
Hollow,  and  weedy  oak,  which  ivy-twine 
Clothes  as  with  net-work  :   here  will  I  couch  my 

limbs, 
Close  by  this  river,  in  this  silent  shade, 
As  safe  and  sacred  from  the  step  of  man 
As  an  invisible  world — unheard,  unseen, 
And  list'ning  only  to  the  pebbly  brook 
That  murmurs  with  a  dead,  yet  tinkling  sound  : 
Or  to  the  bees,  that  in  the  neighboring  trunk 
Make  honey-hoards.    The  breeze,  that  visits  me, 
Was  never  Love's  accomplice,  never  raised 
The  tendril  ringlets  from  the  maiden's  brow, 
And  the  blue,  delicate  veins  above  her  cheek ; 
Ne'er  play'd  the  wanton — never  half-disclosed 
The  maiden's  snowy  bosom,  scattering  thence 
Eye-poisons  for  some  love-distemper'd  youth, 
VVho  ne'er  henceforth  may  see  an  aspen-grove 
40 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


31 


Shiver  in  sunshine,  but  his  feeble  heart 
Shall  flow  away  like  a  dissolving  thing. 

Sweet  breeze  !  thou  only,  if  I  guess  aright, 
Liftest  the  feathers  of  the  robin's  breast, 
That  swells  its  little  breast,  so  full  of  song, 
Sinking  above  me,  on  the  mountain-ash. 
Ami  thou  too,  desert  Stream  !  no  pool  of  thine, 
Though  clear  as  lake  in  latest  summer-eve, 
Did  e'er  reflect  the  stately  virgin's  robe, 
nhe  face,  the  form  divine,  the  downcast  look 
'ontemplative  !  Behold  !  her  open  palm 
'resses  her  cheek  and  brow !  her  elbow  rests 
hi  the  bare  branch  of  half-uprooted  tree, 
That  leans  towards  its  mirror!  Who  erewhile 
lad   from  her  countenance    turn'd,   or  look'd  by 

stealth 
(For  fear  is  true  love's  cruel  nurse),  he  now 
With  stedfast  gaze  and  unoffending  eye, 
Worships  the  watery  idol,  dreaming  hopes 
Delicious  to  the  soul,  but  fleeting,  vain, 
E'en  as  that  phantom-world  on  which  he  gazed, 
But  not  unheeded  gazed  :  for  see,  ah  !  see, 
The  sportive  tyrant  with  her  left  hand  plucks 
The  heads  of  tall  flowers  that  behind  her  grow, 
Lychnis,  and  willow-herb,  and  fox-glove  bells : 
And  suddenly,  as  one  that  toys  with  time, 
Scatters  them  on  the  pool !  Then  all  the  charm 
Is  broken — all  that  phantom-world  so  fair 
Vanishes,  and  a  thousand  circlets  spread, 
And  each  misshapes  the  other.    Stay  awhile, 
Poor  youth,  who  scarcely  darest  lift  up  thine  eyes ! 
The  stream  will  soon  renew  its  smoothness,  soon 
The  visions  will  return  !  And  lo  !  he  stays  : 
And  soon  the  fragments  dim  of  lovely  forms 
Come  trembling  back,  unite,  and  now  once  more 
The  pool  becomes  a  mirror ;  and  behold 
Each  wild-flower  on  the  marge  inverted  there, 
And  there  the  half-uprooted  tree — but  where, 
O  where  the  virgin's  snowy  arm,  that  lean'd 
On  its  bare  branch  ?  He  turns,  and  she  is  gone ! 
Homeward  she  steals  through  many  a  woodland 

maze 
Which  he  shall  seek  in  vain.    Ill-fated  youth ! 
Go,  day  by  day,  and  waste  thy  manly  prime 
In  mad  love-yearning  by  the  vacant  brook, 
Till  sickly  thoughts  bewitch  thine  eyes,  and  thou 
Behold'st  her  shadow  still  abiding  there, 
The  Naiad  of  the  Mirror ! 

Not  to  thee, 

0  wild  and  desert  Stream !  belongs  this  tale : 
Gloomy  and  dark  art  thou — the  crowded  firs 
Spire  from  thy  shores,  and  stretch  across  thy  bed, 
Making  thee  doleful  as  a  cavern-well  : 

Save  when  the  shy  king-fishers  build  their  nest 
On  thy  steep  banks,  no  loves  hast  thou,  wild  stream! 

This  be  my  chosen  haunt — emancipate 
From  passion's  dreams,  a  freeman,  and  alone, 

1  rise  and  trace  its  devious  course.    O  lead, 
Lead  me  to  deeper  shades  and  lonelier  glooms. 
Lo !  stealing  through  the  canopy  of  firs, 
How  fair  the  sunshine  spots  that  mossy  rock, 
Isle  of  the  river,  whose  disparted  waves 
Dart  off"  asunder  with  an  angry  sound, 

How  soon  to  reunite  !  And  see  !  they  meet, 
Each  in  the  other  lost  and  found  :  and  see 


Placelen,  as  spirits,  one  soft  water-sun 

Throbbing  within  them,  Heart  at  once  and  Eye  ! 

Willi  iis  soft  neighborhood  of  filmy  clouds, 

The  stains  and  shadings  of  forgotten  tears, 

Dimness  o'ersvvum  with  lustre  !  Such  the  hour 

Of  deep  enjoyment,  following  love's  brief  feuds  ; 

And  hark,  the  noise  of  a  near  waterfall ! 

I  pass  forth  into  light — I  find  myself 

Beneath  a  weeping  birch  (most  beautiful 

Of  forest-trees,  the  Lady  of  the  woods), 

Hard  by  the  brink  of  a  tall  weedy  rock 

That  overbrovvs  the  cataract.    How  bursts 

The  landscape  on  my  sight  !  Two  crescent  hills 

Fold  in  behind  each  other,  and  so  make 

A  circular  vale,  and  land-lock'd,  as  might  seem. 

With  brook  and  bridge,  and  gray  stone  cottages, 

Half  hid  by  rocks  and  fruit-trees.    At  my  feet, 

The  whortle-berries  are  bedew'd  with  spray, 

Dash'd  upwards  by  the  furious  waterfall. 

How  solemnly  the  pendent  ivy  mass 

Swings  in  its  winnow  :  all  the  air  is  calm. 

The    smoke    from    cottage-chimneys,    tinged    with 

light, 
Rises  in  columns  ;  from  this  house  alone, 
Close  by  the  waterfall,  the  column  slants, 
And  feels  its  ceaseless  breeze.    But  what  is  this  ? 
That  cottage,  with  its  slanting  chimney-smoke, 
And  close  beside  its  porch  a  sleeping  child, 
His  dear  head  pillow'd  on  a  sleeping  dog — 
One  arm  between  its  fore-legs,  and  the  hand 
Holds  loosely  its  small  handful  of  wild-flowers, 
Unfilleted,  and  of  unequal  lengths. 
A  curious  picture,  with  a  master's  haste 
Sketch'd  on  a  strip  of  pinky-silver  skin, 
Peel'd  from  the  birchen  bark  !  Divinest  maid ! 
Yon  bark  her  canvas,  and  those  purple  berries 
Her  pencil !  See,  the  juice  is  scarcely  dried 
On  the  fine  skin  !  She  has  been  newly  here  ; 
And  lo !  yon  patch  of  heath  has  been  her  couch- 
The  pressure  still  remains !  O  blessed  couch ! 
For  this  mayst  thou  flower  early,  and  the  Sun, 
Slanting  at  eve,  rest  bright,  and  linger  long 
Upon  thy  purple  bells  !    O  Isabel ! 
Daughter  of  genius  !  stateliest  of  our  maids  ! 
More  beautiful  than  whom  Alcaeus  wooed, 
The  Lesbian  woman  of  immortal  song ! 
O  child  of  genius  !  stately,  beautiful, 
And  full  of  love  to  all,  save  only  me, 
And  not  ungentle  e'en  to  me  !  My  heart, 
Why  beats  it  thus  ?  Through  yonder  coppice-wood 
Needs  must  the  pathway  turn,  that  leads  straightway 
On  to  her  father's  house.    She  is  alone  ! 
The  night  draws  on — such  ways  are  hard  to  hit — 
And  fit  it  is  I  should  restore  this  sketch, 
Dropt  unawares,  no  douht    Why  should  I  yearn 
To  keep  the  relic  ?  't  will  but  idly  feed 
The  passion  that  consumes  me.    Let  me  haste  ! 
The  picture  in  my  hand  which  she  has  left. 
She  cannot  blame  me  that  I  follow'd  her  ; 
And  I  may  be  her  guide  the  long  wood  through 


THE  NIGHT-SCENE. 

A  DRAMATIC   FRAGMENT. 

SANDOVAL. 

You  loved  the  daughter  of  Don  Manrique  ? 
41 


32 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


EARL    HENRY. 
SANDOVAL. 

Did  you  not  say  you  woo'd  her  ? 

EARL    HENRY. 

Her  whom  I  dared  not  woo ! 


Loved? 


Once  I  loved 


SANDOVAL. 

And  woo'd,  perchance, 
One  whom  you  loved  not ! 

EARL   HENRY. 

Oh !  I  were  most  base, 
Not  loving  Oropeza.    True,  I  woo'd  her, 
Hoping  to  heal  a  deeper  wound  ;  but  she 
Met  my  advances  with  impassion'd  pride, 
That  kindled  love  with  love.    And  when  her  sire, 
Who  in  his  dream  of  hope  already  grasp'd 
The  golden  circlet  in  his  hand,  rejected 
My  suit  with  insult,  and  in  memory 
Of  ancient  feuds  pour'd  curses  on  my  head, 
Her  blessings  overtook  and  baffled  them  ! 
But  thou  art  stern,  and  with  unkindly  countenance 
Art  inly  reasoning  whilst  thou  listenest  to  me. 

SANDOVAL. 

Anxiously,  Henry!  reasoning  anxiously. 
But  Oropeza — 

EARL    HENRY. 

Blessings  gather  round  her ! 
Within  this  wood  there  winds  a  secret  passage, 
Beneath  the  walls,  which  opens  out  at  length 
Into  the  gloomiest  covert  of  the  garden — 
The  night  ere  my  departure  to  the  army, 
She,  nothing  trembling,  led  me  through  that  gloom, 
And  to  that  covert  by  a  silent  stream, 
Which,  with  one  star  reflected  near  its  marge, 
Was  the  sole  object  visible  around  me. 
No  leaflet  stirr'd  ;  the  air  was  almost  sultry ; 
So  deep,  so  dark,  so  close,  the  umbrage  o'er  us ! 
No  leaflet  stirr'd  ; — yet  pleasure  hung  upon 
The  gloom  and  stillness  of  the  balmy  night-air. 
A  little  further  on  an  arbor  stood, 
Fragrant  with  flowering  trees — I  well  remember 
What  an  uncertain  glimmer  in  the  darkness 
Their  snow-wliite  blossoms  made — thither  she  led 

me, 
To  that  sweet  bower !  Then  Oropeza  trembled — 
I  heard  her  heart  beat — if  't  were  not  my  own. 

SANDOVAL. 

A  rude  and  scaring  note,  my  friend ! 

EARL    HENRY. 

Oh !  no ! 

I  have  small  memory  of  aught  but  pleasure. 

The  inquietudes  of  fear,  like  lesser  streams 

Still  flowing,  still  were  lost  in  those  of  love : 

So  love  grew  mightier  from  the  fear,  and  Nature, 

Fleeing  from  Pain,  shelter'd  herself  in  Joy. 

The  stars  above  our  heads  were  dim  and  steady, 

Like  eyes  suffused  with  rapture.    Life  was  in  us: 

We  were  all  life,  each  atom  of  our  frames 

A  living  soul — I  vovv'd  to  die  for  her  : 

With  the  faint  voice  of  one  who,  having  spoken, 


Relapses  into  blessedness,  I  vow'd  it: 
That  solemn  vow,  a  whisper  scarcely  heard, 
A  murmur  breathed  against  a  lady's  ear. 
Oh  !  there  is  joy  above  the  name  of  pleasure, 
Deep  self-possession,  an  intense  repose. 

sandoval  (with  a  sarcastic  smile). 
No  other  than  as  eastern  sages  paint, 
The  God,  who  floats  upon  a  lotos  leaf, 
Dreams  for  a  thousand  ages  ;  then  awaking, 
Creates  a  world,  and  smiling  at  the  bubble, 
Relapses  into  bliss. 

EARL    HENRY. 

Ah !  was  that  bliss 
Fear'd  as  an  alien,  and  too  vast  for  man  ? 
For  suddenly,  impatient  of  its  silence, 
Did  Oropeza,  starting,  grasp  my  forehead. 
I  caught  her  arms ;  the  veins  were  swelling  on  them 
Through  the  dark  bower  she  sent  a  hollow  voice, 
Oh  !  what  if  all  betray  me  ?  what  if  thou  ? 
I  swore,  and  with  an  inward  thought  that  seem'd 
The  purpose  and  the  substance  of  my  being, 
I  swore  to  her,  that  were  she  red  with  guilt, 
I  would  exchange  my  unblench'd  state  with  hers. — 
Friend  !  by  that  winding  passage,  to  that  bower 
I  now  will  go — all  objects  there  will  teach  me 
Unwavering  love,  and  singleness  of  heart. 
Go,  Sandoval !  I  am  prepared  to  meet  her — 
Say  nothing  of  me — I  myself  will  seek  her — 
Nay,  leave  me,  friend !  I  cannot  bear  the  torment 
And  keen  inquiry  of  that  scanning  eye — 

[Earl  Henry  retires  into  the  wood 

sandoval  (alone). 
O  Henry !  always  strivest  thou  to  be  great 
By  thine  own  act — yet  art  thou  never  great 
But  by  the  inspiration  of  great  passion. 
The  whirl-blast  comes,  the  desert-sands  rise  up 
And  shape  themselves  :  from  Earth  to  Heaven  they 

stand, 
As  though  they  were  the  pillars  of  a  temple, 
Built  by  Omnipotence  in  its  own  honor  ! 
But  the  blast  pauses,  and  their  shaping  spirit 
Is  fled  :  the  mighty  columns  were  but  sand, 
And  lazy  snakes  trail  o'er  the  level  ruins ! 


TO  AN  UNFORTUNATE  WOMAN, 

WHOM   THE   AUTHOR    HAD    KNOWN    IN   THE   DAYS    OF 
HER    INNOCENCE. 

Myrtle-leaf  that,  ill  besped, 

Pinest  in  the  gladsome  ray, 
Soil'd  beneath  the  common  tread, 

Far  from  thy  protecting  spray ! 

When  the  Partridge  o'er  the  sheaf 
Whirr'd  along  the  yellow  vale, 

Sad  I  saw  thee,  heedless  leaf! 
Love  the  dalliance  of  the  gale. 

Lightly  didst  thou,  foolish  thing  ! 

Heave  and  flutter  to  his  sighs, 
While  the  flatterer,  on  his  wing, 

Woo'd  and  whisper'd  thee  to  rise. 
42 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


33 


Gaily  from  thy  mother-Stalk 

Wert  thou  danced  and  wafted  high — 
Soon  on  this  unshelter'd  walk 

Flung  to  fade,  to  rot  and  die. 


TO  AN  UNFORTUNATE  WOMAN  AT  THE 
THEATRE. 

Maiden,  that  with  sullen  brow 
Sittest  behind  those  virgins  gay, 

Like  a  scorch'd  and  niildew'd  bough, 
Leafless  "mid  the  blooms  of  May ! 

Him  who  lured  thee  and  forsook, 

Oft  I  wateh'd  with  angry  gaze, 
Fearful  saw  his  pleading  look, 

Anxious  heard  his  fervid  phrase. 

Soft  the  glances  of  the  youth, 
Soft  his  speech,  and  soft  his  sigh  ; 

But  no  sound  like  simple  truth, 
But  no  true  love  in  his  eye. 

Lothing  thy  polluted  lot, 

Hie  thee,  Maiden,  hie  thee  hence ! 

Seek  thy  weeping  Mother's  cot, 
With  a  wiser  innocence. 

Thou  hast  known  deceit  and  folly, 
Thou  hast  felt  that  vice  is  woe  : 

With  a  musing  melancholy 
Inly  arm'd,  go,  Maiden!  go. 

Mother  sage  of  Self-dominion, 

Firm  thy  steps,  O  Melancholy  ! 
The  strongest  plume  in  wisdom's  pinion 

Is  the  memory  of  past  folly. 

Mute  the  sky-lark  and  forlorn, 

While  she  moults  the  firstling  plumes, 

That  had  skimm'd  the  tender  corn, 
Or  the  bean-field's  odorous  blooms : 

Soon  with  renovated  wing 

Shall  she  dare  a  loftier  flight, 
Upward  to  the  day-star  spring, 

And  embathe  in  heavenly  light. 


LINES  COMPOSED  IN  A  CONCERT-ROOM. 

Nor  cold,  nor  stern,  my  soul !  yet  I  detest 

These  scented  Rooms,  where,  to  a  gaudy  throng, 

Heaves  tbe  proud  Harlot  her  distended  breast, 
In  intricacies  of  laborious  song. 

These  feel  not  Music's  genuine  power,  nor  deign 
To  melt  at  Nature's  passion-warbled  plaint ; 

But  when  the  long-breathed  singer's  uptriU'd  strain 
Bursts  in  a  squall — they  gape  for  wonderment. 

Hark  the  deep  buzz  of  Vanity  and  Hate  ! 

Scornful,  yet  envious,  with  self-torturing  sneer 

My  lady  eyes  some  maid  of  humbler  state, 

While  the  pert  Captain,  or  the  primmer  Priest, 
Prattles  accordant  scandal  in  her  ear. 
4  E 


0  urivc  me,  from  this  heartless  scene  released. 
To  hear  our  old  musician,  blind  and  gray 

(Whom  stretching  from  my  nurse's  arms  I  kiss'd  . 
His  Scotlisli  tunes  and  warlike  marches  play 

By  moonshine,  on  the  balmy  summer-night, 
The  while  I  dance  amid  the  tedded  hay 

With  merry  maids,  whose  ringlets  toss  in  light 

Or  lies  the  purple  evening  on  the  bay 
Of  the  calm  glossy  lake,  O  let  me  hide 

Unheard,  unseen,  behind  the  alder-trees. 
For  round  their  roois  the  fisher's  boat  is  tied, 

On  whose  trim  seat  doth  Edmund  stretch  at  ease 
And  while  the  lazy  boat  sways  to  and  fro, 

Breathes  in  his  flute  sad  airs,  so  wild  and  slow, 
That  his  own  cheek  is  wet  with  quiet  tears. 

But  O,  dear  Anne  !  when  midnight  wind  can  crs. 
And  the  gust  pelting  on  the  out-house  shed 

Makes  the  cock  shrilly  on  the  rain-storm  crow, 

To  hear  thee  sing  some  ballad  full  of  woe, 
Ballad  of  shipwreck'd  sailor  floating  dead, 

Whom  his  own  true-love  buried  in  the  sands  ! 
Thee,  gentle  woman,  for  thy  voice  remeasures 
Whatever  tones  and  melancholy  pleasures 

The  things  of  Nature  utter  ;  birds  or  trees, 
Or  moan  of  ocean-gale  in  weedy  caves, 
Or  where  the  stiff  grass  'mid  the  heath-plant  waves. 

Murmur  and  music  thin  of  sudden  breeze. 


THE  KEEPSAKE. 

The  tedded  hay,  the  first  fruits  of  the  soil, 
The  tedded  hay  and  corn-sheaves  in  one  field, 
Show  summer  gone,  ere  come.    The  foxglove  tall 
Sheds  its  loose  purple  bells,  or  in  the  gust, 
Or  when  it  bends  beneath  the  up-springing  lark. 
Or  mountain-finch  alighting.    And  the  rose 
(In  vain  the  darling  of  successful  love) 
Stands,  like  some  boasted  beauty  of  past  years, 
The  thorns  remaining,  and  the  flowers  all  gone. 
Nor  can  I  find,  amid  my  lonely  walk 
By  rivulet,  or  spring,  or  wet  road-side, 
That  blue  and  bright-eyed  floweret  of  the  brook, 
Hope's  gentle  gem,  the  sweet  Forget-me-not  !* 
So  will  not  fade  fhe  flowers  which  Emmeline 
With  delicate  fingers  on  the  snow-white  silk 
Has  work'd   (the  flowers  which  most  she  knew   I 

loved), 
And,  more  beloved  than  they,  her  auburn  hair. 

In  the  cool  morning  twilight,  early  waked 
By  her  full  bosom's  joyous  restlessness, 
Softly  she  rose,  and  lightly  stole  alortg, 
Down  the  slope  coppice  to  the  woodbine  bower, 
Whose  rich  flowers,  swinging  in  the  morning  breeze. 
Over  their  dim  fast-moving  shadows  hung, 
Making  a  quiet  image  of  disquiet 
In  the  smooth,  scarcely  moving  river-pool. 
There,  in  that  bower  where  first  she  own'd  her  love. 
And  let  me  kiss  my  own  warm  tear  of  joy 
From  off  her  glowing  cheek,  she  sate  and  stretch'd 


*  One  of  the  names  (and  meriting  to  be  the  only  one)  of  ihe 
Myosotis  Scorpioidts  Paluslris,  a  flower  from  six  to  twelve 
inches  high,  with  blue  blossom  anrl  bright  yellow  eye.  Il  has 
tbe  same  name  over  the  whole  Empire  of  Germany  (Vergiss- 
mein  nicht)  and,  we  believe,  iu  Denmark  and  Sweden 
43 


34 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


The  silk  upon  the  frame,  and  work'd  her  name 
Between  the  Moss-Rose  and  Forget-me-not — 
Her  own  dear  name,  with  her  own  auburn  hair ! 
That  forced  to  wander  till  sweet  spring  return, 
I  yet  might  ne'er  forget  her  smile,  her  look, 
Her  voice  (that  even  in  her  mirthful  mood 
Has  made  me  wish  to  steal  away  and  weep), 
Nor  yet  the  entrancement  of  that  maiden  kiss 
With  which  she  promised,  that  when  spring  return'd, 
She  would  resign  one  half  of  that  dear  name, 
And  own  thenceforth  no  other  name  but  mine ! 


TO  A  LADY. 

WITH    FALCONER'S    "  SHIPWRECK." 

Ah  !  not  by  Cam  or  Isis,  famous  streams, 
In  arched  groves,  the  youthful  poet's  choice  ; 

Nor  while  half-listening,  'mid  delicious  dreams, 
To  harp  and  song  from  lady's  hand  and  voice  ; 

Nor  yet  while  gazing  in  sublimer  mood 

On  cliff,  or  cataract,  in  Alpine  dell ; 
Nor  in  dim  cave  with  bladdery  sea-weed  strew'd, 

Framing  wild  fancies  to  the  ocean's  swell ; 

Our  sea-bard  sang  this  song !  which  still  he  sings, 
And  sings  for  thee,  sweet  friend !  Hark,  Pity,  hark ! 

Now  mounts,  now  totters  on  the  Tempest's  wings, 
Now  groans,  and  shivers,  the  replunging  Bark ! 

"  Cling   to  the  shrouds  !  "   In  vain  !   The  breakers 
roar — 

Death  shrieks  !  With  two  alone  of  all  his  clan 
Forlorn  the  poet  paced  the  Grecian  shore, 

No  classic  roamer,  but  a  shipwreck'd  man  ! 

Say  then,  what  muse  inspired  these  genial  strains, 
And  lit  his  spirit  to  so  bright  a  flame  ? 

The  elevating  thought  of  suffer'd  pains, 

Which  gentle  hearts  shall  mouru ;  but  chief,  the 
name 

Of  Gratitude  !  Remembrances  of  Friend, 
Or  absent  or  no  more  !  Shades  of  the  Past, 

Which  Love  makes  Substance !  Hence  to  thee  I  send, 
O  dear  as  long  as  life  and  memory  last ! 

I  send  with  deep  regards  of  heart  and  head, 

Sweet  maid,  for  friendship  form'd !  this  work  to 
thee : 

And  thou,  the  while  thou  canst  not  choose  but  shed 
A  tear  for  Falconer,  wilt  remember  me. 


TO  A  YOUNG  LADY. 

ON  HER  RECOVERY  FROM  A  FEVER. 

Why  need  I  say,  Louisa  dear! 
How  glad  I  am  to  see  you  here 

A  lovely  convalescent ; 
Risen  from  the  bed  of  pain  and  fear, 

And  feverish  heat  incessant. 

The  sunny  Showers,  the  dappled  Sky, 
The  little  Birds  that  warble  high, 

Their  vernal  loves  commencing, 
Will  better  welcome  you  than  I 

With  their  sweet  influencing. 


Believe  me,  while  in  bed  you  lay, 
Your  danger  taught  us  all  to  pray : 

You  made  us  grow  devouter! 
Each  eye  look'd  up,  and  seem'd  to  say 

How  can  we  do  without  her  ? 

Besides,  what  vex'd  us  worse,  we  knew. 
They  have  no  need  of  such  as  you 

In  the  place  where  you  were  going ; 
This  World  has  angels  all  too  few, 

And  Heaven  is  overflowing ! 


SOMETIUNG  CHILDISH,  BUT  VERY 
NATURAL. 

WRITTEN    IN    GERMANY. 

If  I  had  but  two  little  wings, 
And  were  a  little  feathery  bird, 
To  you  I  'd  fly,  my  dear ! 
But  thoughts  like  these  are  idle  things, 
And  I  stay  here. 

But  in  my  sleep  to  you  I  fly  : 

I  'm  always  with  you  in  my  sleep  .' 
The  world  is  all  one's  own. 
But  then  one  wakes,  and  where  am  I  ? 
All,  all  alone. 

Sleep  stays  not,  though  a  monarch  bids : 
So  I  love  to  wake  ere  break  of  day  : 
For  though  my  sleep  be  gone, 
Yet,  while  'tis  dark,  one  shuts  one's  lids, 
And  still  dreams  on. 


HOME-SICK. 

WRITTEN    IN    GERMANY. 

'T  is  sweet  to  him,  who  all  the  week 
Through  city-crowds  must  push  his  way, 

To  stroll  alone  through  fields  and  woods, 
And  hallow  thus  the  Sabbath-Day 

And  sweet  it  is,  in  summer  bower, 

Sincere,  affectionate,  and  gay, 
One's  own  dear  children  feasting  round, 

To  celebrate  one's  marriage-day. 

But  what  is  all,  to  his  delight, 

Who  having  long  been  doom'd  to  roam, 
Throws  off  the  bundle  from  his  back, 

Before  the  door  of  his  own  home  ? 

Home-sickness  is  a  wasting  pang  ; 

This  feel  I  hourly  more  and  more  : 
There  's  Healing  only  in  thy  wings, 

Thou  Breeze  that  playest  on  Albion's  shore ! 


ANSWER  TO  A  CHILD'S  QUESTION. 

Do  you  ask  what  the  birds  say  ?  The  Sparrow,  the 

Dove, 
The  Linnet  and  Thrush,  say,  "  I  love  and  I  love ! " 
In  the  winter  they  're  silent — the  wind  is  so  strong , 
What  it  says,  I  don't  know,  but  it  sings  a  loud  song. 
But  green  leaves,  and  blossoms,  and  sunny  warm 

weather, 
And  singing,  and  loving — all  come  back  together 

44 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


35 


But  the  Lark  is  so  brimful  of  gladness  and  love, 
The  green  fields  below  him,  the  blue  sky  above, 
That  he  sings,  and  he  sings ;  and  for  ever  sings  he — 
"  1  love  my  Love,  and  my  Love  loves  me  ! " 


THE  VISIONARY  HOPE. 

Sad  lot,  to  have  no  Hope !   Though  lowly  kneeling 
He  fain  would  frame  a  prayer  within  his  breast, 
Would  fain  entreat  for  some  sweet  breath  of  healing, 
That  his  sick  body  might  have  ease  and  rest; 
He  strove  in  vain!  the  dull  sighs  from  his  chest 
Against  his  will  the  stifling  load  revealing, 
Though  Nature  forced ;  though  like  some  captive  guest, 
Some  royal  prisoner  at  his  conqueror's  feast, 
An  alien's  restless  mood  but  half  concealing. 
The  sternness  on  his  gentle  brow  confess'd, 
Sickness  within  and  miserable  feeling: 
Though  obscure  pangs  made  curses  of  his  dreams, 
And  dreaded  sleep,  each  night  repell'd  in  vain, 
Each  night  was  scatter'd  by  its  own  loud  screams , 
Yet  never  could  his  heart  command,  though  fain, 
One  deep  full  wish  to  be  no  more  in  pain. 

That  Hope,  which  was  his  inward  bliss  and  boast, 
Which  waned  and  died,  yet  ever  near  him  stood, 
Though  changed  in  nature,  wander  where  he  would — 
For  Love's  Despair  is  but  Hope's  pining  Ghost ! 
For  this  one  Hope  he  makes  his  hourly  moan, 
He  wishes  and  can  wish  for  this  alone ! 
Pierced,  as  with  light  from  Heaven,  before  its  gleams 
(So  the  love-stricken  visionary  deems) 
Disease  would  vanish,  like  a  summer  shower, 
Whose  dews  fling  sunshine  from  the  noon-tide  bower! 
Or  let  it  stay !  yet  this  one  Hope  should  give 
Such  strength  that  he  would  bless  his  pains  and  live. 


Its  own  sweet  self — a  love  of  Thee 
That  seems,  yet  cannot  greater  be ! 


THE  HAPPY  HUSBAND. 

A  FRAGMENT. 

Oft,  oft  methinks,  the  while  with  Thee 
I  breathe,  as  from  the  heart,  thy  dear 
And  dedicated  name,  I  hear 

A  promise  and  a  mystery, 

A  pledge  of  more  than  passing  life, 
Yea,  in  that  very  name  of  Wife ! 

A  pulse  of  love,  that  ne'er  can  sleep! 

A  feeling  that  upbraids  the  heart 

With  happiness  beyond  desert, 
That  gladness  half  requests  to  weep! 

Nor  bless  I  not  the  keener  sense 

And  unalarming  turbulence 

Of  transient  joys,  that  ask  no  sting, 

From  jealous  fears,  or  coy  denying; 

But  born  beneath  Love's  brooding  wing, 
And  into  tenderness  soon  dying, 

Wheel  out  their  giddy  moment,  then 

Resign  the  soul  to  love  again. 

A  more  precipitated  vein 

Of  notes,  that  eddy  in  the  flow 

Of  smoothest  song,  they  come,  they  go, 

And  leave  the  sweeter  under-strain 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  LOVE. 

How  w:arm  this  woodland  wild  Recess! 
Love  surely  hath  been  breathing  here. 
And  this  sweet  bed  of  heath,  my  dear ! 

Swells  up,  then  sinks,  with  faint  caress, 
As  if  to  have  you  yet  more  near. 

Eight  springs  have  flown,  since  last  I  lay 
On  seaward  Quantock's  heathy  hills, 
Where  quiet  sounds  from  hidden  rills 

Float  here  and  there,  like  things  astray, 
And  high  o'erhead  the  sky-lark  shrills 

No  voice  as  yet  had  made  the  air 
Be  music  with  your  name;  yet  why 
That  asking  look  ?  that  yearninsr  sigh  ? 

That  sense  of  promise  every  where  I 
Beloved!  flew  your  spirit  by? 

As  when  a  mother  doth  explore 

The  rose-mark  on  her  long-lost  child 
I  met,  I  loved  you,  maiden  mild ! 

As  whom  I  long  had  loved  before — 
So  deeply,  had  I  been  beguiled. 

You  stood  before  me  like  a  thought, 
A  dream  remember'd  in  a  dream. 
But  when  those  meek  eyes  first  did  seem 

To  tell  me,  Love  within  you  wrought — 
O  Greta,  dear  domestic  stream ! 

Has  not,  since  then,  Love's  prompture  deep, 
Has  not  Love's  whisper  evermore, 
Been  ceaseless,  as  thy  gentle  roar  ? 

Sole  voice,  when  other  voices  sleep, 
Dear  under-song  in  Clamor's  hour. 


ON   REVISITING  THE   SEA-SHORE,    AFTER 
LONG   ABSENCE, 

UNDER    STRONG    MEDICAL  RECOMMENDATION    NOT   TO 
BATHE. 

God  be  with  thee,  gladsome  Ocean! 

How  gladly  greet  I  thee  once  more ! 
Ships  and  waves,  and  ceaseless  motion, 

And  men  rejoicing  on  thy  shore. 

Dissuading  spake  the  mild  Physician, 

"Those  briny  waves  for  thee  are  Death!" 

But  my  soul  fulfill'd  her  mission, 

And  lo!  I  breathe  untroubled  breath.' 

Fashion's  pining  sons  and  daughters, 
That  seek  the  crowd  they  seem  to  fly, 

Trembling  they  approach  thy  waters; 
And  what  cares  Nature,  if  they  die  ? 

Me  a  thousand  hopes  and  pleasures. 

A  thousand  recollections  bland, 
Thoughts  sublime,  and  stately  measures 

Revisit  on  thy  echoing  strand  : 
45 


36 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Dreams  (the  soul  herself  forsaking), 
Tearful  raptures,  boyish  niirth  ; 

Silent  adorations,  making 

A  blessed  shadow  of  this  Earth ! 

O  ye  hopes,  that  stir  within  me, 

Health  comes  with  you  from  above! 

God  is  with  me,  God  is  in  me ! 
I  cannot  die,  if  Life  be  Love. 


THE  COMPOSITION  OF  A  KISS. 

Cupid,  if  storying  legends*  tell  aright, 

Once  framed  a  rich  elixir  of  delight. 

A  chalice  o'er  love-kindled  flames  he  fix'd, 

And  in  it  nectar  and  ambrosia  mix'd  : 

With  these  the  magic  dews,  which  evening  brings, 

Brush'd  from  the  Idalian  star  by  faery  wings : 

Each  tender  pledge  of  sacred  faith  he  join'd, 

Each  gentler  pleasure  of  the  unspotted  mind — 

Day-dreams,  whose  tints  with  sportive  brightness  glow. 

And  Hope,  the  blameless  parasite  of  woe. 

The  eyeless  Chemist  heard  the  process  rise, 

The  steamy  chalice  bubbled  up  in  sighs; 

Sweet  sounds  transpired,  as  when  th'  enamour'd  dove 

Pours  the  soft  murm'ring  of  responsive  love. 

The  finish'd  work  might  Envy  vainly  blame, 

And  "  Kisses  "  was  the  precious  compound's  name. 

With  half  the  god  his  Cyprian  mother  blest, 

And  breathed  on  Sara's  lovelier  lips  the  rest. 


III.  MEDITATIVE  POEMS, 


IN    BLANK   VERSE. 


Yea,  he  deserves  to  find  himself  deceived. 
Who  seeks  a  heart  in  the  unthinking  Man. 
Like  shadows  on  a  stream,  the  forms  of  life 
Impress  their  characters  on  the  smooth  forehead : 
Naught  sinks  into  the  Bosom's  silent  depth. 
Quick  sensibility  of  Pain  and  Pleasure 
Moves  the  light  fluids  lightly  ;  but  no  soul 
Warmeth  the  inner  frame. 

Schiller. 


HYMN    BEFORE    SUN-RISE,   IN   THE    VALE 
OF  CHAMOUNY. 

Besides  the  Rivers  Arve  and  Arveiron,  which  have  their 
sources  in  the  foot  of  Mont  Blanc,  five  conspicuous  torrents 
rush  down  its  sides,  and  within  a  few  paces  of  the  Glaciers, 
the  Gentiana  Major  grows  in  immense  numbers,  with  its 
"flowers  of  loveliest  blue." 


Hast  thou  a  charm  to  stay  the  Morning-Star 
In  his  steep  course  ?  So  long  he  seems  to  pause 


*  Effinxit  quondam  blandum  meditata  laborem 

Basia  lasciva  Cypria  Diva  mana. 
Ambrosias  succos  occulta  temperat  arte, 

Fragransqne  infuao  nectare  tingit  opus. 
Snflicit  et  partem  mellis,  quod  subdolus  olira 

Nonimpuno  favia  surripuisset  Amor. 
Decussos  violas  Ibliisad  miacet  odores 

Et  spolm  ;r;stivis  plurima  rapta  rosis. 
Additet  illecebraa  etmil'eet  mills  lepores, 

Et  quot  Acidalius  gaudia  Cestua  habet. 
Kr  his  composuit  Dca  basia  ;  et  omnia  libans 

Invenias  nitidie  sparsa  per  ora  Goes 

Carm.  Quod.  Vol.  II. 


On  thy  bald  awful  head,  O  sovran  Blanc ! 
The  Arve  and  Arveiron  at  thy  base 
Rave  ceaselessly  ;  but  thou,  most  awful  form' 
Risest  from  forth  thy  silent  Sea  of  Pines, 
How  silently !  Around  thee  and  above 
Deep  is  the  air  and  dark,  substantial,  black, 
An  ebon  mass  :  methinks  thou  piercest  it, 
As  with  a  wedge !  But  when  I  look  again. 
It  is  thine  own  calm  home,  thy  crystal  shrine, 
Thy  habitation  from  eternity  ! 

0  dread  and  silent  Mount!  I  gazed  upon  thee. 
Till  thou,  still  present  to  the  bodily  sense, 

Didst  vanish  from  my  thought:  entranced  in  prayer 

1  worshipp'd  the  Invisible  alone. 

Yet,  like  some  sweet  beguiling  melody, 
So  sweet,  we  know  not  we  are  listening  to  it. 
Thou,  the  meanwhile,  wast  blending  with  my  Thought, 
Yea  with  my  Life  and  Life's  own  secret  Joy  : 
Till  the  dilating  Soul,  enrapt,  transfused, 
Into  the  mighty  vision  passing — there 
As  in  her  natural  form,  swell'd  vast  to  Heaven ! 

Awake,  my  soul !  not  only  passive  praise 
Thou  owest !  not  alone  these  swelling  tears, 
Mute  thanks  and  secret  ecstasy!  Awake, 
Voice  of  sweet  song!  Awake,  my  heart,  awake! 
Green  vales  and  icy  cliffs,  all  join  my  Hymn. 

Thou  first  and  chief,  sole  Sovereign  of  the  Vale ! 
O  struggling  with  the  darkness  all  the  night, 
And  visited  all  night  by  troops  of  stars, 
Or  when  they  climb  the  sky  or  when  they  sink  : 
Companion  of  the  Morning-Star  at  dawn, 
Thyself  earth's  rosy  star,  and  of  the  dawn 
Co-herald  :  wake,  O  wake,  and  utter  praise  • 
Who  sank  thy  sunless  pillars  deep  in  earth  ? 
Who  fill'd  thy  countenance  with  rosy  light  ? 
Who  made  thee  Parent  of  perpetual  streams  ? 

And  you,  ye  five  wild  torrents  fiercely  glad ! 
Who  call'd  you  forth  from  night  and  utter  death, 
From  dark  and  icy  caverns  call'd  you  forth, 
Down  those  precipitous,  black,  jagged  rocks, 
For  ever  shatter'd  and  the  same  for  ever  ? 
Who  gave  you  your  invulnerable  life, 
Your  strength,  your  speed,  your  fury,  and  your  joj 
Unceasing  thunder  and  eternal  foam  ? 
And  who  commanded  (and  the  silence  came), 
Here  let  the  billows  stiffen,  and  have  rest  ? 

Ye  Ice-falls !  ye  that  from  the  mountain's  brow 
Adown  enormous  ravines  slope  amain — 
Torrents,  methinks,  that  heard  a  mighty  Voice, 
And  stopp'd  at  once  amid  their  maddest  plunge ! 
Motionless  torrents  !  silent  cataracts  ! 
Who  made  you  glorious  as  the  Gates  of  Heaven 
Beneath  the  keen  full  Moon  ?  Who  bade  the  Sun 
Clothe  you  with  rainbows  ?  Who,  with  living  flowers 
Of  loveliest  blue,  spread  garlands  at  your  feet  ? — 
God  !  let  the  torrents,  like  a  shout  of  nations, 
Answer!  and  let  the  ice-plains  echo,  God! 
God  !  sing  ye  meadow-streams  with  gladsome  voice! 
Ye  pine-groves,  with  your  soft  and  soul-like  sounds! 
And  they  too  have  a  voice,  yon  piles  of  snow, 
And  in  their  perilous  fall  shall  thunder,  God! 
46 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


37 


Ye  living  flowers  that  skirt  the  eternal  frost ' 
Ye  wild  goats  sporting  round  the  eagle's  nest ! 
Ye  eagles,  play-mates  of  the  mountain-storm  ! 
Ye  lightnings,  the  dread  arrows  of  the  clouds ! 
Ye  signs  and  wonders  of  the  element ! 
Utter  forth  God,  and  fill  the  hills  with  praise ! 

Thou  too,  hoar  Mount !  with  thy  sky-pointing  peaks, 
Oft  from  whose  feet  the  Avalanche,  unheard, 
Shoots  downward,  glittering  through  the  pure  serene 
Into  the  depth  of  clouds,  that  veil  thy  breast — 
Thou  too  again,  stupendous  Mountain !  thou 
That  as  I  raise  my  head,  awhile  bow'd  low 
In  adoration,  upward  from  thy  base 
Slow  travelling  with  dim  eyes  suffused  with  tears, 
Solemnly  seemest,  like  a  vapory  cloud, 
To  rise  before  me — Rise,  O  ever  rise, 
Rise  like  a  cloud  of  incense,  from  the  earth ! 
Thou  kingly  Spirit  throned  among  the  hills, 
Thou  dread  Ambassador  from  Earth  to  Heaven, 
Great  Hierarch !  tell  thou  the  silent  sky. 
And  tell  the  Stars,  and  tell  yon  rising  sun 
Earth,  with  her  thousand  voices,  praises  God. 


LINES 


WRITTEN    IN   THE   ALBUM    AT  ELBINGERODE,    IN    THE 
HARTZ    FOREST. 

I  stood  on  Brocken's*  sovran  height,  and  saw 

Woods  crowding  upon  woods,  hills  over  hills, 

A  surging  scene,  and  only  limited 

By  the  blue  distance.     Heavily  my  way 

Downward  I  dragg'd  through  fir-groves  evermore, 

Where  bright  green  moss  heaves  in  sepulchral  forms 

Speckled  with  sunshine  ;  and,  but  seldom  heard, 

The  sweet  bird's  song  became  a  hollow  sound ; 

And  the  breeze,  murmuring  indivisibly, 

Preserved  its  solemn  murmur  most  distinct 

From  many  a  note  of  many  a  waterfall, 

And  the  brook's  chatter ;  'mid  whose  islet  stones 

The  dingy  kidling  with  its  tinkling  bell 

Leap'd  frolicsome,  or  old  romantic  goat 

Sat.  his  white  beard  slow  waving.     I  moved  on 

In  low  and  languid  mood  it  for  I  had  found 

That  outward  forms,  the  loftiest,  still  receive 

Their  finer  influence  from  the  Life  within  : 

Fair  ciphers  else  :  fair,  but  of  import  vague 

Or  unconcerning,  where  the  Heart  not  finds 

History  or  prophecy  of  Friend,  or  Child, 

Or  gentle  Maid,  our  first  and  early  love, 

Or  Father,  or  the  venerable  name 

Of  our  adored  Country !  O  thou  Queen, 

Thou  delegated  Deity  of  Earth, 

O  dear,  dear  England  !  how  my  longing  eye 

Turn'd  westward,  shaping  in  the  steady  clouds 

Thy  sands  and  high  white  cliffs  ! 


*  The  highest  mountain  in  the  Hartz,  and  indeed  in  North 
Germany. 


t 


-When  I  have  gazed 


From  some  high  eminence  on  goodly  vales, 
And  cots  and  villages  embower'd  below. 
The  thought  would  rise  that  all  to  me  was  strange 
Amid  the  scenes  so  fair,  nor  one  small  spot 
^Vhere  my  tired  mind  might  rest,  and  call  it  home. 

Sotitfiey's  Hymn  to  the  Fcnates. 

E2 


My  native  land  ! 
Fill'd  with  the  thought  of  thee  this  heart  was  proud 
Yea,  mine  eye  swam  with  tears  :  that  all  the  view 
From  sovran  Bracken,  woods  and  woody  hills, 
Floated  away,  like  a  departing  dream, 
Feeble  and  dim!  Stranger,  these  impulses 
Blame  thou  not  lightly  ;  nor  will  I  profane, 
With  hasty  judgment  or  injurious  doubt, 
That  man's  sublimer  spirit,  who  can  feel 
That  God  is  everywhere !  the  God  who  framed 
Mankind  to  be  one  mighty  Family, 
Himself  our  Father,  and  the  World  our  Home. 


ON  OBSERVING  A  BLOSSOM  ON  THE  FIRST  OF 
FEBRUARY,  1796. 

Sweet  Flow?er !  that  peeping  from  thy  russet  stem 

Unfoldest  timidly  (for  in  strange  sort 

This    dark,    frieze-coated,   hoarse,    teeth-chattering 

month 
Hath  borrow'd  Zephyr's  voice,  and  gazed  upon  thee 
With  blue  voluptuous  eye),  alas,  poor  Flower! 
These  are  but  flatteries  of  the  faithless  year. 
Perchance,  escaped  its  unknown  polar  cave, 
E'en  now  the  keen  North-East  is  on  its  way. 
Flower  that  must  perish !  shall  I  liken  thee 
To  some  sweet  girl  of  too  too  rapid  growth, 
Nipp'd  by  Consumption  'mid  untimely  charms  ? 
Or  to  Bristowa's  Bard,*  the  wondrous  boy ! 
An  Amaranth,  which  earth  scarce  seem'd  to  own. 
Till  Disappointment  came,  and  pelting  wrong 
Beat  it  to  earth  ?  or  with  indignant  grief 
Shall  I  compare  thee  to  poor  Poland's  Hope, 
Bright  flower  of  Hope  kill'd  in  the  opening  bud  ? 
Farewell,  sweet  blossom !  better  fate  be  thine, 
And  mock  my  boding !  Dim  similitudes 
Weaving  in  moral  strains,  I  've  stolen  one  hour 
From  anxious  Self,  Life's  cruel  Task-Master! 
And  the  warm  wooings  of  this  sunny  day 
Tremble  along  my  frame,  and  harmonize 
The  attemper'd  organ,  that  even  saddest  thoughts 
Mix  with  some  sweet  sensations,  like  harsh  tunes 
Play'd  deftly  on  a  soft-toned  instrument. 


THE  EOLIAN  HARP. 

COMPOSED  AT  CLEVEDO.V,  SOMERSETSHIRE. 

My  pensive  Sara  !  thy  soft  cheek  reclined 

Thus  on  mine  arm,  most  soothing  sweet  it  is 

To  sit  beside  our  cot,  our  cot  o'ergrown 

With  white-flower'd  Jasmin,  and  the  broad-leaved 

Myrtle, 
(Meet  emblems  they  of  Innocence  and  Love  !) 
And  watch  the  clouds,  that  late  were  rich  with  light 
Slow  saddening  round,  and  mark  the  star  of  eve 
Serenely  brilliant  (such  should  wisdom  be) 
Shine  opposite !  How  exquisite  the  scents 
Snatch'd  from   vou   bean-field !    and  the    world  sc 

hush'd! 
The  stilly  murmur  of  the  distant  Sea 
Tells  us  of  Silence. 

And  that  simplest  Lute. 
Placed  length-ways  in  the  clasping  casement,  hark 
How  by  the  desultory  breeze  caress'd, 
Like  some  coy  maid  half  yielding  to  her  lo.   r, 


*  ChoHerton. 


38 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


It  pours  such  sweet  upbraiding,  as  must  needs 
Tempt  to  repeat  the  wrong !  And  now,  its  strings 
Holdlier  swept,  the  long  sequacious  notes 
Over  delicious  surges  sink  and  rise, 
Such  a  soft  floating  witchery  of  sound 
As  twilight  Elfins  make,  when  they  at  eve 
Voyage  on  gentle  gales  from  Fairy-Land, 
Where  Melodies  round  honey-dropping  flowers, 
Footless  and  wild,  like  birds  of  Paradise, 
\or  pause,  nor  perch,  hovering  on  untamed  wing ! 

0  the  one  life  within  us  and  abroad, 
Which  meets  all  mo'.ion  and  becomes  its  soul, 
A  light  in  sound,  a  sound-like  power  in  light, 
Rhythm  in  all  thought,  and  joyance  everywhere — 
Alethinks,  it  should  have  been  impossible 

.\Tot  to  love  all  things  in  a  world  so  fill'd  ; 
Where  the  breeze  warbles,  and  the  mute  still  air 
[s  Music  slumbering  on  her  instrument. 

And  thus,  my  love !  as  on  the  midway  slope 
Of  yonder  hill  I  stretch  my  limbs  at  noon. 
Whilst  through  my  half-closed  eye-lids  I  behold 
The  sunbeams  dance,  like  diamonds,  on  the  main, 
And  tranquil  muse  upon  tranquillity  ; 
Full  manv  a  thought  uncall'd  and  undetain'd, 
And  many  idle  flitting  phantasies,     . 
Traverse  my  indolent  and  passive  brain, 
As  wild  and  various  as  the  random  gales 
That  swell  and  flutter  on  this  subject  lute  ! 

And  what  if  all  of  animated  nature 
lie  but  organic  harps  diversely  framed, 
That  tremble  into  thought,  as  o'er  them  sweeps, 
Plastic  and  vast,  one  intellectual  breeze, 
At  once  the  Soul  of  each,  and  God  of  All  ? 

But  thy  more  serious  eye  a  mild  reproof 
Darts,  O  beloved  woman  !  nor  such  thoughts 
Dim  and  imhallow'd  dost  thou  not  reject, 
And  biddest  me  walk  humbly  with  my  God. 
Meek  daughter  in  the  family  of  Christ! 
Well  hast  thou  said  and  holily  dispraised 
These  shapings  of  the  unregenerate  mind  ; 
Bubbles  that  glitter  as  they  rise  and  break 
On  vain  Philosophy's  aye-babbling  spring. 
For  never  guiltless  may  I  speak  of  him, 
The  Incomprehensible !  save  when  with  awe 

1  praise  him,  and  with  Faith  that  inly  feels ; 
Who  with  his  saving  mercies  healed  me, 

A  sinful  and  most  miserable  Man, 
Wilder'd  and  dark,  and  gave  me  to  possess 
Peace,  and  this  Cot,  and  thee,  heart-honor'd  Maid ! 


REFLECTIONS  ON  HAVING  LEFT  A  PLACE 
OF  RETIREMENT. 


Sermoni  propriora. — Hor. 


Low  was  our  pretty  Cot :  our  tallest  rose 
Peep'd  at  the  chamber-window.     We  could  hear, 
At  silent  noon,  and  eve,  and  early  morn, 
The  Sea's  faint  murmur.     In  the  open  air 
Our  myrtles  blossom'd  ;  and  across  the  Porch 
Thick  jasmins  twined :  the  little  landscape  round 


Was  green  and  woody,  and  refresh'd  the  eye. 
It  was  a  spot  which  you  might  aptly  call 
The  Valley  of  Seclusion !  once  I  saw 
(Hallowing  his  Sabbath-day  by  quietness) 
A  wealthy  son  of  commerce  saunter  by, 
Brislowa's  citizen  :  methought,  it  calm'd 
His  thirst  of  idle  gold,  and  made  him  muse 
With  wiser  feelings ;  for  he  paused,  and  look'd 
With  a  pleased  sadness,  and  gazed  all  around, 
Then  eyed  our  cottage,  and  gazed  round  again, 
And  sigh'd,  and  said,  it  was  a  blessed  place. 
And  we  were  bless'd.     Oft  with  patient  ear 
Long-listening  to  the  viewless  sky-lark's  note 
(Viewless  or  haply  for  a  moment  seen 
Gleaming  on  sunny  wings),  in  whisper'd  tones 
I've  said  to  my  beloved,  "  Such,  sweet  girl! 
The  inobtrusive  song  of  Happiness, 
Unearthly  minstrelsy !  then  only  heard 
When  the  soul  seeks  to  hear;  when  all  is  hush'd, 
And  the  Heart  listens  ! " 

But  the  time,  when  first 
From  that  low  dell,  steep  up  the  stony  Mount 
I  climb'd  with  perilous  toil,  and  reach'd  the  top, 
Oh !  what  a  goodly  scene  !  Here  the  bleak  Mount, 
The  bare  bleak  Mountain  speckled  thin  with  sheep; 
Gray  clouds,  that  shadowing  spot  the  sunny  fields ; 
And  River,  now  with  bushy  rocks  o'erbrow'd, 
Now  winding  bright  and  full,  with  naked  banks; 
And  Seats,  and  Lawns,  the  Abbey  and  the  Wood, 
And  Cots,  and  Hamlets,  and  faint  City-spire  ; 
The  Channel  there,  the  Islands  and  white  Sails, 
Dim    Coasts,    and    cloud-like    Hills,   and   shoreless 

Ocean — 
It  seem'd  like  Omnipresence  !  God,  methought, 
Had  built  him  there  a  Temple :  the  whole  World 
Seem'd  imaged  in  its  vast  circumference, 
No  wish  profaned  my  overwhelmed  heart. 
Blest  hour !  It  was  a  luxury, — to  be ! 

Ah !  quiet  dell ;  dear  cot,  and  Mount  sublime ! 
I  was  constrain'd  to  quit  you.     Was  it  right, 
While  my  unnumber'd  brethren  toil'd  and  bled, 
That  I  should  dream  away  the  intrusted  hours 
On  rose-leaf  beds,  pampering  the  coward  heart 
With  feelings  all  too  delicate  for  use  ? 
Sweet  is  the  tear  that  from  some  Howard's  eye 
Drops  on  the  cheek  of  One  he  lifts  from  Earth : 
And  He  that  works  me  good  with  unmoved  face, 
Does  it  but  half:  he  chills  me  while  he  aids, 
My  Benefactor,  not  my  Brother  Man ! 
Yet  even  this,  this  cold  beneficence, 
Praise,  praise  it,  O  my  Soul !  oft  as  thou  scann'st 
The  Sluggard  Pity's  vision-weaving  tribe  ! 
Who  sigh  for  wretchedness,  yet  shun  the  wretched. 
Nursing  in  some  delicious  solitude 
Their  slothful  loves  and  dainty  Sympathies ! 
I  therefore  go,  and  join  head,  heart,  and  hand, 
Active  and  firm,  to  fight  the  bloodless  fight 
Of  Science,  Freedom,  and  the  Truth  in  Christ. 

Yet  oft,  when  after  honorable  toil 
Rests  the  tired  mind,  and  waking  loves  to  dream, 
My  spirit  shall  revisit  thee,  dear  Cot! 
Thy  jasmin  and  thy  window-peeping  rose, 
And  myrtles  fearless  of  the  mild  sea-air. 
And  I  shall  sigh  fond  wishes — sweet  Abode ! 
48 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


39 


Ah  ! — had  none  greater !  And  that  all  had  such '. 
It  might  be  so — but  the  time  is  not  yet. 
Speed  it,  0  Father !  Let  thy  Kingdom  come ! 


TO  TIIE  REV.  GEORGE   COLERIDGE  OF 
OTTERY  ST.  MARY,  DEVON. 

WITH    SOME   POEMS. 


Notus  in  fratres  animi  patemi. 

Hfrr.  Carm.  lib.  i.  2. 


A  blessed  lot  hath  he,  who  having  pass'd 
His  youth  and  early  manhood  in  the  stir 
And  turmoil  of  the  world,  retreats  at  length, 
With  cares  that  move,  not  agitate  the  heart, 
To  the  same  dwelling  where  his  father  dwelt ; 
And  haply  views  his  tottering  little  ones 
Embrace  those  aged  knees  and  climb  that  lap, 
On  which  first  kneeling  his  own  infancy 
Lisp'd  its  brief  prayer.    Such,  O  my  earliest  Friend 
Thy  lot,  and  such  thy  brothers  too  enjoy. 
At  distance  did  ye  climb  Life's  upland  road, 
Yet  cheer'd  and  cheering :  now  fraternal  love 
Hath  drawn  you  to  one  centre.    Be  your  days 
Holy,  and  blest  and  blessing  may  ye  live  ! 

To  me  th'  Eternal  Wisdom  hath  dispensed 
A  different  fortune  and  more  different  mind — 
Me  from  the  spot  where  first  I  sprang  to  light 
Too  soon  transplanted,  ere  my  soul  had  fix'd 
Its  first  domestic  loves  ;  and  hence  through  life 
Chasing  chance-started  Friendships.    A  brief  while 
Some  have  preserved  me  from  Life's  pelting  ills ; 
But,  like  a  tree  witli  leaves  of  feeble  stem, 
If  the  clouds  lasted,  and  a  sudden  breeze 
Ruffled  the  boughs,  they  on  my  head  at  once 
Dropp'd  the  collected  shower ;  and  some  most  false, 
False  and  fair  foliaged  as  the  Manchineel, 
Have  tempted  me  to  slumoer  in  their  shade 
E'en  'mid  the  storm  ;  then  breathing  subtlest  damps: 
Mix'd  their  own  venom  with  the  rain  from  Heaven 
That  I  woke  poison'd  !  But,  all  praise  to  Him 
Who  gives  us  all  th;,igs,  more  have  yielded  me 
Permanent  shelter ;  and  beside  one  Friend, 
Beneath  th'  impervious  covert  of  one  Oak, 
I've  raised  a  lowly  shed,  and  know  the  names 
Of  Husband  and  of  Father ;  nor  unhearing 
Of  that  divine  and  nightly-whispering  Voice, 
Which  from  my  childhood  to  maturer  years 
Spake  to  me  of  predestinated  wreaths, 
Bright  with  no  fading  colors ! 

Yet  at  times 
My  soul  is  sad,  that  I  have  roam'd  through  life 
Still  most  a  stranger,  most  with  naked  heart 
At  mine  own  home  and  birth-place  :  chiefly  then, 
When  I  remember  thee,  my  earliest  Friend ! 
Thee,  who  didst  watch  my  boyhood  and  my  youth 
Didst  trace  my  wanderings  with  a  Father's  eye ; 
And  boding  evil,  yet  still  hoping  good, 
Rebuked  each  fault,  and  over  all  my  woes 
Sorrow'd  in  silence  !  He  who  counts  alone 
The  beatings  of  the  solitary  heart, 
That  Being  knows,  how  I  have  loved  thee  ever, 


Loved  as  a  brother,  as  a  son  revered  thee ! 

Oh !  't  is  to  me  an  ever-new  delight, 

To  talk  of  thee  and  thine :  or  when  the  blast 

Of  the  shrill  winter,  rattling  our  rude  sash, 

Endears  the  cleanly  hearth  and  social  bowl ; 

Or  when  as  now,  on  some  delicious  eve, 

We,  in  our  sweet  sequester'd  orchard-plot, 

Sit  on  the  tree  crooked  earthward;  whose  old  boughs, 

That  hang  above  us  in  an  arborous  roof, 

Slirr'd  by  the  faint  gale  of  departing  May, 

Send  their  loose  blossoms  slanting  o'er  our  heads ! 

Nor  dost  not  thou  sometimes  recall  those  hours, 
When  with  the  joy  of  hope  thou  gavest  thine  ear 
To  my  wild  firstling-lays.    Since  then  my  song 
Hath  sounded  deeper  notes,  such  as  beseem 
Or  that  sad  wisdom  folly  leaves  behind, 
Or  such  as,  tuned  to  these  tumultuous  times, 
Cope  with  the  tempest's  swell ! 

These  various  strains 
Which  I  have  framed  in  many  a  various  mood, 
Accept,  my  Brother !  and  (for  some  perchance 
Will  strike  discordant  on  thy  milder  mind) 
If  aught  of  Error  or  intemperate  Truth 
Should  meet  thine  ear,  think  thou  that  riper  age 
Will  calm  it  down,  and  let  thy  love  forgive  it ! 


INSCRIPTION   FOR   A  FOUNTAIN  ON  A  HEATH. 

This  Sycamore,  oft  musical  with  bees, — 

Such  tents  the  Patriarchs  loved !  O  long  unharm'd 

May  all  its  aged  boughs  o'er-eanopy 

The  small  round  basin,  which  this  jutting  stone 

Keeps  pure  from  falling  leaves!  Long  may  the  Spring, 

Quietly  as  a  sleeping  infant's  breath, 

Send  up  cold  waters  to  the  traveller 

With  soft  and  even  pulse  !  Nor  ever  cease 

Yon  tiny  cone  of  sand  its  soundless  dance, 

Which  at  the  bottom,  like  a  fairy's  page, 

As  merry  and  no  taller,  dances  still, 

Nor  wrinkles  the  smooth  surface  of  the  Fount 

Here  twilight  is  and  coolness  :  here  is  moss, 

A  soft  seat,  and  a  deep  and  ample  shade. 

Thou  mayst  toil  far  and  find  no  second  tree. 

Drink,  Pilgrim,  here  !  Here  rest !  and  if  thy  heart 

Be  innocent,  here  too  shalt  thou  refresh 

Thy  spirit,  listening  to  some  gentle  sound, 

Or  passing  gale  or  hum  of  murmuring  bees ! 


A  TOMBLESS  EPITAPH. 

'T  is  true,  Idoloclastes  Satyrane ! 
(So  call  him,  for  so  mingling  blame  with  praise, 
And  smiles  with  anxious  looks,  his  earliest  friends 
Masking  his  birth-name,  wont  to  character 
His  wild-wood  fancy  and  impetuous  zeal) 
'T  is  true  that,  passionate  for  ancient  truths, 
And  honoring  with  religious  love  the  Great 
Of  elder  times,  he  hated  to  excess. 
With  an  unquiet  and  intolerant  scorn, 
The  hollow  puppets  of  a  hollow  age, 
Ever  idolatrous,  and  changing  ever 
Its  worthless  Idols !  Learning,  Power,  and  Time, 
(Too  much  of  all)  thus  wasting  in  vain  war 
49 


40 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Of  fervid  colloquy.    Sickness,  't  is  true, 

Whole  years  of  weary  days,  besieged  him  close, 

Even  to  the  gates  and  inlets  of  his  life  ! 

But  it  is  true,  no  less,  that  strenuous,  firm, 

And  with  a  natural  gladness,  he  maintain'd 

The  citadel  unconquer'd,  and  in  joy 

Was  strong  to  follow  the  delightful  Muse. 

For  not  a  hidden  Path,  that  to  the  Shades 

Of  the  beloved  Parnassian  forest  leads, 

Lurk'd  undiscover'd  by  him ;  not  a  rill 

There  issues  from  the  fount  of  Hippocrene, 

But  he  had  traced  it  upward  to  its  source, 

Through  open  glade,  dark  glen,  and  secret  dell. 

Knew  the  gay  wild-flowers  on  its  banks,  and  cull'd 

Its  med'cinable  herbs.    Yea,  oft  alone, 

Piercing  the  long-neglected  holy  cave, 

The  haunt  obscure  of  old  Philosophy, 

He  bade  with  lifted  torch  its  starry  walls 

Sparkle  as  erst  they  sparkled  to  the  flame 

Of  odorous  lamps  tended  by  Saint  and  Sage. 

O  framed  for  calmer  times  and  nobler  hearts ! 

O  studious  Poet,  eloquent  for  truth  ! 

Philosopher!  contemning  wealth  and  death, 

Yet  docile,  childlike,  full  of  life  and  love  ! 

Here,  rather  than  on  monumental  stone, 

This  record  of  thy  worth  thy  Friend  inscribes, 

Thoughtful,  with  quiet  tears  upon  his  cheek. 


THIS  LIME-TREE  BOWER  MY  PRISON. 


In  the  June  of  1797,  some  long-expected  Friends  paid  a  visit 
to  the  Author's  Cottage;  and  on  the  morning  of  their  ar- 
rival, he  met  with  an  accident,  which  disabled  him  from 
walking  during  the  whole  time  of  their  stay.  One  Evening, 
when  they  had  left  him  for  a  few  hours,  he  composed  the 
following  lines  in  the  Garden  Bower. 


Well,  they  are  gone,  and  here  must  I  remain, 
This  Lime-tree  bower  my  prison !  I  have  lost 
Beauties  and  feelings,  such  as  would  have  been 
Most  sweet  to  my  remembrance,  even  when  age 
Had  dimm'd  mine  eyes  to  blindness !  They,  mean- 
while, 
Friends,  whom  I  never  more  may  meet  again, 
On  springy  heath,  along  the  hill-top  edge, 
Wander  in  gladness,  and  wind  down,  perchance, 
To  that  still  roaring  dell,  of  which  I  told  : 
The  roaring  dell,  o'erwooded,  narrow,  deep, 
And  only  speckled  by  the  mid-day  sun  ; 
Where  its  slim  trunk  the  Ash  from  rock  to  rock 
Flings  arching  like  a  bridge  ; — that  branchless  Ash, 
Unsunn'd  and  damp,  whose  few  poor  yellow  leaves 
Ne'er  tremble  in  the  gale,  yet  tremble  still, 
Fann'd  by  the  waterfall !  and  there  my  friends 
Behold  the  dark-green  file  of  long  lank  weeds,* 
That  all  at  once  (a  most  fantastic  sight!) 
Still  nod  and  drip  beneath  the  dripping  edge 
Of  the  blue  clay-stone. 


The  slip  of  smooth  clear  blue  betwixt  two  isles 

Of  purple  shadow  !  Yes,  they  wander  on 

In  gladness  all ;  but  thou,  methinks,  most  glad, 

My  gentle-hearted  Charles !  for  thou  hast  pined 

And  hunger'd  after  Nature,  many  a  year, 

In  the  great  city  pent,  winning  thy  way 

With  sad  yet  patient  soul,  through  evil  and  pain 

And  strange  calamity !  Ah !  slowly  sink 

Behind  the  western  ridge,  thou  glorious  Sun ! 

Shine  in  the  slant  beams  of  the  sinking  orb, 

Ye  purple  heath-flowers!  richlier  burn,  ye  clouds! 

Live  in  the  yellow  light,  ye  distant  groves  ! 

And  kindle,  thou  blue  Ocean !  So  my  Friend, 

Struck  with  deep  joy,  may  stand,  as  I  have  stood, 

Silent  with  swimming  sense  ;  yea,  gazing  round 

On  the  wide  landscape,  gaze  till  all  doth  seem 

Less  gross  than  bodily  ;  and  of  such  hues 

As  veil  the  Almighty  Spirit,  when  yet  he  makes 

Spirits  perceive  his  presence. 

A  delight 
Comes  sudden  on  my  heart,  and  I  am  glad 
As  I  myself  were  there !  Nor  in  this  bower, 
This  little  lime-tree  bower,  have  I  not  mark'd 
Much  that  has  soothed  me.    Pale  beneath  the  blaze 
Hung  the  transparent  foliage ;  and  I  watch'd 
Some  broad  and  sunny  leaf,  and  loved  to  see 
The  shadow  of  the  leaf  and  stem  above 
Dappling  its  sunshine  !  And  that  Walnut-tree 
Was  richly  tinged,  and  a  deep  radiance  lay 
Full  on  the  ancient  Ivy,  which  usurps 
Those  fronting  elms,  and  now,  with  blackest  mass, 
Makes  their  dark  branches  gleam  a  lighter  hue 
Through  the  late  twilight :  and  though  now  the  Bat 
Wheels  silent  by,  and  not  a  Swallow  twitters, 
Yet  still  the  solitary  Humble-Bee 
Sings  in  the  bean-flower!  Henceforth  I  shall  know 
That  Nature  ne'er  deserts  the  wise  and  pure  : 
No  plot  so  narrow7,  be  but  Nature  there, 
No  waste  so  vacant,  but  may  well  employ 
Each  faculty  of  sense,  and  keep  the  heart 
Awake  to  Love  and  Beauty !  and  sometimes 
'T  is  well  to  be  bereft  of  promised  good, 
That  we  may  lift  the  soul,  and  contemplate 
With  lively  joy  the  joys  we  cannot  share. 
My  gentle-hearted  Charles !  when  the  last  Rook 
Beat  its  straight  path  along  the  dusky  air 
Homewards,  I  blest  it !  deeming  its  black  wing 
(Now  a  dim  speck,  now  vanishing  in  light) 
Had  cross'd  the  mighty  Orb's  dilated  glory, 
While  thou  stood'st  gazing ;  or  when  all  was  still, 
Flew  creakingt  o'er  thy  head,  and  had  a  charm 
For  thee,  my  gentle-hearted  Charles,  to  whom 
No  sound  is  dissonant  which  tells  of  Life. 


TO  A  FRIEND 


Beneath  the  wide  wide  Heaven — and  view  again 
The  many-steepled  tract  magnificent 
Of  hilly  fields  and  meadows,  and  the  sea, 
With  some  fair  bark,  perhaps,  whose  sails  light  up 


Now,  my  Friends  emerge  who  had   declared  his  intention  of  writing 


*  The  Asplenium  Scolopendrium,  called  in  some  countries 
the  Adder's  Tongue,  in  others  the  Hart's  Tongue  ;  but  With- 
ering gives  the  Adder's  Tongue  as  the  trivial  name  of  the 
Ophioglossum  only. 


NO    MORE    POETRY. 


Dear  Charles !  whilst  yet  thou  wert  a  babe,  I  ween 
That  Genius  plunged  thee  in  that  wizard  fount 


t  Some  months  after  I  had  written  this  line,  it  gave  me  plea- 
sure to  observe  that  Bartram  had  observed  the  same  circum- 
stance   of  the  Savanna  Crane.     "  When  theso  Birds   move 
their  wings  in  flight,  their  strokes  are  slow,  moderate   and 
50 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


41 


High!  Castalie:  and  (sureties  of  thy  faith) 

That  Pity  and  Simplicity  stood  by, 

And  promised  for  thee,  that  thou  shouldst  renounce 

The  world's  low  cares  and  lying  vanities, 

Stedfast  and  rooted  in  the  heavenly  Muse, 

And  wash'd  and  sanctified  to  Poesy. 

Yes — thou  wert  plunged,  but  with  forgetful  hand 

Held,  as  by  Thetis  erst  her  warrior  Son  : 

And  with  those  recreant  unbaptized  heels 

Thou  'rt  flying  from  thy  bounden  ministeries — 

So  sore  it  seems  and  burthensome  a  task 

To  weave  unwithering  (lowers  !  But  take  thou  heed  : 

For  thou  art  vulnerable,  wild-eyed  Boy, 

And  1  have  arrows*  mystically  dipp'd, 

Such  as  may  stop  thy  speed.    Is  thy  Burns  dead  ? 

And  shall  he  die  unwept,  and  sink  to  Earth 

"  Without  the  meed  of  one  melodious  tear?" 

Thy  Burns,  and  Nature's  own  beloved  Bard, 

Who  to  the  "  Illustrious!  of  his  native  land 

"  So  properly  did  look  for  patronage." 

Ghost  of  Maecenas  !  hide  thy  blushing  face ! 

They  snatch'd  him  from  the  Sickle  and  the  Plow — 

To  gauge  Ale-Firkins. 

Oh !  for  shame  return ! 
On  a  bleak  rock,  midway  the  Aonian  Mount, 
There  stands  a  lone  and  melancholy  tree, 
Whose  aged  branches  in  the  midnight  blast 
Make  solemn  music  :  pluck  its  darkest  bough, 
Ere  yet  the  unwholesome  night-dew  be  exhaled, 
And  weeping  wreath  it  round  thy  Poet's  tomb. 
Then  in  the  outskirts,  where  pollutions  grow, 
Pick  the  rank  henbane  and  the  dusky  flowers 
Of  night-shade,  or  its  red  and  tempting  fruit. 
These  with  stopp'd  nostril  and  glove-guarded  hand 
Knit  in  nice  intertexture,  so  to  twine 
The  illustrious  brow  of  Scotch  Nobility. 

1796. 


TO  A  GENTLEMAN. 

COMPOSED  OX  THE  NIGHT  AFTER  HIS  RECITATION 
OF  A  TOE.M  ON  THE  GROWTH  OF  AN  INDIVIDUAL 
MIND. 

Friend  of  the  Wise  !  and  Teacher  of  the  Good  ! 

Into  my  heart  have  I  received  that  lay 

More  than  historic,  that  prophetic  lay, 

Wherein  (high  theme  by  thee  first  sung  aright) 

Of  the  foundations  and  the  building  up 

Of  a  Human  Spirit  thou  hast  dared  to  tell 

What  may  be  told,  to  the  understanding  mind 

Revealable  ;  and  what  within  the  mind, 

By  vital  breathings  secret  as  the  soul 

Of  vernal  growth,  oft  quickens  in  the  heart 

Thoughts  all  too  deep  for  words  ! — 

Theme  hard  as  high 
Of  smiles  spontaneous,  and  mysterious  fears 
(The  first-born  they  of  Reason  and  twin-birth), 


regular ;  and  even  when  at  a  considerable  distance  or  high 
above  us,  we  plainly  hear  the  quill- feathers  ;  their  shafts  and 
webs  upon  one  another  creak  as  the  joints  or  working  of  a 
vessel  in  a  tempestuous  sea." 

*  Vide  Pind.  Olymp.  iii.  1.  156. 
t  Verbatim  from  Burns's  dedication  of  hie  Poenas  to  the  No- 
hilitv  and  Gentry  of  the  Caledonian  Hunt. 


Of  tides  obedient  to  external  force, 

And  currents  self-determined,  as  might  seem, 

Or  by  some  inner  Power ;  of  moments  awful, 

Now  in  thy  inner  life,  and  now  abroad, 

When    Power   stream'd    from    thee,    and   thy  soul 

received 
The  light  reflected,  as  a  light  bestow'd — 
Of  Fancies  fair,  and  milder  hours  of  youth, 
Hyblean  murmurs  of  poetic  thought 
Industrious  in  its  joy,  in  Vales  and  Glens 
Native  or  outland,  Lakes  and  famous  Hills ! 
Or  on  the  lonely  High-road,  when  the  Stars 
Were  rising ;  or  by  secret  Mountain-streams, 
The  Guides  and  the  Companions  of  thy  way  ' 

Of  more  than  Fancy,  of  the  Social  Sense 
Distending  wide,  and  Man  beloved  as  Man, 
Where  France  in  all  her  towns  lay  vibrating 
Like  some  becalmed  bark  beneath  the  burst 
Of  Heaven's  immediate  thunder,  when  no  cloud 
Is  visible,  or  shadow  on  the  Main. 
For  thou  wert  there,  thine  own  brows  garlanded, 
Amid  the  tremor  of  a  realm  aglow, 
Amid  a  mighty  nation  jubilant, 
When  from  the  general  heart  of  human-kind 
Hope  sprang  forth  like  a  full-born  Deity ! 

Of  that  dear  Hope  afflicted  and  struck  down, 

So  summon'd  homeward,  thenceforth  calm  and  sure 

From  the  dread  watch-tower  of  man's  absolute  Self, 

With  light  unwaning  on  her  eyes,  to  look 

Far  on — herself  a  glory  to  behold, 

The  Angel  of  the  vision !  Then  (last  strain) 

Of  Duty,  chosen  laws  controlling  choice, 

Action  and  Joy  ! — An  orpliic  song  indeed, 

A  song  divine  of  high  and  passionate  thoughts, 

To  their  own  music  chanted ! 

O  great  Bard ' 
Ere  yet  that  last  strain  dying  awed  the  air, 
With  stedfast  eye  I  view'd  thee  in  the  choir 
Of  ever-enduring  men.    The  truly  Great 
Have  all  one  age,  and  from  one  visible  space 
Shed  influence !  They,  both  in  power  and  act, 
Are  permanent,  and  Time  is  not  with  them, 
Save  as  it  worketh  for  them,  they  in  it. 
Nor  less  a  sacred  roll,  than  those  of  old, 
And  to  be  placed,  as  they,  with  gradual  fame 
Among  the  archives  of  mankind,  thy  work 
Makes  audible  a  linked  lay  of  Truth, 
Of  Truth  profound  a  sweet  continuous  lay, 
Not  learnt,  but  native,  her  own  natural  notes ! 
Ah !  as  I  listen'd  with  a  heart  forlorn, 
The  pulses  of  my  being  beat  anew  : 
And  even  as  life  returns  upon  the  drown'd, 
Life's  joy  rekindling  roused  a  throng  of  pains^ 
Keen  Pangs  of  Love,  awakening  as  a  babe 
Turbulent,  with  an  outcry  in  the  heart  ; 
And  Fears  self-will'd,  that  shunn'd  the  eye  of  Hopn 
And  Hope  that  scarce  would  know  itself  from  Fear 
Sense  of  past  Youth,  and  Manhood  come  in  vain 
And  Genius  given,  and  knowledge  won  in  vain  ; 
And  all  which  I  had  cull'd  in  wood-walks  wild, 
And  all  which  patient  toil  had  rear'd,  and  all, 
Commune  with  thee  had  open'd  out — but  flowers 
Strew'd  on  my  corse,  and  borne  upon  my  bier, 
In  the  same  coffin,  for  the  self-same  grave ! 

Tnat  way  no  more  !  and  ill  beseems  it  me, 
Who  came  a  welcomer  in  herald's  guise, 
51 


42 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Singing  of  Glory,  and  Futurity, 
To  wander  back  on  such  unhealthful  road, 
Plucking  the  poisons  of  self-harm !  And  ill 
Such  intertwine  beseems  triumphal  wreaths 
Strew'd  before  thy  advancing  ! 

Nor  do  thou, 
Sage  Bard  !  impair  the  memory  of  that  hour 
Of  my  communion  with  thy  nobler  mind 
By  Pity  or  Grief,  already  felt  too  long ! 
Nor  let  my  words  import  more  blame  than  needs. 
The  tumult  rose  and  ceased  :  for  Peace  is  nigh 
Where  Wisdom's  voice  has  found  a  listening  heart. 
Amid  the  howl  of  more  than  wintry  storms, 
The  Halcyon  hears  the  voice  of  vernal  hours 
Already  on  the  wing. 

Eve  following  eve, 
Dear  tranquil  time,  when  the  sweet  sense  of  Home 
Is  sweetest !  moments  for  their  own  sake  hail'd 
And  more  desired,  more  precious  for  thy  song, 
In  silence  listening,  like  a  devout  child, 
My  soul  lay  passive,  by  the  various  strain 
Driven  as  in  surges  now  beneath  the  stars, 
With  momentary  Stars  of  my  own  birth, 
Fair  constellated  Foam,*  still  darting  off 
Into  the  darkness ;  now  a  tranquil  sea, 
Outspread  and  bright,  yet  swelling  to  the  Moon. 

And  when — O  Friend  !  my  comforter  and  guide  ! 
Strong  in  thyself,  and  powerful  to  give  strength  ! — 
Thy  long  sustained  song  finally  closed, 
And  thy  deep  voice  had  ceased — yet  thou  thyself 
Wert  still  before  my  eyes,  and  round  us  both 
That  happy  vision  of  beloved  faces — 
Scarce  conscious,  and  yet  conscious  of  its  close 
I  sate,  my  being  blended  in  one  thought 
(Thought  was  it  ?  or  Aspiration  ?  or  Resolve  ?) 
Absorb'd,  yet  hanging  still  upon  the  sound — 
And  when  I  rose,  I  found  myself  in  prayer. 


THE  NIGHTINGALE  : 

A   CONVERSATION  POEM; 

WRITTEN    IN    APRIL,    1798. 

No  cloud,  no  relic  of  the  sunken  day 
Distinguishes  the  West,  no  long  thin  slip 
Of  sullen  light,  no  obscure  trembling  hues. 
Come,  we  will  rest  on  this  old  mossy  bridge ! 
You  see  the  glimmer  of  the  stream  beneath, 
But  hear  no  murmuring :  it  flows  silently, 
O'er  its  soft  bed  of  verdure.    All  is  still, 
A  balmy  night !  and  though  the  stars  be  dim, 
Yet  let  us  think  upon  the  vernal  showers 
That  gladden  the  green  earth,  and  we  shall  find 
A  pleasure  in  the  dimness  of  the  stars. 
And  hark  !  the  Nightingale  begins  its  song, 


"  Most  musical,  most  melancholy  "t  bird ! 

A  melancholy  bird  ?  Oh  !  idle  thought ! 

In  nature  there  is  nothing  melancholy. 

But  some  night-wandering  man,  whose  heart  was 

pierced 
With  the  remembrance  of  a  grievous  wrong, 
Or  slow  distemper,  or  neglected  love 
(And  so,  poor  Wretch !  filled  all  things  with  himself 
And  made  all  gentle  sounds  tell  back  the  tale 
Of  his  own  sorrow),  he  and  such  as  he, 
First  named  these  notes  a  melancholy  strain. 
And  many  a  poet  echoes  the  conceit ; 
Poet  who  hath  been  building  up  the  rhyme 
When  he  had  better  far  have  stretch'd  his  limbs 
Beside  a  brook  in  mossy  forest-dell, 
By  Sun  or  Moon-light,  to  the  influxes 
Of  shapes  and  sounds  and  shifting  elements 
Surrendering  his  whole  spirit,  of  his  song 
And  of  his  frame  forgetful !  so  his  fame 
Should  share  in  Nature's  immortality, 
A  venerable  thing  !  and  so  his  song 
Should  make  all  Nature  lovelier,  and  itself 
Be  loved  like  Nature  !  But  't  will  not  be  so ; 
And  youths  and  maidens  most  poetical, 
Who  lose  the  deepening  twilights  of  the  spring 
In  ball-rooms  and  hot  theatres,  they  still, 
Full  of  meek  sympathy,  must  heave  their  sighs 
O'er  Philomela's  pity-pleading  strains. 

My  friend,  and  thou,  our  Sister !  we  have  learnt 
A  different  lore  :  we  may  not  thus  profane 
Nature's  sweet  voices,  always  full  of  love 
And  joyance  !  'T  is  the  merry  Nightingale 
That  crowds,  and  hurries,  and  precipitates 
With  fast  thick  warble  his  delicious  notes, 
As  he  were  fearful  that  an  April  night . 
Would  be  too  short  for  him  to  utter  forth 
His  love-chant,  and  disburthen  his  full  soul 
Of  all  its  music ! 

And  I  know  a  grove 
Of  large  extent,  hard  by  a  castle  huge, 
Which  the  great  lord  inhabits  not ;  and  so 
This  grove  is  wild  with  tangling  underwood. 
And  the  trim  walks  are  broken  up,  and  grass, 
Thin  grass  and  king-cups  grow  within  the  paths 
But  never  elsewhere  in  one  place  I  knew 
So  many  Nightingales  ;  and  far  and  near, 
In  wood  and  thicket,  over  the  wide  grove, 
They  answer  and  provoke  each  other's  song, 
With  skirmish  and  capricious  passagings, 
And  murmurs  musical  and  swift  jug  jug, 
And  one  low  piping  sound  more  sweet  than  all — 
Stirring  the  air  with  such  a  harmony, 
That  should  you  close  your  eyes,  you  might  almost 
Forget  it  was  not  day  !  On  moonlight  bushes, 
Whose  dewy  leaflets  are  but  half  disclosed, 
You  may  perchance  behold  them  on  the  twigs, 
Their  bright,   bright   eyes,   their  eyes  both   bright 

and  full, 
Glistening,  while  many  a  glow-worm  in  the  shade 
Lights  up  her  love-torch. 


•  "  A  beautiful  white  cloud  of  foam  at  momentary  intervals 
courser]  by  the  side  of  the  vessel  with  a  roar,  and  little  stars 
of  flame  danced  and  sparkled  and  went  out  in  it:  and  every 
now  and  then  light  dotachments  of  this  white  cloud-like  foam 
darted  off  from  the  vessel's  side,  each  with  its  own  small  con 
nellation,  over  the  sea,  and  scoured  out  of  sight  like  a  Tartar 
troop  over  a  wilderness." — The  Friend,  p.  220. 


t  This  passage  in  Milton  possesses  an  excellence  far  superior 
to  that  of  mere  description.  It  is  spoken  in  the  character  of  the 
melancholy  man,  and  has  therefore  a  dramatic  propriety.  The 
author  makes  this  remark,  to  rescue  himself  from  the  charge 
of  having  alluded  with  levity  to  a  line  in  Milton :  a  charge  than 
which  none  could  be  more  painful  to  him,  except  perhaps  that 
of  having  ridiculed  his  Bible. 

52 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


43 


A  most  gentle  Maid, 
Who  dwelleth  in  her  hospitable  home 
Hard  by  the  castle,  and  at  latest  eve 
(Even  like  a  lady  vow'd  and  dedicate 
To  something  more  than  Nature  in  the  grove) 
Glides  through  the  pathways  ;  she  knows  all  their 

notes, 
That  gentle  Maid !  and  oft  a  moment's  space, 
What  time  the  Moon  was  lost  behind  a  cloud, 
Hath  heard  a  pause  of  silence  ;  till  the  Moon 
Emerging,  hath  awaken'd  earth  and  sky 
With  one  sensation,  and  these  wakeful  Birds 
Have  all  burst  forth  in  choral  minstrelsy, 
As  if  some  sudden  gale  had  swept  at  once 
A  hundred  airy  harps !    And  she  hath  watch'd 
Many  a  Nightingale  perch'd  giddily 
On  blossomy  twig  still  swinging  from  the  breeze, 
And  to  that  motion  tune  his  wanton  song 
Like  tipsy  joy  that  reels  with  tossing  head. 

Farewell,  O  Warbler  !  till  to-morrow  eve, 
And  you,  my  friends  !  farewell,  a  short  farewell ! 
We  have  been  loitering  long  and  pleasantly, 
And  now  for  our  dear  homes. — That  strain  again  ? 
Full  fain  it  would  delay  me !  My  dear  babe, 
Who,  capable  of  no  articulate  sound, 
Mars  all  things  with  his  imitative  lisp, 
How  he  would  place  his  hand  beside  his  ear, 
His  little  hand,  the  small  forefinger  up, 
And  bid  us  listen  !  And  I  deem  it  wise 
To  make  him  Nature's  Play-mate.    He  knows  well 
The  evening-star ;  and  once,  when  he  awoke 
In  most  distressful  mood  (some  inward  pain 
Had  made  up  that  strange  thing,  an  infant's  dream), 
I  hurried  with  him  to  our  orchard-plot, 
And  he  beheld  the  Moon,  and,  hush'd  at  once, 
Suspends  his  sobs,  and  laughs  most  silently, 
While  his  fair  eyes,  that  swam  with  undropp'd  tears 
Did  glitter  in  the  yellow  moon-beam  !  Well ! — 
It  is  a  father's  tale  :    But  if  that  Heaven 
Should  give  me  life,  his  childhood  shall  grow  up 
Familiar  with  these  songs,  that  with  the  night 
He  may  associate  joy !    Once  more,  farewell, 
Sweet  Nightingale !  Once  more,  my  friends !  farewell. 


FROST  AT  MIDNIGHT. 

The  Frost  performs  its  secret  ministry, 
Unhelp'd  by  any  wind.    The  owlet's  cry 
Came  loud — and  hark,  again !  loud  as  before. 
The  inmates  of  my  cottage,  all  at  rest, 
Have  left  me  to  that  solitude,  which  suits 
Abstruser  musings  :  save  that  at  my  side 
My  cradled  infant  slumbers  peacefully. 
'T  is  calm  indeed  !  so  calm,  that  it  disturbs 
And  vexes  meditation  with  its  strange 
And  extreme  silentness.    Sea,  hill,  and  wood, 
This  populous  village  !  Sea,  and  hill,  and  wood, 
With  all  the  numberless  goings  on  of  life, 
Inaudible  as  dreams  !  the  thin  blue  flame 
Lies  on  my  low  burnt  fire,  and  quivers  not  ; 
Only  that  film,  which  flutter'd  on  the  grate, 
Still  flutters  there,  the  sole  unquiet  thing. 
Methinks,  its  motion  in  this  hush  of  nature 
Gives  it  dim  sympathies  with  me  who  live, 
Making  it  a  companionable  -f&ijti^''"'? 
Whose  puny  flaps  and  freaks  the  idling  Spirit 


Bv  its  own  moods  interprets,  everywhere 
Echo  or  mirror  seeking  of  itself, 
And  makes  a  toy  of  Thought. 

But  O  !  how  oft, 

How  oft,  at  school,  with  most  believing  mind 

Presage ful,  have  I 'gazed  upon  the  bars, 

To  watch  that  fluttering  stranger  !  and  as  oft 

With  unclosed  lids,  already  had  I  dreamt 

Of  my  sweet  birth-place,  and  the  old  church-tower 

Whose  bells,  the  poor  man's  only  music,  rang 

From  morn  to  evening,  all  the  hot  Fair-day, 

So  sweetly,  (hat  they  stirr'd  and  haunted  me 

With  a  wild  pleasure,  falling  on  mine  ear 

Most  like  articulate  sounds  of  things  to  come ! 

So  gazed  I,  till  the  soothing  things,  I  dreamt, 

Lull'd  me  to  sleep,  and  sleep  prolong'd  my  dreams .' 

And  so  I  brooded  all  the  following  morn, 

Awed  by  the  stern  preceptor's  face,  mine  eye 

Fix'd  with  mock  study  on  my  swimming  book : 

Save  if  the  door  half-open'd,  and  I  snatch'd 

A  hasty  glance,  and  still  my  heart  leap'd  up, 

For  still  I  hoped  to  see  the  stranger's  face, 

Townsman,  or  aunt,  or  sister  more  beloved, 

My  play-mate  when  we  both  were  clothed  alike ! 

Dear  Babe,  that  sleepest  cradled  by  my  side, 
Whose  gentle  breathings,  heard  in  this  deep  calm, 
Fill  up  the    interspersed  vacancies 
And  momentary  pauses  of  the  thought ! 
My  babe  so  beautiful !  it  thrills  my  heart 
With  tender  gladness,  thus  to  look  at  thee, 
And  think  that  thou  shalt  learn  far  other  lore. 
And  in  far  other  scenes  !  For  I  was  rear'd 
In  the  great  city,  pent  'mid  cloisters  dim, 
And  saw  nought  lovely  but  the  sky  and  stars. 
But  thou,  my  babe !  shalt  wander  like  a  breeze 
By  lakes  and  sandy  shores,  beneath  the  crags 
Of  ancient  mountain,  and  beneath  the  clouds, 
Which  image  in  their  bulk  both  lakes  and  shores 
And  mountain  crags  :  so  shalt  thou  see  and  hear 
The  lovely  shapes  and  sounds  intelligible 
Of  that  eternal  language,  which  thy  God 
Utters,  who  from  eternity  doth  teach 
Himself  in  all,  and  all  things  in  himself. 
Great  universal  Teacher !  he  shall  mould 
Thy  spirit,  and  by  giving  make  it  ask. 

Therefore  all  seasons  shall  be  sweet  to  thee, 
Whether  the  summer  clothe  the  general  earth 
With  greenness,  or  the  redbreast  sit  and  sing 
Betwixt  the  tufts  of  snow  on  the  bare  branch 
Of  mossy  apple-tree,  while  the  nigh  thatch 
Smokes  in  the  sun-thaw  ;    whether  the  eave-drops 

fall 
Heard  only  in  the  trances  of  the  blast, 
Or  if  the  secret  ministry  of  frost 
Shall  hang  them  up  in  silent  icicles, 
Quietly  shining  to  the  quiet  Moon. 


TO  A  FRIEND. 

TOGETHER   WITH    AN    UNFINISHED    POEM 

T«Wfi  ft*  .my  scanty  brain  hath  built  the  rhyme 
Elaborate  ariti  swelling;  yet  the  heart 
Not  owns  it.    From  thy  spirit-bre^thiflS  powers 

5# 


44 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


I  ask  not  now,  my  friend  !  the  aiding  verse, 
Tedious  to  thee,  and  from  my  anxious  thought 
Of  dissonant  mood.    In  fancy  (well  I  know) 
From  business  wand'ring  far  and  local  cares, 
Thou  creepest  round  a  dear-loved  Sister's  bed 
With  noiseless  step,  and  watchest  the  faint  look, 
Soothing  each  pang  with  fond  solicitude, 
And  tenderest  tones  medicinal  of  love. 

I  too  a  Sister  had,  an  only  Sister 

She  loved  me  dearly,  and  I  doted  on  her ! 
To  her  I  pour'd  forth  all  my  puny  sorrows 
(As  a  sick  patient  in  his  nurse's  arms), 
And  of  the  heart  those  hidden  maladies 
That  shrink  ashamed  from  even  Friendship's  eye. 
Oh  !  I  have  woke  at  midnight,  and  have  wept 
Because  she  was  not  ! — Cheerily,  dear  Charles  ! 
Thou  thy  best  friend  shalt  cherish  many  a  year : 
Such  warm  presages  feel  I  of  high  Hope. 
For  not  uninterested  the  dear  maid 
I've  view'd — her  soul  affectionate  yet  wise, 
Her  polish'd  wit  as  mild  as  lambent  glories, 
That  play  around  a  sainted  infant's  head. 
He  knows  (the  Spirit  that  in  secret  sees, 
Of  whose  omniscient  and  all-spreading  Love 
Aught  to  implore*  were  impotence  of  mind) 
That  my  mute  thoughts  are  sad  before  his  throne, 
Prepared,  when  he  his  healing  ray  vouchsafes, 
To  pour  forth  thanksgiving  with  lifted  heart, 
And  praise  Him  Gracious  with  a  Brother's  joy ! 
December,  1794. 


THE  HOUR  WHEN  WE  SHALL  MEET  AGAIN. 
COMPOSED    DURING    ILLNESS    AND   IN    ABSENCE. 

Dim  hour  !  that  sleep'st  on  pillowing  clouds  afar, 
O  rise  and  yoke  the  turtles  to  thy  car ! 
Bend  o'er  the  traces,  blame  each  lingering  dove, 
And  give  me  to  the  bosom  of  my  love  ! 
My  gentle  love,  caressing  and  carest, 
With  heaving  heart  shall  cradle  me  to  rest  ; 
Shed  the  warm  tear-drop  from  her  smiling  eyes, 
Lull  with  fond  woe.  and  med'cine  me  with  sighs : 
While  finely-flushing  float  her  kisses  meek, 
Like  melted  rubies,  o'er  my  pallid  cheek. 
Chill'd  by  the  night,  the  drooping  rose  of  May 
Mourns  the  long  absence  of  the  lovely  day ; 
Young  Day,  returning  at  her  promised  hour, 
Weeps  o'er  the  sorrows  of  her  fav'rite  flower  ; 
Weeps  the  soft  dew,  the  balmy  gale  she  sighs, 
And  darts  a  trembling  lustre  from  her  eyes. 
New  life  and  joy  th'  expanding  flow'ret  feels  : 
His  pitying  Mistress  mourns,  and  mourning  heals ! 


LINES  TO  JOSEPH  COTTLE. 

My  honor'd  friend  !  whose  verse  concise,  yet  clear 
Tunes  to  smooth  melody  unconquer'd  sense, 
.  May  your  fame  fadeless  live,  as  "  never-sere  " 
The  ivy  wreathes  yon  oak,  whose  broad  defence 


Embow'rs  me  from  noon's  sultry  influence ! 

For,  like  that  nameless  riv'let  stealing  by, 

Your  modest  verse,  to  musing  Quiet  dear, 

Is  rich  with  tints  heaven-borrow'd  :  the  charm'd  eye 

Shall  gaze  undazzled  there,  and  love  the  soften'd  sky. 

Circling  the  base  of  the  Poetic  mount 

A  stream  there  is,  which  rolls  in  lazy  flow 

Its  coal-black  waters  from  Oblivion's  fount : 

The  vapor-poison'd  birds,  that  fly  too  low, 

Fall  with  dead  swoop,  and  to  the  bottom  go. 

Escaped  that  heavy  stream  on  pinion  fleet, 

Beneath  the  Mountain's  lofty-frowning  brow, 

Ere  aught  of  perilous  ascent  you  meet, 

A  mead  of  mildest  charm  delays  th'  unlab'ring  feet. 

Not  there  the  cloud-climb'd  rock,  sublime  and  vast, 
That  like  some  giant-king,  o'erglooms  the  hill ; 
Nor  there  the  pine-grove  to  the  midnight  blast 
Makes  solemn  music  !  But  th'  unceasing  rill 
To  the  soft  wren  or  lark's  descending  trill 
Murmurs  sweet  under-song  'mid  jasmin  bowers. 
In  this  same  pleasant  meadow,  at  your  will, 
I  ween,  you  wander'd — there  collecting  flow'rs 
Of  sober  tint,  and  herbs  of  med'cinable  powers ! 

There  for  the  monareh-murder'd  Soldier's  tomb 
You  wove  th'  unfinish'd  wreath  of  saddest  hues  ;* 
And  to  that  holier  chaplett  added  bloom, 
Besprinkling  it  with  Jordan's  cleansing  dews. 

But  lo !  your  Henderson!  awakes  the  Muse 

His  spirit  beckon'd  from  the  mountain's  height ! 
You  left  the  plain  and  soar'd  'mid  richer  views ' 
So  Nature  mourn'd,  when  sank  the  first  day's  light. 
With  stars,  unseen   before,  spangling   her  robe  of 
night ! 

Still  soar,  my  friend,  those  richer  viewrs  among, 
Strong,  rapid,  fervent  flashing  Fancy's  beam ! 
Virtue  and  Truth  shall  love  your  gentler  song  ; 
But  Poesy  demands  th'  impassion'd  theme  : 
Waked  by  Heaven's  silent  dews  at  eve's  mild  gleam, 
What  balmy  sweets  Pomona  breathes  around  ! 
But  if  the  vext  air  rush  a  stormy  stream, 
Or  Autumn's  shrill  gust  moan  in  plaintive  sound, 
With   fruits    and   flowers    she   loads    the   tempest- 
honor'd  ground. 


*  I  utterly  recant  the  sentiment  contained  in  the  lines 
Of  whose  omniscient  and  all-spreading  love 
Aught  to  implore  were  impotence  of  mind, 
it  being  written  in  Scripture,  "Jlsk,  and  it  shall  be  given  you," 
and  my  human  reason  being  moreover  convinced  of  the  pro- 
priety of  offering  petitions  as  well  as  thanksgivings  to  the  Deity 


IV.  ODES  AND  MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 

THE  THREE  GRAVES. 
A    FRAGMENT    OF    A   SEXTON'S   TALE. 


[The  Author  has  published  the  following  humble  fragment, 
encouraged  by  the  decisive  recommendation  of  more  than  one 
of  our  most  celebrated  living  Poets.  The  language  was  in- 
tended to  be  dramatic  ;  that  is,  suited  to  the  narrator ;  and  the 
metre  corresponds  to  the  homeliness  of  the  diction.  It  is  there- 
fore presented  as  the  fragment,  not  of  a  Poem,  but  of  a  com- 
mon Ballad-tale.  Whether  this  is  sufficient  to  justify  the  adop- 
tion  of  such  a  style,  in  any  metrical  composition  not  profess 
edly  ludicrous,  the  Author  is  himself  in  some  doubt.  At  all 
events,  it  is  not  presented  as  Poetry,  and  it  is  in  no  way  con- 
nected with  the  Author's  judgment  concerning  Poetic  diction. 
Its  merits,  if  any,  are  exclusively  Psychological.   The  story 


*  War,  a  Fragment.  t  John  the  Baptist,  a  Poem. 

t  Monody  on  John  Henderson. 

54 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


45 


which  must  lie  supposed  la  have  been  narrated  in  the  first  and 
second  part*,  is  as  follows. 

Bdward,  a  young  farmer,  meets,  at  the  house  of  Ellen,  her 
bosom  friend,  Mary,  and  commences  an  acquaintance,  which 
ends  in  a  mutual  attachment  With  her  consent,  and  by  the 
advice  of  tlieir  common  friend  Ellen,  he  announces  his  hopes 
and  intentions  to  Mary's  Mother,  a  widow-woman  bordering 
on  her  fortieth  year,  and  from  constant  health,  the  possession 
of  a  competent  property,  and  from  bavins  had  no  other  children 
but  Mary  and  another  daughter  (the  Father  died  in  their  in- 
fancy), retaining,  for  the  greater  part,  her  personal  attractions 
and  comeliness  of  appearance ;  but  a  woman  of  low  education 
and  violent  temper.  The  answer  which  she  at  once  returned 
to  Edward's  application  was  remarkable — "Well,  Edward  ! 
you  are  a  handsome  young  fellow,  and  you  shall  have  my 
Daughter."  From  this  time  all  their  wooing  passed  under  the 
Mother's  eye;  and,  in  fine,  she  became  herself  enamoured  of  her 
future  Son-in-law,  and  practised  every  art,  both  of  endearment 
and  of  calumny,  to  transfer  his  affections  from  her  daughter  to 
herself.  (The  outlines  of  the  Tale  are  positive  facts,  and  of  no 
very  distant  date,  though  the  author  has  purposely  altered  the 
names  and  the  scene  of  action,  as  well  as  invented  the  characters 
of  the  parties  and  the  detail  of  the  incidents.)  Edward,  how- 
ever, though  perplexed  by  her  strange  detraction  from  her 
daughter's  good  qualities,  yet  in  the  innocence  of  his  own  heart 
still  mistaking  her  increasing  fondness  for  motherly  affection! 
she,  at  length  overcome  by  her  miserable  passion,  after  much 
abuse  of  Mary's  temper  and  moral  tendencies,  exclaimed  with 
violent  emotion — "O  Edward  !  indeed,  indeed,  she  is  not  fit  for 
you — she  has  not  a  heart  to  love  you  as  you  deserve.  It  is  I 
that  love  you  !  Marry  me,  Edward!  and  I  will  this  very  day 
settle  all  my  property  on  you." — The  Lover's  eyes  were  now 
opened ;  and  thus  taken  by  surprise,  whether  from  the  effect 
of  the  horror  which  he  felt,  acting  as  it  were  hysterically  on 
his  nervous  system,  or  that  at  the  first  moment  he  lost  the  sense 
of  the  proposal  in  the  feeling  of  its  strangeness  and  absurdity, 
he  flung  her  from  him  and  burst  into  a  fit  of  laughter.  Irritated 
by  this  almost  to  frenzy,  the  woman  fell  on  her  knees,  and  in  a 
loud  voice  that  approached  to  a  scream,  she  prayed  for  a  Curse 
both  on  him  and  on  her  own  Child.  Mary  happened  to  be  in 
the  room  directly  above  them,  heard  Edward's  laush  and  her 
Mother's  blasphemous  prayer,  and  fainted  away.  He,  hearing 
the  fall,  ran  up  stairs,  and  taking  her  in  his  arms,  carried  her 
off  to  Ellen's  home;  and  after  some  fruitless  attempts  on  her 
part  toward  a  reconciliation  with  her  Mother,  she  was  married 
to  him. — And  here  the  third  part  of  the  Tale  begins. 

I  was  not  led  to  choose  this  story  from  any  partiality  to 
tragic,  much  less  to  monstrous  events  (though  at  the  time  that 
I  composed  the  verses,  somewhat  more  than  twelve  years  ago, 
I  was  less  averse  to  such  subjects  than  at  present),  but  from 
finding  in  it  a  striking  proofed'  the  possible  effect  on  the  imagi- 
nation, from  an  idea  violently  and  suddenly  impressed  on  it.  I 
had  been  reading  liryan  Edwards's  account  of  the  effect  of  the 
Oby  Witchcraft  on  the  Negroes  in  the  West  Indies,  and 
Hearne's  deeply  interesting  Anecdotes  of  similar  workings  on 
the  imagination  of  the  Copper  Indians  (those  of  my  readers  who 
have  it  in  their  power  will  be  well  repaid  for  the  trouble  of  re- 
ferring to  those  works  for  the  passages  alluded  to),  and  I  con- 
ceived the  design  of  showing  that  instances  of  this  kind  are  not 
peculiar  to  savage  or  barbarous  tribes,  and  of  illustrating  the 
mode  in  which  the  mind  is  affected  in  these  cases,  and  the  pro- 
gress and  symptoms  of  the  morbid  action  on  the  fancy  from  the 
beginning. 

[The  Tale  is  supposed  to  be  narrated  by  an  old  Sexton,  in  a 
country  church-yard,  to  a  Traveller  whose  curiosity  had  been 
awakened  by  the  appearance  of  three  graves,  close  by  each 
other,  to  two  only  of  which  there  were  grave-stones.  On  the 
first  of  these  were  the  name,  and  dates,  as  usual :  on  the  second, 
no  name,  but  only  adate,  and  the  words,  The  Mercy  of  God  is 
infinite.'] 


The  grapes  upon  the  vicar's  wall 
Were  ripe  as  ripe  could  be ; 

Anl  yellow  leaves  in  sun  and  wind 
Were  falling  from  the  iree. 


On  the  hedge  elms  in  the  narrow  lane 
Still  swung  the  spikes  of  corn : 

Dear  Lord  !  it  seems  but  yesterday — 
Young  Edward's  marriage-morn. 

Up  through  that  wood  behind  the  church. 
There  leads  from  Edward's  door 

A  mossy  track,  all  over-bough'd 
For  half  a  mile  or  more. 

And  from  their  house-door  by  that  track 
The  Bride  and  Bridegroom  went ; 

Sweet  Mary,  though  she  was  not  gay, 
Seem' d  cheerful  and  content. 

But  when  they  to  the  church-yard  came, 

I  've  heard  poor  Mary  say, 
As  soon  as  she  stepp'd  into  the  sun, 

Her  heart  it  died  away. 

And  when  the  vicar  join'd  their  hands, 
Her  limbs  did  creep  and  freeze ; 

But  when  they  pray'd,  she  thought  she  saw 
Her  mother  on  her  knees. 

And  o'er  the  church-path  they  return'd — 

I  saw  poor  Mary's  back, 
Just  as  she  stepp'd  beneath  the  boughs 

Into  the  mossy  track. 

Her  feet  upon  the  mossy  track 

The  married  maiden  set : 
That  moment — I  have  heard  her  say — 

She  wish'd  she  could  forget. 

The  shade  o'erflush'd  her  limbs  with  heat — 

Then  came  a  chill  like  dea<h : 
And  when  the  merry  bells  rang  out, 

They  seem'd  to  stop  her  breath. 

Beneath  the  foulest  Mother's  curse 

No  child  could  ever  thrive  : 
A  Mother  is  a  Mother  still, 

The  holiest  thing  alive. 

So  five  month's  pass'd  :  the  Mother  still 

Would  never  heal  the  strife  ; 
But  Edward  was  a  loving  man, 

And  Mary  a  fond  wife. 

"  My  sister  may  not  visit  us, 
My  mother  says  her  nay  : 

0  Edward !  you  are  all  to  me, 

1  wish  for  your  sake  1  could  be 

More  lifesome  and  more  gay. 

"  I'm  dull  and  sad  .'  indeed,  indeed 

I  know  I  have  no  reason! 
Perhaps  1  am  not  well  in  health, 

And  't  is  a  gloomy  season." 

'Twas  a  drizzly  time — no  ice,  no  snow! 

And  on  the  few  fine  days 
She  stirr'd  not  out,  lest  she  might  meet 

Her  Mother  in  her  ways. 

But  Ellen,  spite  of  miry  ways 

And  weather  dark  and  dreary, 
Trudged  every  day  to  Edward's  house, 

And  made  them  all  more  cheery. 
55 


46 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Oh!  Ellen  was  a  faithful  Friend, 

More  dear  than  any  Sister! 
As  cheerful  too  as  singing  lark ; 
And  she  ne'er  left  them  rill  'twas  dark, 

And  then  they  always  miss'd  her. 

And  now  Ash- Wednesday  came — that  day 

But  few  to  church  repair : 
For  on  that  day  you  know  we  read 

The  Commination  prayer. 

Our  late  old  vicar,  a  kind  man, 

Once,  Sir,  he  said  to  me, 
He  wish'd  that  service  was  clean  out 

Of  our  good  Liturgy. 

The  Mother  walk'd  into  the  church — 

To  Ellen's  seat  she  went ; 
Though  Ellen  always  kept  her  church, 

All  church-days  during  Lent. 

And  gentle  Ellen  welcomed  her 

With  courteous  looks  and  mild. 
Thought  she  "  what  if  her  heart  should  melt 

And  all  be  reconciled  ! " 

The  day  was  scarcely  like  a  day — 
The  clouds  were  black  outright : 

And  many  a  night,  with  half  a  Moon, 
I've  seen  the  church  more  light. 

The  wind  was  wild  ;  against  the  glass 

The  rain  did  beat  and  bicker ; 
The  church-tower  swinging  overhead, 

You  scarce  could  hear  the  vicar ! 

And  then  and  there  the  Mother  knelt, 

And  audibly  she  cried — 
"  Oh  !  may  a  clinging  curse  consume 

This  woman  by  my  side ! 

"  0  hear  me,  hear  me,  Lord  in  Heaven, 
Although  you  take  my  life — 

0  curse  this  woman,  at  whose  house 
Young  Edward  woo'd  his  wife. 

"  By  night  and  day,  in  bed  and  bower, 

O  let  her  cursed  be  ! ! ! " 
So  having  pray'd,  steady  and  slow, 

She  rose  up  from  her  knee ! 
And  left  the  church,  nor  e'er  again 

The  church-door  enter'd  she. 

1  saw  poor  Ellen  kneeling  still, 

So  pale  !  I  guess'd  not  why : 
When  she  stood  up,  there  plainly  wa3 
A  trouble  in  her  eye. 

And  when  the  prayers  were  done,  we  all 
Came  round  and  ask'd  her  why  : 

Giddy  she  seem'd,  and  sure  there  was 
A  trouble  in  her  eye. 

But  ere  she  from  the  church-door  stepp'd, 

She  smiled  and  told  us  why  ; 
•  It  was  a  wicked  woman's  curse," 

Quoth  she,  "  and  what  care  I?" 


She  smiled,  and  smiled,  and  pass'd  it  off 
Ere  from  the  door  she  stept — 

But  all  agree  it  would  have  been 
Much  better  had  she  wept. 

And  if  her  heart  was  not  at  ease, 

This  was  her  constant  cry — 
"  It  was  a  wicked  woman's  curse — 

God 's  good,  and  what  care  I  ? " 

There  was  a  hurry  in  her  looks, 

Her  struggles  she  redoubled  : 
"  It  was  a  wicked  woman's  curse, 

And  why  should  I  be  troubled  ? " 

These  tears  will  come — I  dandled  her 
When  'twas  the  merest  fairy — 

Good  creature !  and  she  hid  it  all : 
She  told  it  not  to  Mary, 

But  Mary  heard  the  tale  :  her  arms 
Round  Ellen's  neck  she  threw ; 

"  0  Ellen,  Ellen,  she  cursed  me. 
And  now  she  hath  cursed  you!" 

I  saw  young  Edward  by  himself 

Stalk  fast  adown  the  lea, 
He  snatch'd  a  stick  from  every  fence, 

A  twig  from  every  tree. 

He  snapp'd  them  still  with  hand  or  knee 

And  then  away  they  flew  ! 
As  if  with  his  uneasy  limbs 

He  knew  not  what  to  do ! 

You  see,  good  Sir !  that  single  hill  ? 

His  farm  lies  underneath  : 
He  heard  it  there,  he  heard  it  all 

And  only  gnash'd  his  teeth. 

Now  Ellen  was  a  darling  love 

In  all  his  joys  and  cares : 
And  Ellen's  name  and  Mary's  name 
Fast  link'd  they  both  together  came, 

Whene'er  he  said  his  prayers. 

And  in  the  moment  of  his  prayers 

He  loved  them  both  alike  : 
Yea,  both  sweet  names  with  one  sweet  joy 

Upon  his  heart  did  strike  ! 

He  reach'd  his  home,  and  by  his  looks 

They  saw  his  inward  strife  : 
And  they  clung  round  him  with  their  arms 

Both  Ellen  and  his  wife. 

And  Mary  could  not  check  her  tears, 

So  on  his  breast  she  bow'd ; 
Then  Frenzy  melted  into  Grief, 

And  Edward  wept  aloud. 

Dear  Ellen  did  not  weep  at  all, 

But  closelier  did  she  cling, 
And  turn'd  her  face,  and  look'd  as  if 

She  saw  some  frightful  thing. 
56 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


47 


And  once  her  both  arms  suddenly 

PART   IV. 

Round  Mary's  neck  she  flung, 

To  see  a  man  tread  over  graves 

And  her  heart  panted,  and  she  felt 

I  hold  it  no  good  mark; 

The  words  upon  her  tongue. 

Tis  wicked  in  the  sun  and  moon, 

And  bad  luck  in  the  dark ! 

She  felt  them  coming,  but  no  power 

Had  she  the  words  to  smother ; 

You  see  that  grave  ?  The  Lord  he  gives, 

And  with  a  kind  of  shriek  she  cried, 

The  Lord,  he  takes  away : 

"  Oh  Christ !  you  're  like  your  Mother ! 

0  Sir!  the  child  of  my  old  age 

Lies  there  as  cold  as  clay. 

So  gentle  Ellen  now  no  more 

Could  make  this  sad  house  cheery ; 

Except  that  grave,  you  scarce  see  one 

And  Mary's  melancholy  ways 

That  was  not  dug  by  me : 

Drove  Edward  wild  and  weary 

I  'd  rather  dance  upon  'em  all 

Than  tread  upon  these  three! 

Lingering  he  raised  his  latch  at  eve 

Though  tired  in  heart  and  limb  • 

"  Ay,  Sexton!  'tis  a  touching  tale," 

He  loved  no  other  place,  and  yet 

You,  Sir !  are  but  a  lad ; 

Home  was  no  home  to  him. 

This  month  1  'm  in  my  seventieth  year, 

And  still  it  makes  me  sad. 

One  evening  he  took  up  a  book, 

And  nothing  in  it  read  ; 

And  Mary's  sister  told  it  me, 

Then  flung  it  down,  and  groaning,  cried. 

For  three  good  hours  and  more ; 

"  Oh !  Heaven !  that  I  were  dead  " 

Though  I  had  heard  it,  in  the  main, 

From  Edward's  self,  before. 

Mary  look'd  up  into  his  face, 

And  nothing  to  him  said ; 

Well !  it  pass'd  ofF!  the  gentle  Ellen 

She  tried  to  smile,  and  on  his  arm 

Did  well  nigh  dote  on  Mary ; 

Mournfully  lean'd  her  head. 

And  she  went  oftener  than  before, 

And  Mary  loved  her  more  and  more : 

And  he  burst  into  tears,  and  fell 

She  managed  all  the  dairy. 

Upon  his  knees  in  prayer : 

"  Her  heart  is  broke !  0  God !  my  grief, 

To  market  she  on  market-days, 

It  is  too  great  to  bear ! " 

To  church  on  Sundays  came  ; 

All  seem'd  the  same :  all  seem'd  so,  Sir ! 

'Twas  such  a  foggy  time  as  makes 

But  all  was  not  the  same ! 

Old  Sextons,  Sir!  like  me, 

Rest  on  their  spades  to  cough ;  the  spring 

Had  Ellen  lost  her  mirth?  Oh!  no! 

Was  late  uncommonly. 

But  she  was  seldom  cheerful ; 

And  Edward  look'd  as  if  he  thought 

And  then  the  hot  days,  all  at  once, 

That  Ellen's  mirth  was  fearful. 

They  came,  we  know  not  how : 

You  look'd  about  for  shade,  when  scarce 

When  by  herself,  she  to  herself 

A  leaf  was  on  a  bough. 

Must  sing  some  merry  rhyme ; 

She  could  not  now  be  glad  for  hours, 

It  happen'd  then  ('twas  in  the  bower 

Yet  silent  all  the  time. 

A  furlong  up  the  wood  ; 

Perhaps  you  know  the  place,  and  yet 

And  when  she  soothed  her  friend,  through  all 

I  scarce  know  how  you  should), 

Her  soothing  words  'twas  plain 

She  had  a  sore  grief  of  her  own, 

No  path  leads  thither,  'tis  not  nigh 

A  haunting  in  her  brain. 

To  any  pasture-plot ; 

But  cluster'd  near  the  chattering  brook, 

And  oft  she  said,  I  'm  not  grown  thin ! 

Lone  hollies  mark'd  the  spot 

And  then  her  wrist  she  spann'd ; 

Anil  once,  when  Mary  was  downcast, 

Those  hollies  of  themselves  a  shape 

She  took  her  by  the  hand, 

As  of  an  arbor  took, 

And  gazed  upon  her,  and  at  first 

A  close,  round  arbor ;  and  it  stands 

She  gently  press'd  her  hand  ; 

Not  three  strides  from  a  brook. 

Then  harder,  till  her  grasp  at  length 

Within  this  arbor,  which  was  still 

Did  gripe  like  a  convulsion ! 

With  scarlet  berries  hung, 

Alas!  said  she,  we  ne'er  can  be 

Were  these  three  friends,  one  Sunday  morn, 

Made  happy  by  compulsion ! 

Just  as  the  first  bell  rung. 

57 

4S 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Tis  sweet  to  hear  a  brook,  'tis  sweet 

To  hear  the  Sabbath-bell, 
'Tis  sweet  to  hear  them  both  at  once, 

Deep  in  a  woody  dell. 

His  limbs  along  the  moss,  his  head 

Upon  a  mossy  heap, 
With  shut-up  senses,  Edward  lay : 
That  brook  e'en  on  a  working  day 

Might  chatter  one  to  sleep. 

And  he  had  pass'd  a  restless  night, 

And  was  not  well  in  health ; 
The  women  sat  down  by  his  side, 

And  talk'd  as  'twere  by  stealth. 

"  The  sun  peeps  through  the  close  thick  leaves. 

See,  dearest  Ellen !  see  ! 
'Tis  in  the  leaves,  a  little  sun, 

No  bigger  than  your  e'e; 


"  A  tiny  sun,  and  it  has  got 

A  perfect  glory  too ; 
Ten  thousand  threads  and  hairs  of  light, 
Make  up  a  glory,  gay  and  bright, 

Round  that  small  orb,  so  blue.' 

And  then  they  argued  of  those  rays, 

What  color  they  might  be  : 
Says  this,  "  they  're  mostly  green ;"  says  that, 

"  They're  amber-like  to  me." 

So  they  sat  chatting,  while  bad  thoughts 

Were  troubling  Edward's  rest  ; 
But  soon  they  heard  his  hard  quick  pants, 

And  the  thumping  in  his  breast. 


"  A  Mother  too ! "  these  self-same  words 

Did  Edward  mutter  plain ; 
His  face  was  drawn  back  on  itself, 

With  horror  and  huge  pain. 

Both  groan'd  at  once,  for  both  knew  well 
What  thoughts  were  in  his  mind  ; 

When  he  waked  up,  and  stared  like  one 
That  hath  been  just  struck  blind. 


He  sat  upright ;  and  ere  the  dream 

Had  had  time  to  depart, 
'  O  God  forgive  me  !  (he  exclaim'd) 

I  have  torn  out  her  heart." 


Then  Ellen  shriek'd,  and  forthwith  burst 

Into  ungentle  laughter ; 
And  Mary  shiver'd,  where  she  sat, 

And  never  she  smiled  after. 


Carmen  roliquum  in  futurum  tempu9  relegatum.  To-morrow ! 
and  To-morrow !  and  To-morrow !— 


DEJECTION; 

AN    ODE. 


Late,  late  yestreen,  I  saw  the  new  Moon, 
With  the  old  Moon  in  her  arms ; 
And  I  fear,  I  fear,  my  Master  dear ! 
We  shall  have  a  deadly  storm. 

Ballad  of  Sir  Patrick  Spens. 


I. 

Well  !  if  the  Bard  was  weather-wise,  who  made 
The  grand  old  ballad  of  Sir  Patrick  Spence, 
This  night,  so  tranquil  now,  will  not  go  hence 
Unroused  by  winds,  that  ply  a  busier  trade 
Than  those  which  mould  yon  cloud  in  lazy  flakes, 
Or  the  dull  sobbing  draught,  that  moans  and  rakes 
Upon  the  strings  of  this  iEolian  lute, 
Which  better  far  were  mute. 
For  lo !  the  New-moon  winter-bright ! 
And  overspread  with  phantom  light, 
(With  swimming  phantom  light  o'erspread 
But  rimm'd  and  circled  by  a  silver  thread) 
I  see  the  old  Moon  in  her  lap,  foretelling 

The  coming  on  of  rain  and  squally  blast. 
And  oh !  that  even  now  the  gust  were  swelling, 

And  the  slant  night-shower  driving  loud  and  fast ! 
Those   sounds  which   oft   have   raised   me,    whilst 
they  awed, 
And  sent  my  soul  abroad, 
Might  now  perhaps  their  wonted  impulse  give, 
Might  startle  this  dull  pain,  and  make  it  move  and 
live! 

II. 
A  grief  without  a  pang,  void,  dark,  and  drear, 
A  stifled,  drowsy,  unimpassion'd  grief, 
Which  finds  no  natural  outlet,  no  relief, 
In  word,  or  sigh,  or  tear — 

0  Lady !  in  this  wan  and  heartless  mood, 
To  other  thoughts  by  yonder  throstle  woo'd. 

All  this  long  eve,  so  balmy  and  serene, 
Have  I  been  gazing  on  the  western  sky, 

And  its  peculiar  tint  of  yellow  green : 
And  still  I  gaze — and  with  how  blank  an  eye  ! 
And  those  thin  clouds  above,  in  flakes  and  bars, 
That  give  away  their  motion  to  the  stars  ; 
Those  stars,  that  glide  behind  them  or  between. 
Now  sparkling,  now  bedimm'd,  but  always  seen 
Yon  crescent  Moon,  as  fix'd  as  if  it  grew 
In  its  own  cloudless,  starless  lake  of  blue ; 

1  see  them  all  so  excellently  fair, 

I  see,  not  feel,  how  beautiful  they  are ! 

III. 

My  genial  spirits  fail, 

And  what  can  these  avail 
To  lift  the  smothering  weight  from  off  my  breast  ? 

It  were  a  vain  endeavor, 

Though  I  should  gaze  for  ever, 
On  that  green  light  that  lingers  in  the  west : 
I  may  not  hope  from  outward  forms  to  win 
The  passion  and  the  life,  whose  fountains  are  within 

IV. 
O  Lady !  we  receive  but  what  we  give, 
And  in  our  life  alone  does  nature  live ; 

58 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


49 


Ours  is  her  wedding-garment,  ours  her  shroud ! 

And  would  we  aught  behold,  of  higher  worth, 
Than  that  inanimate  cold  world  allow'd 
To  the  poor  loveless  ever-anxious  crowd, 

Ah  !  from  the  soul  itself  must  issue  forth, 
A  light,  a  glory,  a  fair  luminous  cloud 

Enveloping  the  Earth — 
And  from  the  soul  itself  must  there  be  sent 

A  sweet  and  potent  voice,  of  its  own  birth, 
Of  all  sweet  sounds  the  life  and  element ! 

V. 

O  pure  of  heart !  thou  need'st  not  ask  of  me 
What  this  strong  music  in  the  soul  may  be  ! 
What,  and  wherein  it  doth  exist, 
This  light,  this  glory,  this  fair  luminous  mist, 
This  beautiful  and  beauty-making  power. 

Joy,  virtuous  Lady !  Joy  that  ne'er  was  given, 
Save  to  the  pure,  and  in  their  purest  hour, 
Life,    and    Life's    Effluence,    Cloud    at    once    and 

Shower, 
Joy,  Lady !  is  the  spirit  and  the  power, 
Which  wedding  Nature  to  us  gives  in  dower 

A  new  Earth  and  new  Heaven, 
Undreamt  of  by  the  sensual  and  the  proud — 
Joy  is  the  sweet  voice,  Joy  the  luminous  cloud — 

We  in  ourselves  rejoice  ! 
And  thence  flows  all  that  charms  or  ear  or  sight, 

All  melodies  the  echoes  of  that  voice, 
All  colors  a  suffusion  from  that  light. 

VI. 

There    was    a  time    when,    though   my  path   was 
rough, 

This  joy  within  me  dallied  with  distress, 
And  all  misfortunes  were  but  as  the  stuff 
Whence  Fancy  made  me  dreams  of  happiness  : 
For  hope  grew  round  me,  like  the  twining  vine, 
And  fruits,  and  foliage,  not  my  own,  seem'd  mine. 
But  now  afflictions  bow  me  down  to  earth : 
Nor  care  I  that  they  rob  me  of  my  mirth. 

But  oh  !  each  visitation 
Suspends  what  nature  gave  me  at  my  birth, 

My  shaping  spirit  of  Imagination. 
For  not  to  think  of  what  I  needs  must  feel, 

But  to  be  still  and  patient,  all  I  can  ; 
And  haply  by  abstruse  research  to  steal 

From  my  own  nature  all  the  natural  Man — 

This  was  my  sole  resource,  my  only  plan  : 
Till  that  which  suits  a  part  infects  the  whole, 
And  nowT  is  almost  grown  the  habit  of  my  Soul. 

vn. 

Hence,  viper  thoughts,  that  coil  around  my  mind, 

Reality's  dark  dream  ! 
1  turn  from  you,  and  listen  to  the  wind, 

Which  long  has  raved  unnoticed.  What  a  scream 
Of  agony  by  torture  lengthen'd  out 
That    lute    sent    forth  !     Thou  Wind,  that  ravest 
without, 

Bare  crag,  or  mountain-tairn*  or  blasted  tree, 
Or  pine-grove  whither  woodman  never  clomb, 
Or  lonely  house,  long  held  the  witches'  home, 

Methinks  were  fitter  instruments  for  thee, 
Mad  Lutanist !  who  in  this  month  of  showers, 
Of  dark-brown  gardens,  and  of  peeping  flowers, 

*  Tairn  is  a  small  lake,  generally,  if  not  always,  applied  to 
the  lakes  up  in  the  mountains,  and  which  are  the  feeders  of 
those  in  the  valleys.  This  address  to  the  Storm-wind  will  not 
appear  extravagant  to  those  who  have  heard  it  at  night,  and 
in  a  moun'ainous  country. 

5  F2 


Makest  Devils'  yule,  with  worse  than  wintry  sung, 
The  blossoms,  buds,  and  timorous  leaves  among. 

Thou  Actor,  perfect  in  all  tragic  sounds  ! 
Thou  mighty  Poet,  e'en  to  Frenzy  bold  ! 
What  tell'st  thou  now  about  ? 
'T  is  of  the  Rushing  of  an  Host  in  rout, 
With    groans  of  trampled   men,    with   smarting 
wounds — 
At  once  they  groan  with  pain,  and  shudder  with  the 

cold! 
But  hush  !  there  is  a  pause  of  deepest  silence  ! 

And  all  that  noise,  as  of  a  rushing  crowd, 
With    groans,    and    tremulous   shudderings — all   is 
over —  [loud  ! 

It  tells  another  tale,  with  sounds  less  deep  and 
A  tale  of  less  affright, 
And  temper'd  with  delight, 
As  Otway's  self  had  framed  the  tender  lay, 
T  is  of  a  little  child 
Upon  a  lonesome  wild, 
Not  far  from  home,  but  she  hath  lost  her  way, 
And  now  moans  low  in  bitter  grief  and  fear, 
And  now  screams  loud,  and  hopes  to  make  her  mother 
hear. 

VIII. 

'T  is  midnight,  but  small  thoughts  have  I  of  sleep : 
Full  seldom  may  my  friend  such  vigils  keep ! 
Visit  her,  gentle  Sleep !  with  wings  of  healing, 

And  may  this  storm  be  but  a  mountain-birth, 
May  all  the  stars  hang  bright  above  her  dwelling, 

Silent  as  though  they  watch'd  the  sleeping  Earth. 
With  light  heart  may  she  rise, 
Gay  fancy,  cheerful  eyes, 

Joy  lift  her  spirit,  joy  attune  her  voice  : 
To  her  may  all  things  live,  from  Pole  to  Pole, 
Their  life  the  eddying  of  her  living  soul ! 

O  simple  spirit,  guided  from  above, 
Dear  Lady !  friend  devoutest  of  my  choice, 
Thus  mayest  thou  ever,  evermore  rejoice. 


ODE  TO  GEORGIANA,  DUCHESS  OF 
DEVONSHIRE, 

ON  THE    TWENTY-FOURTH    STANZA    IN    HER  "  PASSAGE 
OVER    MOUNT   GOTHARD." 


And  hail  the  Chapel !  hail  the  Platform  wild  ! 

Where  Tell  directed  the  avenging  Dart, 
With  well-strung  arm,  that  first  preserved  his  Child 

Then  aim'd  the  arrow  at  the  Tyrant's  heart. 


Splendor's  fondly  foster'd  child  ! 
And  did  you  hail  the  Platform  wild, 

Where  once  the  Austrian  fell 

Beneath  the  shaft  of  Tell  ? 
O  Lady,  nursed  in  pomp  and  pleasure ! 
Whence  learnt  you  that  heroic  measure  ? 

Light  as  a  dream  your  days  their  circlets  ran, 
From  all  that  teaches  Brotherhood  to  Man  ; 
Far,  far  removed !  from  want,  from  hope,  from  fear ! 
Enchanting  music  lull'd  your  infant  ear, 
Obeisance,  praises  soothed  your  infant  heart : 

Emblazonments  and  old  ancestral  crests, 
With  many  a  bright  obtrusive  form  of  art, 

Detain'd  your  eye  from  nature  ■  stately  vests, 
59 


50 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


That  veiling  strove  to  deck  your  charms  divine, 
Rich  viands,  and  the  pleasurable  wine, 
Were  yours  unearn'd  by  toil ;  nor  could  you  see 
The  unenjoying  (oiler's  misery. 
And  yet,  free  Nature's  uncorrupted  child, 
You  hail'd  the  Chapel  and  the  Platform  wild, 
Where  once  the  Austrian  fell 
Beneath  the  shaft  of  Tell ! 

O  Lady,  nursed  in  pomp  and  pleasure  ! 

Whence  learnt  you  that  heroic  measure  ? 

There  crowd  your  finely-fibred  frame, 

All  living  faculties  of  bliss  ; 
And  Genius  to  your  cradle  came, 
His  forehead  wreathed  with  lambent  flame, 
And  bending  low,  with  godlike  kiss 
Breathed  in  a  more  celestial  life ; 
But  boasts  not  many  a  fair  compeer 

A  heart  as  sensitive  to  joy  and  fear  ? 
And  some,  perchance,  might  wage  an  equal  strife, 
Some  few,  to  nobler  being  wrought, 
Co-rivals  in  the  nobler  gift  of  thought. 
Yet  these  delight  to  celebrate 
Laurell'd  War  and  plumy  State  ; 
Or  in  verse  and  music  dress 
Tales  of  rustic  happiness — 
Pernicious  Tales  !  insidious  Strains  ! 
That  sleel  the  rich  man's  breast, 
And  mock  the  lot  unblest, 
The  sordid  vices  and  the  abject  pains, 
Which  evermore  must  be 
The  doom  of  Ignorance  and  Penury  ! 
But  you,  free  Nature's  uncorrupted  child, 
You  hail'd  the  Chapel  and  the  Platform  wild, 
Where  once  the  Austrian  fell 
Beneath  the  shaft  of  Tell ! 

0  Lady,  nursed  in  pomp  and  pleasure ! 
Where  learnt  you  that  heroic  measure  ? 

You  were  a  Mother !  That  most  holy  name, 
Which  Heaven  and  Nature  bless, 

1  may  not  vilely  prostitute  to  those 

Whose  Infants  owe  them  less 
Than  the  poor  Caterpillar  owes 
Its  gaudy  Parent  Fly. 
You  were  a  Mother !  at  your  bosom  fed 

The  Babes  that  loved  you.  You,  with  laughing  eye, 
Each  twilight-thought,  each  nascent  feeling  read, 
Which  you  yourself  created.    Oh !  delight ! 
A  second  time  to  be  a  Mother, 

Without  the  Mother's  bitter  groans  : 
Another  thought,  and  yet  another, 
By  touch,  or  taste,  by  looks  or  tones 
O'er  the  growing  Sense  to  roll, 
The  Mother  of  your  infant's  Soul ! 
The  Angel  of  the  Earth,  who,  while  he  guides 

His  chariot-planet  round  the  goal  of  day, 
All  trembling  gazes  on  the  Eye  of  God, 

A  moment  turn'd  his  awful  face  away  ; 
And  as  he  view'd  you,  from  his  aspect  sweet 

New  influences  in  your  being  rose, 
Blest  Intuitions  and  Communions  fleet 

With  living  Nature,  in  her  joys  and  woes! 
Thenceforth  your  soul  rejoiced  to  see 
The  shrine  of  social  Liberty  ! 
O  beautiful!  O  Nature's  child! 
'Twas  thence  you  hail'd  'he  Platform  wild, 


Where  once  the  Austrian  fell 
Beneath  the  shaft  of  Tell ! 

O  Lady,  nursed  in  pomp  and  pleasure ! 

Thence  learnt  you  that  heroic  measure. 


ODE  TO  TRANQUILLITY. 

Tranquillity  !  thou  better  name 

Than  all  the  family  of  Fame ! 

Thou  ne'er  wilt  leave  my  riper  age 

To  low  intrigue,  or  factious  rage  ; 

For  oh  !  dear  child  of  thoughtful  Truth, 

To  thee  I  gave  my  early  youth, 
And  left  the  bark,  and  blest  the  stedfast  shore, 
Ere  yet  the  Tempest  rose  and  scared  me  with  its  roar. 

Who  late  and  lingering  seeks  thy  shrine, 
On  him  but  seldom,  power  divine, 
Thy  spirit  rests  !  Satiety 
And  Sloth,  poor  counterfeits  of  thee, 
Mock  the  tired  worldling.    Idle  Hope 
And  dire  Remembrance  interlope, 
To  vex  the  feverish  slumbers  of  the  mind : 
The  bubble  floats  before,  the  spectre  stalks  behind. 

But  me  thy  gentle  hand  will  lead 
At  morning  through  the  accustom'd  mead  ; 
And  in  the  sultry  summer's  heat 
Will  build  me  up  a  mossy  seat ; 
And  when  the  gust  of  Autumn  crowds 
And  breaks  the  busy  moonlight  clouds, 
Thou  best  the  thought  canst  raise,  the  heart  attune 
Light  as  the  busy  clouds,  calm  as  the  gliding  Moon 

The  feeling  heart,  the  searching  soul. 
To  thee  I  dedicate  the  whole  ! 
And  while  within  myself  I  trace 
The  greatness  of  some  future  race, 
Aloof  with  hermit-eye  I  scan 
The  present  works  of  present  man — 
A  wild  and  dream-like  trade  of  blood  and  guile, 
Too  foolish  for  a  tear,  too  wicked  for  a  smile ! 


TO  A  YOUNG  FRIEND, 

ON    HIS   PROPOSING   TO    DOMESTICATE    WITH    THE 
AUTHOR. 

COMPOSED  IN  1796. 

A  mount,  not  wearisome  and  bare  and  steep, 

But  a  green  mountain  variously  up-piled, 
Where  o'er  the  jutting  rocks  soft  mosses  creep, 
Or  color'd  lichens  with  slow  oozing  weep ; 

Where  cypress  and  the  darker  yew  start  wild  ; 
And  'mid  the  summer  torrent's  gentle  dash 
Dance  brighten'd  the  red  clusters  of  the  ash ; 

Beneath  whose  boughs,  by  those  still  sounds  be 
guiled, 
Calm  Pensiveness  might  muse  herself  to  sleep ; 

Till  haply  startled  by  some  fleecy  dam, 
That  rustling  on  the  bushy  clift  above, 
With  melancholy  bleat  of  anxious  love, 

Made  meek  inquiry  for  her  wandering  Iamb 
60 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


51 


Such  a  green  mountain  'twere  most  sweet  to  climb, 
E  'en  while  the  bosom  ached  with  loneliness — 
How  more  than  sweet,  if  some  dear  friend  should 
bless 

The  adventurous  toil,  and  up  the  path  sublime 
Now  lead,  now  follow  :  the  glad  landscape  round, 
Wide  and  more  wide,  increasing  without  bound! 

O  then  't  were  loveliest  sympathy,  to  mark 
The  berries  of  the  half-uprooted  ash 
Pripping  and  bright ;  and  list  the  torrent's  dash, — 

Beneath  the  cypress,  or  the  yew  more  dark, 
Seated  at  ease,  on  some  smooth  mossy  rock  ; 
In  social  silence  now,  and  now  to  unlock 
The  treasured  heart ;  arm  link'd  in  friendly  arm, 
Save  if  the  one,  his  muse's  witching  charm 
Muttering  brow-bent,  at  unwatch'd  distance  lag ; 

Till  high  o'erhead  his  beckoning  friend  appears, 
And  from  the  forehead  of  the  topmost  crag 

Shouts  eagerly  :  for  haply  there  nprears 
That  shadowing  pine  its  old  romantic  limbs, 

Which  latest  shall  detain  the  enamour'd  sight 
Seen  from  below,  when  eve  the  valley  dims, 

Tinged  yellow  with  the  rich  departing  light ; 

And  haply,  basin'd  in  some  unsunn'd  cleft, 
A  beauteous  spring,  the  rock's  collected  tears, 
Sleeps  shelter'd  there,  scarce  wrinkled  by  the  gale! 

Together  thus,  the  world's  vain  turmoil  left, 
Stretch'd  on  the  crag,  and  shadow 'd  by  the  pine, 

And  bending  o'er  the  clear  delicious  fount, 
Ah !  dearest  youth  !  it  were  a  lot  divine 
To  cheat  our  noons  in  moralizing  mood, 
While  west-winds  fann'd  our  temples  toil-bedew'd  : 

Then   downwards   slope,   oft   pausing,    from  the 
mount, 
To  some  lone  mansion,  in  some  woody  dale, 
Where  smiling  with  blue  eye,  domestic  bliss 
Gives  this  the  Husband's,  that  the  Brother's  kiss ! 


LINES  TO  W.  L.  ESQ. 

WHILE    HE    SANG    A    SONG    TO    PURCELL's    MUSIC 

While  my  young  cheek  retains  its  healthful  hues, 

And  I  have  many  friends  who  hold  me  dear  ; 

L !  methinks,  I  would  not  often  hear 

Such  melodies  as  thine,  lest  I  should  lose 
All  memory  of  the  wrongs  and  sore  distress, 

For  which  my  miserable  brethren  weep ! 

But  should  uncomforted  misfortunes  steep 
My  daily  bread  in  tears  and  bitterness  ; 
And  if  at  death's  dread  moment  I  should  lie 

With  no  beloved  face  at  my  bed-side, 
To  fix  the  last  glance  of  my  closing  eye, 

Methinks,  such  strains,  breathed  by  my  angel-guide 
Would  make  me  pass  the  cup  of  anguish  by, 

Mix  with  the  blest,  nor  know  that  I  had  died ! 


Thus  rudely  versed  in  allegoric  lore, 
The  Hill  of  Know  ledge  I  essay'd  to  trace  ; 
That  verdurous  hill  with  many  a  resting-place, 
And  many  a  stream,  whose  warbling  waters  pour 

To  glad  and  fertilize  the  subject  plains  ; 
That  hill  with  secret  springs,  and  nooks  untrod, 
And  many  a  fancy-blest  and  holy  sod, 

Where  Inspiration,  his  diviner  strains 
Low  murmuring,  lay ;  and  starting  from  the  rocks 
Stiff  evergreens,  whose  spreading  foliage  mocks 
Want's  barren  soil,  and  the  bleak  frosts  of  age, 
And  Bigotry's  mad  fire-invoking  rage ! 

O  meek  retiring  spirit !  we  will  climb, 
Cheering  and  cheer'd,  this  lovely  hill  sublime  ; 

And  from  the  stirring  world  uplifted  high 
(Whose  noises,  faintly  wafted  on  the  wind, 
To  quiet  musings  shall  attune  the  mind, 

And  oft  the  melancholy  theme  supply), 

There,  while  the  prospect  through  the  gazing  eye 

Pours  all  its  healthful  greenness  on  the  soul, 
We'll  smile  at  wealth,  and  learn  to  smile  at  fame, 
Our  hopes,  our  knowledge,  and  our  joys  the  same, 

As  neighboring  fountains  image,  each  the  whole : 
Then,  when  the  mind  hath  drunk  its  fill  of  truth, 

We'll  discipline  the  heart  to  pure  delight, 
Rekindling  sober  Joy's  domestic  flame. 
They  whom  I  love  shall  love  thee.    Honor'd  youth ! 

Now  may  Heaven  realize  this  vision  bright ! 


ADDRESSED  TO  A  YOUNG   MAN  OF  FORTUNE, 

WHO    ABANDONED    HIMSELF   TO    AN    INDOLENT   AND 

CAUSELESS   MELANCHOLY. 

Hence  that  fantastic  wantonness  of  woe, 
O  Youth  to  partial  Fortune  vainly  dear ! 

To  plunder'd  Want's  half-shelter'd  hovel  go, 
Go,  and  some  hunger-bitten  Infant  hear 
Moan  haply  in  a  dying  Mother's  ear  : 

Or  when  the  cold  and  dismal  fog-damps  brood 

O'er   the    rank    church-yard  with   sere    elm-leaves 
strew'd, 

Pace  round  some  widow's  grave,  whose  dearer  part 
Was  slaughter'd,  where  o'er  his  uncoffin'd  limbs 

The  flocking  flesh-birds  scream'd  !  Then,  while  thy 
heart 
Groans,  and  thine  eye  a  fiercer  sorrow  dims, 

Know  (and  the  truth  shall  kindle  thy  young  mind) 

What  Nature  makes  thee  mourn,  she  bids  thee  heal ! 
O  abject !  if,  to  sickly  dreams  resign'd, 

All  effortless  thou  leave  life's  commonweal 

A  prey  to  Tyrants,  Murderers  of  Mankind. 


SONNET  TO  THE  RIVER  OTTER. 

Dear  native  Brook  !  wild  Streamlet  of  the  West ! 

How  many  various-fated  years  have  past, 

What  happy,  and  what  mournful  hours,  since  last 
I  skimm'd  the  smooth  thin  stone  along  thy  breast, 
Numbering  its  light  leaps  !  yet  so  deep  imprest 
Sink  the  sweet  scenes  of  childhood,  that  mine  eyes 

I  never  shut  amid  the  sunny  ray, 
But  straight  with  all  their  tints  thy  waters  rise, 

Thy  crossing  plank,  thy  marge  with  willows  grav, 
And  bedded  sand  that  vein'd  with  various  dyes 
Gleam'd  through  thy  bright  transparence !   On  my 
way, 

Visions  of  childhood !  oft  have  ye  beguiled 
Lone  manhood's  cares,  yet  waking  fondest  sighs  : 

Ah !  that  once  more  I  were  a  careless  child  ! 


SONNET. 

COMPOSED  ON  A  JOURNEY  HOMEWARD  ;  THE  AUTHOR 
HAVING  RECEIVED  INTELLIGENCE  OF  THE  BIRTH 
OF    A    SON,    SEPTEMBER    20,    1796. 

Oft  o'er  my  brain  does  that  strange  fancy  roll 
Which  makes  the  present  (while  the  flash  doth  last) 
61 


52 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Seem  a  mere  semblance  of  some  unknown  past, 
Mix'd  with  such  feelings,  as  perplex  the  soul 
Self-question'd  in  her  sleep  ;  and  some  have  said* 

We  lived,  ere  yet  this  robe  of  Flesh  we  wore. 

O  my  sweet  baby !  when  I  reach  my  door, 
If  heavy  looks  should  tell  me  thou  art  dead 
(As  sometimes,  through  excess  of  hope,  I  fear), 
I  think  that  I  should  struggle  to  believe 

Thou  wert  a  spirit,  to  this  nether  sphere 
Sentenced  for  some  more  venial  crime  to  grieve  ; 
Didst  scream,  then  spring  to  meet  Heaven's  quick 
reprieve, 

While  we  wept  idly  o'er  thy  little  bier ! 


SONNET. 


TO    A  FRIEND   WHO    ASKED,    HOW  I  FELT   WHEN   THE 
NURSE    FIRST    PRESENTED   MY   INFANT   TO    ME. 

Charles  !  my  slow  heart  was  only  sad,  when  first 
I  scann'd  that  face  of  feeble  infancy : 

For  dimly  on  my  thoughtful  spirit  burst 
All  I  had  been,  and  all  my  child  might  be ! 

But  when  I  saw  it  on  its  Mother's  arm, 
And  hanging  at  her  bosom  (she  the  while 
Bent  o'er  its  features  with  a  tearful  smile) 

Then  I  was  thrill'd  and  melted,  and  most  warm 

Impress'd  a  Father's  kiss  :  and  all  beguiled 
Of  dark  remembrance  and  presageful  fear, 
I  seem'd  to  see  an  angel-form  appear — 

*T  was  even  thine,  beloved  woman  mild  ! 
So  for  the  Mother's  sake  the  Child  was  dear, 

And  dearer  was  the  Mother  for  the  Child. 


THE  VIRGIN'S  CRADLE-HYMN. 

COPIED  FROM  A  PRINT  OF  THE  VIRGIN  IN  A  CATHOLIC 
VILLAGE    IN   GERMANY. 

Dormi,  Jesu  !  Mater  ridet, 
Quae  tam  dulcem  somnum  videt, 

Dormi,  Jesu  !  blandule ! 
Si  non  dormis,  Mater  plorat, 
Inter  fila  cantans  orat 

Blande,  veni,  somnule. 


Sleep,  sweet  babe  !  my  cares  beguiling 
Mother  sits  beside  thee  smiling : 

Sleep,  my  darling,  tenderly ! 
If  thou  sleep  not,  mother  mourneth, 
Singing  as  her  wheel  she  turneth  : 

Come,  soft  slumber,  balmily ! 


f  THE  CHRISTENING  OP  A  FRIEND'S  CHILD. 

This  day  among  the  faithful  placed 

And  fed  with  fontal  manna  ; 
O  with  maternal  title  graced 

Dear  Anna's  dearest  Anna ! 


*  Hv  ttov  Tjpwv  r)  xpv^tj  rrpiv  ev  rtaSc  to>  avdpbyirivoo 
cdei  ycvevQat. 

Plat,  in  Phccdon. 


While  others  wish  thee  wise  and  fair, 

A  maid  of  spotless  fame, 
I'll  breathe  this  more  compendious  prayer — 

Mayst  thou  deserve  thy  name ! 

Thy  Mother's  name,  a  potent  spell, 

That  bids  the  Virtues  hie 
From  mystic  grove  and  living  cell 

Confest  to  Fancy's  eye  ; 

Meek  Quietness,  without  offence ; 

Content,  in  homespun  kirtle ; 
True  Love ;  and  True  Love's  Innocence, 

White  Blossom  of  the  Myrtle ! 

Associates  of  thy  name,  sweet  Child ! 

These  Virtues  mayst  thou  win ; 
With  Face  as  eloquently  mild 

To  say,  they  lodge  within. 

So  when,  her  tale  of  days  all  flown, 
Thy  Mother  shall  be  miss'd  here  ; 

When  Heaven  at  length  shall  claim  its  own, 
And  Angels  snatch  their  Sister ; 

Some  hoary-headed  Friend,  perchance, 

May  gaze  with  stifled  breath  ; 
And  oft,  in  momentary  trance, 

Forget  the  waste  of  death. 

Ev'n  thus  a  lovely  rose  I  view'd 

In  summer-swelling  pride  ; 
Nor  mark'd  the  bud,  that  green  and  rude 

Peep'd  at  the  Rose's  side. 

It  chanced,  I  pass'd  again  that  way 

In  Autumn's  latest  hour, 
And  wond'ring  saw  the  self-same  spray 

Rich  with  the  self-same  flower. 

Ah  fond  deceit !  the  rude  green  bud 

Alike  in  shape,  place,  name, 
Had  bloom'd,  where  bloom'd  its  parent  stud 

Another  and  the  same ! 


EPITAPH  ON  AN  INFANT. 

Its  balmy  lips  the  Infant  blest 
Relaxing  from  its  Mother's  breast, 
How  sweet  it  heaves  the  happy  sigh 
Of  innocent  Satiety! 

And  such  my  Infant's  latest  sigh ! 
O  tell,  rude  stone !  the  passer-by, 
That  here  the  pretty  babe  doth  lie, 
Death  sang  to  sleep  with  Lullaby. 


MELANCHOLY. 

A    FRAGMENT. 

Stretch'd  on  a  moulder'd  Abbey's  broadest  to-.. 

Where  ruining  ivies  propp'd  the  ruins  steep-  - 
Her  folded  arms  wrapping  her  tatter'd  pall. 

Had  Melancholy  mused  herself  to  sleep. 
f.2 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


53 


The  fern  was  press'd  beneath  her  hair, 
The  dark-green  Adder's  Tongue*  was  there  ; 
And  slill  as  past  the  /lagging  sea-gale  weak, 
The  long  lank  leaf  bow'd  fluttering  o'er  her  cheek. 

That  pallid  cheek  was  flush'd  :  her  eager  look 
Beam'd  eloquent  in  slumber!  Inly  wrought, 
Imperfect  sounds  her  moving  lips  forsook, 
And  her   bent    forehead  work'd   with    troubled 
thought. 
Strange  was  the  dream 


TELL'S  BIRTH-PLACE. 

IMITATED  FROM  STOLBERG. 

Mark  this  holy  chapel  well ! 
The  Birth-place,  this,  of  William  Tell. 
Here,  where  stands  God's  altar  dread, 
Stood  his  parents'  marriage-bed. 

Here'  first,  an  infant  to  her  breast, 
Him  his  loving  mother  prest ; 
And  kiss'd  the  babe,  and  bless'd  the  day, 
And  pray'd  as  mothers  use  to  pray  : 

"  Vouchsafe  him  health,  O  God,  and  give 
The  Child  thy  servant  still  to  live!" 
But  God  has  destined  to  do  more 
Through  him,  than  through  an  armed  power. 

God  gave  him  reverence  of  laws, 

Yet  stirring  blood  in  Freedom's  cause — 

A  spirit  to  his  rocks  akin, 

The  eye  of  the  Hawk,  and  the  fire  therein ! 

To  Nature  and  to  Holy  writ 
Alone  did  God  the  boy  commit  : 
Where  flash'd  and  roar'd  the  torrent,  oft 
His  soul  found  wings,  and  soar'd  aloft ! 

The  straining  oar  and  chamois  chase 
Had  form'd  his  limbs  to  strength  and  grace : 
On  wave  and  wind  the  boy  would  toss, 
Was  great,  nor  knew  how  great  he  was  ! 

He  knew  not  that  his  chosen  hand, 
Made  strong  by  God,  his  native  land 
Would  rescue  from  the  shameful  yoke 
Of  Slavery the  which  he  broke ! 


A  CHRISTMAS  CAROL. 

The  Shepherds  went  their  hasty  way, 

And  found  the  lowly  stable-shed 
Where  the  Virgin-Mother  lay  : 

And  now  they  check'd  their  eager  tread, 
For  to  the  Babe,  that  at  her  bosom  clung, 
A  Mother's  song  the  Virgin-Mother  sung. 

They  told  her  how  a  glorious  light, 

Streaming  from  a  heavenly  throng, 
Around  them  shone,  suspending  night ! 
While,  sweeter  than  a  Mother's  song, 
Blest  Angels  heralded  the  Savior's  birth, 
Glory  to  God  on  high !  and  peace  on  Earth. 


*  A  botanical  mistake.    Tho  plant  which  the  poet  here  de 
tcribea  is  called  the  Hart'i  Tongue. 


She  listen'd  to  the  tale  divine, 

And  closer  still  the  Babe  she  press'd  ; 
And  while  she  cried,  the  Babe  is  mine! 
The  milk  rush'd  faster  to  her  breast  : 
Joy  rose  within  her,  like  a  summer's  morn ; 
Peace,  Peace  on  Earth  !  the  Prince  of  Peace  is  bom. 

Thou  Mother  of  the  Prince  of  Peace, 

Poor,  simple,  and  of  low  estate ! 
That  Strife  should  vanish,  Battle  cease, 
O  why  should  this  thy  soul  elate  ? 

Sweet  Music's  loudest  note,  the  Poet's  story, 

Did'st  thou  ne'er  love  to  hear  of  Fame  and  Glory  ? 

And  is  not  War  a  youthful  King, 

A  stately  Hero  clad  in  mail  ? 
Beneath  his  footsteps  laurels  spring ; 
Him  Earth's  majestic  monarchs  hail 
Their  Friend,  their  Play-mate!  and  his  bold  bright  eye 
Compels  the  maiden's  love-confessing  sigh. 

"  Tell  this  in  some  more  courtly  scene, 

To  maids  and  youths  in  robes  of  state ! 
I  am  a  woman  poor  and  mean, 
And  therefore  is  my  Soul  elate. 
War  is  a  ruffian,  all  with  guilt  defiled, 
That  from  the  aged  Father  tears  his  Child  ! 

"  A  murderous  fiend,  by  fiends  adored, 

He  kills  the  Sire  and  starves  the  Son ; 
The  Husband  kills,  and  from  her  board 
Steals  all  his  Widow's  toil  had  won ; 
Plunders  God's  world  of  beauty ;  rends  away 
All  safety  from  the  Night,  all  comfort  from  the  Day 

"  Then  wisely  is  my  soul  elate, 

That  Strife  should  vanish,  Battle  cease : 
I  'm  poor  and  of  a  low  estate, 

The  Mother  of  the  Prince  of  Peace. 
Joy  rises  in  me,  like  a  summer's  morn  : 
Peace,  Peace  on  Earth!  the  Prince  of  Peace  is  born!" 


HUMAN  LIFE, 

ON   THE   DENIAL   OF   IMMORTALITY 

If  dead,  we  cease  to  be  ;  if  total  gloom     ' 

Swallow  up  life's  brief  flash  for  aye,  we  fare 
As  summer-gusts,  of  sudden  birth  and  doom, 

Whose  sound  and  motion  not  alone  declare, 
But  are  their  whole  of  being !  If  the  Breath 

Be  Life  itself,  and  not  its  task  and  tent, 
If  even  a  soul  like  Milton's  can  know  death , 

O  Man !  thou  vessel,  purposeless,  unmeant, 
Yet  drone-hive  strange  of  phantom  purposes ! 

Surplus  of  Nature's  dread  activity, 
Which,  as  she  gazed  on  some  nigh-finish'd  vase, 
Retreating  slow,  with  meditative  pause, 

She  form'd  with  restless  hands  unconsciously ! 
Blank  accident !  nothing's  anomaly! 

If  rootless  thus,  thus  substanceless  thy  state, 
Go,  weigh  thy  dreams,  and  be  thy  Hopes,  thy  Fears, 
The  counter-weights ! — .Thy  Laughter  and  thy  Tears 

Mean  but  themsolves,  each  fittest  to  create, 
63 


54 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


And  to  repay  the  other !  Why  rejoices 

Thy  heart  with  hollow  joy  for  hollow  good  ? 

Why  cowl  thy  face  beneath  the  mourner's  hood, 
Why  waste  thy  sighs,  and  thy  lamenting  voices, 

Image  of  image,  Ghost  of  Ghostly  Elf, 
That  such  a  thing  as  thou  feel'st  warm  or  cold ! 
Yet  what  and  whence  thy  gain  if  thou  withhold 

These  costless  shadows  of  thy  shadowy  self? 
Be  sad !  be  glad  !  be  neither !  seek,  or  shun ! 
Thou  hast  no  reason  why  !  Thou  canst  have  none : 
Thy  being's  being  is  contradiction. 


THE  VISIT  OF  THE  GODS. 

IMITATED  FROM  SCHILLER. 

Never,  believe  me, 
Appear  the  Immortals, 
Never  alone : 
Scarce  had  I  welcomed  the  Sorrow-beguiler, 
Iacchus !  but  in  came  Boy  Cupid  the  Smiler ; 
Lo !  Phoebus  the  Glorious  descends  from  his  Throne ! 
They  advance,  they  float  in,  the  Olympians  all ! 
With  Divinities  fills  my 
Terrestrial  Hall ! 

How  shall  I  yield  you 
Due  entertainment, 
Celestial  Quire  ? 
Me  rather,  bright  guests !  with  your  wings  of  up- 

buoyance 
Bear  aloft  to  your  homes,  to  your  banquets  of  joyance, 
That  the  roofs  of  Olympus  may  echo  my  lyre ! 
Ha !  we  mount !  on  their  pinions  they  waft  up  my  Soul ! 

O  give  me  the  Nectar ! 
O  fill  me  the  Bowl ! 
Give  him  the  Nectar! 
Pour  out  for  the  Poet, 
Hebe  !  pour  free  ! 
Quicken  his  eyes  with  celestial  dew, 
That  Styx  the  detested  no  more  he  may  view, 
And  like  one  of  us  Gods  may  conceit  him  to  be ! 
Thanks,  Hebe !  I  quaff  it !  Io  Pasan,  I  cry! 
The  Wine  of  the  Immortals 
Forbids  me  to  die ! 


ELEGY, 

IMITATED  FROM  ONE  OF  AKENSIDE's  BLANK  VERSE 
INSCRIPTIONS. 

Near  the  lone  pile  with  ivy  overspread, 

Fast  by  the  rivulet's  sleep-persuading  sound, 

Where  "  sleeps  the  moonlight "  on  yon  verdant  bed — 
O  humbly  press  that  consecrated  ground ! 

For  there  does  Edmund  rest,  the  learned  swain ! 

And  there  his  spirit  most  delights  to  rove : 
Young  Edmund !  famed  for  each  harmonious  strain, 

And  the  sore  wounds  of  ill-requited  love. 

Like  some  tall  tree  that  spreads  its  branches  wide, 
And  loads  the  we9t-wind  with  its  soft  perfume, 

His  manhood  blossom 'd  :  till  the  faithless  pride 
Of  fair  Malilda  sank  him  to  the  tomb. 


But  soon  did  righteous  Heaven  her  guilt  pursue ! 

Where'er  with  wilder'd  steps  she  wander'd  pale. 
Still  Edmund's  image  rose  to  blast  her  view, 

Still  Edmund's  voice  accused  her  in  each  gale. 

With  keen  regret,  and  conscious  guilt's  alarms, 
Amid  the  pomp  of  affluence  she  pined  : 

Nor  all  that  lured  her  faith  from  Edmund's  arms 
Could  lull  the  wakeful  horror  of  her  mind. 

Go,  Traveller !  tell  the  tale  with  sorrow  fraught 
Some  tearful  maid,  perchance,  or  blooming  youth 

May  hold  it  in  remembrance ;  and  be  taught 
That  Riches  cannot  pay  for  Love  or  Truth. 


KUBLA  KHAN; 

OR,  A  VISION  IN  A  DREAM. 


[The  following  fragment  is  here  published  at  the  request  of  a 
poet  of  great  and  deserved  celebrity,  and,  as  far  as  the  Author'9 
own  opinions  are  concerned,  rather  as  a  psychological  curiosity, 
than  on  the  ground  of  any  supposed  poetic  merits. 

In  the  summer  of  the  year  1797,  the  Author,  then  in  ill  health, 
had  retired  to  alonely  farm-house  between  Porlock  and  Linton, 
on  the  Exmoor  confines  of  Somerset  and  Devonshire.  In  con- 
sequence of  a  slight  indisposition,  an  anodyne  had  been  pre- 
scribed, from  the  effects  of  which  he  fell  asleep  in  his  chair  at 
the  moment  that  he  was  reading  the  following  sentence,  or 
words  of  the  same  substance,  in  Purchas's  "  Pilgrimage :" — 
"  Here  the  Khan  Kubla  commanded  a  palace  to  be  built,  and  a 
stately  garden  thereunto  ;  and  thus  ten  miles  of  fertile  ground 
were  inclosed  with  a  wall."  The  author  continued  for  abou* 
three  hours  in  a  profound  sleep,  at  least  of  the  external  senses, 
during  which  time  he  has  the  most  vivid  confidence  that  he  could 
not  have  composed  less  than  from  two  to  three  hundred  lines ;  if 
that  indeed  can  be  called  composition  in  which  all  the  images 
rose  up  before  him  as  thiyigs,  with  a  parallel  production  of  the 
correspondent  expressions,  without  any  sensation,  or  conscious- 
ness of  effort.  On  awaking  he  appeared  to  himself  to  have  a 
distinct  recollection  of  the  whole,  and  taking  his  pen,  ink,  and 
paper,  instantly  and  eagerly  wrote  down  the  lines  that  are  here 
preserved.  At  this  moment  he  was  unfortunately  called  out  by 
a  person  on  business  from  Porlock,  and  detained  by  him  above 
an  hour,  and  on  his  return  to  his  room,  found,  to  his  no  small 
surprise  and  mortification,  that  though  he  still  retained  some 
vague  and  dim  recollection  of  the  general  purport  of  the  vision, 
yet,  with  the  exception  of  some  eight  or  ten  scattered  lines  and 
images,  all  the  rest  had  passed  away  like  the  images  on  the 
surface  of  a  stream  into  which  a  stone  had  been  cast,  but,  alas ! 
without  the  after  restoration  of  the  latter. 

Then  all  the  charm 
Is  broken — all  that  phantom-world  so  fair 
Vanishes,  and  a  thousand  circlets  spread, 
And  each  misshapes  the  other.    Stay  awhile, 
Poor  youth  !  who  scarcely  darest  lift  up  thine  eyes— 
The  stream  will  soon  renew  its  smoothness,  soon 
The  visions  will  return  !  And  lo,  he  stays, 
And  soon  the  fragments  dim  of  lovely  forms 
Come  trembling  back,  unite,  and  now  once  more 
The  pool  becomes  a  mirror. 
Yet  from  the  still  surviving  recollections  in  his  mind,  the  Author 
has  frequently  purposed  to  finish  for  himself  what  had  been 
originally,  as  it  were,  given  to  him.    Xa/iepov  altcv  aeru>: 
but  the  to-morrow  is  yet  to  come. 

As  a  contrast  to  this  vision,  I  have  annexed  a  fragment  of  a 
very  different  character,  describing  with  equal  fidelity  the 
dream  of  pain  and  disease. — Note  to  the  first  Edition,  1816.] 


In  Xanadu  did  Kubla  Khan 
A  stately  pleasure-dome  decree ; 
Where  Alph,  the  sacred  river,  ran 
Through  caverns  measureless  to  man, 
Down  to  a  sunless  sea. 

64 


• 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


55 


So  twice  five  miles  of  fertile  ground 
With  walls  and  towers  were  girdled  round : 
And  here  were  gardens  bright  with  sinuous  rills, 
Where  blossom'd  many  an  incense-bearing  tree ; 
And  here  were  forests  ancient  as  the  hills, 
Infolding  sunny  spots  of  greenery. 

But  oh  that  deep  romantic  chasm  which  slanted 
Down  the  green  hill  athwart  a  cedarn  cover ! 
A  savage  place !  as  holy  and  enchanted 
As  e'er  beneath  a  waning  moon  was  haunted 
By  woman  wailing  for  her  demon-lover ! 
And  from  this  chasm,  with  ceaseless  turmoil  seeth- 
ing, 
As  if  this  earth  in  fast  thick  pants  were  breathing 
A  mighty  fountain  momently  was  forced : 
Amid  whose  swift  half-intermitted  burst 
Huge  fragments  vaulted  like  rebounding  hail, 
Or  chatty  grain  beneath  the  thresher's  flail  : 
\nd  'mid  these  dancing  rocks  at  once  and  ever 
It  flung  up  momently  the  sacred  river. 
Five  miles,  meandering  with  a  mazy  motion, 
Through  wood  and  dale  the  sacred  river  ran, 
Then  reach'd  the  caverns  measureless  to  man, 
And  sank  in  tumult  to  a  lifeless  ocean : 
And  'mid  this  tumult  Kubla  heard  from  far 
Ancestral  voices  prophesying  war ! 

The  shadow  of  the  dome  of  pleasure 

Floated  midway  on  the  waves  ; 

Where  was  heard  the  mingled  measure 

From  the  fountain  and  the  caves. 
It  was  a  miracle  of  rare  device, 
A  sunny  pleasure-dome  with  caves  of  ice ! 

A  damsel  with  a  dulcimer 

In  a  vision  once  I  saw : 

It  was  an  Abyssinian  maid, 

And  on  her  dulcimer  she  play'd, 

Singing  of  Mount  A  bora. 

Could  I  revive  within  me 

Her  symphony  and  song, 

To  such  a  deep  delight  't  would  win  me, 
That  with  music  loud  and  long, 
x  would  build  that  dome  in  air, 
That  sunny  dome !  those  caves  of  ice ! 
And  all  who  heard  should  see  them  there, 
And  all  should  cry,  Beware  !  Beware ! 
His  flashing  eyes,  his  floating  hair ! 
Weave  a  circle  round  him  thrice, 
And  close  your  eyes  with  holy  dread, 
For  he  on  honey-dew  hath  fed 
And  drank  the  milk  of  Paradise. 


THE  PAINS  OF  SLEEP. 

Ere  on  my  bed  my  limbs  I  lay, 

It  hath  not  been  my  use  to  pray 

With  moving  lips  or  bended  knees  ; 

But  silently,  by  slow  degrees, 

My  spirit  I  to  Love  compose, 

In  humble  Trust  mine  eye-lids  close, 

With  reverential  resignation, 

No  wish  conceived,  no  thought  express'd ! 

Only  a  sense  of  supplication, 

A  sense  o'er  all  my  soul  imprest 

That  I  am  weak,  yet  not  unbleet, 


Since  in  me,  round  me,  everywhere, 
Eternal  Strength  and  Wisdom  are. 

But  yester-night  I  pray'd  aloud 

In  anguish  and  in  agony, 

Up-starting  from  the  fiendish  crowd 

Of  shapes  and  thoughts  that  tortured  me  : 

A  lurid  light,  a  trampling  throng, 

Sense  of  intolerable  wrong, 

And  whom  I  scorn'd,  those  only  strong ! 

Thirst  of  revenge,  the  powerless  will 

Still  baffled,  and  yet  burning  still ! 

Desire  with  lothing  strangely  mix'd, 

On  wild  or  hateful  objects  fix'd. 

Fantastic  passions !  maddening  brawl ! 

And  shame  and  terror  over  all ! 

Deeds  to  be  hid  which  were  not  hid, 

Which  all  confused  I  could  not  know, 

Whether  I  suffer'd,  or  I  did  : 

For  all  seem'd  guilt,  remorse,  or  woe, 

My  own  or  others',  still  the  same 

Life-stifling  fear,  soul-stifling  shame. 

So  two  nights  pass'd :  the  night's  dismay 
Sadden'd  and  stunn'd  the  coming  day. 
Sleep,  the  wide  blessing,  seem'd  to  me 
Distemper's  worst  calamity. 
The  third  night,  when  my  own  loud  scream 
Had  waked  me  from  the  fiendish  dream, 
O'ercome  with  sufferings  strange  and  wild, 
I  wept  as  I  had  been  a  child  ; 
And  having  thus  by  tears  subdued 
My  anguish  to  a  milder  mood, 
Such  punishments,  I  said,  were  due 
To  natures  deepliest  stain'd  with  sin  - 
For  aye  entempesting  anew 
The  unfathomable  hell  within, 
The  horror  of  their  deeds  to  view, 
To  know  and  lothe,  yet  wish  and  do ! 
Such  griefs  with  such  men  well  agree, 
But  wherefore,  wherefore  fall  on  me  ? 
To  be  beloved  is  all  I  need, 
And  whom  I  love,  I  love  indeed. 


APPENDIX. 


APOLOGETIC  PREFACE 

TO  "  FIRE,  FAMINE,  AND  SLAUGHTER." 

[See  page  26]. 

At  the  house  of  a  gentleman,  w-ho  by  the  principles 
and  corresponding  virtues  of  a  sincere  Christian  con- 
secrates a  cultivated  genius  and  the  favorable  acci- 
dents of  birth,  opulence,  and  splendid  connexions,  it 
was  my  good  fortune  to  meet,  in  a  dinner-party,  with 
more  men  of  celebrity  in  science  or  polite  literature, 
than  are  commonly  found  collected  round  the  same 
table.  In  the  course  of  conversation,  one  of  the  par- 
ty reminded  an  illustrious  Poet,  then  present,  of  somo 
verses  which  he  had  recited  that  morning,  and  which 
had  appeared  in  a  newspaper  under  the  name  of  a 
War-Eclogue,  in  which  Fire,  Famine,  and  Slaughter, 
were  introduced  as  the  speakers.  The  gentleman  so 
addressed  replied,  that  he  was  rather  surprised  that 
65 


56 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


none  of  us  should  have  noticed  or  heard  of  the  poem, 
as  it  had  been,  at  the  time,  a  good  deal  talked  of  in 
Scotland.  It  may  be  easily  supposed,  that  my  feel- 
ings were  at  this  moment  not  of  the  most  comforta- 
ble kind.  Of  all  present,  one  only  knew  or  suspect- 
ed me  to  be  the  author  :  a  man  who  would  have 
established  himself  in  the  first  rank  of  England's 
living  Poets,  if  the  Genius  of  our  country  had  not 
decreed  that  he  should  rather  be  the  first  in  the  first 
rank  of  its  Philosophers  and  scientific  Benefactors. 
It  appeared  the  general  wish  to  hear  the  lines.  As  my 
friend  chose  to  remain  silent,  I  chose  to  follow  his 
example,  and  Mr.  *****  recited  the  Poem.  This  he 
could  do  with  the  better  grace,  being  known  to  have 
ever  been  not  only  a  firm  and  active  Anti-Jacobin  and 
Anti-Gallican,  but  likewise  a  zealous  admirer  of  Mr. 
Pitt,  both  as  a  good  man  and  a  great  Statesman.  As 
a  Poet  exclusively,  he  had  been  amused  with  the 
Eclogue ;  as  a  Poet,  he  recited  it ;  and  in  a  spirit, 
which  made  it  evident,  that  he  would  have  read  and 
repeated  it  with  the  same  pleasure,  had  his  own 
name  been  attached  to  the  imaginary  object  or  agent. 
After  the  recitation,  our  amiable  host  observed, 
that  in  his  opinion  Mr.  *****  had  overrated  the  merits 
of  the  poetry;  but  had  they  been  tenfold  greater, 
they  could  not  have  compensated  for  that  malignity 
of  heart,  which  could  alone  have  prompted  senti- 
ments so  atrocious.  I  perceived  that  my  illustrious 
friend  became  greatly  distressed  on  my  account;  but 
fortunately  I  was  able  to  preserve  fortitude  and  pres- 
ence of  mind  enough  to  take  up  the  subject  without 
exciting  even  a  suspicion  how  nearly  and  painfully 
it  interested  me. 

What  follows,  is  substantially  the  same  as  I  then 
replied,  but  dilated  and  in  language  less  colloquial. 
It  was  not  my  intention,  I  said,  to  justify  the  publi- 
cation, whatever  its  author's  feelings  might  have 
been  at  the  time  of  composing  it.  That  they  are 
calculated  to  call  forth  so  severe  a  reprobation  from 
a  good  man,  is  not  the  worst  feature  of  such  poems. 
Their  moral  deformity  is  aggravated  in  proportion  to 
the  pleasure  which  they  are  capable  of  affording 
to  vindictive,  turbulent,  and  unprincipled  readers. 
Could  it  be  supposed,  though  for  a  moment,  that  the 
author  seriously  wished  what  he  had  thus  wildly  im- 
agined, even  the  •Utempt  to  palliate  an  inhumanity  so 
monstrous  would  oe  an  insult  to  the  hearers.  But  it 
seemed  to  me  worthy  of  consideration,  whether  the 
mood  of  mind,  and  the  general  state  of  sensations, 
in  which  a  Poet  produces  such  vivid  and  fantastic 
images,  is  likely  to  coexist,  or  is  even  compatible, 
with  that  gloomy  and  deliberate  ferocity  which  a 
serious  wish  to  realize  them  would  presuppose.  It 
had  been  often  observed,  and  all  my  experience 
tended  to  confirm  the  observation,  that  prospects  of 
pain  and  evil  toothers,  and,  in  general,  all  deep  feel- 
ings of  revenge,  are  commonly  expressed  in  a  few- 
words,  ironically  tame,  and  mild.  The  mind  under 
so  direful  and  fiend-like  an  influence  seems  to  take  a 
morbid  pleasure  in  contrasting  the  intensity  of  its 
wishes  and  feelings,  with  the  slightncss  or  levity  of 
the  expressions  by  which  they  are  hinted ;  and  in- 
deed feelings  so  intense  and  solitary,  if  they  were 
not  precluded  (as  in  almost  all  cases  they  would  be) 
by  a  constitutional  activity  of  fancy  and  association, 
and  by  the  specific  joyousness  combined  with  it, 
would  assuredly  themselves  preclude  such  activity 
Passion,  in  its  own  quality,  is  the  antagonist  of  ac- 
tion :  though  in  an  ordinarv  and  natural  degree  the 
former  alternates  with  ttie  latter,  and  thereby  revives 


and  strengthens  it.  But  the  more  intense  and  insane 
the  passion  is,  the  fewer  and  the  more  fixed  are  the 
correspondent  forms  and  notions.  A  rooted  hatred, 
an  inveterate  thirst  of  revenge,  is  a  sort  of  madness, 
and  still  eddies  round  its  favorite  object,  and  exer- 
cises as  it  were  a  perpetual  tautology  of  mind  in 
thoughts  and  words,  which  admit  of  no  adequate 
substitutes.  Like  a  fish  in  a  globe  of  glass,  it  moves 
restlessly  round  and  round  the  scanty  circumference, 
which  it  cannot  leave  without  losing  its  vital  ele- 
ment. 

There  is  a  second  character  of  such  imaginary 
representations  as  spring  from  a  real  and  earnest  de- 
sire of  evil  to  another,  which  we  often  see  in  real 
life,  and  might  even  anticipate  from  the  nature  of 
the  mind.  The  images,  I  mean,  that  a  vindictive 
man  places  before  his  imagination,  will  most  often  be 
taken  from  the  realities  of  life  :  they  will  be  images 
of  pain  and  suffering  which  he  has  himself  seen  in- 
flicted on  other  men,  and  which  he  can  fancy  him- 
self as  inflicting  on  the  object  of  his  hatred.  I  will 
suppose  that  we  had  heard  at  different  times  two 
common  sailors,  each  speaking  of  some  one  who  had 
wronged  or  offended  him :  that  the  first  with  appa- 
rent violence  had  devoted  every  part  of  his  adversa- 
ry's body  and  soul  to  all  the  horrid  phantoms  and 
fantastic  places  that  ever  Quevedo  dreamt  of,  and 
this  in  a  rapid  flow  of  those  outre  and  wildly-com- 
bined execrations,  which  too  often  with  our  lower 
classes  serve  for  escape-valves  to  carry  off  the  excess 
of  their  passions,  as  so  much  superfluous  steam  that 
would  endanger  the  vessel  if  it  were  retained.  The 
other,  on  the  contrary,  with  that  sort  of  calmness  of 
tone  which  is  to  the  ear  what  the  paleness  of  anger 
is  to  the  eye,  shall  simply  say,  "  If  I  chance  to  be 
made  boatswain,  as  I  hope  I  soon  shall,  and  can  but 
once  get  that  fellow  under  my  hand  (and  1  shall  be 
upon  the  watch  for  him),  I  '11  tickle  his  pretty  skin ! 

I  wont  hurt  him !  oh  no !  I  '11  only  cut  the to 

the  liver!"  I  dare  appeal  to  all  present,  which  of  the 
two  they  would  regard  as  the  least  deceptive  symp- 
tom of  deliberate  malignity  ?  nay,  whether  it  would 
surprise  them  to  see  the  first  fellow,  an  hour  or  two 
afterward,  cordially  shaking  hands  with  the  very 
man,  the  fractional  parts  of  whose  body  and  soul  he 
had  been  so  charitably  disposing  of;  or  even  perhaps 
risking  his  life  for  him.  What  language  Shakspeare 
considered  characteristic  of  malignant  disposition,  we 
see  in  the  speech  of  the  good-natured  Gratiano,  who 
spoke  "an  infinite  deal  of  nothing  more  than  any 
man  in  all  Venice  ;" 

Too  wild,  too  rude  and  bold  of  voice ! 

the  skipping  spirit,  whose  thoughts  and  words  recip- 
rocally ran  away  with  each  other  ; 

O  be  thou  damn'd,  inexorable  dog ' 

And  for  thy  life  let  justice  be  accused ! 

and  the  wild  fancies  that  follow,  contrasted  with  Shy- 
lock's  tranquil  "  I  stand  here  for  law." 

Or,  to  take  a  case  more  analogous  to  the  present 
subject,  should  we  hold  it  either  fair  or  charitable  to 
believe  it  to  have  been  Dante's  serious  wish,  that  all 
the  persons  mentioned  by  him,  (many  recently  de- 
parted, and  some  even  alive  at  the  time),  should  ac- 
tually suffer  the  fantastic  and  horrible  punishments 
to  which  he  has  sentenced  them  in  his  Hell  and 
Purgatory?  Or  what  shall  we  say  of  the  passages 
in  which  Bishop  Jeremy  Taylor  anticipates  the  state 
of  those  who,  vicious  themselves,  have  been  the 
66 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


57 


cause  of  vice  and  misery  to  their  fellow-creatures  I 
Could  we  endure  for  a  moment  to  think  that  a  spirit, 
like  Bishop  Taylor's,  burning  with  Christian  love  ; 
that  a  mail  constitutionally  overflowing  with  plea- 
surable kindliness;  who  scarcely  even  in  a  casual 
illustration  introduces  the  image  of  woman,  child,  or 
bird,  but  he  embalms  the  thought  with  so  rich  a 
tenderness,  as  makes  the  very  words  seem  beauties 
and  fragments  of  poetry  from  a  Euripides  or  Si  mo. 
nides ; — can  we  endure  to  think,  that  a  man  so  na- 
tured  and  so  disciplined,  did  at  the  time  of  composing 
this  horrible  picture,  attach  a  sober  feeling  of  reality 
to  the  phrases  ?  or  that  he  would  have  described  in 
the  same  tone  of  justification,  in  the  same  luxuriant 
flow  of  phrases,  the  tortures  about  to  be  inflicted  on 
a  living  individual  by  a  verdict  of  the  Star-Chamber? 
or  the  still  more  atrocious  sentences  executed  on  the 
Scotch  anti-prelatists  and  schismatics,  at  the  com- 
mand, and  in  some  instances  under  the  very  eye  of 
the  Duke  of  Lauderdale,  and  of  that  wretched  bigot 
who  afterwards  dishonored  and  forfeited  the  throne 
of  Great  Britain  ?  Or  do  we  not  rather  feel  and  un- 
derstand, that  these  violent  words  were  mere  bubbles, 
flashes  and  electrical  apparitions,  from  the  magic 
caldron  of  a  fervid  and  ebullient  fancy,  constantly 
fuelled  by  an  unexampled  opulence  of  language  ? 

Were  I  now  to  have  read  by  myself  for  the  first 
time  the  Poem  in  question,  my  conclusion,  I  fully 
believe,  would  be,  that  the  writer  must  have  been 
some  man  of  warm  feelings  and  active  fancy ;  that 
he  had  painted  to  himself  the  circumstances  that  ac- 
company war  in  so  many  vivid  and  yet  fantastic 
forms,  as  proved  that  neither  the  images  nor  the 
feelings  were  the  result  of  observation,  or  in  any 
way  derived  from  realities.  I  should  judge,  that  the)' 
were  the  product  of  his  own  seething  imagination, 
and  therefore  impregnated  with  that  pleasurable  ex- 
ultation which  is  experienced  in  all  energetic  exer- 
tion of  intellectual  power ;  that  in  the  same  mood 
he  had  generalized  the  causes  of  the  war,  and  then 
personified  the  abstract,  and  christened  it  by  the 
name  which  he  had  been  accustomed  to  hear  most 
often  associated  with  its  management  and  measures. 
I  should  guess  that  the  minister  was  in  the  author's 
mind  at  the  moment  of  composition,  as  completely 
a-aci'is,  avaiiioaapKos,  as  Anacreon's  grasshopper,  and 
that  he  had  as  little  notion  of  a  real  person  of  flesh 
and  blood, 

Distinguishable  in  member,  joint,  or  limb, 

as  Milton  had  in  the  grim  and  terrible  phantoms  (half 
person,  half  allegory)  which  he  has  placed  at  the 
gates  of  Hell.  I  concluded  by  observing,  that  the 
Puem  was  not  calculated  to  excite  passion  in  any 
mind,  or  to  make  any  impression  except  on  poetic 
readers ;  and  that  from  the  culpable  levity,  betraved 
at  the  close  of  the  Eclogue  by  the  grotesque  union 
of  epigrammatic  wit  with  allegoric  personification, 
in  the  allusion  to  the  most  fearful  of  thoughts,  I 
should  conjecture  that  the  "  rantin'  Bardie,"  instead 
of  really  believing,  much  less  wishing,  the  fate  spo- 
ken of  in  the  last  line,  in  application  to  any  human 
individual,  would  shrink  from  passing  the  verdict 
even  on  the  Devil  himself,  and  exclaim  with  poor 
Burns, 

But  fare  ye  weel,  auld  Nickie-ben! 

Oh  !  wad  ye  tnk  a  thought  an'  men' ! 

Ye  aiblins  might — I  dinna  ken — 

Still  hae  a  stake — 


I  'm  wue  to  think  upon  yon  den, 

Ev'n  lor  your  sake  ! 

I  need  not  say  that  these  thoughts,  which  are  here 
dilated,  were  in  such  a  company  only  rapidly  sug- 
gested. Our  kind  host  smiled,  and  with  a  courteous 
compliment  observed,  that  the  defence  was  too  good 
for  the  cause.  My  voice  faltered  a  little,  for  I  was 
somewhat  agitated ;  though  not  so  much  on  my  own 
account  as  for  the  uneasiness  that  so  kind  and 
friendly  a  man  would  feel  from  the  thought  that  he 
had  been  the  occasion  of  distressing  me.  At  length 
I  brought  out  these  words:  "  I  must  now  confess, 
Sir !  that  I  am  author  of  that  Poem.  It  was  written 
some  years  ago.  I  do  not  attempt  to  justify  my  past 
sell',  young  as  I  then  was;  but  as  little  as  I  would 
now  write  a  similar  poem,  so  far  was  I  even  then 
from  imagining,  that  the  lines  would  be  taken  as 
more  or  less  than  a  sport  of  fancy.  At  all  events,  if 
I  know  my  own  heart,  there  was  never  a  moment 
in  my  existence  in  which  I  should  have  been  more 
ready,  had  Mr.  Pitt's  person  been  in  hazard,  to  inter- 
pose my  own  body,  and  defend  his  life  at  the  risk  of 
my  own." 

I  have  prefaced  the  Poem  with  this  anecdote,  be- 
cause to  have  printed  it  without  any  remark  might 
well  have  been  understood  as  implying  an  uncondi- 
tional approbation  on  my  part,  and  this  after  many 
years'  consideration.  But  if  it  be  asked  why  I  re- 
published it  at  all  ?  I  answer,  that  the  Poem  had 
been  attributed  at  different  times  to  different  other 
pereons ;  and  what  I  had  dared  beget,  I  thought  it 
neither  manly  nor  honorable  not  to  dare  father. 
From  the  same  motives  I  should  have  published 
perfect  copies  of  two  Poems,  the  one  entitled  The 
Devil's  Thoughts,  and  the  other  The  Two  Round 
Spaces  on  the  To-.nh-Slone,  but  that  the  three  first 
stanzas  of  the  former,  which  were  worth  all  the  rest 
of  the  poem,  and  the  best  stanza  of  the  remainder, 
were  written  by  a  friend  of  deserved  celebrity ;  and 
because  there  are  passages  in  both,  which  might 
have  given  offence  to  the  religious  feelings  of  certain 
readers.  I  myself  indeed  see  no  reason  why  vulgar 
superstitions,  and  absurd  conceptions  that  deform  the 
pure  faiih  of  a  Christian,  should  possess  a  greater 
immunity  from  ridicule  than  stories  of  witches,  or 
the  fables  of  Greece  and  Rome.  But  there  are 
those  who  deem  it  profaneness  and  irreverence  to 
call  an  ape  an  ape,  if  it  but  wear  a  monk's  cowl  on 
its  head ;  and  I  would  rather  reason  with  this  weak- 
ness  than  offend  it. 

The  passage  from  Jeremy  Taylor  to  which  I  re- 
ferred, is  found  in  his  second  Sermon  on  Christ's 
Advent  to  Judgment;  which  is  likewise  the  second 
in  his  year's  course  of  sermons.  Among  many  re- 
markable passages  of  the  same  character  in  those 
discourses,  I  have  selected  this  as  the  most  so.  "But 
when  this  Lion  of  the  tribe  of  Judah  shall  appear, 
then  Justice  shall  strike  and  Mercy  shall  not  hold 
her  hands ;  she  shall  strike  sore  strokes,  and  Pity 
shall  not  break  the  blow.  As  there  are  treasures  of 
good  things,,  so  hath  God  a  treasure  of  wrath  and 
fury,  and  scourges  and  scorpions;  and  then  shall  be 
produced  the  shame  of  Lust  and  the  malice  of  Envy, 
and  the  groans  of  the  oppressed  and  the  persecutions 
of  the  saints,  and  the  cares  of  Covetousness  and  the 
troubles  of  Ambition,  and  the  inddence  of  traitor 
and  the  violences  of  rebels,  and  the  rage  of  anger  and 
the  uneasiness  of  impatience,  and  the  restlessness  ol 
67 


58 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


unlawful  desires  ;  and  by  this  time  the  monsters  and 
diseases  will  be  numerous  and  intolerable,  when 
God's  heavy  hand  shall  press  the  sanies  and  the  in- 
tolerableness,  ihe  obliquity  and  the  unreasonableness, 
the  amazement  and  the  disorder,  the  smart  and  the 
Borrow,  the  guilt  and  the  punishment,  out  from  all 
our  sins,  and  pour  them  into  one  chalice,  and  mingle 
them  with  an  infinite  wrath,  and  make  the  wicked 
drink  of  all  the  vengeance,  and  force  it  down  their 
unwilling  throats  with  the  violence  of  devils  and 
accursed  spirits." 

That  this  Tartarean  drench  displays  the  imagina- 
tion rather  than  the  discretion  of  the  compounder; 
that,  in  short,  this  passage  and  others  of  the  kind 
are  in  a  bad  taste,  few  will  deny  at  the  present  day. 
It  would  doubtless  have  more  behoved  the  good 
bishop  not  to  be  wise  beyond  what  is  written,  on  a 
subject  in  which  Eternity  is  opposed  to  Time,  and  a 
death  threatened,  not  the  negative,  but  the  positive 
Oppositive  of  Life  ;  a  subject,  therefore,  which  must 
of  necessity  be  indescribable  to  the  human  under- 
standing in  our  present  state.  But  I  can  neither  find 
nor  believe,  that  it  ever  occurred  to  any  reader  to 
ground  on  such  passages  a  charge  against  Bishop 
Taylor's  humanity,  or  goodness  of  heart.  I  was 
not  a  little  surprised  therefore  to  find,  in  the  Pur- 
suits of  Literature  and  other  works,  so  horrible  a 
sentence  passed  on  Milton's  moral  character,  for  a 
passage  in  Ms  prose-writings,  as  nearly  parallel  to 
this  of  Taylor's  as  two  passages  can  well  be  con- 
ceived to  be.  All  his  merits,  as  a  poet  forsooth — all 
the  glory  of  having  written  the  Paradise  Lost,  are 
light  in  the  scale,  nay,  kick  the  beam,  compared 
with  the  atrocious  malignity  of  heart  expressed  in 
the  offensive  paragraph.  I  remembered,  in  general, 
that  Milton  had  concluded  one  of  his  works  on  Re- 
formation, written  in  the  fervor  of  his  youthful  im- 
agination, in  a  high  poetic  strain,  that  wanted  metre 
only  to  become  a  lyrical  poem.  I  remembered  that 
in  the  former  part  he  had  formed  to  himself  a  perfect 
ideal  of  human  virtue,  a  character  of  heroic,  disin- 
terested zeal  and  devotion  for  Truth,  Religion,  and 
public  Liberty,  in  Act  and  in  Suffering,  in  the  day 
of  Triumph  and  in  the  hour  of  Martyrdom.  Such 
spirits,  as  more  excellent  than  others,  he  describes 
as  having  a  more  excellent  reward,  and  as  distin- 
guished by  a  transcendent  glory :  and  this  reward 
and  this  glory  he  displays  and  particularizes  with  an 
energy  and  brilliance  that  announced  the  Paradise 
Lost  as  plainly  as  ever  the  bright  purple  clouds  in 
the  east  announced  the  coming  of  the  sun.  Milton 
then  passes  to  the  gloomy  contrast,  to  such  men  as 
from  motives  of  selfish  ambition  and  the  lust  of  per- 
sonal aggrandizement  should,  against  their  own  light, 
persecute  truth  and  the  true  religion,  and  wilfully 
abuse  the  powers  and  gifts  intrusted  to  them,  to 
bring  vice,  blindness,  misery  and  slavery,  on  their 
native  country,  on  the  very  country  that  had  trusted, 
enriched  and  honored  them.  Such  beings,  after  that 
speedy  and  appropriate  removal  from  their  sphere  of 
miscljief  which  all  good  and  humane  men  must  of 
course  desire,  will,  lie  lakes  for  granted  by  parity  of 
reason,  meet  with  a  punishment,  an  ignominy,  and  a 
retaliation,  as  much  severer  than  other  wicked  men, 
as  their  guilt  and  its  consequences  were  more  enor- 
mous. His  description  of  this  imaginary  punishment 
presents  more  distinct  pictures  to  the  fancy  than  the 
extract  from  Jeremy  Taylor;  but  the  thoughts  in  the 
latter  are  incomparably  more  exaggerated  and  hor- 
rific.   All  this  I  knew ;  but  I  neither  remembered, 


nor  by  reference  and  careful  re-perusal  could  dis 
cover,  any  other  meaning,  either  in  Milton  or  Taj  lor 
but  that  good  men  will  be  rewarded,  and  the  impen- 
itent wicked  punished,  in  proportion  to  their  disposi- 
tions  and  intentional  acts  in  this  life ;  and  that  if  the 
punishment  of  the  least  wicked  be  fearful  beyond 
conception,  all  words  and  descriptions  must  be  so  far 
true,  that  they  must  fall  short  oi  the  punishment  that 
awaits  the  transcendently  wicked.  Had  Milton  stated 
either  his  ideal  of  virtue,  or  of  depravity,  as  an  indi- 
vidual or  individuals  actually  existing?  Certainly  not 
Is  this  representation  worded  historically,  or  only  hy- 
pothetically  ?  Assuredly  the  latter !  Does  he  express 
it  as  his  own  wish,  that  after  death  they  should  suffer 
these  tortures  ?  or  as  a  general  consequence,  deduced 
from  reason  and  revelation,  that  such  will  be  their 
fate?  Again,  the  latter  only!  His  wish  is  expressly  con- 
fined to  a  speedy  stop  being  put  by  Providence  to 
their  power  of  inflicting  misery  on  others !  But  did  he 
name  or  refer  to  any  persons,  living  or  dead?  No! 
But  the  calumniators  of  Milton  dare  say  (for  what 
will  calumny  not  dare  say  ?)  that  he  had  Laud  and 
Stafford  in  his  mind,  while  writing  of  remorseless 
persecution,  and  the  enslavement  of  a  free  Country, 
from  motives  of  selfish  ambition.  Now7,  what  if  a 
stern  anti-prelatist  should  dare  say,  that  in  speaking 
of  the  i7isolcncies  of  traitors  and  the  violences  of  rt  lids. 
Bishop  Taylor  must  have  individualized  in  his  mind, 
Hampden,  Hollis,  Pym,  Fairfax,  Ireton,  and  Mil- 
ton? And  what  if  he  should  take  the  liberty  of  con- 
cluding, that,  in  the  after  description,  the  Bishop  was 
feeding  and  feasting  his  party-hatred,  and  with  those 
individuals  before  the  eyes  of  his  imagination  enjoy- 
ing, trait  by  trait,  horror  after  horror,  the  picture  of 
their  intolerable  agonies?  Yet  this  bigot  would  have 
an  equal  right  thus  to  criminate  the  one  good  and 
great  man,  as  these  men  have  to  criminate  the  other. 
Milton  has  said,  and  I  doubt  not  but  that  Taylor  with 
equal  truth  could  have  said  it,  "  that  in  his  whole 
life  he  never  spake  against  a  man  even  that  hi.--  .-kin 
should  be  grazed."  He  asserted  this  when  one  of  his 
opponents  (either  Bishop  Hall  or  his  nephew)  had 
called  upon  the  women  and  children  in  the  streets 
to  take  up  stones  and  stone  him  (Milton).  It  is 
known  that  Milton  repeatedly  used  his  interest  to 
protect  the  royalists ;  but  even  at  a  time  when  all 
lies  would  have  been  meritorious  against  him,  no 
charge  was  made,  no  story  pretended,  that  he  hnd 
ever  directly  or  indirectly  engaged  or  assisted  in 
their  persecution.  Oh !  methinks  there  are  other  and 
far  better  feelings,  which  should  be  acquired  by  the 
perusal  of  our  great  elder  writers.  When  I  have 
before  me  on  the  same  table,  the  works  of  Hammond 
and  Baxter  :  when  I  reflect  with  what  joy  and  de  :r 
ness  their  blessed  spirits  are  now  loving  each  other 
it  seems  a  mournful  thing  that  their  names  should 
be  perverted  to  an  occasion  of  bitterness  among  us, 
who  arc  enjoying  that  happy  mean  which  the 
too-much  on  both  sides  was  perhaps  necessary  lo 
produce.  "  The  tangle  of  delusions  which  stifled  and 
distorted  the  growing  tree  of  our  well-being  has  Icon 
torn  away  !  the  parasite  weeds  that  fed  on  its  very 
roots  have  been  plucked  up  with  a  salutary  violence 
To  us  there  remain  only  quiet  duties,  the  constant 
care,  the  gradual  improvement,  the  cautious  un- 
hazardous labors  of  the  industrious  though  contented 
gardener — to  prune,  to  strengthen,  to  engraft,  and 
one  by  one  to  remove  from  its  leaves  and  fresh 
shoots  the  slug  and  the  caterpillar.  But  far  be 
it  from  us  to  undervalue  with  light  and  senseless 
68 


SIBYLLINE  LEAVES. 


59 


detraction  the  conscientious  hardihood  of  our  prede- 
cessors, or  even  to  condemn  in  them  that  vehemence, 
to  which  the  blessings  it  won  for  us  leave  us  now 
neither  temptation  or  pretext.  We  antedate  the 
/( i  tings,  in  order  to  criminate  the  authors,  of  our  pres- 
ent Liberty,  Light  and  Toleration."  (The  Friend, 
p.  54.) 

If  ever  two  great  men  might  seem,  during  their 
whole  lives,  to  have  moved  in  direct  opposition,  though 
neither  of  them  has  at  any  time  introduced  the 
name  of  the  other,  Milton  and  Jeremy  Taylor  were 
they.  The  former  commenced  his  career  by  attack- 
ing the  Church-Liturgy  and  all  set  forms  of  prayer. 
The  latter,  but  far  more  successfully,  by  defending 
both  Milton's  next  work  was  then  against  the  Pre- 
lacy and  the  then  existing  Church-Government — 
Taylor's  in  vindication  and  support  of  them.  Milton 
became  more  and  more  a  stem  republican,  or  rather 
an  advocate  for  that  religious  and  moral  aristocracy 
which,  in  his  day,  was  called  republicanism,  and 
which,  even  more  than  royalism  itself,  is  the  direct 
antipode  of  modern  jacobinism.  Taylor,  as  more  and 
more  sceptical  concerning  the  fitness  of  men  in  general 
for  power,  became  more  and  more  attached  to  the 
prerogatives  of  monarchy.  From  Calvinism,  with  a 
still  decreasing  respect  for  Fathers,  Councils,  and  for 
Church-Antiquity  in  general,  Milton  seems  to  have 
ended  in  an  indifference,  if  not  a  dislike,  to  all  forms 
of  ecclesiastic  government,  and  to  have  retreated 
wholly  into  the  inward  and  spiritual  church-commu- 
nion of  his  own  spirit  with  the  Light,  that  lighteth 
every  man  that  cometh  into  the  world.  Taylor,  with 
a  growing  reverence  for  authority,  an  increasing 
sense  of  the  insufficiency  of  the  Scriptures  without 
the  aids  of  tradition  and  the  consent  of  authorized 
interpreters,  advanced  as  far  in  his  approaches  (not 
indeed  to  Popery,  but)  to  Catholicism,  as  a  conscien- 
tious minister  of  the  English  Church  could  well  ven- 
ture. Milton  would  be,  and  would  utter  the  same, 
to  all,  on  all  occasions :  he  would  tell  the  truth,  the 
whole  truth,  and  nothing  but  the  truth.  Taylor 
would  become  all  things  to  all  men,  if  by  any 
means  he  might  benefit  any ;  hence  he  availed  him- 
self, in  his  popular  writings,  of  opinions  and  repre- 
sentations which  stand  often  in  striking  contrast  with 
the  doubts  and  convictions  expressed  in  his  more 
philosophical  works.  He  appears,  indeed,  not  too 
severely  to  have  blamed  that  management  of  truth 
{islam  falsitatem  dispensativam)  authorized  and  ex- 
emplified by  almost  all  the  fathers:  Integrum  omnino 
Doctoribus  et  ccetus  Christiain  antistibus  esse,  ut  dolos 
vei  sent,  falsa  veris  intermisrcant  et  imprimis  rcJigionis 
kostes  fallant,  dummodo  veritatis  commodis  et  utilitali 
inserviant. 

The  same  antithesis  might  be  carried  on  with  the 
elements  of  their  several  intellectual  powers.  Mil 
ton,  austere,  condensed,  imaginative,  supporting  hi 
truth  by  direct  enunciations  of  lofty  moral  senti 
ment  and  by  distinct  visual  representations,  and  in 
the  same  spirit  overwhelming  what  he  deemed  false- 
hood by  moral  denunciation  and  a  succession  of  pic- 
tures appalling  or  repulsive.  In  his  prose,  so  many 
metaphors,  so  many  allegorical  miniatures.  Taylor, 
eminently  discursive,  accumulative,  and  (to  use  one 
of  his  own  words)  aggloTnerative  ;  still  more  rich  in 
images  than  Milton  himself,  but  images  of  Fancy, 
and  presented  to  the  common  and  passive  eye,  rather 
than  to  the  eye  of  the  imagination.  Whether  sup- 
porting or  assailing,  he  makes  his  way  either  by  ar- 
gument or  by  appeals  to  the  affections,  unsurpassed 


even  by  the  Schoolmen  in  subtlety,  agility  and  Iftgic 
wit,  and  unrivalled  by  the  most  rhetorical  of  the 
fathers  in  the  copiousness  and  vividness  of  his  ex- 
pressions and  illustrations.  Here  words  that  eon- 
\i  j  feelings, and  words  that  Hush  images,  and  wotds 
of  abstract  notion,  How  together,  and  a!  once  whirl 
and  rush  onward  like  a  stream,  at  once  rapid  and 
full  of  eddies;  and  yet  still  interfused  here  and  there 
we  see  a  tongue  or  isle  of  smooth  water,  with  some 
picture  in  it  of  earth  or  sky,  landscape  or  living 
group  of  quiet  beauty. 

Differing,  (hen,  so  widely,  and  almost  contrariant- 
ly,  wherein  did  these  great  men  agree?  wherein 
did  they  resemble  each  other?  In  Genius,  in 
Learning,  in  unfeigned  Piety,  in  blameless  Parity 
of  Life,  and  in  benevolent  aspirations  and  put 
for  the  moral  and  temporal  improvement  of  their  fel- 
low-creatures! Both  of  them  wrote  a  Latm  Acci- 
dence, to  render  education  more  easy  and  less  pain- 
ful to  children;  both  of  them  composed  hymns  and 
psalms  proportioned  to  the  capacity  of  common  con- 
gregations ;  both,  nearly  at  the  same  time,  set  the 
glorious  example  of  publicly  recommending  and  sup- 
porting general  Toleration,  and  the  Liberty  both  of 
the  Pulpit  and  the  Press!  In  the  writings  of  neither 
shall  we  find  a  single  sentence,  like  those  meek 
deliverances  to  God's  mercy,  with  which  Laud  ac- 
companied his  votes  for  the  mutilations  and  lothe- 
some  dungeoning  of  Leighton  and  others! — nowhere 
such  a  pious  prayer  as  we  find  in  Bishop  Hall's 
memoranda  of  his  own  Life,  concerning  the  subtle 
and  witty  Atheist  that  so  grievously  perplexed  and 
gravelled  him  at  Sir  Robert  Drury's,  till  he  prayed  to 
the  Lord  to  remove  him,  and  behold !  his  prayers 
were  heard;  for  shortly  afterward  this  Philistine 
combatant  went  to  London,  and  there  perished  of 
the  plague  in  great  misery !  In  short,  now  here  shall 
we  find  the  least  approach,  in  the  lives  and  writings 
of  John  Milton  or  Jeremy  Taylor,  to  that  guarded 
gentleness,  to  that  sighing  reluctance,  with  which 
the  holy  Brethren  of  the  Inquisition  deliver  over  a 
condemned  heretic  to  the  civil  magistrate,  recom- 
mending him  to  mercy,  and  hoping  that  the  magis- 
trate will  treat  the  erring  brother  with  all  possible 
mildness  ! — the  magistrate,  who  too  well  knows  what 
would  be  his  own  fate,  if  he  dared  offend  them  by 
acting  on  their  recommendation. 

The  opportunity  of  diverting  the  reader  from  my- 
self to  characters  more  worthy  of  his  attention,  has 
led  me  far  beyond  my  first  intention  ;  but  it  is  not 
unimportant  to  expose  the  false  zeal  which  has  occa- 
sioned these  attacks  on  our  elder  patriots.  It  has 
been  too  much  the  fashion,  first  to  personify  the 
Church  of  England,  and  then  to  speak  of  different 
individuals,  who  in  different  ages  have  been  rulers 
in  that  church,  as  if  in  some  strange  way  t/iet/  con- 
stituted its  personal  identity.  Why  should  a  clergy- 
man of  the  present  day  feel  interested  in  the  defence 
of  Laud  or  Sheldon  !  Surely  it  is  sufficient  for  the 
warmest  partisan  of  our  establishment,  that  he  can 
assert  with  truth, — when  our  Church  persecuted,  it 
was  on  mistaken  principles  held  in  common  by  all 
Christendom  ;  and,  at  all  events,  far  less  culpable 
was  this  intolerance  in  the  Bishops,  who  were  main- 
taining the  existing  laws,  than  the  persecuting  spirit 
afterwards  shown  by  their  successful  opponents,  who 
had  no  such  excuse,  and  who  should  have  been 
taught  mercy  by  their  own  sufferings,  and  wisdom  by 
the  utter  failure  of  the  experiment  in  their  own  case. 
We  can  say,  that  our  Church,  apostolical  in  its  faith, 
69 


10 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


primitive  in  its  ceremonies,  unequalled  in  its  liturgical 
forms ;  that  our  Church,  which  has  kindled  and  dis- 
played more  bright  and  burning  lights  of  Genius  and 
Learning,  than  all  other  Protestant  churches  since 
•he  Reformation,  was  (with  the  single  exception  of 
!he  times  of  Laud  and  Sheldon)  least  intolerant, 
when  all  Christians  unhappily  deemed  a  species  of 
ntolerance  their  religious  duty;  that  Bishops  of  our 
church  were  among  the  first  that  contended  against 
this  error;  and  finally,  that  since  the  Reformation, 
when  tolerance   became  a  fashion,  the  Church  of 


England,  in  a  tolerating  age,  has  shown  herself  emi 
nently  tolerant,  and  far  more  so,  both  in  Spirit  and  in 
fact,  that  many  of  her  most  bitter  opponents,  who 
profess  to  deem  toleration  itself  an  insult  on  the 
rights  of  mankind  !  As  to  myself,  who  not  only  know 
the  Church-Establishment  to  be  tolerant,  but  who 
see  in  it  the  greatest,  if  not  the  sole  safe  bulwark  of 
Toleration,  I  feel  no  necessity  of  defending  or  pal- 
liating oppressions  under  the  two  Charleses,  in  order 
to  exclaim  with  a  full  and  fervent  heart,  esto  pfi 
petua ! 


&Ue  iUtuc  o€  tfie  Ancient  if&avincr* 

IN  SEVEN  PARTS. 


Facile  credo,  plures  esse  Naturas  invisibles  quam  visibiles  in  rerum  universitate.  Sed  horum  omnium 
familiam  quia  nobis  enarrabit  ?  et  gradus  et  cognationes  et  discrimina  et  singulorum  munera?  Quid 
agunt ?  quK  loca  habitant  ?  Harum  rertim  notitiam  semper  ambivit  ingenium  humanum,  nunquam 
attigit.  Juvat,  interea,  non  diffiteor,  quandoque  in  aninio,  tanquam  in  tabula,  majoris  et  melioris  mundi 
imaginemcontemplari:  ne  mens  assnefacta  hodierna;  vita;  mimitiis  se  contraliat  nimis,  et  totasubsidat 
in  pusillas  cogitatione6.  Sed  veritati  interea  invigilandum  est,  modusque  servandus,  ut  certa  ab 
incertis,  diem  anocte,  distinguamus.— T.  Burnet:  Archocol.  Phil  p.  68. 


An  ancient  Mari- 
ner meeteth  three 
gallants  bidden  to 
a  wedding-feast, 
and  detaineth 


PART  I. 

It  is  an  ancient  Mariner, 
And  he  stoppeth  one  of  three : 
"  By  thy  long  gray  beard  and  glitter- 
ing eye, 
Now  wherefore  stopp'st  thou  me  ? 

"  The  Bridegroom's  doors  are  open'd 

wide, 
And  I  am  next  of  kin  ; 
The  guests  are  met,  the  feast  is  set : 
Mayst  hear  the  merry  din." 

He  holds  him  with  his  skinny  hand  : 

"  There  was  a  ship,"  quoth  he. 

"  Hold  off!  unhand  me,  gray-beard 

loon ! " 
Eftsoons  his  hand  dropt  he. 

He  holds  him  with  his  glittering  eye — 
The  Wedding-Guest  stood  still, 
And  listens  like  a  three-years'  child  ; 
The  Mariner  hath  his  will. 

The  Wedding-Guest  sat  on  a  stone, 
He  cannot  choose  but  hear  ; 
And  thus  spake  on  that  ancient  man, 
The  bright-eyed  mariner. 

The  ship  was  cheer'd,    the  harbor 

clear'd, 
Merrily  dicl  we  drop 
Below  the  kirk,  below  the  hill, 
Below  the  light-house  top. 

The  Mariner  tells  The  Sun  came  up  upon  the  left, 

how  the  ship  sail-  Out  of  the  sea  came  he  ! 

ed  southward         An(J  h    gh         brj   ,  d         h      •  h 

with  a  good  wind  .        e.    '  ° 

and  fair  weather,   Went  down  into  tne  sea. 

till  it  reached  the 

line  Higher  and  higher  every  day, 

Till  over  the  mast  at  noon 

The  Wedding-Guest   here  beat  his 

breast, 
For  he  heard  the  loud  bassoon. 


The  wedding- 
guest  is  spell- 
bound by  the  eye 
of  the  old  seafar- 
ing man,  and  con- 
strained to  hear 
his  tale. 


The  bride  hath  paced  into  the  hall,     The  wedding- 
Red  as  a  rose  is  she ;  JjJJjj*  h^h  *■ 
Nodding  their  heads  before  her  goes  ^e  Mariner  con- 
The  merry  minstrelsy.                            tinueth  his  tale. 
The   Wedding-Guest    he    beat   his 

breast, 
Yet  he  cannot  choose  but  hear  ; 
And  thus  spake  on  that  ancient  man, 
The  bright-eyed  Mariner. 

And  now  the  storm-blast  came,  and  The  ship  drawn 
he  by  a  storm  toward 

Was  tyrannous  and  strong :  tne  S0UtD  P°le- 

He  struck  with  his  o'ertaking  wings, 
And  chased  us  south  along. 

With  sloping  masts  and  dripping  prow, 
As  who  pursued  with  yell  and  blow 
Still  treads  the  shadow  of  his  foe, 
And  forward  bends  his  head, 
The  ship  drove  fast,  loud  roar'd  the 

blast, 
And  southward  aye  we  fled. 

And  now  there  came  both  mist  and 

snow, 
Aud  it  grew  wondrous  cold; 
And  ice,  mast-high,  came  floating  by, 
As  green  as  emerald. 

And  through  the  drifts  the  snowy  clifts  The  land  of  ice. 

Did  send  a  dismal  sheen:  and  °r  fearful 

Nor  shapes   of  men  nor  beasts  we  founda ;"'hcre  n<> 
,      r  living  thing  was 

Ken  (0  De  seen. 

The  ice  was  all  between. 

The  ice  was  here,  the  ice  was  there, 

The  ice  was  all  around  : 

It  crack'd  and  growl'd,  and  roar'd  and 

howl'd, 
Like  noises  in  a  swound  ! 

At  length  did  cross  an  Albatross: 
Thorough  the  fog  it  came ; 
As  if  it  had  been  a  Christian  soul, 
We  hail'd  it  in  God's  name. 

70 


Till  a  great  sea- 
bird,  called  the 
Albatross,  came 
through  thes-now 
t'otr,  ami  was  re- 
ceived with  great 
joy  and  hospital 
ity- 


THE  ANCIENT  MARINER. 


61 


And  lo  !    the  Al- 
batross proveth 
a  bird  of  good 
omen,  and  follow 
etli  the  ship  as  it 
returned  north- 
ward through  fog 
and  floating  ice. 


It  ate  the  food  it  ne'er  had  eat, 
And  round  and  round  it  flew. 
The  ice  did  split  with  a  thunder-fit ; 
The  helmsman  steer'd  us  through  ! 

And  a  good  south-wind  sprung  up 

behind ; 
The  Albatross  did  follow, 
And  every  day,  for  food  or  play, 
Came  to  the  mariner's  hollo ! 

In  mist  or  cloud,  on  mast  or  shroud, 
It  perch'd  for  vespers  nine  ; 
Whiles  all  the   night,  through   fog- 
smoke  white, 
Glimmer'd  the  white  moon-shine. 


The  ancient  Mari-  "God  save  thee,  ancient  Mariner! 
ner  inhospitably    From  the   fiends,   that 'plague  thee 
killeth  the  pious  tn„s  i 

omen?     °    °        Why  look'st   thou  so  ? " — With   my 
cross-bow 
I  shot  the  Albatross. 

PART  II. 

The  Sun  now  rose  upon  the  right : 
Out  of  the  sea  came  he, 
Still  hid  in  mist,  and  on  the  left 
Went  down  into  the  sea. 

And  the  good  south-wind  still  blew 

behind, 
But  no  sweet  bird  did  follow, 
Nor  any  day  for  food  or  play 
Came  to  the  mariner's  hollo ! 

His  shipmates  cry  And  I  had  done  an  hellish  tiling, 
out  against  the      And  it  would  work  'em  woe : 
ancient  Manner     For     „  u  j  ,    d  ^-j    h     wrf 

for  killing  the  bird  » 

of  good-luck.         1  hat  made  the  breeze  to  blow. 

Ah  wretch  !  said  they,  the  bird  to 
slay, 

That  made  the  breeze  to  blow ! 

Nor  dim   nor  red,   like   God's  own 

head. 
The  glorious  Sun  uprist : 
Then  all  averr'd,  I  had  kill'd  the  bird 
That  brought  the  fog  and  mist. 
'T  was  right,  said  they,  such  birds  to 

slay 
That  bring  the  fog  and  mist. 

The  fair  breeze  blew,  the  white  foam 

flew, 
The  furrow  follow'd  free  ; 
We  were  the  first  that  ever  burst 
Into  that  silent  sea. 

Down  dropt  the  breeze,  the  sails  dropt 

down, 
'T  was  sad  as  sad  could  be ; 
And  we  did  speak  only  to  break 
The  silence  of  the  sea  ! 

All  in  a  hot  and  copper  sky, 
The  bloody  Sun,  at  noon, 
Right  up  above  the  mast  did  stand, 
No  bigger  than  the  Moon. 
G2 


But  when  the  fog 
cleared  off,  they 
justify  the  same, 
and  thus  make 
themselves  ac- 
complices in  the 
crime. 


The  fair  breeze 
continues  ;   the 
ship  enters  the 
Pacific  Ocean  and 
sails  northward, 
even  till  it  reach- 
es the  Line. 

The  ship  hath 
been  suddenly 
heca.med. 


Day  a  Iter  day,  day  after  day, 
We  stuck,  nor  breath  nor  motion; 
As  idle  as  a  painted  ship 
Upon  a  painted  ocean. 

Water,  water,  everywhere, 
And  all  the  boards  did  shrink  : 
Water,  water,  everywhere, 
Nor  any  drop  to  drink. 

The  very  deep  did  rot :  0  Christ ! 
That  ever  this  should  be ! 
Yea,  slimy  things  did  crawl  with  legs 
Upon  the  slimy  sea. 

About,  about,  in  reel  and  rout 
The  death-fires  danced  at  night ; 
The  water,  like  a  witch's  oils, 
Burnt  green,  and  blue  and  white. 


And  the  Alba- 
tross begins  to  b- 
avenged. 


A  spirit  had  fol- 
lowed them :  one 
of  the  invisible  in- 


And  some  in  dreams  assured  were 
Of  the  spirit  that  plagued  us  so  ; 
Nine  fathom  deep  he  had  follow'd  us  habitants  of  this 
From  the  land  of  mist  and  snow.         planet  -neither 

departed  souls 
nor  angels ;  con- 
cerning whom  the  learned  Jew,  Josephus,  and  the  Platonic 
Constantinopolitan,  Michael  Psellus,  may  be  consulted.  They 
are  very  numerous,  and  there  is  no  climate  or  element  without 
one  or  more. 

And   every  tongue,    through   utter 

drought, 
Was  wither'd  at  the  root ; 
We  could  not  speak,  no  more  than  if 
We  had  been  choked  with  soot. 


Ah  !  well-a-day !  what  evil  looks 
Had  I  from  old  and  young ! 
Instead  of  the  cross,  the  Albatross 
About  my  neck  was  hung. 


PART  III 


The  shipmates,  in 
their  sore  distress 
would  lain  throw 
the  whole  guilt  on 
the  ancient  Mar- 
iner : — in  si«n 
whereof  they 
hang  the  dead 
sea-bird  round 
his  neck. 


Each 


The  ancient  Ma- 
riner beholdeth  a 
sign  in  the  ele- 
ment afar  off 


There  pass'd  a  weary  time 

throat 
Was  parch'd,  and  glazed  each  eye. 
A  weary  time  !  a  weary  time ! 
How  glazed  each  weary  eye, 
When  looking  westward,  I  beheld 
A  something  in  the  sky. 

At  first  it  seem'd  a  little  speck, 
And  then  it  seem'd  a  mist; 
It  moved  and  moved,  and  took  at  last 
A  certain  shape,  I  wist. 

A  speck,  a  mist,  a  shape,  I  wist ! 
And  still  it  near'd  and  near'd  : 
As  if  it  dodged  a  water-sprite, 
It  plunged  and  tack'd  and  veer'd. 


With   throats  unslaked,  with  black  At  its  nearer  ap- 

lips  baked,  p.r°a^h-  il  sfm" 

_-  , -,  ,        ,  .,  eth  him  to  be  a 

We  could  nor  laugh  nor  wail ;  Bnjp  .    and  at  a 

Through  utter  drought  all  dumb  we  dear  ransom   he 

Stood  •  freeth  his  speech 

I  bit  my  arm,  I  suck'd  the  blood,         *^lhe  bonda  0l 

And  cried,  A  sail !  a  sail ! 

71 


02 


COLERTDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


With  throats  unslaked,  with  black 

lips  baked, 
Agape  they  heard  me  call ; 
A  flash  of  joy.      Gramercy  !  they  for  joy  did  grin, 

And  all  at  once  their  breath  drew  in, 
As  they  were  drinking  all. 

And  horror  fol-     geet  see;  (j  cried)  she  tacks  no  more! 

.ows:  for  can  it  be  Hi(her  fe  ug        rf 

a  ship,  that  cornea  ' 

onward  without    Without  a  breeze,  without  a  tide, 

wind  or  tide  1        She  steadies  with  upright  keel ! 

The  western  wave  was  all  a  flame, 
The  day  was  well-nigh  done, 
Almost  upon  the  western  wave 
Rested  the  broad  bright  Sun ; 
When  that  strange  shape  drove  sud- 
denly 
Betwixt  us  and  the  Sun. 


It  seemeth  him 
but  the  skeleton 
of  a  ship. 


And  its  ribs  are 
seen  as  bars  on 
the  face  of  the 
setting  Sun. 

The  spectre- 
woman  and  her 
death-mate,  and 
no  other  onboard 
'he  skeleton-ship. 
Like  vessel,  like 


Death,  and  Life- 
t  a- Death  have 
diced  for  the 
ship's  crew,  and 
she  (the  latter) 
winneth  the  an- 
cient Mariner. 

No  twilight 
within  the  courts 
of  the  sun. 


At  the  rising  of 
he  moon. 


And  straight   the  Sun  was   fleck'd 

with  bars, 
(Heaven's  Mother  send  us  grace !) 
As  if  through  a  dungeon-grate   he 

peer'd 
With  broad  and  burning  face. 

Alas  !  (thought  I,  and  my  heart  beat 

loud) 
How  fast  she  nears  and  nears ! 
Are  those  her  sails  that  glance  in  the 

Sun, 
Like  restless  gossameres  ? 

Are  those  her  ribs  through  which  the 

Sun 
Did  peer,  as  through  a  grate  ; 
And  is  that  woman  all  her  crew  ? 
Is  that  a  Death,  and  are  there  two  ? 
Is  Death  that  woman's  mate  ? 

Her  lips  were  red,  her  looks  were 

'     free, 
Her  locks  were  yellow  as  gold  : 
Her  skin  was  as  white  as  leprosy, 
The  Night-Mare  Life-in-Death  was 

she, 
Who  thicks  man's  blood  with  cold. 

The  naked  hulk  alongside  came, 
And  the  twain  were  casting  dice  ; 
"  The  game  is  done  !  I  've  won,  I  've 

won ! " 
Quoth  she,  and  whistles  thrice. 

The  Sun's  rim  dips ;  the  stars  rush 

out: 
At  one  stride  comes  the  Dark  ; 
With  far-heard  whisper,  o'er  the  sea 
Off  shot  the  spectre-bark. 

We  listen'd  and  look'd  sideways  up ! 
Fear  at  my  heart,  as  at  a  cup, 
My  life-blood  seem'd  to  sip ! 
The  stars  were  dim,  and  thick  the 

night, 
The  steersman's   face  by  his  lamp 

gleam'd  white  ; 
From  the  sails  the  dew  did  drip- 
Till  clomb  above  the  eastern  bar 
The  horned  Moon,  with  one  bright 

star 
Within  the  nether  tip. 


One    after  one,  by  the  star-dogged  One  after  an 
Moon,  other, 

Too  quick  for  groan  or  sigh, 

Each  turn'd  his  face  with  a  ghastly 
pang, 

And  cursed  me  with  his  eye. 

Four  times  fifty  living  men  His  shipmates 

(And  I  heard  nor  sigh  nor  groan),        &<>?  down  dead 
With  heavy  thump,  a  lifeless  lump, 
They  dropp'd  down  one  by  one. 

The  souls  did  from  their  bodies  fly, —  gut  TAfe-in- 

They  fled  to  bliss  or  woe !  Death  begins  hei 

And  every  soul,  it  pass'd  me  by  work  on  ,ne  an" 

Like  the  whizz  of  my  cross-bow  !  Clent  Mar,ner' 

PART  IV. 

"  I  fear  thee,  ancient  Mariner!  The  wedding- 

t  c        .,        ,  ■  ,        i  I  guest  feareth  that 

I  fear  thy  skinny  hand  !  a  gpirit  h  ta,king 

And  thou   art  long,   and  lank,  and  to  him ; 

brown, 

As  is  the  ri'ob'd  sea-sand.* 


But  the  ancient 
Mariner  assureth 
him  of  his  bodily 
life,  and  proeeed- 
eth  to  relate  his 
horrible  penance. 


He  despiseth  the 
creatures  of  the 
calm. 


And  envieth  that 
they  should  live, 
and  so  many  lie 
dead. 


"  I  fear  thee  and  thy  glittering  eye, 
And  thy  skinny  hand  so  brown." — 
Fear  not,  fear  not,  thou  Wedding 

Guest ! 
This  body  dropt  not  down. 

Alone,  alone,  all,  all  alone, 
Alone  on  a  wide  wide  sea ! 
And  never  a  saint  took  pity  on 
My  soul  in  agony. 

The  many  men,  so  beautiful ! 

And  they  all  dead  did  lie  : 

And    a    thousand    thousand    slimy 

things 
Lived  on  ;  and  so  did  I. 

I  look'd  upon  the  rotting  sea, 
And  drew  my  eyes  away; 
I  look'd  upon  the  rotting  deck, 
And  there  the  dead  men  lay. 

I  look'd  to  Heaven,  and  tried  to  pray ; 
But  or  ever  a  prayer  had  gush'd, 
A  wicked  whisper  came,  and  made 
My  heart  as  dry  as  dust 

I  closed  my  lids,  and  kept  them  close, 

And  the  balls  like  pulses  beat ; 

For  the  sky  and  the  sea,  and  the  sea 

and  the  sky, 
Lay  like  a  load  on  my  weary  eye 
And  the  dead  were  at  my  feet. 

The  cold  sweat  melted  from  their  But  the  curse  liv- 
limbs  eth  for  him  in  ths 

Nor  rot  nor  reek  did  they ;  [me  ^een<° 

The  look  with  which  they  look'd  on 
Had  never  pass'd  away. 

An  orphan's  curse  would  drag  to  Hell 
A  spirit  from  on  high ; 


*  For  the  two  last  lines  of  this  stanza,  I  am  indebted  to  Mr. 
Wordsworth.  It  was  on  a  delightful  walk  from  Nether  Stowey 
to  Dulverton,  with  him  and  his  sister,  in  the  Autumn  of  1797 
that  this  Poem  was  planned,  and  in  purt  composed. 

72 


THE  ANCIENT  MARINER. 


68 


But  oh !  more  horrible  than  that 
Is  a  curse  in  a  dead  man's  eye  ! 
Seven  days,  seven  nights,  I  saw  that 

curse. 
And  yet  I  could  not  die. 

In  his  loneliness    The  m0ving  Moon  went  up  the  sky, 
^rneS'rards  And  nowhere  d,d  abide: 
the  journeying       Softly  she  was  going  up, 
Moon,  and  the       And  a  star  or  two  beside — 
stars  that  still  so- 
journ, yet  still  move  onward  ;  and  everywhere  the  blue  sky 
belongs  to  them,  and  is  their  appointed  rest,  and  their  native 
country  and  their  own  natural  homes,  which  they  enter  unan- 
nounced, as  lords  that  are  certainly  expected,  and  yet  there  is 
a  silent  joy  at  their  arrival. 

Her  beams  bemock'd  the  sultry  main, 

Like  April  hoar-frost  spread  ; 

But  where  the  ship's  huge  shadow 

lay, 
The  charmed  water  burnt  alway 
A  still  and  awful  red. 


By  the  light  of 
the  Moon  he  be- 
holdeth  God's 
creatures  of  the 
great  calm. 


Beyond  the  shadow  of  the  ship 

I  watch'd  the  water-snakes  : 

They  moved  in  tracks   of   shining 

white, 

And  when  they  rear'd,  the  elfish  light 
Fell  off  in  hoary  flakes. 

Within  the  shadow  of  the  ship 
I  watch'd  their  rich  attire  : 
Blue,  glossy  green,  and  velvet  black, 
They  coil'd  and  swam  ;  and  every 

track 
Was  a  flash  of  golden  fire. 

Their  oeauty  and  O  happy  living  things  !  no  tongue 
their  happiness,      -j^,.  beauty  might  declare  . 

A  spring  of  love  gush'd  from  my 
heart, 
He  blesseth  them  And  I  bless'd  them  unaware  : 
in  his  heart.  gure  my  y^j  gamt  tQok  ^  Qn  m(j> 

And  I  bless'd  them  unaware. 

The  spell  begins    The  self-same  moment  I  could  pray  ; 
And  from  my  neck  so  free 
The  Albatross  fell  off,  and  sank 
Like  lead  into  the  sea. 

PART  V. 

Oh  Sleep!  it  is  a  gentle  thing, 
Beloved  from  pole  to  pole  ! 
To  Mary  Queen  the  praise  be  given ! 
She    sent    the    gentle    sleep    from 

Heaven, 
That  slid  into  my  soul. 

By  grace  of  the  The  silly  buckets  on  the  deck, 

holy  Mother,  the  That  had  g0  ,  remailVd)       [dew  . 

ancient  Mariner  T    ,  .         °  „,,,i      ., 

is  refreshed  with  *■  dreamt  that  they  were  fill  d  with 

rain.  And  when  I  awoke,  it  rain'd. 

My  lips  were  wet,  my  throat  was  cold, 
My  garments  all  were  dank  ; 
Sure  I  had  drunken  in  my  dreams, 
And  still  my  body  drank. 

I   moved,  and    could   not   feel   my 

limbs  : 
I  was  so  light — almost 
I  thought  that  I  had  died  in  sleep, 
And  was  a  blessed  ghost 


And  soon  I  heard  a  roaring  wind  :       He  heareth 
It  did  not  come  anear;  sounds  and  sceth 

„  .  ,    .  ,  .      ,      ,     ,  .,      strange  sights 

But  with  its  sound  it  shook  the  sails,  an(i  commetioia 

That  were  so  thin  and  sere.  in  the  sky  and 

the  element. 

The  upper  air  burst  into  life ! 
And  a  hundred  fire-flags  sheen. 
To  and  fro  they  were  hurried  about! 
And  to  and  fro,  and  in  and  out, 
The  wan  stars  danced  between. 

And  the  coming  wind  did  roar  more 

loud, 
And  the  sails  did  sigh  like  sedge  ; 
And  the  rain  pour'd  down  from  one 

black  cloud ; 
The  Moon  was  at  its  edge. 

The  thick  black  cloud  was  cleft,  and 

still 

The  Moon  was  at  its  side : 
Like  waters  shot  from  some  high  crag, 
The  lightning  fell  with  never  a  jag, 
A  river  steep  and  wide. 

The  loud  wind  never  reach'd  the  The  bodies  ofthe 
ship  ship's  crew  are 

Yet  now'the  ship  moved  on !  ^^0^ 

Beneath  the  lightning  and  the  Moon 
The  dead  men  gave  a  groan. 

They  groan'd,  they  stirr'd,  they  all 

uprose, 
Nor  spake,  nor  moved  their  eyes ; 
It  had  been  strange,  even  in  a  dream, 
To  have  seen  those  dead  men  rise. 

The    helmsman    steer'd,    the    ship 

moved  on , 
Yet  never  a  breeze  up  blew ; 
The  mariners  all  'gan  work  the  ropes. 
Where  they  were  wont  to  do ; 
They  raised  their  limbs  like  lifeless 

tools 
— We  were  a  ghastly  crew. 

The  body  of  my  brother's  son 
Stood  by  me,  knee  to  knee  : 
The  body  and  I  pull'd  at  one  rope, 
But  he  said  nought  to  me. 


"  I  fear  thee,  ancient  Mariner!" 

Be  calm,  thou  Wedding-guest ! 

'T  was  not  those  souls  that  fled  in 

pain, 
Which  to  their  corses  came  again, 
But  a  troop  of  spirits  blest : 

For  when  it  dawn'd — they  dropp'd 

their  arms, 
And  cluster'd  round  the  mast ; 
Sweet  sounds  rose  slowly  through 

their  mouths, 
And  from  their  bodies  pass'd. 

Around,   around,    flew   each    sweet 

sound, 
Then  darted  to  the  Sun  ; 
Slowly  the  sounds  came  back  again, 
Now  mix'd,  now  one  by  one. 

73 


But  not  by  the 
souls  of  the  men, 
nor  by  daemons  of 
earth  or  middle 
air,  but  by  a 
blessed  troop  of 
angelic  spirits, 
sent  down  by  the 
invocation  of  the 
guardian  saint. 


64 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


The  lonesome 
spirit  from  the 
south-pole  carries 
on  the  ship  as  far 
as  the  line,  in 
obedience  to  the 
angelic  troop,  but 
still   requireth 
vengeance. 


The  Polar  Spirit's 
fellow  daemons, 
the  invisible  in- 
habitants of  the 
element,  take  part 
in  his  wrong; 
and  two  of  them 
relate,  one  to  the 
other,  that  pen- 
ance long  and 
heavy  for  the  an- 
cient Mariner 
hath  been  accord- 
ed to  the  Polar 
Spirit,  who  re- 
turneth   south- 
ward. 


Sometimes,  a-drooping  from  the  sky, 
I  heard  the  sky-lark  sing ; 
Sometimes  all  little  birds  that  are, 
How  they  seem'd  to  fill  the  sea  and 

air, 
With  their  sweet  jargoning  ! 

And  now  't  was  like  all  instruments, 
Now  like  a  lonely  flute ; 
And  now  it  is  an  angel's  song, 
That  makes  the  Heavens  be  mute. 

It  ceased ;  yet  still  the  sails  made  on 

A  pleasant  noise  till  noon, 

A  noise  like  of  a  hidden  brook 

In  the  leafy  month  of  June, 

That  to  the  sleeping  woods  all  night 

Singeth  a  quiet  tune. 

Till  noon  we  quietly  sailed  on, 
Yet  never  a  breeze  did  breathe : 
Slowly  and  smoothly  went  the  ship, 
Moved  onward  from  beneath. 

Under  the  keel  nine  fathom  deep, 
From  the  land  of  mist  and  snow, 
The  spirit  slid  :  and  it  was  he 
That  made  the  ship  to  go. 
The  sails  at  noon  left  off  their  tune, 
And  the  ship  stood  still  also. 

The  Sun,  right  up  above  the  mast, 
Had  fix'd  her  to  the  ocean  : 
But  in  a  minute  she  'gan  stir, 
With  a  short  uneasy  motion — 
Backwards  and   forwards  half  her 

length 
With  a  short  uneasy  motion. 

Then  like  a  pawing  horse  let  go, 
She  made  a  sudden  bound  : 
It  flung  the  blood  into  my  head, 
And  I  fell  down  in  a  swound. 

How  long  in  that  same  fit  I  lay, 
I  have  not  to  declare  ; 
But  ere  my  living  life  return'd, 
I  heard  and  in  my  soul  discern'd 
Two  voices  in  the  air. 

"  Is  it  he  ?"  quoth  one,  "  Is  this  the 

man? 
By  him  who  died  on  cross, 
With  his  cruel  bow  he  laid  full  low 
The  harmless  Albatross. 

"  The  spirit  who  bideth  by  himself 

In  the  land  of  mist  and  snow, 

He  loved   the   bird  that  loved   the 

man 
Who  shot  him  with  his  bow." 

The  other  was  a  softer  voice, 

As  soft  as  honey-dew : 

Quoth  he,  *'  The  man  hath  penance 

done, 
And  penance  more  will  do." 


PART  VI. 

FIRST  VOICE. 

But  tell  me,  tell  me  !  speak  again, 
Thy  soft  response  renewing — 
What  makes   that  ship  drive  on  so 

fast? 
What  is  the  ocean  doing  ? 

SECOND   VOICE. 

Still  as  a  slave  before  his  lord, 
The  ocean  hath  no  blast ; 
His  great  bright  eye  most  silently 
Up  to  the  Moon  is  cast — 

If  he  may  know  which  way  to  go ; 
For  she  guides  him  smooth  or  grim. 
See,  brother,  see  !  how  graciously 
She  looketh  down  on  him. 

FIRST  VOICE. 

But  why  drives  on  that  ship  so  fast, 
Without  or  wave  or  wind  ? 

second  voice. 
The  air  is  cut  away  before, 
And  closes  from  behind. 

Fly,  brother,  fly !   more  high,  more 

high! 
Or  we  shall  be  belated  : 
For  slow  and  slow  that  ship  will  go, 
When  the  Mariner's  trance  is  abated. 

I  woke,  and  we  were  sailing  on 
As  in  a  gentle  weather : 

as  night,  ca 

was  high ; 
The  dead  men  stood  together. 

All  stood  together  on  the  deck, 
For  a  charnel-dungeon  fitter  : 
All  fix'd  on  me  their  stony  eyes, 
That  in  the  Moon  did  glitter. 

The  pang,  the  curse,  with  which  they 

died, 
Had  never  pass'd  away : 
I  could  not  draw  my  eyes  from  theirs, 
Nor  turn  them  up  to  pray. 


And  now  this  spell  w:as  snapt :  once  The  curse  is  fi 

more  nally  expiated. 

I  view'd  the  ocean  green, 
And  look'd  far  forth,  yet  little  saw 
Of  what  had  else  been  seen — 

Like  one,  that  on  a  lonesome  road 

Doth  walk  in  fear  and  dread, 

And  having  once  turn'd  round  walks 

on, 
And  turns  no  more  his  head ; 
Because  he  knows,  a  frightful  fiend 
Doth  close  behind  him  tread. 

But  soon  there  breathed  a  wind  on  me, 
Nor  sound  nor  motion  made  : 
Its  path  was  not  upon  the  sea, 
In  ripple  or  in  shade. 

74 


The  Mariner  hath 
been  cast  into  a 
trance ;  for  the 
angelic  power 
causeth  the  ves- 
sel to  drive  north 
ward  faster  than 
human  life  could 
endure 


The  supernatura 
motion  is  retard- 
ed ;  the  Mariner 
awakes,  and  his 
penance  begins 
anew. 


THE  ANCIENT  MARINER. 


65 


eth  his  native 
country. 


It  raised  my  hair,  it  fann'd  my  cheek 
Like  a  meadow-gale  of  spring — 
It  mingled  strangely  with  my  fears, 
Yet  it  felt  like  a  welcoming. 

Swiftly,  swiftly  flew  the  ship, 
Yet  she  sail'd  softly  too: 
Sweetly,  sweetly  blew  the  breeze — 
On  me  alone  it  blew. 

And  the  ancient    Oh  !  dream  of  joy  !  is  this  indeed 
Mariner  behold-    Tim  light-house  top  I  see  ? 

Is  this  the  hill  ?  is  this  the  kirk  ? 

Is  this  mine  own  countree  ? 

We  drifted  o'er  the  harbor  bar, 
And  I  with  sobs  did  pray — 
O  let  me  be  awake,  my  God ! 
Or  let  me  sleep  alway. 

The  harbor-bay  was  clear  as  glass, 
So  smoothly  it  was  strewn ! 
And  on  the  bay  the  moonlight  lay, 
And  the  shadow  of  the  moon. 

The  rock  shone  bright,  the  kirk  no 

less 
That  stands  above  the  rock : 
The  moonlight  slcep'd  in  silentness 
The  steady  weathercock. 


The  angelic  spir- 
its leave  the 
dead  bodies, 

And  appear  in 
the't  own  forms 
of  light. 


And  the  bay  was  white  with  silent 

light, 
Till,  rising  from  the  same, 
Full  many  shapes  that  shadows  were, 
In  crimson  colors  came. 

A  little  distance  from  the  prow 
Those  crimson  shadows  were  : 
I  turn'd  my  eyes  upon  the  deck — 
Oh,  Christ !  what  saw  I  there  ! 

Each  corse  lay  flat,  lifeless  and  flat ; 
And,  by  the  holy  rood  ! 
A  man  all  light,  a  seraph-man, 
On  every  corse  there  stood. 

This  seraph  band,  each  waved  his 

hand  : 
It  was  a  heavenly  sight ! 
They  stood  as  signals  10  the  land 
Each  one  a  lovely  light  ; 

This  seraph  band,  each  waved  his 

hand, 
No  voice  did  they  impart — 
No  voice ;  but  oh  !  the  silence  sank 
Like  music  on  my  heart. 

But  soon  I  heard  the  dash  of  oars, 
I  heard  the  Pilot's  cheer ; 
My  head  was  turn'd  perforce  away, 
And  I  saw  a  boat  appear. 

The  Pilot  and  the  Pilot's  boy, 
I  heard  them  coming  fast : 
Dear  Lord  in  Heaven !  it  was  a  joy 
The  dead  men  could  not  blast. 

I  saw  a  third — I  heard  his  voice  :  ' 
It  is  the  Hermit  good ! 


He  singeth  loud  his  godly  hymns 

That  he  makes  in  the  wood. 

He'll   shrive  my   soul,  he'll    wash 

away 
The  Albatross's  blood. 

PART  VII. 

This  Hermit  good  lives  in  that  wood  The  Hermit  of 
Which  slopes  down  to  the  sea.  toe  Wood, 

How  loudly  his  sweet  voice  he  rears! 
He  loves  to  talk  with  marineres 
That  come  from  a  far  countree. 

He  kneels  at  morn,  and  noon,  and 

eve — 
He  hath  a  cushion  plump  : 
It  is  the  moss  that  wholly  hides 
The  rotted  old  oak-stump. 

The  skifl-boat  near'd  :  I  heard  them 

talk, 
"  Why  this  is  strange,  I  trow ! 
Where  are  those  lights  so  many  and 

fair, 
That  signal  made  but  now  ? " 

"  Strange,  by  my  faith ! "  the  Hermit  Approacheth  the 
said sn'P  w'to  wonder 

"  And  they  answer  not  our  cheer ! 

The  planks  look   warp'd !    and  see 
those  sails, 

How  thin  they  are  and  sere ! 

I  never  saw  aught  like  to  them, 

Unless  perchance  it  were 

"  Brown  skeletons  of  leaves  that  lag 
My  forest-brook  along ; 
When  the  ivy-tod  is  heavy  with  snow, 
And  the  owlet  whoops  to  the  wolf 

below, 
That  eats  the  she-wolf's  young." 

"  Dear  Lord !  it  hath  a  fiendish  look — 
(The  Pilot  made  reply,) 
I  am  a-fear'd  " — "  Push  on,  push  on ! " 
Said  the  Hermit  cheerily. 

The  boat  came  closer  to  the  ship, 
But  I  nor  spake  nor  stirr'd  ; 
The  boat  came  close  beneath  the  ship, 
And  straight  a  sound  was  heard. 

Under  the  water  it  rumbled  on,  The  ship  suddenly 

Still  louder  and  more  dread:  sinketh. 

It  reach'd  the  ship,  it  split  the  bay ; 
The  ship  went  down  like  lead. 

Stunn'd  by  that  loud   and  dreadful  The  ancient  Ma- 
sound  riner  is  saved  in 

Which  sky'  and  ocean  smote,  the  Pilot,s  boat' 

Like  one  that  hath  been  seven  days 
drown'd 

My  body  lay  afloat ; 

But  swift  as  dreams,  myself  I  found 

Within  the  Pilot's  boat. 

Upon  the  whirl,  where  sank  the  ship, 
The  boat  spun  round  and  round  ; 
And  all  was  still,  save  that  the  hill 
Was  telling  of  the  sound. 

75 


66 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


The  ancient  Ma- 
imer earnestly  en- 
sreateth  the  Her- 
mit to  shrive  him  ; 
and  the  penance 
of  life  falls  on 
him. 


And  ever  and 
anon  throughout 
his  future  life  an 
agony  constrain- 
eth  him  to  travel 
from  land  to  land, 


I  moved  my  lips — the  Pilot  shriek'd. 
And  fell  down  in  a  fit ; 
The  holy  Hermit  raised  his  eyes, 
And  pray'd  where  he  did  sit. 

I  took  the  oars :  the  Pilot's  boy, 

Who  now  doth  crazy  go, 

Laugh 'd  loud  and  long,  and  all  the 

while 
His  eyes  went  to  and  fro. 
"  Ha !  ha ! "  quoth  he, "  full  plain  I  see, 
The  Devil  knows  how  to  row." 

And  now,  all  in  my  own  countree, 

I  stood  on  the  firm  land  ! 

The  Hermit  stepp'd  forth  from  the 

boat, 
And  scarcely  he  could  stand. 

"  0  shrive  me,  shrive  me,  holy  man ! " 

The  Hermit  cross'd  his  brow. 

"  Say  quick,"  quoth  he,  "  I  bid  thee 

say 
— What  manner  of  man  art  thou  ? " 

Forthwith   this  frame  of  mine  was 

wrench'd 
With  a  woful  agony, 
Which  forced  me  to  begin  my  tale ; 
And  then  it  left  me  free. 

Since  then,  at  an  uncertain  hour, 
That  agony  returns  : 
And  till  my  ghastly  tale  is  told, 
This  heart  within  me  burns. 

I  pass,  like  night,  from  land  to  land  ; 
I  have  strange  power  of  speech ; 
That  moment  that  his  face  I  see, 
I  know  the  man  that  must  hear  me  : 
To  him  my  tale  I  teach. 

What  loud  uproar  bursts  from  that 

door ! 
The  wedding-guests  are  there : 


But  in  the  garden-bower  the  bride 
And  bride-maids  singing  are  : 
And  hark !  the  little  vesper-bell, 
Which  biddeth  me  to  prayer. 

O  Wedding-Guest!  this  soul  hath  been 
Alone  on  a  wide  wide  sea  : 
So  lonely  'twas,  that  God  himself 
Scarce  seemed  there  to  be. 

O  sweeter  than  the  marriage-feast, 
'Tis  sweeter  far  to  me, 
To  walk  together  to  the  kirk, 
With  a  goodly  company ! — 

To  walk  together  to  the  kirk, 
And  all  together  pray, 
While  each  to  his  great  Father  bends, 
Old    men,    and    babes,   and   loving 

friends, 
And  youths  and  maidens  gay ! 

Farewell,  farewell !  but  this  I  tell 
To  thee,  thou  Wedding-Guest ! 
He  prayeth  well,  who  loveth  well 
Botli  man  and  bird  and  beast. 

He  prayeth  best,  who  loveth  best 
All  things  both  great  and  small ; 
For  the  dear  God  who  loveth  us, 
He  made  and  loveth  all. 

The  Mariner,  whose  eye  is  bright, 
Whose  beard  with  age  is  hoar, 
Is  gone :  and  now  the  Wedding-Guest 
Turn'd  from  the  bridegroom's  door. 

He  went  like  one  that  hath  been 

stunn'd, 
And  is  of  sense  forlorn, 
A  sadder  and  a  wiser  man 
He  rose  the  morrow  morn. 


And  to  teach,  by 
his  own  example, 
love  and  rever- 
ence to  all  things 
that  Gud  made 
and  loveth. 


(EfmstafceL 


PREFACE* 


The  first  part  of  the  following  poem  was  written  in 
the  year  one  thousand  seven  hundred  and  ninety- 
seven,  at  Stowey  in  the  county  of  Somerset  The 
second  part,  after  my  return  from  Germany,  in  the 
year  one  thousand  eight  hundred,  at  Keswick,  Cum- 
berland. Since  the  latter  date,  my  poetic  powers 
have  been,  till  very  lately,  in  a  state  of  suspended 
animation.  But  as,  in  my  very  first  conception  of  the 
tale,  I  had  the  whole  present  to  my  mind,  with  the 
wholeness,  no  less  than  with  the  loveliness  of  a 
vision,  I  trust  that  I  shall  yet  be  able  to  embody  in 
verse  the  three  parts  yet  to  come. 

It  is  probable,  that  if  the  poem  had  been  finished 


*  To  the  edition  of  1816. 


at  either  of  the  former  periods,  or  if  even  the  first 
and  second  part  had  been  published  in  the  year  1800, 
the  impression  of  its  originality  would  have  beer, 
much  greater  than  I  dare  at  present  expect.  Bu' 
for  this,  I  have  only  my  own  indolence  to  blame 
The  dates  are  mentioned  for  the  exclusive  purpose 
of  precluding  charges  of  plagiarism  or  .servile  imi- 
tation from  myself.  For  there  is  amongst  us  a  set  of 
critics,  who  seem  to  hold,  that  every  possible  thought 
and  image  is  traditional ;  who  have  no  notion  that  there 
are  such  things  as  fountains  in  the  world,  small  as 
well  as  great ;  and  who  would  therefore  charitably 
derive  every  rill  they  behold  flowing,  from  a  perfora- 
tion made  in  some  other  man's  tank.  I  am  confident, 
however,  that  as  far  as  the  present  poem  is  concerned, 
the  celebrated  poets  whose  writings  I  might  be  sus- 
pected of  having  imitated,  either  in  particular  pas- 
sages, or  in  the  tone  and  the  spirit  of  the  whole, 
would  be  among  the  first  to  vindicate  me  from  the 
76 


CHRISTABEL. 


67 


charge,  and  who,  on  any  striking  coincidence,  would 
permit  me  to  address  them  in  this  doggrel  version  of 
two  monkish  Latin  hexameters. 

'T  is  mine  and  it  is  likewise  yours ; 
But  nn'  it"  this  will  not  do. 
Let  it  bo  mine,  good  friend !  for  I 
Am  the  poorer  of  the  two. 

I  have  only  to  add  that  the  metre  of  the  Christa- 
bel  is  not,  properly  speaking,  irregular,  though  it 
may  seem  so  from  its  being  founded  on  a  new  prin- 
ciple :  namely,  that  of  counting  in  each  line  the  ac- 
cents, not  the  syllables.  Though  the  latter  may  vary 
from  seven  to  twelve,  yet  in  each  line  the  accents 
will  be  found  to  be  only  four.  Nevertheless  this  oc- 
casional variation  in  number  of  syllables  is  not  in- 
troduced wantonly,  or  for  the  mere  ends  of  conveni- 
ence, but  in  correspondence  with  some  transition,  in 
the  nature  of  the  imagery  or  passion. 


CHRISTABEL. 


PART  I. 

'T  is  the  middle  of  night  by  the  castle  clock, 
And  the  owls  have  awaken'd  the  crowing  cock ; 

Tu-whit ! Tu-whoo  ! 

And  hark,  again!  the  crowing  cock, 
How  drowsily  it  crew. 

Sir  Leoline,  the  Baron  rich, 

Hath  a  toothless  mastiff,  which 

From  her  kennel  beneath  the  rock 

Maketh  answer  to  the  clock, 

Four  for  the  quarters,  and  twelve  for  the  hour ; 

Ever  and  aye,  by  shine  and  shower, 

Sixteen  short  howls,  not  over-loud  ; 

Some  say,  she  sees  my  lady's  shroud. 

Is  the  night  chilly  and  dark  ? 
The  night  is  chilly,  but  not  dark. 
The  thin  gray  cloud  is  spread  on  high, 
It  covers  but  not  hides  the  sky. 
The  moon  is  behind,  and  at  the  full ; 
And  yet  she  looks  both  small  and  dull. 
The  night  is  chill,  the  cloud  is  gray : 
'Tis  a  month  before  the  month  of  May, 
And  the  Spring  comes  slowly  up  this  way. 

The  lovely  lady,  Christabel, 

Whom  her  father  loves  so  well, 

What  makes  her  in  the  wood  so  late, 

A  furlong  from  the  castle  gate  ? 

She  had  dreams  all  yesternight 

Of  her  own  betrothed  knight  ; 

And  she  in  the  midnight  wood  will  pray 

For  the  weal  of  her  lover  that 's  far  away. 

She  stole  along,  she  nothing  spoke, 

The  sighs  she  heaved  were  soft  and  low, 

And  naught  was  green  upon  the  oak, 

But  moss  and  rarest  misletoe : 

She  kneels  beneath  the  huge  oak-tree, 

And  in  silence  prayeth  she. 


The  lady  sprang  up  suddenly, 

The  lovely  lady,  Christabel ' 

It  moan'd  as  near,  as  near  can  be, 

But  what  it  is,  she  cannot  tell. — 

On  the  other  side  it  seems  to  be, 

Of  the  huge,  broad-breasted,  old  oak-tree. 

The  night  is  chill ;  the  forest  bare ; 

Is  it  the  wind  that  moaneth  bleak  ? 

There  is  not  wind  enough  in  the  air 

To  move  away  the  ringlet  curl 

From  the  lovely  lady's  cheek — 

There  is  not  wind  enough  to  twirl 

The  one  red  leaf,  the  last  of  its  clan, 

That  dances  as  often  as  dance  it  can, 

Hanging  so  light,  and  hanging  so  high, 

On  the  topmost  twig  that  looks  up  at  the  sky. 

Hush,  beating  heart  of  Christabel ! 
Jesu,  Maria,  shield  her  well ! 
She  folded  her  arms  beneath  her  cloak, 
And  stole  to  the  other  side  of  the  oak. 
What  sees  she  there  ? 

There  she  sees  a  damsel  bright, 
Drest  in  a  silken  robe  of  white, 
That  shadowy  in  the  moonlight  shone : 
The  neck  that  made  that  white  robe  wan, 
Her  stately  neck,  and  arms,  were  bare ; 
Her  blue-vein'd  feet  unsandall'd  were, 
And  wildly  glitter'd  here  and  there 
The  gems  entangled  in  her  hair. 
I  guess,  't  was  frightful  there  to  see 
A  lady  so  richly  clad  as  she — 
Beautiful  exceedingly ! 


Mary  mother,  save  me  now ! 

(Said  Christabel),  And  who  art  thou  ? 

The  lady  strange  made  answer  meet, 

And  her  voice  was  faint  and  sweet : — 

Have  pity  on  my  sore  distress, 

I  scarce  can  speak  for  weariness : 

Stretch  forth  thy  hand,  and  have  no  fear ! 

Said  Christabel,  How  earnest  thou  here  ? 

And  the  lady,  whose  voice  was  faint  and  sweet 

Did  thus  pursue  her  answer  meet : — 


My  sire  is  of  a  noble  line, 
And  my  name  is  Geraldine  : 
Five  warriors  seized  me  yestermorn, 
Me,  even  me,  a  maid  forlorn : 
They  choked  my  cries  with  force  and  fright, 
And  tied  me  on  a  palfrey  white. 
The  palfrey  was  as  fleet  as  wind, 
And  they  rode  furiously  behind. 
They  spurr'd  amain,  their  steeds  were  white; 
And  once  we  cross'd  the  shade  of  night. 
As  sure  as  Heaven  shall  rescue  me, 
I  have  no  thought  what  men  they  be  ; 
Nor  do  I  know  how  long  it  is 
(For  I  have  lain  entranced  I  wis) 
Since  one,  the  tallest  of  the  five, 
Took  me  from  the  palfrey's  back, 
A  weary  woman,  scarce  alive. 
Some  mutter'd  words  his  comrades  spoke 
He  placed  me  underneath  this  oak, 
77 


68 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


He  swore  they  would  return  with  haste : 
Whither  they  went  I  cannot  tell — 
I  thought  I  heard,  some  minutes  past, 
Sounds  as  of  a  castle-bell. 
Stretch  forth  thy  hand  (thus  ended  she), 
And  help  a  wretched  maid  to  flee. 

Then  Christabel  stretch'd  forth  her  hand, 
And  comforted  fair  Geraldine  : 

0  well,  bright  dame  !  may  you  command 
The  service  of  Sir  Leoline  ; 

And  gladly  our  stout  chivalry 
Will  he  send  forth  and  friends  withal, 
To  guide  and  guard  you  safe  and  free 
Home  to  your  noble  father's  hall. 

She  rose ;  and  forth  with  steps  they  pass'd 

That  strove  to  be,  and  were  not,  fast. 

Her  gracious  stars  the  lady  blest, 

And  thus  spake  on  sweet  Christabel : 

All  our  household  are  at  rest, 

The  hall  as  silent  as  the  cell ; 

Sir  Leoline  is  weak  in  health, 

And  may  not  well  awaken'd  be, 

But  we  will  move  as  if  in  stealth  ; 

And  I  beseech  your  courtesy, 

This  night,  to  share  your  couch  with  me. 

They  cross'd  the  moat,  and  Christabel 

Took  the  key  that  fitted  well  ; 

A  little  door  she  open'd  straight, 

All  in  the  middle  of  the  gate ; 

The  gate  that  was  iron'd  within  and  without, 

Where  an  army  in  battle  array  had  march'd  out. 

The  lady  sank,  belike  through  pain, 

And  Christabel  with  might  and  main 

Lifted  her  up,  a  weary  weight, 

Over  the  threshold  of  the  gate  : 

Then  the  lady  rose  again, 

And  moved,  as  she  were  not  in  pain. 

So  free  from  danger,  free  from  fear, 

They  cross'd  the  court :  right  glad  they  wrere. 

And  Christabel  devoutly  cried 

To  the  lady  by  her  side, 

Praise  we  the  Virgin  all  divine 

Who  hath  rescued  thee  from  thy  distress ! 

Alas,  alas  !  said  Geraldine, 

1  cannot  speak  for  weariness. 

So  free  from  danger,  free  from  fear, 

They  cross'd  the  court :  right  glad  they  were. 

Outside  her  kennel,  the  mastiff  old 
Lay  fast  asleep,  in  moonshine  cold. 
The  mastiff  old  did  not  awake, 
Yet  she  an  angry  moan  did  make ! 
And  what  can  ail  the  mastiff  bitch? 
Never  till  now  she  utter'd  yell 
Beneath  the  eye  of  Christabel. 
Perhaps  it  is  the  owlet's  scritch: 
For  what  can  ail  the  mastiff  bitch  ? 

They  pass'd  the  hall,  that  echoes  still, 
Pass  as  lightly  as  you  will ! 
The  brands  were  flat,  the  brands  were  dying, 
Amid  their  own  white  ashes  lying: 


But  when  the  lady  pass'd,  there  came 

A  tongue  of  light,  a  fit  of  flame ; 

And  Christabel  saw  the  lady's  eye, 

And  nothing  else  saw  she  thereby, 

Save  the  boss  of  the  shield  of  Sir  Leoline  tall, 

Which  hung  in  a  murky  old  niche  in  the  wall. 

O  softly  tread  !  said  Christabel, 

My  father  seldom  sleepeth  well. 

Sweet  Christabel  her  feet  doth  bare ; 
And,  jealous  of  the  listening  air, 
They  steal  their  way  from  stair  to  stair : 
Now  in  glimmer,  and  now  in  gloom — 
And  now  they  pass  the  Baron's  room, 
As  still  as  death  with  stifled  breath ! 
And  now  have  reach'd  her  chamber-door  ; 
And  now  doth  Geraldine  press  down 
The  rushes  of  the  chamber  floor. 

The  moon  shines  dim  in  the  open  air, 
And  not  a  moonbeam  enters  here. 
But  they  without  its  light  can  see 
The  chamber  carved  so  curiously, 
Carved  with  figures  strange  and  sweet, 
All  made  out  of  the  carver's  brain, 
For  a  lady's  chamber  meet  : 
The  lamp  with  twofold  silver  chain 
Is  fasten'd  to  an  angel's  feet. 

The  silver  lamp  burns  dead  and  dim ; 

But  Christabel  the  lamp  will  trim. 

She  trimm'd  the  lamp,  and  made  it  bright, 

And  left  it  swinging  to  and  fro, 

While  Geraldine,  in  wretched  plight 

Sank  down  upon  the  floor  below. 

0  weary  lady,  Geraldine, 

1  pray  you,  drink  this  cordial  wine  ! 
It  is  a  wine  of  virtuous  powers  ; 
My  mother  made  it  of  wild  flowers. 

And  will  your  mother  pity  me, 
Who  am  a  maiden  most  forlorn  ? 
Christabel  answer' d — Woe  is  me ! 
She  died  the  hour  that  I  was  born. 
I  have  heard  the  gray-hair'd  friar  tell, 
How  on  her  death-bed  she  did  say, 
That  she  should  hear  the  castle-bell 
Strike  twelve  upon  my  wedding-day. 

0  mother  dear !  that  thou  wert  here ! 

1  would,  said  Geraldine,  she  were  ! 

But  soon,  with  alter'd  voice,  said  she — 
"  Off,  wandering  mother  !  Peak  and  pine  ! 
I  have  power  to  bid  thee  flee. " 
Alas !  what  ails  poor  Geraldine  ? 
Why  stares  she  with  unsettled  eye  ? 
Can  she  the  bodiless  dead  espy  ? 
And  why  with  hollow  voice  cries  she, 
"  Off,  woman,  off!  this  hour  is  mine — 
Though  thou  her  guardian  spirit  be, 
Off,  woman,  off!  'tis  given  to  me." 

Then  Christabel  knelt  by  the  lady's  side, 
And  raised  to  heaven  her  eyes  so  blue — 
Alas  !  said  she,  this  ghastly  ride — 
Dear  lady!  it  hath  wilder'd  you! 

78 


CHRISTABEL. 


60 


The  lady  wiped  her  moist  cold  brow, 
And  faintly  said,  "  'T  is  over  now  !" 

Again  the  wild-flower  wine  she  drank : 
Her  fair  large  eyes  'gan  glitter  bright, 
And  from  the  floor  whereon  she  sank, 
The  lofty  lady  stood  upright ; 
She  was  most  beautiful  to  see, 
Like  a  lady  of  a  far  countree. 

And  thus  the  lofty  lady  spake — 
All  they,  who  live  in  the  upper  sky, 
Do  love  you,  holy  Christabel ! 
And  you  love  them,  and  for  their  sake 
And  for  the  good  which  me  befell, 
Even  I  in  my  degree  will  try, 
Fair  maiden  !  to  requite  you  well. 
But  now  unrobe  yourself;  for  I 
.Must  pray,  ere  yet  in  bed  I  lie. 

Quoth  Christabel,  So  let  it  be  ! 
And  as  the  lady  bade,  did  she. 
Her  gentle  limbs  did  she  undress, 
And  lay  down  in  her  loveliness. 

But  through  her  brain  of  weal  and  woe 
So  many  thoughts  moved  to  and  fro, 
That  vain  it  were  her  lids  to  close ; 
So  half-way  from  the  bed  she  rose, 
And  on  her  elbow7  did  recline 
To  look  at  the  Lady  Geraldine. 

Beneath  the  lamp  the  lady  bow'd, 
And  slowly  roll'd  her  eyes  around  ; 
Then  drawing  in  her  breath  aloud, 
Like  one  that  shudder'd,  she  unbound 
The  cincture  from  beneath  her  breast : 
Her  silken  robe,  and  inner  vest, 
Dropt  to  her  feet,  and  full  in  view, 

Behold  !  her  bosom  and  half  her  side 

A  sight  to  dream  of,  not  to  tell ! 

0  shield  her !  shield  sweet  Christabel 

Yet  Geraldine  nor  speaks  nor  stirs  ; 
Ah  !  what  a  stricken  look  was  hers! 
Deep  from  within  she  seems  half-way 
To  lift  some  weight  with  sick  assay, 
And  eyes  the  maid  and  seeks  delay ; 
Then  suddenly  as  one  defied 
Collects  herself  in  scorn  and  pride, 
And  lay  down  by  the  Maiden's  side ! — 
And  in  her  arms  the  maid  she  took, 

Ah  well-a-day ! 
And  with  low  voice  and  doleful  look 
These  words  did  say 
In  the  touch  of  this  bosom  there  worketh  a  spell, 
Which  is  lord  of  thy  utterance,  Christabel  ! 
Thou  knowest  to-night,  and  wilt  know  to-morrow 
This  mark  of  my  shame,  this  seal  of  my  sorrow  ; 
But  vainly  Ihou  warrest, 

For  this  is  alone  in 
Thy  power  to  declare, 

That  in  the  dim  forest 
Thou  heardest  a  low  moaning, 
H 


And  fomulest  a  bright  lady,  surpassingly  fair  : 

And  didst  bring  her  home  with  thee  in  love  and  in 

charily,  , 

To  shield  her  and  shelter  her  from  the  damp  air. 

THE  CONCLUSION  TO  PART  I. 

It  was  a  lovely  sight  to  see 
The  lady  Christabel,  when  she 
Was  praying  at  the  old  oak-tree. 

Amid  the  jagged  shadows 

Of  mossy  leafless  boughs, 

Kneeling  in  the  moonlight, 

To  make  her  gentle  vows  ; 
Her  slender  palms  together  prest, 
Heaving  sometimes  on  her  breast ; 
Her  face  resign'd  to  bliss  or  bale — 
Her  face,  O  call  it  fair,  not  pale  ! 
And  both  blue  eyes  more  bright  than  clear, 
Each  about  to  have  a  tear. 


With  open  eyes  (ah  woe  is  me  !) 
Asleep,  and  dreaming  fearfully, 
Fearfully  dreaming,  yet  I  wis, 
Dreaming  that  alone,  which  is — 
O  sorrow  and  shame !  Can  this  be  she, 
The  lady,  who  knelt  at  the  old  oak-tree  ? 
And  lo  !  the  worker  of  these  harms, 
That  holds  the  maiden  in  her  arms, 
Seems  to  slumber  still  and  mild, 
As  a  mother  with  her  child. 


A  star  hath  set,  a  star  hath  risen, 
O  Geraldine  !  since  arms  of  thine 
Have  been  the  lovely  lady's  prison. 
O  Geraldine  !  one  hour  was  thine — 
Thou  'st  had  thy  will !  By  tairn  and  rill, 
The  night-birds  all  that  hour  were  still. 
But  now  they  are  jubilant  anew, 
From  cliff  and  tower,  tu-whoo  !  tu-whoo  1 
Tu-whoo !  tu-whoo  !  from  wood  and  fell ! 


And  see  !  the  lady  Christabel 
Gathers  herself  irom  out  her  trance  ; 
Her  limbs  relax,  her  countenance 
Grows  sad  and  soft ;  the  smooth  thin  lids 
Close  o'er  her  eyes  ;  and  tears  she  sheds- 
Large  tears  that  leave  the  lashes  bright ! 
And  oft  the  while  she  seems  to  smile 
As  infants  at  a  sudden  light ! 

Yea,  she  doth  smile,  and  she  doth  weep, 
Like  a  youthful  hermitess, 
Beauteous  in  a  wilderness, 
Who,  praying  always,  prays  in  sleep, 
And,  if  she  move  unquietly, 
Perchance,  't  is  but  the  blood  so  free, 
Comes  back  and  tingles  in  her  feet. 
No  doubt,  she  hath  a  vision  sweet : 
What  if  her  guardian  spirit  't  were, 
What  if  she  knew  her  mother  near? 
But  this  she  knows,  in  joys  and  woes, 
That  saints  will  aid  if  men  will  call : 
For  the  blue  sky  bends  over  all ! 
79 


70 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


PART  II. 

Each  matin-bell,  the  Baron  saith, 
Knells  us  back  to  a  world  of  death. 
These  words  Sir  Leoline  first  said, 
When  he  rose  and  found  his  lady  dead : 
These  words  Sir  Leoline  will  say, 
Many  a  morn  to  his  dying  day ! 

And  hence  the  custom  and  law  began, 
That  still  at  dawn  the  sacristan, 
Who  duly  pulls  the  heavy  bell, 
Five-and-forty  beads  must  tell 
Between  each  stroke — a  warning  knell, 
Which  not  a  soul  can  choose  but  hear 
From  Bratha  Head  to  Wyndermere. 

Saith  Bracy  the  bard,  So  let  it  knell ! 
And  let  the  drowsy  sacristan 
Still  count  as  slowly  as  he  can  ! 
There  is  no  lack  of  such,  I  ween, 
As  well  fill  up  the  space  between. 
In  Langdale  Pike  and  Witch's  Lair 
And  Dungeon-ghyll  so  foully  rent, 
With  ropes  of  rock  and  bells  of  air 
Three  sinful  sextons'  ghosts  are  pent, 
Who  all  give  back,  one  after  t'  other, 
The  death-note  to  their  living  brother; 
And  oft  too,  by  the  knell  offended, 
Just  as  their  one  !  two  !  three  !  is  ended, 
The  devil  mocks  the  doleful  tale 
With  a  merry  peal  from  Borrovvdale. 

The  air  is  slill !  through  mist  and  cloud 
That  merry  peal  comes  ringing  loud  ; 
And  Geraldine  shakes  off  her  dread, 
And  rises  lightly  from  the  bed  ; 
Puts  on  her  silken  vestments  white. 
And  tricks  her  hair  in  lovely  plight, 
And,  nothing  doubting  of  her  spell, 
Awakens  the  lady  Christabel. 
"  Sleep  you,  sweet  lady  Christabel  ? 
1  trust  that  you  have  rested  well." 

And  Christabel  awoke  and  spied 

The  same  who  lay  down  by  her  side — 

O  rather  say,  the  same  whom  she 

Raised  up  beneath  the  old  oak-tree ! 

Nay,  fairer  yet !  and  yet  more  fair ! 

For  she  belike  hath  drunken  deep 

Of  all  the  blessedness  of  sleep  ! 

And  while  she  spake,  her  looks,  her  air 

Such  gentle  thankfulness  declare, 

That  (so  it  seem'd)  her  girded  vests 

Grew  tight  beneath  her  heaving  breasts. 

"  Sure  I  have  sinn'd,"  said  Christabel, 

"  Now  Heaven  be  praised  if  all  be  well !' 

And  in  low  faltering  tones,  yet  sweet, 

Did  she  the  lofty  lady  greet 

With  such  perplexity  of  mind 

As  dreams  too  lively  leave  behind. 

So  quickly  she  rose,  and  quickly  array'd 
Her  maiden  limbs,  and  having  pray'd 
That  He,  who  on  the  cross  did  groan, 
Might  wash  away  her  sins  unknown. 


She  forthwith  led  fair  Geraldine 
To  meet  her  sire,  Sir  Leoline. 

The  lovely  maid  and  the  lady  tall 
Are  pacing  both  into  the  hall, 
And,  pacing  on  through  page  and  groom. 
Enter  the  Baron's  presence-room. 

The  Baron  rose,  and  while  he  prest 
His  gentle  daughter  to  his  breast, 
With  cheerful  wonder  in  his  eyes 
The  lady  Geraldine   espies, 
And  gave  such  welcome  to  the  same, 
As  might  beseem  so  bright  a  dame ! 

But  when  he  heard  the  lady's  tale, 
And  when  she  told  her  father's  name, 
Why  wax'd  Sir  Leoline  so  pale, 
Murmuring  o'er  the  name  again, 
Lord  Roland  de  Vaux  of  Tryermaine  ? 

Alas  !  they  had  been  friends  in  youth ; 

But  whispering  tongues  can  poison  truth  , 

And  constancy  lives  in  realms  above, 

And  life  is  thorny  ;  and  youth  is  vain  : 

And  to  be  wroth  with  one  we  love, 

Doth  work  like  madness  in  the  brain. 

And  thus  it  chanced,  as  I  divine, 

With  Roland  and  Sir  Leoline. 

Each  spake  words  of  high  disdain 

And  insult  to  his  heart's  best  brother : 

They  parted — ne'er  to  meet  again  ! 

But  never  either  found  another 

To  free  the  hollow  heart  from  paining — 

They  stood  aloof,  the  scars  remaining, 

Like  cliffs  which  had  been  rent  asunder ; 

A  dreary  sea  now  flows  between. 

But  neither  heat,  nor  frost,  nor  thunder, 

Shall  wholly  do  awaj;,  I  ween, 

The  marks  of  that  which  once  hath  been 

Sir  Leoline,  a  moment's  space, 

Stood  gazing  on  the  damsel's  face  : 

And  the  youthful  Lord  of  Tryermaine 

Came  back  upon  his  heart  again. 

0  then  the  Baron  forgot  his  age  ! 

His  noble  heart  swell'd  high  with  rage  ; 

He  swore  by  the  wounds  in  Jesu's  side, 

He  would  proclaim  it  far  and  wide 

With  trump  and  solemn  heraldry, 

That  they,  who  thus  had  wrong'd  the  dame, 

Were  base  as  spotted  infamy ! 

"  And  if  they  dare  deny  the  same, 

My  herald  shall  appoint  a  week, 

And  let  the  recreant  traitors  seek 

My  tourney  court — that  there  and  then 

1  may  dislodge  their  reptile  souls 
From  the  bodies  and  forms  of  men!" 
He  spake  :  his  eye  in  lightning  rolls! 

For  the  lady  was  ruthlessly  seized;  and  he  kei.T  d 
In  the  beautiful  lady  the  child  of  his  friend ! 

And  now  the  tears  were  on  his  face, 
And  fondly  in  his  arms  he  took 
Fair  Geraldine.  who  met  the  embrace, 
Prolonging  it  with  joyous  look. 

80 


CHRISTABEL, 


71 


Which  when  she  view'd,  a  vision  fell 

Upon  the  soul  of  Christabel, 

The  vision  of  fear,  the  touch  and  pain ! 

She  shrunk  and  shudder'd,  and  saw  again — 

(Ah,  woe  is  me !  Was  it  for  thee, 

Thou  gentle  maid !  such  sights  to  see  1) 

Again  she  saw  that  bosom  old, 

Again  she  felt  that  bosom  cold, 

And  drew  in  her  breath  with  a  hissing  sound  : 

Whereat  the  knight  turn'd  wildly  round, 

And  nothing  saw  but  his  own  sweet  maid 

With  eyes  upraised,  as  one  that  pray'd. 

The  touch,  the  sight,  had  pass'd  away, 
And  in  its  stead  that  vision  blest, 
Which  comforted  her  after-rest, 
While  in  the  lady's  arms  she  lay, 
Had  put  a  rapture  in  her  breast, 
And  on  her  lips  and  o'er  her  eyes 
Spread  smiles  like  light .' 

With  new  surprise, 
"  What  ails  then  my  beloved  child  ? " 
The  Baron  said — His  daughter  mild 
Made  answer,  "  All  will  yet  be  well ! " 
I  ween,  she  had  no  power  to  tell 
Aught  else :  so  mighty  was  the  spell. 

Yet  he,  who  saw  this  Geraldine, 
Had  deem'd  her  sure  a  thing  divine. 
Such  sorrow  with  such  grace  she  blended, 
As  if  she  fear'd  she  had  offended 
Sweet  Christabel,  that  gentle  maid ! 
And  with  such  lowrly  tones  she  pray'd, 
She  might  be  sent  without  delay 
Home  to  her  father's  mansion. 

"  Nay ! 
Nay,  by  my  soul !"  said  Leoline. 
"  Ho !  Bracy  the  bard,  the  charge  be  thine : 
Go  thou,  with  music  sweet  and  loud, 
And  take  two  steeds  with  trappings  proud, 
And  take  the  youth  whom  thou  lovest  best 
To  bear  thy  harp,  and  learn  thy  song, 
And  clothe  you  both  in  solemn  vest, 
And  over  the  mountains  haste  along, 
Lest  wandering  folk,  that  are  abroad, 
Detain  you  on  the  valley  road. 
And  when  he  has  cross'd  the  Irthing  flood, 
My  merry  bard  !  he  hastes,  he  hastes 
Up  Knorren  Moor,  through  Halegarth  wood, 
And  reaches  soon  that  castle  good 
Which  stands  and  threatens  Scotland's  wastes. 

"  Bard  Bracy,  bard  Bracy !  your  horses  are  fleet, 

Ye  must  ride  up  the  hall,  your  music  so  sweet, 

More  loud  than  your  horses'  echoing  feet ! 

And  loud  and  loud  to  Lord  Roland  call, 

Thy  daughter  is  safe  in  Langdale  hall ! 

Thy  beautiful  daughter  is  safe  and  free — 

Sir  Leoline  greets  thee  thus  through  me. 

He  bids  thee  come  without  delay 

With  ail  thy  numerous  array  ; 

And  take  thy  lovely  daughter  home  : 

And  he  will  meet  thee  on  the  way 


With  all  his  numerous  array, 
White  with  their  panting  palfreys'  foam; 
And  by  mine  honor  !  I  will  say, 
That  I  repent  me  of  the  day 
When  I  spake  words  of  high  disdain 
To  Roland  de  Vaux  of  Tryermaine  ! 
— For  since  that  evil  hour  hath  flown, 
Many  a  summer's  sun  hath  shone ; 
Yet  ne'er  found  I  a  friend  again 
Like  Roland  de  Vaux  of  Tryermaine." 

The  Lady  fell,  and  clasp'd  his  knees, 
Her  face  upraised,  her  eyes  o'erflowing  ; 
And  Bracy  replied,  with  faltering  voice, 
Her  gracious  hail  on  all  bestowing ; — 
Thy  words,  thou  sire  of  Christabel, 
Are  sweeter  than  my  harp  can  tell ; 
Yet  might  I  gain  a  boon  of  thee, 
This  day  my  journey  should  not  be. 
So  strange  a  dream  hath  come  to  me , 
That  I  had  vow'd  with  music  loud 
To  clear  yon  wood  from  thing  unblest, 
Warn'd  by  a  vision  in  my  rest ! 
For  in  my  sleep  I  saw  that  dove, 
That  gentle  bird,  whom  thou  dost  love, 
And  call'st  by  thy  own  daughter's  name — 
Sir  Leoline  !  1  saw  the  same, 
Fluttering,  and  uttering  fearful  moan, 
Among  the  green  herbs  in  the  forest  alone. 
Which  when  I  saw  and  when  I  heard, 
I  wonder'd  what  might  ail  the  bird : 
For  nothing  near  it  could  I  see, 
Save  the  grass  and  green  herbs  underneath  the 
old  tree. 

And  in  my  dream,  methought,  I  went 
To  search  out  what  might  there  be  found ; 
And  what  the  sweet  bird's  trouble  meant 
That  thus  lay  fluttering  on  the  ground. 
I  went  and  peer'd,  and  could  descry 
No  cause  for  her  distressful  cry  ; 
But  yet  for  her  dear  lady's  sake 
I  stoop'd,  methought,  the  dove  to  take. 
When  lo !  I  saw  a  bright,  green  snake 
Coil'd  around  its  wings  and  neck. 
Green  as  the  herbs  on  which  it  couch'd, 
Close  by  the  dove's  its  head  it  crouch'd ! 
And  with  the  dove  it  heaves  and  stirs, 
Swelling  its  neck  as  she  swell'd  hers ! 
I  woke ;  it  was  the  midnight  hour, 
The  clock  was  echoing  in  the  tower; 
But  though  my  slumber  was  gone  by, 
This  dream  it  would  not  pass  away — 
It  seems  to  live  upon  my  eye ! 
And  thence  I  vow'd  this  self-same  day, 
With  music  strong  and  saintly  song 
To  wander  through  the  forest  bare, 
Lest  aught  unholy  loiter  there. 

Thus  Bracy  said  :  the  Baron,  the  while, 
Half-listening  heard  him  with  a  smile  ; 
Then  turn'd  to  Lady  Geraldine, 
His  eyes  made  up  of  wonder  and  love  ,• 
And  said  in  courtly  accents  fine, 
Sweet  Maid  !  Lord  Roland's  beauteous  dove, 
With  arms  more  strong  than  harp  or  song, 
81 


VI 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Thy  sire  and  I  will  crush  the  snake ! 
He  kiss'd  her  forehead  as  he  spake, 
And  Geraldine  in  maiden  wise, 
Casting  down  her  large  bright  eyes, 
With  blushing  cheek  and  courtesy  fine 
She  turn'd  her  from  Sir  Leoline ; 
Softly  gathering  up  her  train, 
That  o'er  her  right  arm  fell  again ; 
And  folded  her  arms  across  her  chest, 
And  couch'd  her  head  upon  her  breast, 

And  look'd  askance  at  Christabel 

Jesu,  Maria,  shield  her  well ! 

A  snake's  small  eye  blinks  dull  and  shy, 

And  the  lady's  eyes  they  shrunk  in  her  head, 

Each  shrunk  up  to  a  serpent's  eye, 

And  with  somewhat  of  malice  and  more  of  dread, 

At  Christabel  she  look'd  askance  : — 

One  moment — and  the  sight  was  fled ! 

But  Christabel,  in  dizzy  trance 

Stumbling  on  the  unsteady  ground, 

Shudder'd  aloud,  with  a  hissing  sound ; 

And  Geraldine  again  turn'd  round, 

And  like  a  thing,  that  sought  relief, 

Full  of  wonder  and  full  of  grief, 

She  roll'd  her  large  bright  eyes  divine 

Wildly  on  Sir  Leoline. 

The  maid,  alas  !  her  thoughts  are  gone, 
She  nothing  sees — no  sight  but  one  ! 
The  maid,  devoid  of  guile  and  sin, 
I  know  not  how,  in  fearful  wise 
So  deeply  had  she  drunken  in 
That  look,  those  shrunken  serpent  eyes, 
That  all  her  features  were  resign'd 
To  this  sole  image  in  her  mind : 
And  passively  did  imitate 
That  look  of  dull  and  treacherous  hate ! 
And  thus  she  stood,  in  dizzy  trance, 
Still  picturing  that  look  askance 
With  forced,  unconscious  sympathy 

Full  before  her  father's  view 

As  far  as  such  a  look  could  be, 
In  eyes  so  innocent  and  blue. 
And  when  the  trance  was  o'er,  the  maid 
Paused  awhile,  and  inly  pray'd  : 
Then  falling  at  the  Baron's  feet, 
"  By  my  mother's  soul  do  I  entreat 
That  thou  this  woman  send  away ! " 
She  said  :  and  more  she  could  not  say ; 
For  what  she  knew  she  could  not  tell, 
O'ermaster'd  by  the  mighty  spell. 

Why  is  thy  cheek  so  wan  and  wild, 
Sir  Leoline  ?  Thy  only  child 
Lies  at  thy  feet,  thy  joy,  thy  pride. 
So  fair,  so  innocent,  so  mild  $ 


The  same,  for  whom  thy  lady  died. 

0  by  the  pangs  of  her  dear  mother, 
Think  thou  no  evil  of  thy  child  ! 
For  her,  and  thee,  and  for  no  other, 
She  pray'd  the  moment  ere  she  died  ; 
Pray'd  that  the  babe  for  whom  she  died 
Might  prove  her  dear  lord's  joy  and  pride! 

That  prayer  her  deadly  pangs  beguiled, 

Sir  Leoline ! 
And  wouldst  thou  wrong  thy  only  child, 

Her  child  and  thine  ? 

Within  the  Baron's  heart  and  brain 

If  thoughts  like  these  had  any  share, 

They  only  swell'd  his  rage  and  pain, 

And  did  but  work  confusion  there. 

His  heart  was  cleft  with  pain  and  rage, 

His  cheeks  they  quiver'd,  his  eyes  were  wild, 

Dishonor'd  thus  in  his  old  age ; 

Dishonor'd  by  his  only  child, 

And  all  his  hospitality 

To  the  insulted  daughter  of  his  friend 

By  more  than  woman's  jealousy 

Brought  thus  to  a  disgraceful  end — 

He  roll'd  his  eye  with  stern  regard 

Upon  the  gentle  minstrel  bard, 

And  said  in  tones  abrupt,  austere, 

Why,  Bracy  !  dost  thou  loiter  here  ? 

1  bade  thee  hence !  The  Bard  obey'd  ; 
And,  turning  from  his  own  sweet  maid, 
The  aged  knight,  Sir  Leoline, 

Led  forth  the  lady  Geraldine  ! 

THE  CONCLUSION  TO  PART  II. 

A  little  child,  a  limber  elf, 

Singing,  dancing  to  itself, 

A  fairy  thing  with  red  round  cheeks 

That  always  finds  and  never  seeks, 

Makes  such  a  vision  to  the  sight 

As  fills  a  father's  eyes  with  light ; 

And  pleasures  flow  in  so  thick  and  fast 

Upon  his  heart,  that  he  at  last 

Must  needs  express  his  love's  excess 

With  words  of  unmeant  bitterness. 

Perhaps  'tis  pretty  to  force  together 

Thoughts  so  all  unlike  each  other ; 

To  mutter  and  mock  a  broken  charm, 

To  dally  with  wrong  that  does  no  harm. 

Perhaps  'tis  tender  too  and  pretty 

At  each  wild  word  to  feel  within 

A  sweet  recoil  of  love  and  pity. 

And  what,  if  in  a  world  of  sin 

(O  sorrow  and  shame  should  this  be  true) .' 

Such  giddiness  of  heart  and  brain 

Comes  seldom  save  from  rage  and  pain, 

So  talks  as  it 's  most  used  to  do. 


REMORSE. 


73 


Remorse ; 

A  TRAGEDY,  IN  FIVE  ACTS. 


DRAMATIS  PERSONS. 


Marquis  Valdez,  Father  to  the  two  brothers,  and 

S  Donna  Teresa's  Guardian. 
Don  Alvar,  the  eldest  son. 
Dox  Ordonio,  the  youngest  son. 
Monviedro,  a  Dominican  and  Inquisitor. 
Zulimf.z,  the  faithful  attendant  on  Alvar. 
Isidore,  a  Moresco  Chieftain,  ostensibly  a  Christian. 
Familiars  of  the  Inquisition. 
Naomi. 

Moors,  Servants,  etc. 
Donna  Teresa,  an  Orphan  Heiress. 
Aliiadra,  Wife  to  Isidore. 

Time.  The  reign  of  Philip  II.,  just  at  the  close  of 
the  civil  wars  against  the  Moors,  and  during  the 
heat  of  the  persecution  which  raged  against  them, 
shortly  after  the  edict  which  forbade  the  wearing 
of  Moresco  apparel  under  pain  of  death. 


REMORSE. 

ACT  I. 

SCENE  I. 
Tlte  Sea  Shore  on  the  Coast  of  Granada. 

Don  Alvar,  -wrapt  in  a  Boat-cloak,  and  Zulimez 
(a  Moresco),  both  as  just  landed 

zulimez. 
No  sound,  no  face  of  joy  to  welcome  us  ! 

alvar. 
My  faithful  Zulimez,  for  one  brief  moment 
Let  me  forget  my  anguish  and  their  crimes. 
If  aught  on  earth  demand  an  unmix'd  feeling, 
'T  is  surely  this — after  long  years  of  exile, 
To  step  forth  on  firm  land,  and  gazing  round  us, 
To  hail  at  once  our  country,  and  our  birth-place. 
Hail.  Spain !  Granada,  hail !  once  more  I  press 
Thy  sands  with  filial  awe,  land  of  my  fathers ! 

ZULIMEZ. 

Then  claim  your  rights  in  it!  O,  revered  Don  Alvar, 

Yet,  yet  give  up  your  all  too  gentle  purpose. 

Il  is  too  hazardous !  reveal  yourself, 

And  let  the  guilty  meet  the  doom  of  guilt ! 

ALVA  I! . 

Remember,  Zulimez!  I  am  his  brother: 
Injured,  indeed  !  O  deeply  injured!  yet 
Ordonio's  brother. 

ZULIMEZ. 

Nobly-minded  Alvar ! 
This  sure  but  gives  his  guilt  a  blacker  dye. 

ALVAR. 

The  more  behoves  it,  I  should  rouse  within  him 
Remorse!  that  I  should  save  him  from  himself. 
H2 


ZULIMEZ. 

Remorse  is  as  the  heart  in  which  it  grows : 
If  that  be  gentle,  it  drops  balmy  dews 
Of  true  repentance ;  but  if  proud  and  gloomy, 
It  is  a  poison-tree  that,  pierced  to  the  inmost, 
Weeps  only  tears  of  poison. 

ALVAR. 

And  of  a  brother, 
Dare  I  hold  this,  unproved  ?  nor  make  one  effort, 
Tosavehim? — Hear  me,  friend!  I  have  yet  to  tell  thee 
That  this  same  life,  which  lie  conspired  to  take, 
Himself  once  rescued  from  the  angry  flood, 
And  at  the  imminent  hazard  of  his  own. 
Add  too  my  oath — 

ZULIMEZ. 

You  have  thrice  told  already 
The  years  of  absence  and  of  secrecy. 
To  which  a  forced  oath  bound  you :  if  in  truth 
A  suborn'd  murderer  have  the  power  to  dictate 
A  binding  oath — 

ALVAR. 

My  long  captivity 
Left  me  no  choice:  the  very  Wish  too  languish'd 
With  the  fond  Hope  that  nursed  it ;  the  sick  babe 
Droop'd  at  the  bosom  of  its  faniish'd  mother 
But  (more  than  all)  Teresa's  perfidy; 
The  assassin's  strong  assurance,  when  no  interest. 
No  motive  could  have  tempted  him  to  falsehood : 
In  the  first  pangs  of  his  awaken'd  conscience, 
When  with  abhorrence  of  his  own  black  purpose 
The  murderous  weapon,  pointed  at  my  breast, 
Fell  from  his  palsied  hand — 

ZULIMEZ. 

Heavy  presumption ! 

ALVAR. 

It  weigh'd  not  with  me — Hark !  I  will  tell  thee  all : 
As  we  pass'd  by,  I  bade  thee  mark  the  base 
Of  yonder  cliff — 

ZULIMEZ. 

That  rocky  seat  you  mean, 
Shaped  by  the  billows  I — 

ALVAR. 

There  Teresa  met  me, 
The  morning  of  the  day  of  my  departure. 
We  were  alone:  the  purple  hue  of  dawn 
Fell  from  the  kindling  east  aslant  upon  us, 
And,  blending  with  the  blushes  on  her  cheek, 
Suffused  the  tear-drops  there  with  rosy  light. 
There  seem'd  a  glory  round  us,  and  Teresa 
The  angel  of  the  vision  !  [  Then  with  agitation 

Hadst  thou  seen 
How  in  each  motion  her  most  innocent  soul 
Beam'd  forth  and   brightcn'd,  thou  thyself  wouldst 

tell  me, 
Guilt  is  a  thing  impossible  in  her! 
She  must  be  innocent ! 

ZULIMEZ  (with  a  sigh). 

Proceed,  my  Lord .' 
83 


74 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


ALVAR. 

A  portrait  which  she  had  procured  by  stealth 
I  For  ever  then  it  seems  her  heart  foreboded 
Or  knew  Onlonio's  moody  rivalry), 
A  portrait  of"  herself  with  thrilling  hand 
She  tied  around  my  neck,  conjuring  me 
With  earnest  prayers,  that  I  would  keep  it  sacred 
To  my  own  knowledge :  nor  did  she  desist, 
Till  she  had  won  a  solemn  promise  from  me, 
That  (save  my  own)  no  eye  should  e'er  behold  it 
Till  my  return.     Yet  this  the  assassin  knew, 
Knew  that  which  none  but  she  could  have  disclosed. 

ZULIMEZ. 

A  damning  proof! 

ALVAR. 

My  own  life  wearied  me ! 
And  but  for  the  imperative  Voice  within, 
With  mine  own  hand  I  had  thrown  off  the  burthen. 
Fhat  Voice,  which  quell'd  me,  calm'd  me :  and  I 

sought 
The  Belgic  states :  there  join'd  the  better  cause  ; 
And  there  too  fought  as  one  that  courted  death! 
Wounded,  I  fell  among  the  dead  and  dying, 
In  death-like  trance  :  a  long  imprisonment  follow'd. 
The  fullness  of  my  anguish  by  degrees 
Waned  to  a  meditative  melancholy  ; 
And  still,  the  more  I  mused,  my  soul  became 
More  doubtful,  more  perplex'd ;  and  still  Teresa, 
Night  after  night,  she  visited  my  sleep, 
Now  as  a  saintly  sufferer,  wan  and  tearful, 
Now  as  a  saint  in  glory  beckoning  to  me ! 
Yes,  still,  as  in  contempt  of  proof  and  reason, 
[  cherish  the  fond  faith  that  she  is  guiltless ! 
Hear  then  my  fix'd  resolve :  I  '11  linger  here 
In  the  disguise  of  a  Moresco  chieftain. — 
The  Moorish  robes  ? — 

ZULIMEZ. 

All,  all  are  in  the  sea-cave, 
Some  furlong  hence.     I  bade  our  mariners 
Secrete  the  boat  there. 

ALVAR. 

Above  all,  the  picture 
Of  the  assassination — 

ZULIMEZ. 

Be  assured 
That  it  remains  uninjured. 

ALVAR. 

Thus  disguised, 
[  will  first  seek  to  meet  Ordonio's — wife! 
[f  possible,  alone  too.     This  was  her  wonted  walk, 
And  this  the  hour ;  her  words,  her  very  looks 
Will  acquit  her  or  convict. 

ZULIMEZ. 

Will  they  not  know  you  ? 

ALVAR. 

With  your  aid,  friend,  I  shall  unfearingly 
Trust  the  disguise ;  and  as  to  my  complexion, 
My  long  imprisonment,  the  scanty  food, 
This  scar, — and  toil  beneath  a  burning  sun, 
Have  done  already  half  the  business  for  us. 
Add  too  my  youth,  when  last  we  saw  each  other. 
Manhood  has  swoln  my  chest,  and  taught  my  voice 
A  hoarser  note — Besides,  they  think  me  dead  : 
And  what  the  mind  believes  impossible, 
The  bodily  sense  is  slow  to  recognize. 

ZULIMEZ. 

'Tis  yours,  Sir,  to  command  ;  mine  to  obey. 


Now  to  the  cave  beneath  the  vaulted  rock, 
Where  having  shaped  you  to  a  Moorish  chieftain, 
I  will  seek  our  mariners ;  and  in  the  dusk 
Transport  whate'er  we  need  to  the  small  dell 
In  the  Alpuxarras — there  where  Zagri  lived. 

ALVAR. 

I  know  it  well :  it  is  the  obscurest  haunt 

Of  all  the  mountains —  [Both  stand  listening 

Voices  at  a  distance ! 
Let  us  away !  [Exeunt. 


SCENE  II. 


Enter  Teresa  and  Valdez. 

TERESA. 

I  hold  Ordonio  dear ;  he  is  your  son 
And  Alvar's  brother. 

VALDEZ. 

Love  him  for  himself, 
Nor  make  the  living  wretched  for  the  dead. 

TERESA. 

I  mourn  that  you  should  plead  in  vain,  Lord  Valdez; 
But  heaven  hath  heard  my  vow,  and  I  remain 
Faithful  to  Alvar,  be  he  dead  or  living. 

VALDEZ. 

Heaven  knows  with  what  delight  I  saw  your  loves, 
And  could  my  heart's  blood  give  him  back  to  thee, 
I  would  die  smiling.     But  these  are  idle  thoughts; 
Thy  dying  father  comes  upon  my  soul 
With  that  same  look,  with  which  he  gave  thee  to  me, 
I  held  thee  in  my  anus  a  powerless  babe, 
While  thy  poor  mother  with  a  mute  entreaty 
Fix'd  her  faint  eyes  on  mine.     Ah  not  for  this, 
That  I  should  let  thee  feed  thy  soul  with  gloom, 
And  with  slow  anguish  wear  away  thy  life, 
The  victim  of  a  useless  constancy. 
I  must  not  see  thee  wretched. 

TERESA. 

There  are  woes 
Ill-barter'd  for  the  garishness  of  joy ! 
If  it  be  wretched  with  an  untired  eye 
To  watch  those  skiey  tints,  and  this  green  ocean ; 
Or  in  the  sultry  hour  beneath  some  rock. 
My  hair  dishevell'd  by  the  pleasant  sea-breeze, 
To  shape  sweet  visions,  and  live  o'er  again 
All  past  hours  of  delight !  If  it  be  wretched 
To  watch  some  bark,  and  fancy  Alvar  there, 
To  go  through  each  minutest  circumstance 
Of  the  blest  meeting,  and  to  frame  adventures 
Most  terrible  and  strange,  and  hear  him  tell  them ; 
*  (As  once  I  knew  a  crazy  Moorish  maid 
Who  drest  her  in  her  buried  lover's  clothes, 
And  o'er  the  smooth  spring  in  the  mountain  cleft 
Hung  with  her  lute,  and  play'd  the  self-same  tune 
He  used  to  play,  and  listen'd  to  the  shadow 
Herself  had  made) — if  this  be  wretchedness, 
And  if  indeed  it  be  a  wretched  thing 
To  trick  out  mine  own  death-bed,  and  imagine 
That  I  had  died,  died  just  ere  his  return ! 
Then  see  him  listening  to  my  constancy, 
Or  hover  round,  as  he  at  midnight  oft 


*  Here  Valdez  bends  back,  and  smiles  at  her  wildness, 
which  Teresa  noticing,  checks  her  enthusiasm,  and  in  a  sooth- 
ing hair-pbiyful  tone  and  manner,  apologizes  for  her  fancy, 
by  the  little  tale  in  the  parenthesis. 

84 


REMORSE. 


75 


Sits  on  my  grave  and  gazes  at  the  moon ; 

Or  haply,  in  some  more  fantastic  mood, 

To  be  in  Paradise,  and  with  choice  flowers 

Build  up  a  bower  where  he  and  I  might  dwell, 

And  there  to  wait  his  coming  !  O  my  sire  ! 

My  Alvar's  sire !  if  this  be  wretchedness 

That  eats  away  the  life,  what  were  it,  think  you. 

If  in  a  most  assured  reality 

He  should  return,  and  see  a  brother's  infant 

Smile  at  him  from  my  arms  ? 

Oh,  what  a  thought !  [Clasping  her  forehead. 

VALDEZ. 

A  thought  ?  even  so!  mere  thought!  an  empty  thought. 
The  very  week  he  promised  his  return 

teresa  (abruptly). 
Was  it  not  then  a  busy  joy  ?  to  see  him, 
After  those  three  years'  travels !  we  had  no  fears — 
The  frequent  tidings,  the  ne'er-failing  letter, 
Almost  endear'd  his  absence  !  Yet  the  gladness, 
The  tumult  of  our  joy !  What  then  if  now 

VALDEZ. 

0  power  of  youth  to  feed  on  pleasant  thoughts, 
Spite  of  conviction!  I  am  old  and  heartless! 
Yes,  I  am  old — I  have  no  pleasant  fancies — 
Hectic  and  unrefresh'd  with  rest — 

teresa  (with  great  tenderness) 

My  father ! 

VALDEZ. 

The  sober  truth  is  all  too  much  for  me  ! 

1  see  no  sail  which  brings  not  to  my  mind 

The  home-bound  bark  in  which  my  son  was  captured 
By  the  Algerine — to  perish  with  his  captors  ! 

TERESA. 

Oh  no !  he  did  not ! 

VALDEZ. 

Captured  in  sight  of  land  ! 
From  yon  hill  point,  nay,  from  our  castle  watch-tower 
We  might  have  seen 

TERESA. 

His  capture,  not  his  death. 

VALDEZ. 

Alas  !  how  aptly  thou  forgett'st  a  tale 

Thou  ne'er  didst  wish  to  learn !  my  brave  Ordonio 

Saw  both  the  pirate  and  his  prize  go  down, 

In  the  same  storm  that  baffled  his  own  valor, 

And  thus  twice  snatch'd  a  brother  from  his  hopes  : 

Gallant  Ordonio !  (pauses ;  then  tenderly).    O  beloved 

Teresa ! 
Wouldst  thou  best  prove  thy  faith  to  generous  Alvar, 
And  most  delight  his  spirit,  go,  make  thou 
His  brother  happy,  make  his  aged  father 
Sink  to  the  grave  in  joy. 

TERESA. 

For  mercy's  sake, 
Press  me  no  more  !  I  have  no  power  to  love  him. 
His  proud  forbidding  eye,  and  his  dark  brow, 
Chill  me  like  dew  damps  of  the  unwholesome  night : 
My  love,  a  timorous  and  tender  flower, 
Closes  beneath  his  touch. 

VALDEZ. 

You  wrong  him,  maiden ! 
You  wrong  him,  by  my  soul !  Nor  was  it  well 
To  character  by  such  unkindly  phrases 
The  stir  and  workings  of  that  love  for  you 
Which  he  has  toil'd  to  smother,     'T  was  not  well, 
Nor  is  it  grateful  in  you  to  forget 


His  wounds  and  perilous  voyages,  and  how 

With  an  heroic  fearlessness  of  danger 

He  roam'd  the  coast  of  Afric  for  your  Alvar. 

It  was  not  well — You  have  moved  me  even  to  tears. 

TERESA. 

Oh  pardon  me,  Lord  Valdez !  pardon  me ! 

It  was  a  foolish  and  ungrateful  speech, 

A  most  ungrateful  speech !  But  I  am  hurried 

Beyond  myself,  if  I  but  hear  of  one 

Who  aims  to  rival  Alvar.     Were  we  not 

Born  in  one  day,  like  twins  of  the  same  parent  ? 

Nursed  in  one  cradle  ?  Pardon  me,  my  father ! 

A  six  years'  absence  is  a  heavy  thing, 

Yet  still  the  hope  survives 

valdez  (looking  foruiard). 
Hush!  'tis  Monviedro. 

TERESA 

The  Inquisitor !  on  what  new  scent  of  blood  ? 

Enter  Monviedro  with  Alhadra. 

monviedro  (having  first  made  his  obeisance  to 
Valdez  and  Teresa). 

Peace  and  the  truth  be  with  you !  Good  my  Lord, 
My  present  need  is  with  your  son. 

[Looking  forward. 
We  have  hit  the  time.    Here  comes  he !  Yes,  'tis  he. 

Enter  from  the  opposite  side  Don  Ordonio. 

My  Lord  Ordonio,  this  Moresco  woman 
(Alhadra  is  her  name)  asks  audience  of  you. 

ordonio. 
Hail,  reverend  father!  what  may  be  the  business? 

monviedro. 
My  Lord,  on  strong  suspicion  of  relapse 
To  his  false  creed,  so  recently  abjured, 
The  secret  servants  of  the  inquisition 
Have  seized  her  husband,  and  at  my  command 
To  the  supreme  tribunal  would  have  led  him, 
But  that  he  made  appeal  to  you,  my  Lord, 
As  surety  for  his  soundness  in  the  faith. 
Though  lessen'd  by  experience  what  small  trust 
The  asseverations  of  these  Moors  deserve, 
Yet  still  the  deference  to  Ordonio's  name, 
Nor  less  the  wish  to  prove,  with  what  high  honor 
The  Holy  Church  regards  her  faithful  soldiers, 
Thus  far  prevail'd  with  me  that 

ORDONIO. 

Reverend  father, 
I  am  much  beholden  to  your  high  opinion, 
Which  so  o'erprizes  my  light  services. 

[Then  to  Alhadra. 
I  would  that  I  could  serve  you  ;  but  in  truth 
Your  face  is  new  to  me. 

MONVIEDRO. 

My  mind  foretold  me, 
That  such  would  be  the  event.  In  truth,  Lord  Valdez, 
'T  was  little  probable,  that  Don  Ordonio, 
That  your  illustrious  son,  who  fought  so  bravely 
Some  four  years  since  to  quell  these  rebel  Moors, 
Should  prove  the  patron  of  this  infidel ! 
The  guarantee  of  a  Moresco's  faith  ! 
Now  I  return. 

ALHADRA. 

My  Lord,  my  husband's  name 

Is  Isidore.  (Ordonio  starts.) — You  may  remember  it: 

85 


76 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Three  years  ago,  three  years  this  very  week, 
You  left  him  at  Almeria. 

MONVIEDRO. 

Palpably  false ! 
This  very  week,  three  years  ago,  my  Lord 
(You  needs  must  recollect  it  by  your  wound), 
You  were  at  sea,  and  there  engaged  the  pirates, 
The  murderers  doubtless  of  your  brother  Alvar  ! 

[Teresa  looks  at  Monviedro  with  disgust  and 
horror.   Ordonio's  appearance  to  be  collected 
from  what  follows. 
monviedro  (to  Valdez,  and  pointing  at  Ordonio). 
What !  is  he  ill,  my  Lord  ?  how  strange  he  looks  ! 

valdez  {angrily). 
You  press'd  upon  him  too  abruptly,  father, 
The  fate  of  one,  on  whom,  you  know,  he  doted. 

ordonio  {starting  as  in  sudden  agitation). 

0  Heavens !  I  ?  I — doted  ?  {then  recovering  himself). 

Yes !  I  doted  on  him. 
[Ordonio  walks  to  the  end  of  the  stage, 
Valdez  follows,  soothing  him. 
teresa  {her  eye  following  Ordonio). 

1  do  not,  can  not,  love  him.     Is  my  heart  hard  ? 
Is  my  heart  hard  ?  that  even  now  the  thought 
Should  force  itself  upon  me  ? — Yet  I  feel  it ! 

monviedro. 
The  drops  did  start  and  stand  upon  his  forehead  ! 
I  will  return.     In  very  truth,  I  grieve 
To  have  been  the  occasion.    Ho  !  attend  me,  woman 
alhadra  {to  Teresa). 

0  gentle  lady !  make  the  father  stay, 
Until  my  Lord  recover.     I  am  sure, 

That  he  will  say  he  is  my  husband's  friend. 

TERESA. 

Stay,  father !  stay !  my  Lord  will  soon  recover. 

ordonio  {as  they  return,  to  Valdez). 
Strange,  that  this  Monviedro 
Should  have  the  power  so  to  distemper  me ! 

valdez. 
Nay,  'twas  an  amiable  weakness,  son! 
monviedro. 

My  Lord,  I  truly  grieve 

ordonio. 

Tut !  name  it  not. 
A  sudden  seizure,  father !  think  not  of  it. 
As  to  this  woman's  husband,  I  do  know  him. 

1  know  him  well,  and  that  he  is  a  Christian. 

monviedro. 
I  hope,  my  Lord,  your  merely  human  pity 

Doth  not  prevail 

ordonio. 
'Tis  certain  that  he  v>as  a  Catholic; 
What  changes  may  have  happen'd  in  three  years, 
I  cannot  say ;  but  grant  me  this,  good  father  : 
Myself  I'll  sift  him  :  if  I  find  him  sound, 
You  '11  grant  me  your  authority  and  name 
To  liberate  his  house. 

monviedro. 

Your  zeal,  my  Lord, 
And  your  late  merits  in  this  holy  warfare, 
Would  authorize  an  ampler  trust — you  have  it. 

ORDONIO. 

I  will  attend  you  home  within  an  hour. 

valdez. 
Meantime,  return  with  us  and  take  refreshment. 


ALHADRA. 

Not  till  my  husband 's  free !  I  may  not  do  it. 
I  will  stay  here. 

teresa  {aside). 

Who  is  this  Isidore  ? 

valdez. 

Daughter ! 

TERESA. 

With  your  permission,  my  dear  Lord, 

I  '11  loiter  yet  awhile  t'  enjoy  the  sea  breeze. 

[Exeunt  Valdez,  Monviedro,  and  Ordonio. 
alhadra. 
Hah !  there  he  goes !  a  bitter  curse  go  with  him, 
A  scathing  curse ! 

{Then  as  if  recollecting  herself,  and  with  a  timid  look). 
You  hate  him,  don't  you,  lady  ? 
teresa  {perceiving  that  Alhadra  is  conscious  she  has 

spoken  imprudently). 
Oh  fear  not  me  !  my  heart  is  sad  for  you. 

alhadra. 

These  fell  inquisitors  !  these  sons  of  blood ! 
As  I  came  on,  his  face  so  madden'd  me, 
That  ever  and  anon  I  clutch'd  my  dagger 
And  half  unsheathed  it 

teresa. 

Be  more  calm,  I  pray  you. 
alhadra. 
And  as  he  walked  along  the  narrow  path 
Close  by  the  mountain's  edge,  my  soul  grew  eager ; 
'Twas  with  hard  toil  I  made  myself  remember 
That  his  Familiars  held  my  babes  and  husband. 
To  have  leapt  upon  him  with  a  tiger's  plunge, 
And  hurl'd  him  down  the  rugged  precipice, 
O,  it  had  been  most  sweet! 

TERESA. 

Hush  !  hush  for  shame  ! 
Where  is  your  woman's  heart  ? 
alhadra. 

O  gentle  lady ! 
You  have  no  skill  to  guess  my  many  wrongs, 
Many  and  strange !  Besides  {ironically),  I  am  a  Chris- 
tian, 
And  Christians  never  pardon — 'tis  their  faith! 

TERESA. 

Shame  fall  on  those  who  so  have  shown  it  to  thee ! 

alhadra. 
I  know  that  man ;  'tis  well  he  knows  not  me. 
Five  years  ago  (and  he  was  the  prime  agent). 
Five  years  ago  the  holy  brethren  seized  me. 

TERESA. 

What  might  your  crime  be  ? 

ALHADRA. 

I  was  a  Moresco ! 
They  cast  me,  then  a  young  and  nursing  mother, 
Into  a  dungeon  of  their  prison-house, 
Where  was  no  bed,  no  fire,  no  ray  of  light, 
No  touch,  no  sound  of  comfort!  The  black  air, 
It  was  a  toil  to  breathe  it !  when  the  door, 
SlowT  opening  at  the  appointed  hour,  disclosed 
One  human  countenance,  the  lamp's  red  flame 
Cower'd  as  it  enter'd,  and  at  once  sunk  down. 
Oh  miserable  !  by  that  lamp  to  see 
My  infant  quarrelling  with  the  coarse  hard  bread 
Brought  daily  :  for  the  little  wretch  was  sickiy — 
My  rage  had  dried  away  its  natural  food. 
In  darkness  I  remain'd — the  dull  bell  counting, 
86 


REMORSE. 


77 


Which  haply  told  me,  that  all  the  all-cheering  Sun 
Was  rising  on  our  garden.     When  I  dozed, 
JMv  infant's  moanings  mingled  with  my  slumbers 
And  waked  me. — If  you  were  a  mother,  Lady, 
I  should  scarce  dnre  to  tell  you,  that  its  noises 
And  peevish  cries  so  fretted  on  my  brain 
That  I  have  struck  the  innocent  babe  in  anger. 

TERESA. 

0  Heaven !  it  is  too  horrible  to  hear. 

ALHADRA. 

What  was  it  then  to  suffer  I  Tis  most  right 
That  such  as  you  should  hear  it. — Know  you  not, 
What  Nature  makes  you  mourn,  she  bids  you  heal? 
Great  Evils  ask  great  Passions  to  redress  them, 
And  Whirlwinds  fitliest  scatter  Pestilence. 

TERESA. 

You  were  at  length  released  ? 

ALHADRA. 

Yes,  at  length 

1  saw  the  blessed  arch  of  the  whole  heaven ! 

'T  was  the  first  time  my  infant  smiled.     No  more — 

For  if  I  dwell  upon  that  moment,  Lady, 

A  trance  comes  on  which  makes  me  o'er  again 

All  I  then  was — my  knees  hang  loose  and  drag, 

And  my  lip  falls  with  such  an  idiot  laugh, 

That  you  would  start  and  shudder ! 

TERESA. 

But  your  husband — 

ALHADRA. 

A  month's  imprisonment  would  kill  him,  Lady. 

TERESA. 

Alas,  poor  man ! 

ALHADRA. 

He  hath  a  lion's  courage, 
Fearless  in  act,  but  feeble  in  endurance; 
Unfit  for  boisterous  times,  vith  gentle  heart 
He  worships  Nature  in  the  hill  ana  valley, 
J\ot  knowing  what  he  loves,  but  loves  it  all — 

Enter  Alvar  disguised  as  a  Moresco.  and  in  Moorish 
garments. 

TERESA. 

Know  you  that  stately  Moor  ? 

ALHADRA. 

I  know  him  not : 
But  doubt  not  he  is  some  Moresco  chieftain, 
Who  hides  himself  among  the  Alpuxarras. 

TERESA. 

The  Alpuxarras  ?    Does  he  know  his  danger, 
So  near  this  seat  ? 

ALHADRA. 

He  wears  the  Moorish  robes  too, 
As  in  defiance  of  the  royal  edict. 

[Alhadra  advances  to  Alvar,  who  has  ivalked  to 
the  back  of  the  stage  near  the  rocks.  Teresa 
drops  her  veil. 

ALHADRA 

Gallant  Moresco !  An  inquisitor, 
Monviedro,  of  known  hatred  to  our  race 

alvar  (interrupting  her). 
You  have  mistaken  me.     I  am  a  Christian. 

ALHADRA. 

He  deems,  that  we  are  plotting  to  ensnare  him : 
Speak  to  him,  Lady — none  can  hear  you  speak, 
And  not  believe  you  innocent  of  guile. 


TERESA. 

If  aught  enforce  you  to  concealment,  Sir ■ 

ALHADRA. 

He  trembles  strangely. 

[Alvar  sinks  down  and  hides  his  face  in  his  role. 

TERESA. 

See,  we  have  disturb'd  him. 

[Approaches  nearer  to  him, 
I  pray  you  think  us  friends — uncowl  your  face, 
For  you  seem  faint,  and  the  night  breeze  blows  healing. 
I  pray  you  think  us  friends ! 

alvar  (raising  his  head). 

Calm,  very  calm ! 
'Tis  all  too  tranquil  for  reality! 
And  she  spoke  to  me  with  her  innocent  voice, 
That  voice,  that  innocent  voice !  She  is  no  traitress ' 

TERESA. 

Let  us  retire.  (Haughtily  to  Alhadra). 

[They  advance  to  the  front  of  the  Stage 

ALHADRA  (with  SCOril). 

He  is  indeed  a  Christian. 

alvar  (aside). 
She  deems  me  dead,  yet  wears  no  mourning  garment ! 
Why  should   my  brother's — wife — wear  mourning 
garments  ? 

[To  Teresa. 
Your  pardon,  noble  dame !  that  I  disturb'd  you  : 
I  had  just  started  from  a  frightful  dream. 

TERESA. 

Dreams  tell  but  of  the  Past,  and  yet,  'tis  said, 
They  prophesy — 

alvar. 
The  Past  lives  o'er  again 
In  its  effects,  and  to  the  guilty  spirit 
The  ever-frowning  Present  is  its  image. 

TERESA. 

Traitress !  (Then  aside). 

What  sudden  spell  o'ermasters  me  ? 
Why  seeks  he  me,  shunning  the  Moorish  woman  ? 
[Teresa  looks  round  uneasily,  but  gradually  be 

comes  attentive  as  Alvar  proceeds  in  the 

next  speech. 

alvar. 
I  dreamt  I  had  a  friend,  on  whom  I  leant 
With  blindest  trust,  and  a  betrothed  maid, 
Whom  I  was  wont  to  call  not  mine,  but  me  : 
For  mine  own  self  seem'd  nothing,  lacking  her. 
This  maid  so  idolized  that  trusted  friend 
Dishonor'd  in  my  absence,  soul  and  body ! 
Fear,  following  guilt,  tempted  to  blacker  guilt. 
And  murderers  were  suborn'd  against  my  life. 
But  by  my  looks,  and  most  impassion'd  words, 
I  roused  the  virtues  that  are  dead  in  no  man. 
Even  in  the  assassins'  hearts !  they  made  their  terms( 
And  thank'd  me  for  redeeming  them  from  murder. 

ALHADRA. 

You  are  lost  in  thought :  hear  him  no  more,  sweet  Lady ! 

TERESA. 

From  morn  to  night  I  am  myself  a  dreamer, 
And  slight  things  bring  on  me  the  idle  mood ! 
Well,  Sir,  what  happen'd  then  ? 

ALVAR. 

On  a  rude  rock, 
A  rock,  methought,  fast  by  a  grove  of  firs, 
Whose  thready  leaves  to  the  low  breathing  gale 
Made  a  soft  sound  most  like  the  distant  ocean, 

87 


78 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


I  stay'd  as  though  the  hour  of  death  were  pass'd, 
And  I  were  sitting  in  the  world  of  spirits — 
For  all  things  seem'd  unreal !  There  I  sate — 
The  dews  (ell  clammy,  and  the  night  descended, 
Black,  sultry,  close  !  and  ere  the  midnight  hour, 
A  storm  came  on,  mingling  all  sounds  of  fear, 
That  woods,  and  sky,  and  mountains,  seem'd  one 

havoc. 
The  second  flash  of  lightning  show'd  a  tree 
Hard  by  me,  newly  scathed.     I  rose  tumultuous  : 
My  soul  work'd  high,  I  bared  my  head  to  the  storm, 
And,  with  loud  voice  and  clamorous  agony, 
Kneeling  I  pray'd  to  the  great  Spirit  that  made  me, 
Pray'd  that  Remorse  might  fasten  on  their  hearts, 
And  cling  with  poisonous  tooth,  inextricable 
As  the  gored  lion's  bite  ! 

TERESA  (shuddering). 

A  fearful  curse ! 

alhadra  (fiercely). 
But  dreamt  you  not  that  you  return'd  and  kill'd  them? 
Dreamt  you  of  no  revenge  ? 

alvar  {his  voice  trembling,  and  in  tones  of  deep  distress). 

She  would  have  died, 
Died  in  her  guilt — perchance  by  her  own  hands ! 
And  bending  o'er  her  self-inflicted  wounds, 
I  might  have  met  the  evil  glance  of  frenzy, 
And  leapt  myself  into  an  unblest  grave  ! 
I  pray'd  for  the  punishment  that  cleanses  hearts: 
For  still  I  loved  her ! 

ALHADRA. 

And  you  dreamt  all  this  ? 

TERESA. 

My  soul  is  full  of  visions  all  as  wild ! 

ALHADRA. 

There  is  no  room  in  this  heart  for  puling  love-tales. 
teresa  (lifts  up  her  veil,  and  advances  to  Alvar). 
Stranger,  farewell !  I  guess  not  who  you  are, 
Nor  why  you  so  address'd  your  tale  to  me. 
Your  mien  is  noble,  and,  I  own,  perplex'd  me 
With  obscure  memory  of  something  past, 
Which  still  escaped  my  efforts,  or  presented 
Tricks  of  a  fancy  pamper'd  with  long  wishing. 
If,  as  it  sometimes  happens,  our  rude  startling 
Whilst  your  full  heart  was  shaping  out  its  dream, 
Drove  you  to  this,  your  not  ungentle  wildness — 
You  have  my  sympathy,  and  so  farewell  • 
But  if  some  undiscover'd  wrongs  oppress  you, 
And  you  need  strength  to  drag  them  into  light, 
The  generous  Valdez,  and  my  Lord  Ordonio, 
Have  arm  and  will  to  aid  a  noble  sufferer ; 
Nor  shall  you  want  my  favorable  pleading. 

[Exeunt  Teresa  and  Alhadra. 

alvar  (alone). 
"Y  is  strange !  It  cannot  bo !  my  Lord  Ordonio ! 
Her  Lord  Ordonio!  Nay,  I  will  not  do  it! 
I  cursed  him  once — and  one  curse  is  enough ! 
How  bad  she  look'd,  and  pale  !  but  not  like  guilt — 
And  her  calm  tones — sweet  as  a  song  of  mercy! 
If  the  bad  spirit  retain'd  his  angel's  voice, 
Hell  scarce  were  Hell.     And  why  not  innocent  ? 
Who  meant  to  murder  me,  might  w'ell  cheat  her  ? 
But  ere  she  married  him,  he  had  stain'd  her  honor; 
Ah  !  there  I  am  hamper'd.     What  if  this  were  a  lie 
Framed  by  the  assassin  ?  Who  should  tell  it  him, 
If  it  were  truth  ?  Ordonio  would  not  tell  him. 
Yet  why  one  lie  ?  all  else,  I  know,  was  truth. 


No  start,  no  jealousy  of  stirring  conscience ! 
And  she  referr'd  to  me — fondly,  methought ! 
Could  she  walk  here  if  she  had  been  a  traitress  ? 
Here,  where  we  play'd  together  in  our  childhood  ? 
Here,  where  we  plighted  vows?    where  her  cold 

cheek 
Received  my  last  kiss,  when  with  suppress'd  feelii 
She  had  fainted  in  my  arms?  It  cannot  be! 
'T  is  not  in  Nature !  I  will  die,  believing 
That  I  shall  meet  her  where  no  evil  is, 
No  treachery,  no  cup  dash'd  from  the  lips. 
I'll  haunt  this  scene  no  more!  live  she  in  peace  .' 
Her  husband — ay,  her  husband  !  May  this  angel 
New  mould  his  canker'd  heart !  Assist  me,  Heav 
That  I  may  pray  for  my  poor  guilty  brother!     [hxiu 


ACT  II. 

SCENE  I. 

A  wild  and  mountainous  Country.  Ordonio  and  Isi- 
dore are  discovered,  supposed  at  a  little  distance 
from  Isidore's  house. 

ordonio. 

Here  we  may  stop :  your  house  distinct  in  view, 

Yet  we  secured  from  listeners. 

ISIDORE. 

Now  indeed 
My  house !  and  it  looks  cheerful  as  the  clusters 
Basking  in  sunshine  on  yon  vine-clad  rock, 
That  over-brows  it !  Patron !  Friend  !  Preserver ! 
Thrice  have  you  saved  my  life.     Once  in  the  battle 
You  gave  it  me  :  next  rescued  me  from  suicide, 
When  for  my  follies  I  was  made  to  wander, 
With  mouths  to  feed,  and  not  a  morsel  for  them 
Now,  but  for  you,  a  dungeon's  slimy  stones 
Had  been  my  bed  and  pillow. 

ORDONIO. 

Good  Isidore ! 
Why  this  to  me  ?  It  is  enough,  you  know  it. 

ISIDORE. 

A  common  trick  of  Gratitude,  my  Lord, 
Seeking  to  ease  her  own  full  heart 

ORDONIO. 

Enough, 
A  debt  repaid  ceases  to  be  a  debt. 
You  have  it  in  your  power  to  serve  me  greatly. 

ISIDORE. 

And  how,  my  Lord  ?  I  pray  you  to  name  the  thing. 
I  would  climb  up  an  ice-glaz'd  precipice 
To  pluck  a  weed  you  fancied ! 

ordonio  (with  embarrassment  and  hesitation). 

Why — that — Lady— 

ISIDORE. 

'T  is  now  three  years,  my  Lord,  since  last  I  saw  you 
Have  you  a  son,  my  Lord  ? 

ORDONIO. 

O  miserable —         [Aside 
Isidore !  you  are  a  man,  and  know  mankind. 
I  told  you  what  I  wish'd — now  for  the  truth ! — 
She  lov'd  the  man  you  kill'd. 

ISIDORE  (looking  as  suddenly  alarmed). 

You  jest,  my  Lord  ? 

ORDONIO. 

And  till  his  death  is  proved,  she  will  not  wed  me. 

88 


REMORSE. 


79 


ISIDORE. 

You  sport  with  me,  my  Lord  I 

ORDONIO. 

Come,  come !  this  foolery 
Lives  only  in  thy  looks :  thy  heart  disowns  it ! 

ISIDORE. 

I  can  bear  this,  and  any  thing  more  grievous 

From  you,  my  Lord — but  how  can  I  serve  you  here  ? 

ORDONIO. 

Why,  you  can  utter  with  a  solemn  gesture 

Oracular  sentences  of  deep  no-meaning, 

Wear  a  quaint  garment,  make  mysterious  antics — 

ISIDORE. 

I  am  dull,  my  Lord !  I  do  not  comprehend  you. 

ORDONIO. 

In  blunt  terms,  you  can  play  the  sorcerer. 
She  hath  no  faith  in  Holy  Church,  'tis  true  : 
Her  lover  school'd  her  in  some  newer  nonsense ! 
Yet  still  a  tale  of  spirits  works  upon  her. 
She  is  a  lone  enthusiast,  sensitive, 
Shivers,  and  cannot  keep  the  tears  in  her  eye : 
And  such  do  love  the  marvellous  too  well 
Not  to  believe  it.     We  will  wind  up  her  fancy 
With  a  strange  music,  that  she  knows  not  of — 
With  fumes  of  frankincense,  and  mummery, 
Then  leave,  as  one  sure  token  of  his  death, 
That  portrait,  which  from  off  the  dead  man's  neck 
I  bade  thee  take,  the  trophy  of  thy  conquest. 

ISIDORE. 

Will  that  be  a  sure  sign  ? 

ORDONIO. 

Beyond  suspicion. 
Fondly  caressing  him,  her  favor'd  lover 
(By  some  base  spell  he  had  bewitch'd  her  senses), 
She  whisper'd  such  dark  fears  of  me,  forsooth, 
As  made  this  heart  pour  gall  into  my  veins. 
And  as  she  coyly  bound  it  round  his  neck, 
She  made  him  promise  silence  ;  and  now  holds 
The  secret  of  the  existence  of  this  portrait, 
Known  only  to  her  lover  and  herself. 
But  I  had  traced  her,  stolen  unnoticed  on  them, 
And  unsuspected  saw  and  heard  the  whole. 

ISIDORE. 

But  now  I  should  have  cursed  the  man  who  told  me 
You  could  ask  aught,  my  Lord,  and  I  refuse — 
But  this  I  cannot  do. 

ORDONIO. 

Where  lies  your  scruple  ? 

Isidore  (with  stammering). 

Why — why,  my  Lord ! 
You  know  you  told  me  that  the  lady  loved  you, 
Had  loved  you  with  incautious  tenderness ; 
That  if  the  young  man,  her  betrothed  husband, 
Returned,  yourself,  and  she,  and  the  honor  of  both 
Must  perish.  Now,  though  with  no  tenderer  scruples 
Than  those  which  being  native  to  the  heart, 
Than  those,  my  Lord,  which  merely  being  a  man — 
ORDONIO  (aloud,  though  to  express  his  contempt 
he  speaks  in  the  third  person). 
This  fellow  is  a  Man — he  kill'd  for  hire 
One  whom  he  knew  not,  yet  has  tender  scruples ! 

[Then  turning  to  Isidore. 
These  doubts,  these  fears,  thy  whine,  thy  stammer- 
ing— 
Pish,  fool !  thou  blunder'st  through  the  book  of  guilt, 
Spelling  thy  villany. 


ISIDORE. 

My  Lord — my  Lord, 
I  can  bear  much — yes;  very  much  from  you ! 
But  there 's  a  point  where  sufferance  is  meanness  : 
I  am  no  villain — never  kill'd  for  hire — 
My  gratitude 

ORDONIO. 

O  ay — your  gratitude  ! 
'Twas  a  well-sounding  word — what  have  you  done 
with  it? 

ISIDORE. 

Who  proffers  his  past  favors  for  my  virtue — 
ordonio  (with  bitter  scorn). 

Virtue ! 

ISIDORE. 

Tries  to  o'erreach  me — is  a  very  sharper, 
And  should  not  speak  of  gratitude,  my  Lord. 
I  knew  not  'twas  your  brother ! 

ordonio  (alarmed). 

And  who  told  you  ? 

ISIDORE. 

He  himself  told  me. 

ORDONIO. 

Ha !  you  talk'd  with  him ! 
And  those,  the  two  Morescoes  who  were  with  you  ? 

ISIDORE. 

Both  fell  in  a  night-brawl  at  Malaga. 
ordonio  (in  a  low  voice). 

My  brother — 

ISIDORE. 

Yes,  my  Lord,  I  could  not  tell  you  ! 

I  thrust  away  the  thought — it  drove  me  wild. 

But  listen  to  me  now — I  pray  you  listen 

ORDONIO. 

Villain !  no  more !  I  '11  hear  no  more  of  it 

ISIDORE. 

My  Lord,  it  much  imports  your  future  safety 
That  you  should  hear  it. 

ordonio  (turning  off  from  Isidore.) 
Am  not  J  a  Man ! 
'Tis  as  it  should  be!  tut — the  deed  itself 
Was  idle,  and  these  after-pangs  still  idler ! 

ISIDORE. 

We  met  him  in  the  very  place  you  mention'd. 
Hard  by  a  grove  of  firs — 

ORDONIO. 

Enough — enough — 

ISIDORE. 

He  fought  us  valiantly,  and  wounded  all ; 
In  fine,  compell'd  a  parley. 

ordonio  (sighing,  as  if  lost  in  thought). 
Alvar!  brother! 

ISIDORE. 

He  offer'd  me  his  purse — 

ordonio  (with  eager  suspicion). 
Yes? 
Isidore  (indignantly). 

Yes — I  spurn'd  it. — 
He  promised  us  I  know  not  what — in  vain.' 
Then  with  a  look  and  voice  that  overawed  me, 
He  said,  What  mean  you,  friends  ?  My  life  is  dear 
I  have  a  brother  and  a  promised  wife, 
Who  make  life  dear  to  me — and  if  I  fall, 
That  brother  will  roam  earth  and  hell  for  vengeance. 
There  was  a  likeness  in  his  face  to  yours ; 
I  ask'd  his  brother's  name  :  he  said — Ordonio 
69 


80 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Son  of  Lord  Valdez !  I  had  well-nigh  fainted. 
At  length  I  said  (if  that  indeed  /  said  it, 
And  that  no  Spirit  made  my  tongue  its  organ), 
That  woman  is  dishonor'd  by  that  brother, 
And  he  the  man  who  sent  us  to  destroy  you. 
He  drove  a  thrust  at  me  in  rage.     I  told  him, 
He  wore  her  portrait  round  his  neck.     He  look'd 
As  he  had  been  made  of  the  rock  that  propt  his 

back — 
Ay,  just  as  you  look  now^-only  less  ghastly ! 
At  length,  recovering  from  his  trance,  he  threw 
His  sword  away,  and  bade  us  take  his  life, 
It  was  not  worth  his  keeping. 

ORDONIO. 

And  you  kill'd  him  ? 

Oh  blood-hounds!   may  eternal  wrath  flame  round 
you! 

He  was  his  Maker's  Image  undefaced !       [A  pause. 

It  seizes  me — by  Hell,  I  will  go  on ! 

What — wouldst  thou  stop,  man  ?  thy  pale  looks  won't 
save  thee  !  [A  pause. 

Oh  cold — cold — cold !  shot  through  with  icy  cold ! 
Isidore  (aside). 

Were  he  alive,  he  had  return'd  ere  now — 

The  consequence  the  same — dead  through  his  plot- 
ting! 

ORDONIO. 

0  this  unutterable  dying  away — here — 

Hiis  sickness  of  the  heart !  [A  pause. 

What  if  I  went 
And  lived  in  a  hollow  tomb,  and  fed  on  weeds  ? 
Ay!  that's  the  road  to  heaven!  0  fool!  fool!  fool! 

[A  pause. 
What  have  I  done  but  that  which  nature  destined, 
Or  the  blind  elements  stirr'd  up  within  me  ? 

1  f  good  were  meant,  why  were  we  made  these  Be- 

ings? 
And  if  not  meant — 

ISIDORE. 

You  are  disturb'd,  my  Lord ! 
ORDONIO    (starts,  looks  at  him  wildly ;  then,  after  a 

pause,  during  which  his  features  are  forced  into 

a  smile). 
A  gust  of  the  soul !  i'  faith,  it  overset  me. 

0  'twas  all  folly — all !  idle  as  laughter! 
Now,  Isidore !  I  swear  that  thou  shalt  aid  me. 

Isidore  (in  a  low  voice). 

1  '11  perish  first ! 

ORDONIO. 

What  dost  thou  mutter  of? 

ISIDORE. 

Some  of  your  servants  know  me,  I  am  certain. 

ORDONIO. 

There 's  some  sense  in  that  scruple ;  but  we  '11  mask 
you. 

ISIDORE. 

They  '11  know  my  gait :  but  stay !  last  night  I  watch'd 
A  stranger  near  the  ruin  in  the  wood, 
Who  as  it  seem'd  was  gathering  herbs  and  wild  flow- 
ers. 
I  had  follow'd  him  at  distance,  seen  him  scale 
Its  western  wall,  and  by  an  easier  entrance 
Stole  after  him  unnoticed.     There  I  mark'd, 
That,  'mid  the  chequer-work  of  light  and  shade, 
With  curious  choice  he  pluck'd  no  other  flowers 
But  those  on  which  the  moonlight  fell :  and  once 
I  heard  him  muttering  o'er  the  plant.     A  wizard — 
Some  gaunt  slave  prowling  here  for  dark  employment. 


ORDONIO. 

Doubtless  you  question'd  him  ? 

ISIDORE. 

'Twas  my  intention 
Having  first  traced  him  homeward  to  his  haunt. 
But  lo !  the  stern  Dominican,  whose  spies 
Lurk  everywhere,  already  (as  it  seem'd) 
Had  given  commission  to  his  apt  familiar 
To  seek  and  sound  the  Moor  ;  who  now  returning, 
Was  by  this  trusty  agent  stopp'd  midway. 
I,  dreading  fresh  suspicion  if  found  near  him 
In  that  lone  place,  again  conceal'd  myself, 
Yet  within  hearing.     So  the  Moor  was  question'd, 
And  in  your  name,  as  lord  of  this  domain. 
Proudly  he  answer'd,  "  Say  to  the  Lord  Ordonio, 
He  that  can  bring  the  dead  to  life  again ! " 

ORDONIO. 

A  strange  reply ! 

ISIDORE. 

Ay,  all  of  him  is  strange. 
He  call'd  himself  a  Christian,  yet  he  wears 
The  Moorish  robes,  as  if  he  courted  death. 

ORDONIO. 

Where  does  this  wizard  live  ? 

Isidore  (pointing  to  the  distance). 

You  see  that  brooklet ' 
Trace  its  course  backward :  through  a  narrow  opening 
It  leads  you  to  the  place. 

ORDONIO. 

How  shall  I  know  it  ? 

ISIDORE. 

You  cannot  err.     It  is  a  small  green  dell 
Built  all  around  with  high  off-sloping  hills, 
And  from  its  shape  our  peasants  aptly  call  it 
The  Giant's  Cradle.     There's  a  lake  in  the  rnidst, 
And  round  its  banks  tall  wood  that  branches  over, 
And  makes  a  kind  of  faery  forest  grow 
Down  in  the  water.     At  the  further  end 
A  puny  cataract  falls  on  the  lake  ; 
And  there,  a  curious  sight !  you  see  its  shadow 
For  ever  curling  like  a  wreath  of  smoke, 
Up  through  the  foliage  of  those  faery  trees. 
His  cot  stands  opposite.     You  cannot  miss  it. 

ordonio  (in  retiring  stops  suddenly  at  the  edge  of  the 

scene,  and  then  turning  round  to  Isidore). 
Ha ! — Who  lurks  there  ?  Have  we  been  overheard  ? 
There,  where  the  smooth  high  wall  of  slate-rock  glit- 
ters— 

ISIDORE. 

'Neath  those  lall  stones,  which,  propping  each  the 

other, 
Form  a  mock  portal  with  their  pointed  arch ! 
Pardon  my  smiles !  'T  is  a  poor  Idiot  Boy, 
Who  sils  in  the  sun,  and  twirls  a  bough  about, 
His  weak  eyes  seethed  in  most  unmeaning  tears. 
And  so  he  sits,  swaying  his  cone-like  head ; 
And,  staring  at  his  bough  from  morn  to  sun-set, 
See-saws  his  voice  in  inarticulate  noises ! 

ORDONIO. 

'Tis  well !  and  now  for  this  same  Wizard's  Lair. 

ISIDORE. 

Some  three  strides  up  the  hill,  a  mountain  ash 
Stretches  its  lower  boughs  and  scarlet  clusters 
O'er  the  old  thatch. 

ORDONIO. 

I  shall  not  fail  to  find  it. 
[Exeunt  Ordonio  and  Isidore. 
90 


REMORSE. 


8J 


SCENE  II. 

The  Inside  of  a  Cottage,  around  which  Flowers  and 
Plants  of  various  kinds  are  seen.  Discovers  Alvar, 
Zulimez,  aiul  Alhadra,  as  on  the  point  of  leaving;. 

alhadra  (addressing  Alvar). 
Farewell,  then !  and  though  many  thoughts  perplex 

me, 
Aught  evil  or  ignoble  never  can  I 
Suspect  of  thee !  If  what  thou  seem'st  thou  art, 
The  oppressed  brethren  of  thy  blood  have  need 
Of  such  a  leader. 

ALVAR. 

Noble-minded  woman! 
Long  time  against  oppression  have  I  fought, 
And  for  the  native  liberty  of  faith 
Have  bled,  ami  suffcr'd  bonds.     Of  this  be  certain  : 
Time,  as  he  courses  onwards,  still  unrolls 
The  volume  of  Concealment.     In  the  Future, 
As  in  the  optician's  glassy  cylinder, 
The  indistinguishable  blots  and  colors 
Of  the  dim  Past  collect  and  shape  themselves, 
Upstarting  in  their  own  completed  image 
To  scare  or  to  reward. 

I  sought  the  guilty, 
And  what  I  sought  I  found :  but  ere  the  spear 
Flew  from  my  hand,  there  rose  an  angel  form 
Betwixt  me  and  my  aim.     With  baffled  purpose 
To  the  Avenger  I  leave  Vengeance,  and  depart ! 

Whate'er  betide,  if  aught  my  arm  may  aid, 
Or  power  protect,  my  word  is  pledged  to  thee : 
For  many  are  thy  wrongs,  and  thy  soul  noble. 
Once  more,  farewell. 

[Exit  Alhadra. 
Yes,  to  the  Belgic  states 
We  will  return.  These  robes,  this  stain'd  complexion, 
Akin  to  falsehood,  weigh  upon  my  spirit. 
Whate'er  befall  us,  the  heroic  Maurice 
Will  grant  us  an  asylum,  in  remembrance 
Of  our  past  services. 

ZULIMEZ. 

And  all  the  wealth,  power,  influence  which  is  yours, 
You  let  a  murderer  hold  ? 

alvar. 

O  faithful  Zulimez ! 
That  my  return  involved  Ordonio's  death, 
1  trust,  would  give  me  an  unmingled  pang, 
Yet  bearable  : — but  when  I  see  my  father 
Strewing  his  scant  gray  hairs,  e'en  on  the  ground, 
Which  soon  must  be  his  grave,  and  my  Teresa — 
Her  husband  proved  a  murderer,  and  her  infants, 
His  infants — poor  Teresa ! — all  would  perish, 
All  perish — all !  and  I  (nay  bear  with  me) 
Could  not  survive  the  complicated  ruin ! 

zulimez  {much  afected). 
Nay  now !  I  have  distress'd  you — you  well  know, 
I  ne'er  will  quit  your  fortunes.     True,  'tis  tiresome! 
You  are  a  painter*  one  of  many  fancies ! 
You  can  call  up  past  deeds,  and  make  them  live 
On  the  blank  canvas!  and  each  little  herb, 
That  grows  on  mountain  bleak,  or  tangled  forest, 
You  have  learnt  to  name 

Hark !  heard  you  not  some  footsteps  ? 


Vide  Appendix,  Note  1. 
I 


ALVAR. 

What  if  it  were  my  brother  coming  onwards < 
I  sent  a  most  mysterious  message  to  him. 

Enter  Ordonio. 
alvar  (starling) 
It  is  he ! 

ordonio  (to  himself  as  he  enters). 
If  I  distinguish'd  right  her  gait  and  stature, 
It  was  the  Moorish  woman,  Isidore's  wife, 
That  pass'd  me  as  I  enter'd.     A  lit  taper, 
In  the  night  air,  doth  not  more  naturally 
Attract  the  night-flies  round  it,  than  a  conjuror 
Draws  round  him  the  whole  female  neighborhood. 

[Addressing  Alvar. 
You  know  my  name,  I  guess,  if  not  my  person. 
I  am  Ordonio,  son  of  the  Lord  Valdez. 

alvar  (with  deep  emotion). 
The  Son  of  Valdez ! 

[Ordonio  walks  leisurely  round  the  room,  and  look* 
attentively  at  the  plants. 

zulimez  (to  Alvar). 

Why,  what  ails  you  now  ? 
How  your  hand  trembles!  Alvar,  speak!  what  wish 
you? 

alvar. 
To  fall  upon  his  neck  and  weep  forgiveness ! 

ordonio  (returning,  and  aloud). 
Pluck'd  in  the  moonlight  from  a  ruin'd  abbey — 
Those  only,  which  the  pale  rays  visited ! 
O  the  unintelligible  power  of  weeds, 
When  a  few  odd  prayers  have  beenmutter'd  o'er  them. 
Then  they  work  miracles !  I  warrant  you, 
There 's  not  a  leaf,  but  underneath  it  lurks 
Some  serviceable  imp. 

There 's  one  of  you 
Hath  sent  me  a  strange  message. 
alvar. 

I  am  he. 
ordonio. 
With  you,  then,  I  am  to  speak  .- 

[Haughtily  waving  his  hand  to  Zulimez. 
And,  mark  you,  alone.  [Exit  Zulimez. 

"  He  that  can  bring  the  dead  to  life  again!" — 
Such  was  your  message,  Sir !  You  are  no  dullard, 
But  one  that  strips  the  outward  rind  of  things! 

alvar. 
'Tis  fabled  there  are  fruits  with  tempting  rinds. 
That  are  all  dust  and  rottenness  within. 
Wouldst  thou  I  should  strip  such? 

ordonio. 

Thou  quibbling  fool, 
What  dost  thou  mean?   Think'st  thou  I  journey "d 

hither, 
To  sport  with  thee  ? 

alvar. 
O  no,  my  Lord !  to  sport 
Best  suits  the  gaiety  of  innocence. 
ordonio  (aside). 
O  what  a  thing  is  man !  the  wisest  heart 
A  Fool !  a  Fool  that  laughs  at  its  own  folly, 
Yet  still  a  fool !  [Looks  round  the  Cottage 

You  are  poor! 


What  follows  thence  ? 


ORDONIO. 

That  you  would  fain  be  richer 
91 


82 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


The  Inquisition,  too — You  comprehend  me  ? 

You  are  poor,  in  peril.     I  have  wealth  and  power, 

Can  quench  the  flames,  and  cure  your  poverty  ; 

And  for  the  boon  I  ask  of  you,  but  this, 

That  you  should  serve  me — once — for  a  few  hours. 

alvar  (solemnly). 
Thou  art  the  son  of  Valdez !  would  to  Heaven 
That  I  could  truly  and  for  ever  serve  thee. 

ORDONIO. 

The  slave  begins  to  soften.  [Aside. 

You  are  my  friend, 
"  He  that  can  bring  the  dead  to  life  again." 
Nay,  no  defence  to  me !  The  holy  brethren 
Believe  these  calumnies — I  knovr  thee  better. 

{Then  with  great  bitterness). 
Thou  art  a  man,  and  as  a  man  I  '11  trust  thee ! 

alvar  {aside). 
Alas !  this  hollow  mirth — Declare  your  business. 

ORDONIO. 

I  love  a  lady,  and  she  would  love  me, 
But  for  an  idle  and  fantastic  scruple. 
Have  you  no  servants  here,  no  listeners  ? 

[Ordonio  steps  to  the  door. 

ALVAR. 

VVhat,  faithless  too  ?  False  to  his  angel  wife  ? 
To  such  a  wife  ?  Well  mightst  thou  look  so  wan, 
Ill-starr'd  Teresa ! — Wretch  !  my  softer  soul 
Is  pass'd  away,  and  I  will  probe  his  conscience ! 

ORDONIO. 

In  truth  this  lady  loved  another  man, 
But  he  has  perish'd. 

ALVAR. 

What !  you  kill'd  him !  hey  ? 

ORDONIO. 

I  '11  dash  thee  to  the  earth,  if  thou  but  think'st  it ! 
Insolent  slave !  how  daredst  thou — 

[Turns  abruptly  from  Alvar,  and  then  to  himself. 
Why!  what's  this ? 
'T  was  idiocy !  I  '11  tie  myself  to  an  aspen, 
And  wear  a  fool's  cap — 

alvar  (watching  his  agitation). 
Fare  thee  well — 
I  pity  thee,  Ordonio,  even  to  anguish. 

[Alvar  is  retiring. 

ORDONIO  [having  recovered  himself). 
Ho  !  [Calling  to  Alvar. 

ALVAR. 

Be  brief:  what  wish  you? 

ORDONIO. 

You  are  deep  at  bartering — You  charge  yourself 
At  a  round  sum.     Come,  come,  I  spake  unwisely. 

ALVAR. 

I  listen  to  you. 

ORDONIO. 

In  a  sudden  tempest, 
Did  Alvar  perish — he,  I  mean — the  lover — 
The  fellow, 

ALVAR. 

Nay,  speak  out !  't  will  ease  your  heart 
To  call  him  villain ! — Why  stand'st  thou  aghast! 
Men  think  it  natural  to  hate  their  rivals. 

ORDONIO  (hesitating). 
Now,  till  she  knows  him  dead,  she  will  not  wed  me. 

alvar  (with  eager  vehemence). 
Are  you  not  wedded  then  ?  Merciful  Heaven ! 
Not  wedded  to  Teresa  ? 


ORDONIO. 

Why,  what  ails  thee  ? 
What,  art  thou  mad  ?  why  look'st  thou  upward  so  ? 
Dost  pray  to  Lucifer,  Prince  of  the  Air  ? 

alvar  (recollecting  himself). 
Proceed,  I  shall  be  silent. 
[Alvar  sits,  and  leaning  on  the  table,  hides  his  face. 

ORDONIO. 

To  Teresa? 
Politic  wizard !  ere  you  sent  that  message, 
You  had  conn'd  your  lesson,  made  yourself  proficient 
In  all  my  fortunes      Hah !  you  prophesied 
A  golden  crop !  Well,  you  have  not  mistaken — 
Be  faithful  to  me,  and  I  '11  pay  thee  nobly. 

alvar  (lifting  up  his  head). 
Well !  and  this  lady  ? 

ORDONIO. 

If  we  could  make  her  certain  of  his  death, 
She  needs  must  wed  me.     Ere  her  lover  left  her, 
She  tied  a  little  portrait  round  his  neck, 
Entreating  him  to  wear  it. 

alvar  (sigldng). 

Yes !  he  did  so ! 

ORDONIO. 

Why  no !  he  was  afraid  of  accidents, 
Of  robberies,  and  shipwrecks,  and  the  like. 
In  secrecy  he  gave  it  me  to  keep, 
Till  his  return. 

ALVAR. 

What !  he  was  your  friend,  then  ! 

ordonio  (wounded  and  embarrassed). 
I  was  his  friend. — 

Now  that  he  gave  it  me 
This  lady  knows  not.     You  are  a  mighty  wizard — 
Can  call  the  dead  man  up — he  will  not  come — 
He  is  in  heaven  then — there  you  have  no  influence : 
Still  there  are  tokens — and  your  imps  may  bring  you 
Something  he  wore  about  him  when  he  died. 
And  when  the  smoke  of  the  incense  on  the  altar 
Is  pass'd,  your  spirits  will  have  left  this  picture. 
What  say  you  now  ? 

alvar  (after  a  pause). 

Ordonio,  I  will  do  it 

ORDONIO. 

We  '11  hazard  no  delay.     Be  it  to-night, 
In  the  early  evening.     Ask  for  the  Lord  Valdez. 
I  will  prepare  him.     Music  too,  and  incense 
(For  I  have  arranged  it — Music,  Altar,  Incense), 
All  shall  be  ready.     Here  is  this  same  picture, 
And  here,  what  you  will  value  more,  a  purse. 
Come  early  for  your  magic  ceremonies. 

ALVAR. 

I  will  not  fail  to  meet  you. 

ORDONIO. 

Till  next  we  meet,  farewell ! 

[Exit  Ordonio 

alvar  (alone,  indignantly  flings  the  purse  away,  and 
gazes  passionately  at  the  portrait). 

And  I  did  curse  thee  ? 
At  midnight?  on  my  knees?  and  I  believed 
Thee  perjured,  thee  a  traitress !   Thee  dishorior'c* 
O  blind  and  credulous  fool !  O  guilt  of  folly  ! 
Should  not  thy  inarticulate  Fondnesses, 
Thy  Infant  Loves — should  not  thy  Maiden  Vows 
Have  come  upon  my  heart  ?  And  this  sweet  Image, 
Tied  round  my  neck  with  many  a  chaste  endearment, 
92 


REMORSE. 


83 


And  thrilling  hands,  that  made  me  weep  anjd  tremble — 
Ah,  coward  dupe  !  to  yield  it  to  the  miscreant, 
Who  spake  pollution  of  thee !  barter  for  Life 
This  farewell  Pledge,  which  with  impassion'd  Vow 
I  had  sworn  that  I  would  grasp — ev'n  in  my  death- 
pang! 

I  am  unworthy  of  thy  love,  Teresa, 

Of  that  unearthly  smile  upon  those  lips, 

Which  ever  smiled  on  me !  Yet  do  not  scorn  me — 

I  lisp'd  thy  name,  ere  I  had  learnt  my  mother's. 

Dear  Portrait !  rescued  from  a  traitor's  keeping, 
I  will  not  now  profane  thee,  holy  Image, 
To  a  dark  trick.     That  worst  bad  man  shall  find 
A  picture,  which  will  wake  the  hell  within  him, 
And  rouse  a  fiery  whirlwind  in  his  conscience. 


ACT  HI. 

SCENE  I. 


A  Hall  of  Armory,  with  an  Altar  at  the  back  of  the 
Stage.  Soft  Music  front  an  instrument  of  Glass 
or  Steel. 

Valdez,  Ordonio,  and  Alvar  in  a  Sorcerer's  robe, 
are  discovered. 

ORDONIO. 

This  was  too  melancholy,  father. 

VALDEZ. 

Nay, 
My  Alvar  loved  sad  music  from  a  child. 
Once  he  was  lost ;  and  after  weary  search 
We  found  him  in  an  open  place  in  the  wood, 
To  which  spot  he  had  follow'd  a  blind  boy, 
Who  breathed  into  a  pipe  of  sycamore 
Some  strangely  moving  notes :  and  these,  he  said, 
Were  taught  him  in  a  dream.     Him  we  first  saw 
Stretch'd  on  the  broad  top  of  a  sunny  heath-bank : 
And  lower  down  poor  Alvar,  fast  asleep, 
His  head  upon  the  blind  boy's  dog.    It  pleased  me 
To  mark  how  he  had  fasten'd  round  the  pipe 
A  silver  toy  his  grandam  had  late  given  him. 
Melhinks  I  see  him  now  as  he  then  look'd — 
Even  so ! — He  had  outgrown  his  infant  dress, 
Yet  still  he  wore  it. 

ALVAR. 

My  tears  must  not  flow ! 
I  must  not  clasp  his  knees,  and  cry,  My  father ! 
Enter  Teresa,  and  Attendants. 

TERESA. 

Lord  Valdez,  you  have  ask'd  my  presence  here, 
And  I  submit ;  but  (Heaven  bear  witness  for  me) 
My  heart  approves  it  not!  'tis  mockery. 

ORDONIO. 

Believe  you  then  no  preternatural  influence  ? 
Believe  you  not  that  spirits  throng  around  us  ? 

TERESA. 

Say  rather  that  I  have  imagined  it 
A  possible  thing :  and  it  has  soothed  my  soul 
As  other  fancies  have ;  but  ne'er  seduced  me 
To  traffic  with  the  black  and  frenzied  hope 
That  the  dead  hear  the  voice  of  witch  or  wizard. 
(To  Alvar.    Stranger,  I  moum  and  blush  to  see  you 
here, 


On  such  employment !  With  far  other  thoughts 
I  left  you. 

ordonio  (aside). 
Ha !  he  has  been  tampering  with  her ''. 
alvar. 

0  high-soul'd  maiden !  and  more  dear  to  me 
Than  suits  the  Stranger's  name  ! — 

I  swear  to  thee 

1  will  uncover  all  concealed  guilt 

Doubt,  but  decide  not !  Stand  ye  from  the  altar. 

[Here  a  strain  of  music  is  heard  from  behind  the 
scene. 

ALVAR. 

With  no  irreverent  voice  or  imcouth  charm 
I  call  up  the  Departed ! 

Soul  of  Alvar! 
Hear  our  soft  suit,  and  heed  my  milder  spell : 
So  may  the  Gates  of  Paradise,  unbarr'd, 
Cease  thy  swift  toils !  since  haply  thou  art  one 
Of  that  innumerable  company 
Who  in  broad  circle,  lovelier  than  the  rainbow. 
Girdle  this  round  earth  in  a  dizzy  motion, 
With  noise  too  vast  and  constant  to  be  heard : 
Fitliest  unheard  !  For  oh,  ye  numberless 
And  rapid  travellers !  What  ear  unsrunn'd, 
What  sense  unmadden'd,  might  bear  up  against 
The  rushing  of  your  congregated  wings  ? 

[Music 
Even  now  your  living  wheel  turns  o'er  my  head ! 

[Music  expressive  of  the  movements  and  images 
that  follow. 
Ye,  as  ye  pass,  toss  high  the  desert  sands, 
That  roar  and  whiten,  like  a  burst  of  waters, 
A  sweet  appearance,  but  a  dread  illusion 
To  the  parch'd  caravan  that  roams  by  night ! 
And  ye  build  upon  the  becalmed  waves 
That  whirling  pillar,  which  from  Earth  !o  Heaven 
Stands  vast,  and  moves  in  blackness !  Ye  too  split 
The  ice  mount !  and  with  fragments  many  and  huge 
Tempest  the  new-thaw'd  sea,  whose  sudden  gulfs 
Suck  in,  perchance,  some  Lapland  wizard  skiff! 
Then  round  and  round  the  wliirlpool's  marge  ye 

dance, 
Till  from  the  blue  swoln  Corse  the  Soul  toils  out, 
And  joins  your  mighty  Army. 

[Here  behind  the  scenes  a  voice  sings  the  three 
words,  "Hear,  sweet  Spirit." 

Soul  of  Alvar ! 
Hear  the  mild  spell,  and  tempt  no  blacker  Charm ! 
By  sighs  unquiet,  and  the  sickly  pang 
Of  a  half  dead,  yet  still  undying  Hope, 
Pass  visible  before  our  mortal  sense ! 
So  shall  the  Church's  cleansing  rites  be  thine, 
Her  knells  and  masses  that  redeem  the  Dead! 


Behind  the  Scenes,  accompanied  by  the  same  Instru- 
ment as  before. 

Hear,  sweet  spirit,  hear  the  spell, 
Lest  a  blacker  charm  compel ! 
So  shall  the  midnight  breezes  swell 
With  thy  deep  long-lingering  knell. 

And  at  evening  evermore, 
In  a  Chapel  on  the  shore, 
Shall  the  Chanters  sad  and  saintly. 
Yellow  tapers  burning  faintly, 
93 


84 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Doleful  Masses  chant  for  thee, 
Miserere  Domine! 

Hark !  the  cadence  dies  away 
On  the  yellow  moonlight  sea : 

The  boatmen  rest  their  oars  and  say, 

Miserere  Domine !  [A  long  pause. 

ORDONIO. 

The  innocent  obey  nor  charm  nor  spell ! 

My  brother  is  in  heaven.     Thou  sainted  spirit, 

Burst  on  our  sight,  a  passing  visitant ! 

Once  more  to  hear  thy  voice,  once  more  to  see  thee, 

O  'twere  a  joy  to  me ! 

ALVAR. 

A  joy  to  thee ! 
What  if  thou  heard'st  him  now  ?  What  if  his  spirit 
Re-enter'd  its  cold  corse,  and  came  upon  thee 
With  many  a  stab  from  many  a  murderer's  poniard  ? 
What  if  (his  stedfast  Eye  still  beaming  Pity 
And  Brother's  love)  he  turn'd  Ms  head  aside, 
Lest  he  should  look  at  thee,  and  with  one  look 
Hurl  thee  beyond  all  power  of  Penitence  ? 

VALDEZ. 

These  are  unholy  fancies ! 

ordonio  (struggling  with  his  feelings). 
Yes,  my  father, 
He  is  in  Heaven ! 

alvar  (still  to  Ordonio). 

But  what  if  he  had  a  brother, 
Who  had  lived  even  so,  that  at  his  dying  hour 
The  name  of  Heaven  would  have  convulsed  his  face, 
More  than  the  death-pang  ? 

VALDEZ. 

Idly  prating  man ! 
Thou  hast  guess'd  ill :  Don  Alvar's  only  brother 
Stands  here  before  thee — a  father's  blessing  on  him ! 
He  is  most  virtuous. 

alvar  (still  to  Ordonio). 

What,  if  his  very  virtues 
Had  pamper'd  his  svvoln  heart  and  made  him  proud  ? 
And  what  if  Pride  had  duped  him  into  guilt  ? 
Yet  still  he  stalk'd  a  self-created  God, 
Not  very  bold,  but  exquisitely  cunning; 
And  one  that  at  his  Mother's  looking-glass 
Would  force  his  features  to  a  frowning  sternness  ? 
Young  Lord !  I  tell  thee,  that  there  are  such  Beings — 
Yea,  and  it  gives  fierce  merriment  to  the  damn'd, 
To  see  these  most  proud  men,  that  lothe  mankind, 
At  every  stir  and  buzz  of  coward  conscience, 
Trick,  cant,  and  lie,  most  whining  hypocrites ! 
Away,  away !  Now  let  me  hear  more  music. 

[Music  again. 

TERESA. 

'T  is  strange,  I  tremble  at  my  own  conjectures ! 

But  whatsoe'er  it  mean,  I  dare  no  longer 

Be  present  at  these  lawless  mysteries, 

This  dark  provoking  of  the  Hidden  Powers  ! 

Already  I  affront — if  not  high  Heaven — 

Yet  Alvar's  Memory ! — Hark !  I  make  appeal 

Against  the  unholy  rite,  and  hasten  hence 

To  bend  before  a  lawful  shrine,  and  seek 

That  voice  which  whispers,  when  the  still  heart 

listens, 
Comfort  and  faithful  Hope  !  Let  us  retire. 
alvar  (to  Teresa  anxiously). 
O  full  of  faith  and  guileless  love,  thy  Spirit 


Still  prompts  thee  wisely.     Let  the  pangs  of  guilt 
Surprise  the  guilty  :  thou  art  innocent .' 

[Exeunt  Teresa  and  Attendant. 
(Music  as  before). 
The  spell  is  mutter'd — Come,  thou  wandering  Shape, 
Who  own'st  no  Master  in  a  human  eye, 
Whate'er  be  this  man's  doom,  fair  be  it,  or  foul ; 
If  he  be  dead,  O  come !  and  bring  with  thee 
That  which  he  grasp'd  in  death !  but  if  he  live, 
Some  token  of  his  obscure  perilous  life. 

[The  whole  Music  clashes  into  a  Chorus. 

CHORUS. 

Wandering  Demons,  hear  the  spell! 
Lest  a  blacker  charm  compel — 
[The  incense  on  the  altar  takes  fire  suddenly,  and 
an  illuminated  picture  of  Alvar's  assassina- 
tion   is   discovered,   and   having   remained  a 
few    seconds    is    then   hidden   by   ascending 
fames. 
ordonio  (starting  in  great  agitation). 
Duped  !  duped !  duped  ! — the  traitor  Isidore ! 

[At  this  instant  the  doors  are  forced  open,  Mon- 
viedro  and  the  Familiars  of  the  Inquisition, 
Servants  etc.  enter  and  f  11  the  stage. 
monviedro. 
First  seize  the  sorcerer !  suffer  him  not  to  speak  ! 
The  holy  judges  of  the  Inquisition 
Shall  hear  his  first  words. — Look  you  pale,  Lord 

Valdez? 
Plain  evidence  have  we  here  of  most  foul  sorcery. 
There  is  a  dungeon  underneath  this  castle, 
And  as  you  hope  for  mild  interpretation, 
Surrender  instantly  the  keys  and  charge  of  it. 
ordonio  (recovering  himself  as  from  stupor,  to 
Servants.) 
Why  haste  you  not  ?    Off  with  him  to  the  dungeon ! 
[All  rush  out  in  tumult 


SCENE  n. 

Interior  of  a  Chapel,  with  painted  Windows. 
Enter  Teresa. 

TERESA. 

When  first  I  enter'd  this  pure  spot,  forebodings 
Press'd  heavy  on  my  heart :  but  as  I  knelt, 
Such  calm  unwonted  bliss  possess'd  my  spirit, 
A  trance  so  cloudless,  that  those  sounds,  hard  by, 
Of  trampling  uproar  fell  upon  mine  ear 
As  alien  and  unnoticed  as  the  rain-storm 
Beats  on  the  roof  of  some  fair  banquet-room, 

While  sweetest  melodies  are  warbling 

Enter  Valdez. 
valdez. 
Ye  pitying  saints,  forgive  a  father's  blindness, 
And  extricate  us  from  this  net  of  peril ! 

TERESA. 

Who  wakes  anew  my  fears,  and  speaks  of  peril  ? 

VALDEZ. 

0  best  Teresa,  wisely  wert  thou  prompted ! 
This  was  no  feat  of  mortal  agency ! 
That  picture — Oh,  that  picture  tells  me  all ! 
With  a  flash  of  light  it  came,  in  flames  it  varush'd 
Self-kindled,  self-consumed :  bright  as  thy  Life, 
Sudden  and  unexpected  as  thy  Fate, 
Alvar !  My  son !  My  son ! — The  Inquisitor — 

94 


REMORSE. 


85 


TERESA. 

Torture  me  not !  But  Alvar — Oh  of  Alvai  ? 

VALDEZ. 

How  often  would  he  plead  for  these  Moreseoes ! 
The  brood  accurst !  remorseless,  coward  murderers ! 

TERESA  (wildly). 

So  ?  so  ? — I  comprehend  you — He  is 

VALDEZ  {with  averted  countenance). 

He  is  no  more ! 

TERESA. 

O  sorrow  !  that  a  father's  voice  should  say  this, 
A  father's  heart  believe  it ! 

VALDEZ. 

A  worse  sorrow 
Are  Fancy's  wild  hopes  to  a  heart  despairing ! 

TERESA. 

These   rays   that  slant  in  through   those   gorgeous 

windows, 
From  yon  bright  orb — though  color'd  as  they  pass, 
Are   they  not'  Light  1 — Even  so  that  voice,   Lord 

Valdee ! 
Which  whispers  to  my  soul,  though  haply  varied 
By  many  a  fancy,  many  a  wishful  hope, 
Speaks  yet  the  truth :  and  Alvar  lives  for  me! 

VALDEZ. 

Yes,  for  three  wasting  years,  thus  and  no  other, 
He  has  lived  for  thee — a  spirit  for  thy  spirit ! 
My  child,  we  must  not  give  religious  faith 
To  every  voice  which  makes  the  heart  a  listener 
To  its  own  wish. 

TERESA. 

I  breathed  to  the  Unerring 
Permitted  prayers.    Must  those  remain  unanswer'd, 
Yet  impious  sorcery,  that  holds  no  commune 
Save  with  the  lying  Spirit,  claim  belief? 

VALDEZ. 

0  not  to-day,  not  now  for  the  first  time 
Was  Alvar  lost  to  thee — 

[Turning  off,  aloud,  but  yet  as  to  himself. 
Accurst  assassins ! 
Disarm'd,  o'erpower'd,  despairing  of  defence, 
At  his  bared  breast  he  seem'd  to  grasp  some  relict 

More  dear  than  was  his  life 

TERESA  {with  a  faint  shrieh). 

O  Heavens !  my  portrait ! 
And  he  did  grasp  it  in  his  death-pang! 

Off,  false  Demon, 
That  beat'st  thy  black  wings  close  above  my  head ! 
[Ordonio  enttrs  with  the  keys  of  the  dungeon 
in  his  hand. 
Hush !  who  comes  here  ?    The  wizard  Moor's  em- 
ployer ! 
Moors  were  his  murderers,  you  say  ?  Saints  shield  us 

From  wicked  thoughts 

[Valdez  moves  towards  the  back  of  the  stage  to 
meet  Ordonio,  and  during  the  concluding 
lints  of  Teresa's  speech  appears  as  eagerly 
conversing  with  him. 

Is  Alvar  dead  ?  what  then  ? 
The  nuptial  rites  and  funeral  shall  be  one  ! 
Here's  no  abiding-place  for  thee,  Teresa. — 
Away  !  they  see  me  not — TJtou  seest  me,  Alvar! 
To  thee  I  bend  my  course. — But  first  one  question, 
One  question  to  Ordonio. — My  bmbs  tremble — 
There  I  may  sit  unmark'd — a  moment  will  restore  me. 
[Retires  out  of  sight. 
ordonio  {as  he  advances  with  Valdez). 
These  are  the  dungeon  keys.    Monviedro  knew  not 
That  I  too  had  received  the  wizard  message, 
12 


"  He  that  can  bring  the  dead  to  life  again." 
But  now  he  is  satisfied,  1  plann'd  this  scheme 
To  work  a  full  conviction  on  the  culprit, 
And  he  intrusts  him  wholly  to  my  keeping. 

VALDEZ. 

'Tis  well,  my  son!  But  have  you  yet  discover'd 
Where  is  Teresa  ?  what  those  speeches  meant — 
Pride,  and  Hypocrisy,  and  Guilt,  and  Cunning? 
Then  when  the  wizard  fix'd  his  eye  on  you, 
And  you,  I  know  not  why,  look'd  pale  and  trem- 
bled— 
Why — why,  what  ails  you  now  ? — 
ordonio  {confused). 

Me  ?  what  ails  me  ? 
A  pricking  of  the  blood — It  might  have  happen'd 
At  any  other  time. — Why  scan  you  me  ? 

VALDEZ 

His  speech  about  the  corse,  and  stabs  and  murderers 
Bore  reference  to  the  assassins 

ORDONIO. 

Duped  !  duped  !  duped 
The  traitor,  Isidore  !  [A  pause  ;  then  uildly. 

I  tell  thee,  my  dear  father  ! 
I  am  most  glad  of  this. 

valdez  {confused). 

True — Sorcery 
Merits  its  doom  ;  and  this  perchance  may  guide  us 
To  the  discovery  of  the  murderers. 
I  have  their  statures  and  their  several  faces 
So  present  to  me,  that  but  once  to  meet  them 
Would  be  to  recognize. 

ORDONIO. 

Yes !  yes  !  we  recognize  them 
I  was  benumb'd,  and  stagger'd  up  and  down 
Through  darkness  without  light — dark — dark — dark ! 
My  flesh  crept  chill,  my  limbs  felt  manacled, 
As  had  a  snake  coil'd  round  them  ! — Now  't  is  sun- 
shine, 
And  the  blood  dances  freely  through  its  channels ! 

[Turns  off  abruptly  ;  then  to  himself 
This  is  my  virtuous,  grateful  Isidore  ! 

[Then  mimicking  Isidore's  manner  and  voice. 
"A  common  trick  of  gratitude,  my  Lord!" 
Oh  Gratitude  !  a  dagger  would  dissect 
His  "own  full  heart" — 'twere  good  to  see  its  color 

valdez. 
These  magic  sights  !  O  that  I  ne'er  had  yielded, 
To  your  entreaties  !  Neither  had  I  yielded, 
But  that  in  spite  of  your  own  seeming  faith 
I  held  it  for  some  innocent  stratagem, 
Which  Love  had  prompted,  to  remove  the  doubts 
Of  wild  Teresa — by  fancies  quelling  fancies ! 

ordonio  (in  a  slow  voice,  as  reasoning  to  himself) 
Love !  Love !  and  then  we  hate !  and  what  ?  and 

wherefore ! 
Hatred  and  Love  !  Fancies  opposed  by  fancies ! 
What,  if  one  reptile  sling  another  reptile! 
Where  is  the  crime  .'   The  goodly  face  of  Nature 
Hath  one  disfeaturing  stain  the  less  upon  it. 
Are  we  not  all  predestined  Transiency, 
And  cold  Dishonor  ?    Grant  it,  that  this  hand 
Had  given  a  morsel  to  the  hungry  worms 
Somewhat  too  early — Where 's  the  crime  of  this  ? 
That  this  must  needs  bring  on  the  idiocy 
Of  moist-eyed  Penitence — 'tis  like  a  dream! 

valdez. 

Wild  talk,  my  son '  But  thy  excess  of  feeling 

[Averting  himself 
°5 


8G 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Almost,  I  fear,  it  hath  unhinged  his  brain. 

ORDONio  {now  in  soliloquy,  and  now  addressing 

his  father  :    and  just  after  the  speech  has 

commenced,  Teresa  reappears  and  advances 

slowly). 

Say,  I  had  laid  a  body  in  the  sun ! 

Well !  in  a  month  there  swarm  forth  from  the  corse 

A  thousand,  nay,  ten  thousand  sentient  beings 

In  place  of  that  one  man. — Say,  1  had  kill'd  him ! 

[Teresa  starts,  and  stops,  listening. 
Yet  who  shall  tell  me,  that  each  one  and  all 
Of  these  ten  thousand  lives  is  not  as  happy 
As  that  one  life,  which  being  push'd  aside, 
Made  room  for  these  unnumber'd 

valdez. 

O  mere  madness ! 

[Teresa  moves  hastily  forwards,  and  places  herself 

directly  before  Ordonio. 

ORDONIO  {checking  the  feeling  of  surprise,  and 

forcing   his   tones  into  an  expression   of 

playful  courtesy). 

Teresa  ?  or  the  Phantom  of  Teresa  ? 

TERESA. 

Alas!  the  Phantom  only,  if  in  truth 

The  substance  of  her  Being,  her  Life's  life, 

Have  ta'en  its  flight  through  Alvar's  death-wound — 

{A  pause.)  Where — 

(Even  coward  Murder  grants  the  dead  a  grave) 
O  tell  me,  Valdez  ! — answer  me,  Ordonio  ! 
Where  lies  the  corse  of  my  betrothed  husband  ? 

ORDONIO. 

There,  where  Ordonio  likewise  would  fain  lie! 
In   the   sleep-compelling  earth,  in  unpierced  dark 

ness ! 
For  while  we  live — 
An  inward  day  that  never,  never  sets, 
Glares  round  the  soul,  and  mocks  the  closing  eye 

lids ! 
Over  his  rocky  grave  the  Fir-grove  sighs 
A  lulling  ceaseless  dirge !  'T  is  well  with  him. 

[Strides  off  in  agitation  towards   the  altar,  but 

returns  as  Valdez  is  speaking. 
TERESA  {recoiling  with  the  expression  appropriate  to 

the  passion). 
The  rock  !  the  fir-grove !  [To  Valdez. 

Didst  thou  hear  him  say  it  ? 
Hush  !  I  will  ask  him ! 

VALDEZ. 

Urge  him  not — not  now! 
This  we  beheld.    Nor  He  nor  1  know  more, 
Than  what  the  magic  imagery  reveal'd. 
The  assassin,  who  press'd  foremost  of  the  three 

ORDONIO. 

A  tender-hearted,  scrupulous,  grateful  villain, 
Whom  I  will  strangle ! 

valdez  {looking  with  anxious  disquiet  at  his  Son,  yet 
attempting  to  proceed  with  his  description). 

While  his  two  companions 

ORDONIO. 

Dead  !  dead  already!  what  care  we  for  the  dead  ? 

valdez  {to  Teresa). 
Pity  him !  soothe  him  !  disenchant  his  spirit ! 
These  supernatural  shows,  this  strange  disclosure, 
And  this  too  fond  affection,  which  still  broods 
O'er  Alvar's  fate,  and  still  burns  to  avenge  it — 
These,  struggling  with  his  hopeless  love  for  you, 
Distemper  him,  and  give  reality 
To  the  creatures  of  his  fancy — 


ORDONIO. 

Is  it  so  ? 
Yes !  yes !  even  like  a  child,  that,  too  abruptly 
Roused  by  a  glare  of  light  from  deepest  sleep, 
Starts  up  bewilder'd  and  talks  idly. 

{Then  mysteriously.)  Father! 

What  if  the  Moors  that  made  my  brother's  grave 
Even  now  were  digging  ours  ?  What  if  the  bolt, 
Though  aim'd,  I  doubt  not,  at  the  son  of  Valdez, 
Yet  miss'd  its  true  aim  when  it  fell  on  Alvar  >. 

valdez. 
Alvar  ne'er  fought  against  the  Moors, — say  rather, 
He  was  their  advocate ;  but  you  had  march'd 
With  fire  and  desolation  through  their  villages. — 
Yet  he  by  chance  was  captured. 

ORDONIO. 

Unknown,  perhaps. 
Captured,  yet,  as  the  son  of  Valdez,  murder'd. 
Leave  all  to  me.    Nay,  whither,  gentle  Lady? 

VALDEZ. 

What  seek  you  now  ? 

TERESA. 

A  better,  surer  light 

To  guide  me 

Both  valdez  and  ORDONIO. 
Whither  ? 

TERESA. 

To  the  only  place 
Where  life  yet  dwells  for  me,  and  ease  of  heart 
These  walls  seem  threatening  to  fall  in  upon  me! 
Detain  me  not !  a  dim  Power  drives  me  hence, 
And  that  will  be  my  guide. 

VALDEZ. 

To  find  a  lover ! 
Suits  that  a  high-born  maiden's  modesty  ? 

0  folly  and  shame !  Tempt  not  my  rage,  Teresa ! 

TERESA. 

Hopeless,  I  fear  no  human  being's  rage. 

And  am  I  hastening  to  the  arms O  Heaven! 

1  haste  but  to  the  grave  of  my  beloved ! 

[Exit,  Valdez  following  after  her 

ORDONIO. 

This,  then,  is  my  reward  !  and  I  must  love  her  ? 
Scorn'd  !    shudder'd  at !  yet  love  her  still  ?   yes ! 

yes  ! 
By  the  deep  feelings  of  Revenge  and  Hate 
I  will  still  love  her — woo  her — win  her  too  ! 
{A  pause)  Isidore  safe  and  silent,  and  the  portrait 
Found  on  the  wizard — he,  belike,  self-poison'd 
To  escape  the  crueller  flames My  soul  shouts 

triumph ! 
The  mine  is  undermined  !  Blood  !  Blood  !  Blood ! 
They  thirst  for  thy  blood!  thy  blood,  Ordonio! 

[A  pause. 
The  hunt  is  up !  and  in  the  midnight  wood, 
With  lights  to  dazzle  and  with  nets  they  seek 
A  timid  prey :  and  lo !  the  tiger's  eye 
Glares  in  the  red  flame  of  his  hunter's  torch ! 
To  Isidore  I  will  dispatch  a  message, 
And  lure  him  to  the  cavern!  ay,  that  cavern! 
He  cannot  fail  to  find  it.    Thither  I  '11  lure  him, 
Whence  he  shall  never,  never  more  return! 

[Looks  through  the  side  wiiuiow 
A  rim  of  the  sun  lies  yet  upon  the  sea, 
And  now  't  is  gone  !  All  shall  be  done  to-night. 

[Exit. 
96 


REMORSE. 


87 


ACT  IV. 

SCENE  I. 

A  cavern,  dark,  except  where  a  gleam  of  moonlight  is 
seen  on  one  side  at  the  further  end  of  it ;  supposed 
to  be  cast  on  it  from  a  ere  vice  in  a  part  of  the 
cavern  out  of  sight-  Isidore  alone,  an  extinguished 
torch  in  his  hand. 

ISIDORE. 

Faith  't  was  a  moving  letter — very  moving ! 
'  His  life  in  danger,  no  place  safe  but  this ! 
Twas  his  turn  now  to  talk  of  gratitude." 
And  yet — but  no !  there  can't  be  such  a  villain. 
It  cannot  be ! 

Thanks  to  that  little  crevice, 
Which  lets  the  moonlight  in !  I  '11  go  and  sit  by  it. 
To  peep  at  a  tree,  or  see  a  he-goat's  beard, 
Or  hear  a  cow  or  two  breathe  loud  in  their  sleep — 
Any  tiling  but  this  crash  of  water-drops ! 
These  dull  abortive  sounds  that  fret  the  silence 
With  puny  thwartings  and  mock  opposition ! 
So  beats  the  death-watch  to  a  dead  man's  ear. 

[He  goes  out  of  sight,  opposite  to  the  patch  of 

moonlight :  returns  after  a  minute's  elapse, 

in  an  ecstasy  of  fear. 
A  hellish  pit !  The  very  same  I  dreamt  of! 
I  was  just  in — and  those  damn'd  fingers  of  ice 
Which  clutch'd  my  hair  up !  Ha ! — what's  that — it 

moved. 

[Isidore  stands  staring  at  another  recess  in 
the  cavern.  In  the  mean  time  Ordo.mo  en- 
ters with  a  torch,  and  halloos  to  Isidore. 

ISIDORE. 

I  swear  that  I  saw  something  moving  there ! 
The  moonshine  came  and  went  like  a  flash  of  light- 
ning  

I  swear,  I  sawr  it  move. 

ordo.mo  (goes  into  the  recess,  then  returns,  and  with 
great  scorn). 

A  jutting  clay  stone 
Props  on  the  long  lank  weed,  that  grows  beneath : 
And  the  weed  nods  and  drips. 

Isidore  {forcing  a  laugh  faintly). 

A  jest  to  laugh  at ! 
It  was  not  that  which  scared  me,  good  my  Lord. 

ordonio. 
What  scared  you,  then  ? 

ISIDORE. 

You  see  that  little  rift  ? 
But  first  permit  me ! 
[Lights  his  torch  at  Ordonio's,  and  while  lighting  it. 
(A  lighted  torch  in  the  hand, 
Is  no  unpleasant  object  here — one's  breath 
Floats  round  the  flame,  and  makes  as  many  colors 
As  the  thin  clouds  that  travel  near  the  moon.) 
You  see  that  crevice  there  ? 
My  torch  extinguish'd  by  these  water  drops, 
And  marking  that  the  moonlight  came  from  thence, 
I  stept  in  to  it,  meaning  to  sit  there ; 
But  scarcely  had  I  measured  twenty  paces — 
My  body  bending  forward,  yea,  overbalanced 
Almost  beyond  recoil,  on  the  dim  brink 
Of  a  huge  chasm  I  stept.     The  shadowy  moonshine 
Filling  the  Void,  so  counterfeited  Substance, 
N 


That  my  foot  hung  aslant  adown  the  edge. 
Was  it  my  own  fear  ? 

Fear  too  hath  its  instincts! 
(And  yet  such  dens  as  these  are  wildly  told  of, 
And  yet  are  Beings  that  live,  yet  not  for  the  eye) 
An  arm  of  frost  above  and  from  behind  me 
Pluck'd  up  and  snatch'd  me  backward.     Merciful 

Heaven ! 
You  smile !  alas,  even  smiles  look  ghastly  here ! 
My  Lord,  I  pray  you,  go  yourself  and  view  it. 

ORDONIO. 

It  must  have  shot  some  pleasant  feelings  through  you. 

ISIDORE. 

If  every  atom  of  a  dead  man's  flesh 
Should  creep,  each  one  with  a  particular  life, 
Yet  all  as  cold  as  ever — 'twas  just  so! 
Or  had  it  drizzled  needle  points  of  frost 
Upon  a  feverish  head  made  suddenly  bald — 
ordonio  {interrupting  him). 

Why,  Isidore 
I  blush  for  thy  cowardice.    It  might  have  startled. 
I  grant  you,  even  a  brave  man  for  a  moment — 
But  such  a  panic — 

ISIDORE. 

When  a  boy,  my  Lord  ! 
I  could  have  sate  whole  hours  beside  that  chasm, 
Push'd  in  huge  stones,  and  heard  them  strike  and 

rattle 
Against  its  horrid  sides:  then  hung  my  head 
Low  down,  and  listen'd  till  the  heavy  fragments 
Sank  with  faint  crash  in  that  still  groaning  well, 
Which  never  thirsty  pilgrim  blest,  which  never 
A  living  thing  came  near — unless,  perchance, 
Some  blind-worm  battens  on  the  ropy  mould 
Close  at  its  edge. 

ORDONIO. 

Art  thou  more  coward  now  f 

ISIDORE. 

Call  him,  that  fears  his  fellow-man,  a  coward  ! 
I  fear  not  man — but  this  inhuman  cavern, 
It  were  too  bad  a  prison-house  for  goblins. 
Beside  (you  '11  smile,  my  Lord),  but  true  it  is, 
My  last  night's  sleep  was  very  sorely  haunted 
By  what  had  pass'd  between  us  in  the  morning. 

0  sleep  of  horrors !  Now  run  down  and  stared  at 
By  Forms  so  hideous  that  they  mock  remembrance — 
Now  seeing  nothing  and  imagining  nothing, 

But  only  being  afraid — stifled  with  Fear ! 

While  every  goodly  or  familiar  form 

Had  a  strange  power  of  breathing  terror  round  me ! 

1  saw  you  in  a  thousand  fearful  shapes  ; 
And,  I  entreat  your  lordship  to  believe  me, 
In  my  last  dream 

ORDO.MO. 

Well  ? 

ISIDORE. 

I  was  in  the  act 
Of  falling  down  that  chasm,  when  Alhadra 
Waked  me  :  she  heard  my  heart  beat. 

ORDONIO. 

Strange  enough! 
Had  you  been  here  before  ? 

ISIDORE. 

Never,  my  Lord ! 
But  mine  eyes  do  not  see  it  now  more  clearly, 
Than  in  my  dream  I  saw — that  very  chasm. 
ordonio  (stands  lost  in  thought,  then  after  a  pause.) 
I  know  not  why  it  should  be  !  yet  it  is — 

97 


88 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


What  is,  my  Lord  ? 


ORDONIO. 

Abhorrent  from  our  nature, 


To  kill  a  man. — 


ISIDORE. 

Except  in  self-defence. 

ORDONIO. 

Why,  that 's  my  case ;  and  yet  the  soul  recoils  from  it — 
'Tis  so  with  me  at  least.     But  you,  perhaps, 
Have  sterner  feelings  ? 

ISIDORE. 

Something  troubles  you. 
How  shall  I  serve  you  ?  By  the  life  you  gave  me, 
By  all  that  makes  that  life  of  value  to  me, 
My  wife,  my  babes,  my  honor,  I  swear  to  you, 
Name  it,  and  I  will  toil  to  do  the  thing, 
If  it  be  innocent !  But  this,  my  Lord, 
Is  not  a  place  where  you  could  perpetrate, 
No,  nor  propose,  a  wicked  thing.     The  darkness, 
When  ten  strides  off,  we  know  't  is  cheerful  moonlight, 
Collects  the  guilt,  and  crowds  it  round  the  heart. 
It  must  be  innocent. 
[Ordoxio  darkly,  and  in  the  feeling  of  self-justifica- 
tion, tells  what  he  conceives  of  his  own  character  and 
actions,  speaking  of  himself  in  the  third  person. 

ORDONIO. 

Thyself  be  judge. 
One  of  our  family  knew  this  place  well. 

ISIDORE. 

Who  ?  when  ?  my  Lord  ? 

ORDONIO. 

What  boots  it,  who  or  when  ? 

Hang  up  thy  torch — I  '11  tell  his  tale  to  thee. 

{They  hang  up  their  torches  on  some  ridge  in 
the  cavern. 
He  was  a  man  different  from  other  men, 
And  he  despised  them,  yet  revered  himself. 

Isidore  (aside). 
He  ?  Hi.  despised  ?  Thou  'rt  speaking  of  thyself! 
I  am  on  my  guard,  however :  no  surprise. 

[Then  foC-RDONio. 
What !  he  was  mad  ? 

ORDONIO. 

All  men  seem'd  mad  to  him ! 
Nature  had  made  him  for  some  other  planet, 
And  press'd  his  soul  into  a  human  shape 
By  accident  or  malice.     In  this  world 
He  found  no  fit  companion. 


[Aside. 


Of  himself  he  speaks. 

Alas!  poor  wretch! 
Mad  men  are  mostly  proud. 

ORDONIO. 

He  walk'd  alone, 
And  phantom  thoughts  unsought-for  troubled  him. 
Something  within  would  still  be  shadowing  out 
All  possibilities;  and  with  these  shadows 
His  mind  held  dalliance.     Once,  as  so  it  happen'd, 
A  fancy  cross'd  him  wilder  than  the  rest : 
To  this  in  moody  murmur  and  low  voice 
He  yielded  utterance,  as  some  talk  in  sleep : 
The  man  who  heard  him. — 

Why  didst  thou  look  round  ? ' 


ISIDORE. 

I  have  a  prattler  three  years  old,  my  Lord ! 

In  truth  he  is  my  darling.     As  I  went 

From  forth  my  door,  he  made  a  moan  in  sleep — 

But  I  am  talking  idly — pray  proceed ! 

And  what  did  this  man  ? 

ORDONIO. 

With  his  human  hand 
He  gave  a  substance  and  reality 
To  that  wild  fancy  of  a  possible  thing. — 
Well  it  was  done !  [  Then  very  wildly 

Why  babblest  thou  of  guilt  ? 
The  deed  was  done,  and  it  pass'd  fairly  off. 
And  he  whose  tale  I  tell  thee — dost  thou  listen  ? 

ISIDORE. 

I  would,  my  Lord,  you  were  by  my  fire-side, 
I  'd  listen  to  you  with  an  eager  eye, 
Though  you  began  this  cloudy  tale  at  midnight ; 
But  I  do  listen — pray  proceed,  my  Lord. 

ORDONIO. 

Where  was  I  ? 

ISIDORE. 

He  of  whom  you  tell  the  tale — 

ORDONIO. 

Surveying  all  things  with  a  quiet  scorn. 
Tamed  himself  down  to  living  purposes, 
The  occupations  and  the  semblances 
Of  ordinary  men — and  such  he  seem'd! 
But  that  same  over-ready  agent — he — 

ISIDORE. 

Ah !  what  of  him,  my  Lord  ? 

ORDONIO 

He  proved  a  traitor, 
Betray'd  the  mystery  to  a  brother  traitor, 
And  they  between  them  hatch'd  a  damned  plot 
To  hunt  him  down  to  infamy  and  death. 
What  did  the  Valdez  ?  I  am  proud  of  the  name, 
Since  he  dared  do  it. — 

[Ordonio  grasps  his  sword,  and  turns  off  from 
Isidore  ;  then  after  a  pause  returns 
Our  links  burn  dimly. 

ISIDORE. 

A  dark  tale  darkly  finish'd !  Nay,  my  Lord ! 
Tell  what  he  did. 

ORDONIO. 

That  which  his  wisdom  prompted — 

He  made  that  Traitor  meet  him  in  this  cavern, 

And  here  he  kill'd  the  Traitor. 

ISIDORE. 

No !  the  fool ! 
He  had  not  wit  enough  to  be  a  traitor. 
Poor  thick-eyed  beetle  !  not  to  have  foreseen 
That  he  who  gull'd  thee  with  a  wliimper'd  lie 
To  murder  his  own  brother,  would  not  scruple 
To  murder  thee,  if  e'er  his  guilt  grew  jealous, 
And  he  could  steal  upon  thee  in  the  dark ! 

ORDONIO. 

Thou  wouldst  not  then  have  come,  if 

ISIDORE. 

Oh  yes,  my  Lord  ! 

I  would  have  met  him  arm'd,  and  scared  the  coward 
[Isidore  throws  off  his  robe ;  shows  himself  armed, 
and  draws  his  sword. 

ORDONIO. 

Now  this  is  excellent,  and  warms  the  blood  ! 
My  heart  was  drawing  back,  drawing  me  back 

98 


REMORSE. 


89 


With  weak  and  womanish  scruples.    Now  my  Ven- 
geance 
Beckons  me  onwards  with  a  warrior's  mien, 
And  claims  that  life,  my  pity  robb'd  her  of — 
Now  will  I  kill  thee,  thankless  slave !  and  count  it 
Among  my  comfortable  thoughts  hereafter. 

ISIDORE. 

And  all  my  little  ones  fatherless — 

Die  thou  first. 
[They  fight ;  Ordoxio  disarms  Isidoue,  and  in  dis- 
arming him  throws  his  sword  up  that  recess  oppo- 
site to  which  they  were  standing.  Isidoue  hurries 
into  the  recess  u-i/h  his  torch,  Ordoxio  follows  him  ; 
a  loud  cry  of  "  Traitor!  Monster!"  is  heard 
from,  the  cavern,  and  in  a  moment  Ordonio  returns 
alone. 

ordonio. 
I  have  hurl'd  him  down  the  chasm !  Treason  for  trea- 
son. 
He  dreamt  of  It :  henceforward  let  him  sleep 
A  dreamless  sleep,  from  which  no  wife  can  wake  him. 
His  dream  too  is  made  out — Now  for  his  friend. 

[Exit  Ordonio. 


SCENE  II* 


VALDEZ. 

Hush,  thoughtless  woman! 

TERESA. 

Nay,  it  wakes  within  me 
More  than  a  woman's  spirit. 

VALDEZ. 

No  more  of  this — 
What  if  Monviedro  or  his  creatures  hear  us ! 
I  dare  not  listen  to  you. 

TERESA 

My  honor'd  Lord, 
These  were  my  Alvar's  lessons  ;  and  whene'er 
I  bend  me  o'er  his  portrait,  I  repeat  them, 
As  if  to  give  a  voice  to  the  mute  image. 

VALDEZ. 

We  have  mourn'd  for  Ahar. 


The  interior  Court  of  a  Saracenic  or  Gothic  Castle, 
with  the  Iron  Gate  of  a  Dungeon  visible. 

TERESA. 

Heart-chilling  Superstition!  thou  canst  glaze 
Even  Pity's  eye  with  her  own  frozen  tear. 
In  vain  I  urge  the  tortures  that  await  him ; 
Even  Selma,  reverend  guardian  of  my  childhood, 
My  second  mother,  shuts  her  heart  against  me ! 
Well,  I  have  won  from  her  what  most  imports 
The  present  need,  this  secret  of  the  dungeon, 
Known  only  to  herself — A  Moor!  a  Sorcerer! 
No,  I  have  faith,  that  Nature  ne'er  permitted 
Baseness  to  wear  a  form  so  noble.     True, 
I  doubt  not,  that  Ordonio  had  suborn'd  him 
To  act  some  part  in  some  unholy  fraud ; 
As  little  doubt,  that  for  some  unknown  purpose 
He  hath  baffled  his  suborner,  terror-struck  him, 
And  that  Ordonio  meditates  revenge ! 
But  my  resolve  is  fix'd !  myself  will  rescue  him, 
And  learn  if  haply  he  know  aught  of  Alvar. 

Enter  Valdez. 

valdez. 
Still  sad  ? — and  gazing  at  the  massive  door 
Of  that  fell  Dungeon  which  thou  ne'er  hadst  sight  of, 
Save  what,  perchance,  thy  infant  fancy  shaped  it, 
When  the  nurse  still'd  thy  cries  with  unmeant  threats. 
Now  by  my  faith,  Girl !  this  same  wizard  haunts  thee  ! 
A  stately  man,  and  eloquent  and  tender — 

[  With  a  sneer. 
Who  then  need  wonder  if  a  lady  sighs 
Even  at  the  thought  of  what  these  stern  Dominicans — 

teresa  {with  solemn  indignation). 
The  horror  of  their  gl  lastly  punishments 
Doth  so  o'ertop  the  height  of  all  compassion, 
That  I  should  feel  too  little  for  mine  enemy, 
If  it  were  possible  I  could  feel  more, 
Even  though  the  dearest  inmates  of  our  household 
Were  doom'd  to  suffer  them.  That  such  things  are — 


*  Vide  Appendix,  Note  2. 


Of  his  sad  fate  there  now  remains  no  doubt. 
Have  I  no  other  son  ? 

TERESA. 

Speak  not  of  him ! 
That  low  imposture !  That  mysterious  picture ! 
If  this  be  madness,  must  I  wed  a  madman? 
And  if  not  madness,  there  is  mystery, 
And  guilt  doth  lurk  behind  it. 

valdez. 

Is  this  well  ? 

TERESA. 

Yes,  it  is  truth  :  saw  you  his  countenance  ? 
How  rage,  remorse,  and  scorn,  and  stupid  fear. 
Displaced  each  other  with  swift  interchanges  ? 

0  that  I  had  indeed  the  sorcerer's  power! 

1  would  call  up  before  thine  eyes  the  image 
Of  my  betrothed  Alvar,  of  thy  first-born ! 

His  own  fair  countenance,  his  kingly  forehead, 
His  tender  smiles,  love's  day-dawn  on  his  lips  ! 
That  spiritual  and  almost  heavenly  light 
In  his  commanding  eye — his  mien  heroic, 
Virtue's  own  native  heraldry !  to  man 
Genial,  and  pleasant  to  his  guardian  angel. 
Whene'er  he  gladden'd,  how  the  gladness  spread 
Wide  round  him !  and  when  oft  with  swelling  tears. 
Flash'd  through  by  indignation,  he  bew'ail'd 
The  wrongs  of  Belgium's  martyr'd  patriots, 
Oh,  what  a  grief  was  there — for  joy  to  envy, 
Or  gaze  upon  enamour'd ! 

O  my  father ! 
Recall  that  morning  when  we  knelt  together, 
And  thou  didst  bless  our  loves !  O  even  now, 
Even  now,  my  sire !  to  thy  mind's  eye  present  him, 
As  at  that  moment  he  rose  up  before  thee, 
Stately,  with  beaming  look !  Place,  place  beside  him 
Ordonio's  dark  perturbed  countenance  ! 
Then  bid  me  (Oh  thou  couldst  not)  bid  me  turn 
From  him,  the  joy,  the  triumph  of  our  kind  ! 
To  take  in  exchange  that  brooding  man,  who  never 
Lifts  up  his  eye  from  the  earth,  unless  to  scowl. 

VALDEZ. 

Ungrateful  woman !  I  have  tried  to  stifle 
An  old  man's  passion !  was  it  not  enough 
That  thou  hadst  made  my  son  a  restless  man, 
Banish'd  his  health,  and  half  unhinged  his  reason; 
But  that  thou  wilt  insult  him  with  suspicion  ? 
And  toil  to  blast  his  honor  ?  I  am  old, 
A  comfortless  old  man ! 

TERESA. 

O  Grief!  to  hear 
Hateful  entreaties  from  a  voice  we  love ! 
99 


90 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Enter  a  Peasant  and  presents  a  letter  to  Valdez. 

valdez  {reading  it). 

"  He  dares  not  venture  hither ! "  Why  what  can  this 

mean  ? 
"  Lest  the  Familiars  of  the  Inquisition, 
That  watch  around  my  gates,  should  intercept  him ; 
But  he  conjures  me,  that  without  delay 
I  hasten  to  him — for  my  own  sake  entreats  me 
To  guard  from  danger  him  I  hold  imprison' d — 
He  will  reveal  a  secret,  the  joy  of  which 
Will  even  outweigh  the  sorrow." — Why  what  can 

this  be  ? 
Perchance  it  is  some  Moorish  stratagem, 
To  have  in  me  a  hostage  for  his  safety. 
Nay,  that  they  dare  not  ?  Ho !  collect  my  servants ! 
I  will  go  thither — let  them  arm  themselves. 

[Exit  Valdez. 

teresa  (alone). 
The  moon  is  high  in  heaven,  and  all  is  hush'd. 
Yet,  anxious  listener !  1  have  seem'd  to  hear 
A  low  dead  thunder  mutter  through  the  night, 
As  'twere  a  giant  angry  in  his  sleep. 
O  Alvar !  Alvar !  that  they  could  return, 
Those  blessed  days  that  imitated  heaven, 
When  we  two  wont  to  walk  at  even-tide ; 
When  we  saw  naught  but  beauty  ;  when  we  heard 
The  voice  of  that  Almighty  One  who  loved  us 
In  every  gale  that  breathed,  and  wave  that  ,mur- 
mur'd ! 

0  we  have  listen'd,  even  till  high-wrought  pleasure 
Hath  half  assumed  the  countenance  of  grief, 

And  the  deep  sigh  seem'd  to  heave  up  a  weight 
Of  bliss,  that  press'd  too  heavy  on  the  heart. 

[A  pause. 
And  this  majestic  Moor,  seems  he  not  one 
Who  oft  and  long  communing  with  my  Alvar 
Hath  drunk  in  kindred  lustre  from  his  presence, 
And  guides  me  to  him  with  reflected  light  ? 
What  if  in  yon  dark  dungeon  coward  Treachery 
Be  groping  for  him  with  envenom'd  poniard — 
Hence,  womanish  fears,  traitors  to  love  and  duty — 

1  '11  free  him.  [Exit  Teresa. 


SCENE  III. 


The  Mountains  by  moonlight.     Alhadra  alone  in  a 
Moorish  dress. 

ALHADRA. 

Yon  hanging  woods,  that  touch'd  by  autumn  seem 
As  they  were  blossoming  hues  of  fire  and  gold ; 
The  flower-like  woods,  most  lovely  in  decay, 
The  many  clouds,  the  sea,  the  rock,  the  sands, 
Lie  in  the  silent  moonshine  :  and  the  owl, 
(Strange  !  very  strange !)  the  screech-owl  only  wakes ! 
Sole  voice,  sole  eye  of  all  this  world  of  beauty ! 
Unless,  perhaps,  she  sing  her  screeching  song 
To  a  herd  of  wolves,  that  skulk  athirst  for  blood. 
Why  such  a  thing  am  I  ? — Where  are  these  men  ? 
I  need  the  sympathy  of  human  faces, 
To  beat  away  this  deep  contempt  for  all  things, 
Which  quenches  my  revenge.     Oh !  would  to  Alia, 
The  raven,  or  the  sea-mew,  were  appointed 
To  bring  me  food !  or  rather  that  my  soul 
Could  drink  in  life  from  the  universal  air! 
It  were  a  lot  divine  in  some  small  skiff" 
Along  some  Ocean's  boundless  solitude, 


To  float  for  ever  with  a  careless  course, 
And  think  myself  the  only  being  alive  ! 

My  children ! — Isidore's  children ! — Son  of  Valdez, 
This  hath  new-strung  mine  arm.  Thou  coward  tyrant 
To  stupify  a  woman's  heart  with  anguish, 
Till  she  forgot — even  that  she  was  a  mother ! 
[Slie  fives  her  eye  on  the  earth.    Then  drop  in  one  after 
'  another,  from  different  parts  of  the  stage,  a  con- 
siderable number  of  Morescoes,  all  in  Moorish  gar- 
ments and  Moorish  armor.      They  form  a  circle  at 
a  distance  round  Alhadra,  and  remain  silent  till 
the  second  in  command,  Naomi,  enters,  distinguished 
by  his  dress  and  armor,  and  by  the  silent  obeisance 
paid  to  him  on  his  entrance  by  the  other  Moors. 

NAOMI. 

Woman !  may  Alia  and  the  Prophet  bless  thee  ! 
We  have  obey'd  thy  call.  Where  is  our  chief? 
And  why  didst  thou  enjoin  these  Moorish  garments  ? 

Alhadra  (raising  her  eyes,  and  looking  round  on  the 

circle). 
Warriors  of  Mahomet !  faithful  in  the  battle  ! 
My  countrymen !  Come  ye  prepared  to  work 
An  honorable  deed  ?  And  would  ye  work  it 
In  the  slave's  garb  ?  Curse  on  those  Christian  robes! 
They  are  spell-blasted  :  and  whoever  wears  them 
His  arm  shrinks  wither'd,  his  heart  melts  away, 
And  his  bones  soften. 

NAOMI. 

Where  is  Isidore  ? 
alhadra  (in  a  deep  low  voice). 
This  night  I  went  from  forth  my  house,  and  left 
His  children  all  asleep :  and  he  was  living ! 
And  I  return'd  and  found  them  still  asleep, 
But  he  had  perish'd 

ALL  THE  MORESCOES. 

Perish'd  ? 

ALHADRA. 

He  had  perish'd ! 
Sleep  on,  poor  babes !  not  one  of  you  doth  know 
That  he  is  fatherless — a  desolate  orphan  ! 
Why  should  we  wake  them  ?  can  an  infant's  arm 
Revenge  his  murder  ? 

one  morescoe  (to  another). 

Did  she  say  his  murder  ? 

NAOMI. 

Murder  ?  Not  murder'd  ? 

ALHADRA. 

Murder'd  by  a  Christian ! 
[They  all  at  once  draw  their  sabres- 
alhadra  (to  Naomi,  who  advances  from  the  circled 
Brother  of  Zagri !  fling  away  thy  sword; 
This  is  thy  chieftain's !    [He  steps  forward  to  take  xL 

Dost  thou  dare  receive  it  ? 
For  I  have  sworn  by  Alia  and  the  Prophet, 
No  tear  shall  dim  these  eyes,  this  woman's  heart 
Shall  heave  no  groan,  till  I  have  seen  that  sword 
Wet  with  the  life-blood  of  the  son  of  Valdez ! 

[A  paute. 
Ordonio  was  your  chieftain's  murderer ! 

NAOMI. 

He  dies,  by  Alia. 
ALL  (kneeling.) 

By  4.11a 

ALHADRA. 

This  night  your  chieftain  arm'd  himself, 
100 


REMORSE. 


91 


I 


And  hurried  from  me.     But  I  follow'd  him 
At  distance,  till  I  saw  him  enter — there! 

NAOMI. 

The  cavern  ? 

ALHADRA. 

Yes,  the  mouth  of  yonder  cavern. 

After  a  while  I  saw  the  son  of  Valdez 

Rush  by  with  flaring  torch ;  he  likewise  enter'd. 

There  was  another  and  a  longer  pause ; 

And  once,  methought  I  heard  the  clash  of  swords ! 

And  soon  the  son  of  Valdez  rcappear'd  : 

He  flung  his  torch  towards  the  moon  in  sport, 

And  seem'd  as  he  were  mirthful !  I  stood  listening, 

Impatient  for  the  footsteps  of  my  husband ! 

^  NAOMI. 

Thou  calledst  him? 

ALHADRA. 

I  crept  into  the  cavern — 
'Twas  dark  and  very  silent  [Then  wildly. 

What  saidst  thou  ? 
No !  no !  I  did  not  dare  call,  Isidore, 
Lest  I  should  hear  no  answer  !  A  brief  while, 
Belike,  I  lost  all  thought  and  memory 
Of  that  for  which  I  came !  After  that  pause, 

0  Heaven !  I  heard  a  groan,  and  follow'd  it : 
And  yet  another  groan,  which  guided  me 
Into  a  strange  recess — and  there  was  light, 

A  hideous  light !  his  torch  lay  on  the  ground  ; 
Its  flame  burnt  dimly  o'er  a  chasm's  brink : 

1  spake  ;  and  whilst  I  spake,  a  feeble  groan 

Came  from  that  chasm !  it  was  his  last !  his  death- 
groan  ! 

NAOMI. 

Comfort  her,  Alia. 

ALHADRA. 

I  stood  in  unimaginable  trance 
And  agony  that  cannot  be  remember'd, 
Listening  with  horrid  hope  to  hear  a  groan  ! 
But  I  had  heard  his  last :  my  husband's  death-groan ! 

NAOMI. 

Haste  !  let  us  onward. 

ALHADRA. 

I  look'd  far  down  the  pit — 
My  sight  was  bounded  by  a  jutting  fragment: 
Ami  it  was  stain'd  with  blood.   Then  first  I  shriek'd, 
My  eye-balls  burnt,  my  brain  grew  hot  as  fire, 
And  all  the  hanging  drops  of  the  wet  roof 
Turn'd  into  blood — I  saw  them  turn  to  blood ! 
And  I  was  leaping  wildly  down  the  chasm, 
When  on  the  farther  brink  I  saw  his  sword, 
And  it  said,  Vengeance ! — Curses  on  my  tongue ! 
The  moon  hath  moved  in  Heaven,  and  I  am  here, 
And  he  hath  not  had  vengeance !  Isidore ! 
Spirit  of  Isidore !   thy  murderer  lives ! 
Away !  away ! 

ALL. 

Away !  away ! 

[She  rushes  off,  all  following  her. 


ACT  V. 

SCENE  I. 

A  Dungeon. 

alvar  {alone)  rises  slowly  from  a  bed  of  reeds. 

ALVAR. 

And  this  place  my  forefathers  made  for  man  • 


This  is  the  process  of  our  love  and  wisdom 

To  each  poor  brother  who  oflends  against  us — 

Most  innocent,  perhaps — and  what  If  guilty  '. 

Is  this  the  only  cure  ?  Merciful  God ! 

Each  pore  and  natural  outlet  shrivell'd  up, 

By  ignorance  and  parching  poverty, 

Ilis  energies  roll  back  upon  his  heart, 

And  stagnate  and  corrupt,  till,  changed  to  poison, 

They  break  out  on  him,  like  a  lothesome  plague 

spot! 
Then  we  call  in  our  pamper'd  mountebanks : 
And  this  is  their  best  cure !  uncomforted 
And  friendless  solitude,  groaning  and  tears, 
And  savage  faces,  at  the  clanking  hour, 
Seen  through  the  steam  and  vapors  of  his  dungeon 
By  the  lamp's  dismal  twilight !  So  he  lies 
Circled  with  evil,  till  his  very  soul 
Unmoulds  its  essence,  hopelessly  deform'd 
By  sights  of  evermore  deformity ! 
With  other  ministrations  thou,  O  Nature  ! 
Healest  thy  wandering  and  dislemperd  child : 
Thou  pourest  on  him  thy  soft  influences, 
Thy  sunny  hues,  fair  forms,  and  breathing  sweets ; 
Thy  melodies  of  words,  and  winds,  and  waters ! 
Till  he  relent,  and  can  no  more  endure 
To  be  a  jarring  and  a  dissonant  thing 
Amid  this  general  dance  and  minstrelsy  ; 
But,  bursting  into  tears,  wins  back  his  way, 
His  angry  spirit  heal'd  and  harmonized 
By  the  benignant  touch  of  love  and  beauty. 
I  am  chill  and  weaiy !  Yon  rude  bench  of  stone, 
In  that  dark  angle,  the  sole  resting-place  ! 
But  the  self-approving  mind  is  its  own  light, 
And  life's  best  warmth  still  radiates  from  the  heart 
Where  Love  sits  brooding,  and  an  honest  purpose. 

[Retires  out  of  sight. 

Enter  Teresa  with  a  Taper. 


It  has  chill'd  my  very  life — my  own  voice  scares  me ! 

Yet  when  I  hear  it  not,  I  seem  to  lose 

The  substance  of  my  being — my  strongest  grasp 

Sends  inwards  but  weak  witness  that  I  am. 

I  seek  to  cheat  the  echo. — How  the  half  sounds 

Blend  with  this  strangled  light !  Is  he  not  here — 

[Looking  round. 
O  for  one  human  face  here — but  to  see 
One  human  face  here  to  sustain  me. — Courage  ! 
It  is  but  my  own  fear !  The  life  within  me, 
It  sinks  and  wavers  like  this  cone  of  flame, 
Beyond  which  I  scarce  dare  look  onward  !  Oh ! 

[Shuddering 
If  I  faint !  If  this  inhuman  den  should  be 
At  once  my  death-bed  and  my  burial  vault! 

[Faintly  screams  as  Alvar  emerges  from  the  recess. 

alvar.  {rushes  towards  her,  and  catches  her  as  she 
is  falling). 

0  gracious  Heaven !  it  is,  it  is  Teresa ! 

1  shall  reveal  myself?  The  sudden  shock 
Of  rapture  will  blow  out  this  spark  of  life, 
And  Joy  complete  what  Terror  has  begun. 

0  ye  impetuous  beatings  here,  be  still ! 
Teresa,  best  beloved  !  pale,  pale,  and  cold ! 
Her  pulse  doth  flutter !  Teresa !  my  Teresa  ! 

teresa  {recovering,  looks  round  wildly). 

1  heard  a  voice ;  but  often  in  my  dreams 

I  hear  that  voice !  and  wake  and  try — and  try— 
101 


92 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


To  hear  it  waking !  but  I  never  could — 
And  't  is  so  now — even  so !  Well :  he  is  dead — 
Murder'd,  perhaps !  And  I  am  faint,  and  feel 
As  if  it  were  no  painful  thing  to  die ! 

alvar  {eagerly). 
Believe  it  not,  sweet  maid !  Believe  it  not, 
Beloved  woman!  'Twas  a  low  imposture, 
Framed  by  a  guilty  wretch. 

teresa  (retires  from  him,  and  feebly  supports  herself 
against  a  pillar  of  the  dungeon). 

Ha !  Who  art  thou  ? 
alvar  (exceedingly  affected). 
Suborn'd  by  his  brother — 

TERESA. 

Didst  thou  murder  him  ? 
And  dost  thou  now  repent  ?  Poor  troubled  man, 
I  do  forgive  thee,  and  may  Heaven  forgive  thee ! 

ALVAR. 

Ordonio — he — 

TERESA. 

If  thou  didst  murder  him — 
His  spirit  ever  at  the  throne  of  God 
Asks  mercy  for  thee  :  prays  for  mercy  for  thee, 
With  tears  in  Heaven ! 

ALVAR. 

Alvar  was  not  murder'd. 
Be  calm !  Be  calm,  sweet  maid ! 

teresa  (wildly). 
Nay,  nay,  but  tell  me  ! 

[A  pause ;  then  presses  her  forehead. 
O  'tis  lost  again! 
This  dull  confused  pain — 

[A  pause,  she  gazes  at  Alvar. 
Mysterious  man ! 
Methinks  I  can  not  fear  thee :  for  thine  eye 
Doth  swim  with  love  and  pity — Well !  Ordonio — 
Oh  my  foreboding  heart !  and  he  suborn'd  thee, 
And  thou  didst  spare  his  life  ?  Blessings  shower  on 

thee, 
As  many  as  the  drops  twice  counted  o'er 
In  the  fond  faithful  heart  of  his  Teresa ! 

alvar. 
I  can  endure  no  more.     The  Moorish  Sorcerer 
Exists  but  in  the  stain  upon  his  face. 
That  picture — 

teresa  (advances  towards  him). 
Ha !  speak  on ! 
alvar. 

Beloved  Teresa! 
It  told  but  half  the  truth.     O  let  this  portrait 
Tell  all — that  Alvar  lives — that  he  is  here  ! 
Thy  much  deceived  but  ever  faithful  Alvar. 

[Takes  her  portrait  from  his  neck,  and  gives  it  her. 
teresa  (receiving  the  portrait). 
The  same — it  is  the  same.     Ah !  who  art  thou  ? 
Nay  I  will  call  thee,  Alvar  !     [She  falls  on  his  neck. 
alvar. 

O  joy  unutterable ! 
But  hark !  a  sound  as  of  removing  bars 
At  the  dungeon's  outer  door.     A  brief,  brief  while 
Conceal  thyself,  my  love  !  It  is  Ordonio. 
For  the  honor  of  our  race,  for  our  dear  father ; 
O  for  himself  too  (he  is  still  my  brother) 
Let  me  recall  him  to  his  nobler  nature, 
That  he  may  wake  as  from  a  dream  of  murder ! 
O  let  me  reconcile  him  to  himself, 


Open  the  sacred  source  of  penitent  tears, 
And  be  once  more  his  own  beloved  Alvar. 

TERESA. 

O  my  all  virtuous  love !  I  fear  to  leave  thee 
With  that  obdurate  man. 

ALVAR. 

Thou  dost  not  leave  me ! 
But  a  brief  while  retire  into  the  darkness : 

0  that  my  joy  could  spread  its  sunshine  round  thee 

TERESA. 

The  sound  of  thy  voice  shall  be  my  music ! 

[Retiring,  she  returns  hastily  and  embraces  ALVAn. 
Alvar!  my  Alvar!  am  I  sure  I  hold  thee? 
Is  it  no  dream  ?  thee  in  my  arms,  my  Alvar!     [Exit. 
[A   noise  at  the  Dungeon  door.     It  opens,  and 
Ordonio  enters,  with  a  goblet  in  Ids  hand 

ORDONIO. 

Hail,  potent  wizard  !  in  my  gayer  mood 

1  pour'd  forth  a  libation  to  old  Pluto, 

And  as  I  brimm'd  the  bowl,  I  thought  on  thee. 

Thou  hast  conspired  against  my  life  and  honcr, 

Hast  trick'd  me  foully ;  yet  I  hate  thee  not. 

Why  should  I  hate  thee  ?  this  same  world  of  ours, 

'T  is  but  a  pool  amid  a  storm  of  rain, 

And  we  the  air-bladders  that  course  up  and  down, 

And  joust  and  tilt  in  merry  tournament ; 

And  when  one  bubble  runs  foul  of  another, 

[Waving  his  hand  to  Alvar. 
The  weaker  needs  must  break. 

alvar. 

I  see  thy  heart ! 
There  is  a  frightful  glitter  in  thine  eye 
Which  doth  betray  thee.     Inly-tortured  man ! 
This  is  the  revelry  of  a  drunken  anguish, 
Which  fain  would  scoff  away  the  pang  of  guilt. 
And  quell  each  human  feeling. 

ORDONIO. 

Feeling !  feeling ! 
The  death  of  a  man — the  breaking  of  a  bubble — 
'T  is  true  I  cannot  sob  for  such  misfortunes ; 
But  faintness,  cold  and  hunger — curses  on  me 
If  willingly  I  e'er  inflicted  them ! 
Come,  take  the  beverage ;  this  chill  place  demands  it. 
[Ordonio  proffers  the  goblet 

ALVAR. 

Yon  insect  on  the  wall, 

Which  moves  this  way  and  that  its  hundred  limbs, 

Were  it  a  toy  of  mere  mechanic  craft, 

It  were  an  infinitely  curious  thing ! 

But  it  has  life,  Ordonio !  life,  enjoyment ! 

And  by  the  power  of  its  miraculous  will 

Wields  all  the  complex  movements  of  its  frame 

Unerringly  to  pleasurable  ends ! 

Saw  I  that  insect  on  this  goblet's  brim, 

I  would  remove  it  with  an  anxious  pity ! 

ORDONIO. 

What  meanest  thou  ? 

ALVAR. 

There's  poison  in  the  wine. 

ORDONIO. 

Thou  hast  guess'd  right ;  there 's  poison  in  the  wine. 
There's  poison  in't — which  of  us  two  shall  drink  it? 
For  one  of  us  must  die .' 

ALVAR. 

Whom  dost  thou  think  me  1 
102 


REMORSE. 


93 


ORDONIO. 

The  accomplice  and  sworn  friend  of  Isidore. 

ALVAR. 

I  know  him  not. 
And  yet  methinks  I  have  heard  the  name  but  lately. 
Means  he  the  husband  of  the  Moorish  woman  ? 
Isidore  ?  Isidore  ? 

ORDON'IO. 

Good  !  good  !  that  lie !  by  heaven  it  has  restored  me. 
Now  I  am  thy  master !  Villain !  thou  shalt  drink  it, 
Or  die  a  bitterer  death. 

ALVAR. 

What  strange  solution 
Hast  thou  found  out  to  satisfy  thy  fears, 
And  drug  them  to  unnatural  sleep  ? 
[Altar  takes  the  goblet,  and  throwing  it  to  the  ground 
with  stern  contempt. 

My  master ! 

ORDOXIO. 

Thou  mountebank! 

ALVAR. 

Mountebank  and  villain ! 
What  then  art  ihou  ?  For  shame,  put  up  thy  sword ! 
What  boots  a  weapon  in  a  wither'd  arm  ? 
I  fix  mine  eye  upon  thee,  and  thou  tremblest ! 
I  speak,  and  fear  and  wonder  crush  thy  rage, 
And  turn  it  to  a  motionless  distraction! 
Thou  blind  self-worshipper !  thy  pride,  thy  cunning, 
Thy  faith  in  universal  villany, 
Thy  shallow  sophisms,  thy  pretended  scorn 
For  all  thy  human  brethren — out  upon  them  ! 
What  have  they  done  for  thee  ?  have  they  given  thee 

peace  ? 
Cured  thee  of  starting  in  thy  sleep  ?  or  made 
The  darkness  pleasant  when  thou  wakest  at  midnight  ? 
Art  happy  when  alone  ?  Canst  walk  by  thyself 
With  even  step  and  quiet  cheerfulness  ? 
Yet,  yet  thou  mayest  be  saved 

ordonio  (vacantly  repeating  the  words). 

Saved  ?  saved  ? 

ALVAR. 

One  pang! 
Could  I  call  up  one  pang  of  true  Remorse ! 

ORDONIO. 

He  told  me  of  the  babes  that  prattled  to  him, 

His  fatherless  little  ones  !  Remorse  !  Remorse ! 

Where  gott'st  thou  that  fool's  word  ?  Curse  on  Remorse ! 

Can  it  give  up  the  dead,  or  recompact 

A  mangled  body  }  mangled — dash'd  to  atoms ! 

Not  all  the  blessings  of  a  host  of  angels 

Can  blow  away  a  desolate  widow's  curse ! 

And  though  thou  spill  thy  heart's  blood  for  atonement, 

It  will  not  weigh  against  an  orphan's  tear ! 

alvar  (almost  overcome  by  his  feelings). 
But  Alvar — 

ORDOXIO. 

Ha !  it  chokes  thee  in  the  throat, 
Even  thee ;  and  yet  I  pray  thee  speak  it  out ! 
Still  Alvar!  Alvar! — howl  it  in  mine  ear, 
Heap  it  like  coals  of  fire  upon  my  heart, 
And  shoot  it  hissing  through  my  brain ! 


Alas! 
That  day  when  thou  didst  leap  from  off  the  rock 
Into  the  waves,  and  grasp'd  thy  sinking  brother, 
And  bore  him  to  the  strand ;  then,  son  of  Valdez, 
K 


Hot*  swiri  and  musical  the  name  of  Alvar! 
Then,  then,  Ordonio,  he  was  dear  to  thee, 
And  thou  wert  dear  to  him  ;  Heaven  only  knows 
How  very  dear  thou  wort !  Why  didst  thou  hate  him  ? 

0  heaven  !  how  he  would  fall  upon  thy  neck, 
And  weep  forgiveness ! 

ORDONTO. 

Spirit  of  the  dead ! 
Methinks  I  know  thee !  ha !  my  brain  turns  wild 
At  its  own  dreams ! — off- — off,  fantastic  shadow  ! 

ALVAR. 

1  fain  would  tell  thee  what  I  am !  but  dare  not ! 

ORDONIO. 

Cheat !  villain !  traitor !  whatsoever  thou  be — 
I  fear  thee,  man ! 

teresa  (rushing  out  and  falling  on  Alvar's  neck). 
Ordonio !  't  is  thy  brother. 

[Ordonio  with  frantic  wildness  runs  upon  Alvar 
with  his  sword.  Teresa  flings  herself  on 
Ordonio  and  arrests  his  arm. 

Stop,  madman,  stop. 
alvar. 
Does  then  this  thin  disguise  impenetrably 
Hide  Alvar  from  thee  ?  Toil  and  painful  wounds 
And  long  imprisonment  in  unwholesome  dungeons, 
Have  marr'd  perhaps  all  trait  and  lineament 
Of  what  I  was  !  But  chiefly,  chiefly,  brother, 
My  anguish  for  thy  guilt ! 

Ordonio — Brother ! 
Nay,  nay,  thou  shalt  embrace  me. 
ordonio  (drawing  back  and  gazing  at  Alvar  with  a 
countenance  of  at  once  awe  and  terror). 

Touch  me  not ! 
Touch  not  pollution,  Alvar!  I  will  die. 
[He  attempts  to  fall  on  his  sword:  Alvar  and  Teresa 
prevent  him. 
ALVAR. 

We  will  find  means  to  save  your  honor.     Live, 
Oh  live,  Ordonio !  for  our  father's  sake  ! 
Spare  his  gray  haire  ! 

TERESA. 

And  you  may  yet  be  happy. 

ORDON'IO. 

0  horror !  not  a  thousand  years  in  heaven 

Could  recompose  this  miserable  heart, 

Or  make  it  capable  of  one  brief  joy ! 

Live !  Live !  Why  yes  !  't  were  well  to  live  with  you 

For  is  it  fit  a  villain  should  be  proud  ? 

My  brother !  I  will  kneel  to  you,  my  brother ! 

[Kneeling. 
Forgive  me,  Alvar  ! — Curse  me  with  forgiveness ! 

ALVAR. 

Call  back  thy  soul,  Ordonio,  and  look  round  thee  : 
Now  is  the  time  for  greatness !  Think  that  Heaven — 

TERESA. 

0  mark  his  eye !  he  hears  not  what  you  say. 

ordonio  (pointing  at  the  vacancy). 
Yes,  mark  his  eye !  there's  fascination  in  it ! 
Thou  saidst  thou  didst  not  know  him — That  is  he! 
He  comes  upon  me ! 

alvar. 
Heal,  O  heal  him,  Heaven ! 

ordonio. 
Nearer  and  nearer!  and  I  cannot  stir! 
Will  no  one  hear  these  stifled  groans,  and  wake  me  ' 
103 


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COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


He  would  have  died  to  save  me,  and  I  kill'd  him — 
A  husband  and  a  father! — 

TERESA. 

Some  secret  poison 
Drinks  up  his  spirits ! 

ORDONio  {fiercely  recollecting  himself). 
Let  the  eternal  Justice 
Prepare  my  punishment  in  the  obscure  world — 
I  will  not  bear  to  live — to  live — O  agony ! 
And  be  myself  alone  my  own  sore  torment ! 

[The  doors  of  the  dungeon  are  broken  open,  and  in 
rush  Alhadka,  and  the  band  of  Morescoes. 

ALHADRA. 

Seize  first  that  man ! 

[Alvar  presses  onward  to  defend  Ordonio. 
ordonio. 
Off,  ruffians !  I  have  flung  away  my  sword. 
Woman,  my  life  is  thine !  to  thee  I  give  it! 
Off"!  he  that  touches  me  with  his  hand  of  flesh, 
I  '11  rend  his  limbs  asunder !  I  have  strength 
With  this  bare  arm  to  scatter  you  like  ashes. 


My  husband- 


0  horrible ! 


ALHADRA. 
ORDONIO. 

Yes,  I  murder'd  him  most  foully. 

ALVAR  and  TERESA. 


ALHADRA. 

Why  didst  thou  leave  his  children  ? 
Demon,  thou  shouldst  have  sent  thy  dogs  of  hell 
To  lap  their  blood !  Then,  then  I  might  have  harden'd 
My  soul  in  misery,  and  have  had  comfort. 
I  would  have  stood  far  off;  quiet  though  dark, 
And  bade  the  race  of  men  raise  up  a  mourning 
For  a  deep  horror  of  desolation, 
Too  great  to  be  one  soul's  particular  lot ! 
Brother  of  Zagri !  let  me  lean  upon  thee. 

[Struggling  to  suppress  her  feelings. 
The  time  is  not  yet  come  for  woman's  anguish. 
I  have  not  seen  his  blood — Within  an  hour 
Those  little  ones  will  crowd  around  and  ask  me, 
Where  is  our  father  ?  I  shall  curse  thee  then ! 
Wert  thou  in  heaven,  my  curse  would  pluck  thee 
thence ! 

TERESA. 

He  doth  repent!  See,  see,  I  kneel  to  thee! 

O  let  him  live  !  That  aged  man,  his  father 

alhadra  {sternly) 
Why  had  he  such  a  son  ? 

[Shouts  from  the  distance  of,  Rescue !  Rescue ! 

Alvar !  Alvar !  and  the  voice  of  Valdez  heard. 

alhadra. 

Rescue  ? — and  Isidore's  Spirit  unavenged  ? 
The  deed  be  mine !  [Suddenly  stabs  Ordonio. 

Now  take  my  life ! 

ordonio  {staggering  from  the  wound). 

Atonement! 
Alvar  {while  ivith  Teresa  supporting  Ordonio). 
Arm  of  avenging  Heaven, 

Thou  hast  snatch'd  from  me  my  most  cherish'd  hope. 
But  go !  my  word  was  pledged  to  thee. 

ORDONIO. 

Away ! 
Brave  not  my  father's  rage  !  I  thank  thee !  Thou — 
[Then  turning  his  eyes  languidly  to  Alvar. 


She  hath  avenged  the  blood  of  Isidore ! 

I  stood  in  silence  like  a  slave  before  her, 

That  I  might  taste  the  wormwood  and  the  gall, 

And  satiate  this  self-accusing  heart 

With  bitterer  agonies  than  death  can  give. 

Forgive  me,  Alvar ! 

Oh !  couldst  thou  forget  me !  [Dies 
[Alvar  and  Teresa  bend  over  the  body  of  Ordonio 

alhadra  {to  the  Moors). 
I  thank  thee,  Heaven  !  thou  hast  ordain'd  it  wisely, 
That  still  extremes  bring  their  own  cure.  That  point 
In  misery,  which  makes  the  oppressed  Man 
Regardless  of  his  own  life,  makes  him  too 
Lord  of  the  Oppressor's — Knew  I  a  hundred  men 
Despairing,  but  not  palsied  by  despair, 
This  arm  should  shake  the  Kingdoms  of  the  World , 
The  deep  foundations  of  iniquity 
Should  sink  away,  earth  groaning  from  beneath  them ; 
The  strong-holds  of  the  cruel  men  should  fall, 
Their  Temples  and  their  mountainous  Towers  should 

fall  ; 
Till  Desolation  seem'd  a  beautiful  thing, 
And  all  that  were,  and  had  the  Spirit  of  Life, 
Sang  a  new  song  to  her  who  had  gone  forth, 
Conquering  and  still  to  conquer ! 

[Alhadra  hurries  of  with  the  Moors ;  the  stage  fills 
with  armed  Peasants  and  Servants,  Zulimez 
and  Valdez  at  their  head.  Valdez  rushes  into 
Alvar's  arms. 

alvar. 
Turn  not  thy  face  that  way,  my  father !  hide, 
Oh  hide  it  from  his  eye !  Oh  let  thy  joy 
Flow  in  unmingled  stream  through  thy  first  blessing 
[Both  kneel  to  Valdez 
valdez. 
My  Son !  My  Alvar !  bless,  Oh  bless  him,  Heaven ! 

TERESA. 

Me  too,  my  Father  ? 

valdez. 
Bless,  Oh  bless  my  children ! 

[Both  rise. 

ALVAR. 

Delights  so  full,  if  unalloy'd  with  grief, 
Were  ominous.     In  these  strange  dread  events 
Just  Heaven  instructs  us  with  an  awful  voice, 
That  Conscience  rules  us  e'en  against  our  choice. 
Our  inward  monitress  to  guide  or  warn, 
If  listen'd  to ;  but  if  repell'd  with  scorn, 
At  length  as  dire  Remorse,  she  reappears, 
Works  in  our  guilty  hopes,  and  selfish  fears ! 
Still  bids,  Remember !  and  still  cries,  Too  late ! 
And  while  she  scares  us,  goads  us  to  our  fate. 


APPENDIX. 


Note  1,  page  81,  col.  1. 

You  are  a  painter. 

The  following  lines  I  have  preserved  in  this  place, 
not  so  much  as  explanatory  of  the  picture  of  the 
assassination,  as  (if  I  may  say  so  without  disrespect 
to  the  Public)  to  gratify  my  own  feelings,  the  passage 
being  no  mere  fancy  portrait ;  but  a  slight,  yet  not 
104 


REMORSE. 


95 


unfaithful  profile  of  one  *  who  still  lives,  nobilitate 
felix,  arte  clarior,  vita  colendissimus. 

zulimez  (speaking  of  Alvar  in  the  third  person). 
Such  was  the  noble  Spaniard's  own  relation. 
He  told  me,  too,  how  in  his  early  youth, 
And  his  first  travels,  'twas  his  choice  or  chance 
To  make  Ions  sojourn  in  sea-wedded  Venice  ; 
There  won  the  love  of  that  divine  old  man, 
Courted  by  mightiest  kings,  the  famous  Titian! 
Who,  like  a  second  and  more  lovely  Nature, 
By  the  sweet  mystery  of  lines  and  colors, 
Changed  the  blank  canvas  to  a  magic  mirror, 
That  made  the  Absent  present ;  and  to  Shadows 
Gave  light,  depth,  substance,  bloom,  yea,  thought  and 

motion. 
He  loved  the  old  man,  and  revered  his  art : 
And  though  of  noblest  birth  and  ample  fortune, 
The  young  enthusiast  thought  it  no  scorn 
But  this  inalienable  ornament, 
To  be  his  pupil,  and  with  filial  zeal 
By  practice  to  appropriate  the  sage  lessons, 
Which  the  gay,  smiling  old  man  gladly  gave. 
The  Art,  hehonor'd  thus,  requited  him  : 
And  in  the  following  and  calamitous  years 
Beguiled  the  hours  of  his  captivity. 

ALHADRA. 

And  then  he  framed  this  picture?  and  unaided 
By  arts  unlawful,  spell,  or  talisman ! 

ALVAR. 
A  potent  spell,  a  mighty  talisman! 
The  imperishable  memory  of  the  deed 
Sustain'd  by  love,  and  grief,  and  indignation! 
So  vivid  were  the  forms  within  his  brain, 
His  very  eyes,  when  shut,  made  pictures  of  them ! 

Note  2,  page  89,  col.  1. 
The  following  Scene,  as  unfit  for  the  stage,  was  taken 
from  the  Tragedy,  in  the  year  1797,  and  published 
in  the  Lyrical  Ballads.  But  this  work  having  been 
long  out  of  print.  I  have  been  advised  to  reprint  it, 
as  a  Note  to  the  second  Scene  of  Act  the  Fourth,  p. 
89. 

Enter  Teresa  and  Selma. 


'Tis  said,  he  spake  of  you  familiarly, 

As  mine  and  Alvar's  common  foster-mother. 

SELMA. 

Now  blessings  on  the  man,  whoe'er  he  be. 

That  join'd  your  names  with  mine!  O  my  sweet  Lady, 

As  often  as  I  think  of  those  dear  times, 

When  you  two  little  ones  would  stand,  at  eve, 

On  each  side  of  my  chair,  and  make  me  learn 

All  you  had  learnt  in  the  day ;  and  how  to  talk 

In  gentle  phrase ;  then  bid  me  sing  to  you — 

'Tis  more  like  heaven  to  come,  than  what  has  been  I 

TERESA. 

But  that  entrance,  Selma  ? 

SELMA. 

Can  no  one  bear?  It  is  a  perilous  talel 

TERESA. 

No  one. 


*  Sir  George  Beaumont.  (Written  1814.) 


SELMA. 
My  husband's  father  told  it  me, 
Poor  old  Sesina — angels  rest  his  soul ! 
He  was  a  woodman,  and  could  fell  and  saw 
With  lusty  arm.    You  know  that  huge  round  bean 
Which  props  the  hanging  wall  of  the  old  Chapel  ? 
Beneath  that  tree,  while  yet  it  was  a  tree, 
He  found  a  baby  wrapt  in  mosses,  lined 
With  thistle-beards,  and  such  small  locks  of  wool 
As  hang  on  brambles.    Well,  he  brought  him  home 
And  reared  him  at  the  then  Lord  Valdez'  cost. 
And  so  the  babe  grew  up  a  pretty  boy, 
A  pretty  boy,  but  most  unteachable— 
He  never  learnt  a  prayer,  nor  told  a  bead. 
But  knew  the  names  of  birds,  and  mock'd  their  notes, 
And  whistled,  as  he  were  a  bird  himself: 
And  all  the  autumn  'twas  his  only  play 
To  gather  seeds  of  wild  flowers,  and  to  plant  them 
With  earth  and  water  on  the  stumps  of  trees. 
A  Friar,  who  gather'd  simples  in  the  wood, 
A  gray-hair'd  man,  he  loved  this  little  boy: 
The  boy  loved  him,  and,  when  the  friar  taught  him, 
He  soon  could  write  with  the  pen ;  and  from  that  time 
Lived  chiefly  at  the  Convent  or  the  Castle. 
So  he  became  a  rare  and  learned  youth: 
But  O!  poor  wretch!  he  read,  and  read,  and  read, 
Till  his  brain  turn'd  ;  and  ere  his  twentieth  year 
He  had  unlawful  thoughts  of  many  things: 
And  though  he  pray'd,  he  never  loved  to  pray 
With  holy  men,  nor  in  a  holy  place. 
But  yet  his  speech,  it  was  so  soft  and  sweet, 
The  late  Lord  Valdez  ne'er  was  wearied  with  him. 
And  once,  as  by  the  north  side  of  the  chapel 
They  stood  together,  chain'd  in  deep  discourse, 
The  earth  heaved  under  them  with  such  a  groan, 
That  the  wall  totter'd,  and  had  well-nigh  fallen 
Bight  on  their  heads.    My  Lord  was  sorely  frighten'd; 
A  fever  seized  him,  and  he  made  confession 
Of  all  the  heretical  and  lawless  talk 
Which  brought  this  judgment :  so  the  youth  was  seized , 
And  cast  into  that  hole.    My  husband's  father 
Sobb'd  like  a  child — it  almost  broke  his  heart: 
And  once  as  he  was  working  near  this  dungeon, 
He  heard  a  voice  distinctly;  'twas  the  youth's, 
Who  sung  a  doleful  song  about  green  fields, 
How  sweet  it  were  on  lake  or  wide  savanna 
To  hunt  for  food,  and  be  a  naked  man, 
And  wander  up  and  down  at  liberty. 
He  always  doted  on  the  youth,  and  now 
His  love  grew  desperate  ;  and  defying  death, 
He  made  that  cunning  entrance  I  described, 
And  the  young  man  escaped. 

TERESA. 

'Tis  a  sweet  tale: 
Such  as  would  lull  a  listening  child  to  sleep, 
His  rosy  face  besoil'd  with  unwiped  tears. 
And  what  became  of  him  ? 

SELMA. 

He  went  on  shipboard 
With  those  bold  voyagers  who  made  discovery 
Of  golden  lands.    Sesina's  younger  brother 
Went  likewise,  and  when  he  return'd  to  Spain, 
He  told  Sesina,  that  the  poor  mad  youth, 
Soon  after  they  arrived  in  that  new  world, 
In  spite  of  his  dissuasion,  seized  a  boat, 
And  all  alone  set  sail  by  silent  moonlight 
Up  a  great  river,  great  as  any  sea, 
And  ne'er  was  heard  of  more :  but  'tis  suppose! 
He  lived  and  died  among  the  savage  men. 
105 


96 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


A  CHRISTMAS  TALE. 
IN  TWO  PARTS. 


Hip  irupl  %pf)  TOtavra  Xiyctv  ^cifiSvo;  fa  0>p(f. 

Apud  ATHEN.EOM. 


ADVERTISEMENT. 


The  form  of  the  following  dramatic  poem  is  in  hum 
ble  imitation  of  the  Winter's  Tale  of  Shakspeare 
except  that  I  have  called  the  first  part  a  Prelude  in- 
stead of  a  first  Act,  as  a  somewhat  nearer  resem- 
blance to  the  plan  of  the  ancients,  of  which  one 
specimen  is  left  us  in  the  ./Eschylian  Trilogy  of  the 
Agamemnon,  the  Orestes,  and  the  Eumenides.  Though 
a  matter  of  form  merely,  yet  two  plays,  on  different 
periods  of  the  same  tale,  might  seem  less  bold,  than 
an  interval  of  twenty  years  between  the  first  and 
second  act.  This  is,  however,  in  mere  obedience  to 
custom.  The  effect  does  not,  in  reality,  at  all  de- 
pend on  the  Time  of  the  interval ;  but  on  a  very  dif- 
ferent principle.  There  are  cases  in  which  an  inter- 
val of  twenty  hours  between  the  acts  would  have  a 
worse  effect  (i.  e.  render  the  imagination  less  disposed 
to  take  the  position  required)  than  twenty  years  in 
other  cases.  For  the  rest,  I  shall  be  well  content  if 
my  readers  will  take  it  up,  read  and  judge  it,  as  a 
Christmas  tale. 


CHARACTERS. 


MEN. 
Emerick,  usurping  King  of  Illyria. 
Raab  Kiuprili,  an  IRyrian  Chieftain. 
Casimir,  Son  of  Kiuprili. 
Chef  Ragozzi,  a  Military  Commander 

WOMAN. 
Zapolya,  Queen  of  Illyria. 


ZAPOLYA. 

PART  I. 
THE  PRELUDE,  ENTITLED,  "  THE  USURP- 
ERS FORTUNE." 
SCENE  I. 
Front  of  the  Palace  with  a  magnificent  Colonnade.  On 
one  side  a  military  Guard-House.    Sentries  pacing 
backward  and  forward  before  the.  Palace.     Chef 
Ragozzi,  at  the  door  of  the  Guard-House,  as  looking 
forwards  at  some  object  in  the  distance. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

My  eyes  deceive  me  not,  it  must  be  he ! 
Who  but  our  chief,  my  more  than  father,  who 


But  Raab  Kiuprili  moves  with  such  a  gait  ? 
Lo !  e'en  this  eager  and  unwonted  haste 
But  agitates,  not  quells,  its  majesty. 
My  patron!  my  commander!  yes,  'tis  he! 
Call  out  the  guards.     The  Lord  Kiuprili  comes. 

Drums  beat,  etc.  the  Guard  turns  out.     Enter  Raab 

Kiuprili. 
raab  kiuprili  (making  a  signal  to  stop  the  drums,  etc.) 
Silence  !  enough !  This  is  no  time,  young  friend ! 
For  ceremonious  dues.     This  summoning  drum, 
Th'  air-shattering  trumpet,  and  the  horseman's  clatter, 
Are  insults  to  a  dying  sovereign's  ear. 
Soldiers,  'tis  well!  Retire!  your  general  greets  you, 
His  loyal  fellow-warriors.  [Guards  retire. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Pardon  my  surprise. 
Thus  sudden  from  the  camp,  and  unattended ! 
What  may  these  wonders  prophesy  ? 
raab  kiuprili. 

Tell  me  first, 
How  fares  the  king  ?  His  majesty  still  lives  ? 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

We  know  no  otherwise ;  but  Emerick's  friends 
(And  none  but  they  approach  him)  scoff  at  hope. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Ragozzi !  I  have  rear'd  thee  from  a  child, 

And  as  a  child  I  have  rear'd  thee.    Whence  this  air 

Of  mystery  ?  That  face  was  wont  to  open 

Clear  as  the  morning  to  me,  showing  all  things. 

Hide  nothing  from  me. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

0  most  loved,  most  honor'd, 

The  mystery  that  struggles  in  my  looks, 
Betray'd  my  whole  tale  to  thee,  if  it  told  thee 
That  I  am  ignorant ;  but  fear  the  worst. 
And  mystery  is  contagious.     All  things  here 
Are  full  of  motion :  and  yet  all  is  silent : 
And  bad  men's  hopes  infect  the  good  with  fears. 
raab  kiuprili  (his  hand  to  his  heart). 

1  have  trembling  proof  within,  how  true  thou  speakest. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

That  the  prince  Emerick  feasts  the  soldiery, 
Gives  splendid  arms,  pays  the  commanders'  debts, 
And  (it  is  whisper'd)  by  sworn  promises 
Makes  himself  debtor — hearing  this,  thou  hast  heard 

All (Thru  in  a  subdued  and  saddened  voice.) 

But  what  my  Lord  will  learn  too  soon  himself. 

RAAB    KIUPRILI. 

Ha  ! — Well  then,  let  it  come  !    Worse  scarce  can 

come. 
This  letter,  written  by  the  trembling  hand 
Of  royal  Andreas,  calls  me  from  the  camp 
106 


ZAPOLYA. 


97 


To  his  immediate  presence.    It  appoints  me, 

The  Queen,  and  Emerick,  guardians  of  the  realm, 

And  of  the  royal  infant.     Day  by  day, 

Robb'd  of  Zapolya's  soothing  cares,  the  king 

Yearns  only  to  behold  one  precious  boon, 

And  with  his  life  breathe  forth  a  father's  blessing. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Remember  you,  my  Lord,  that  Hebrew  leech, 
Whose  lace  so  much  distemper'd  you  1 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Barzoni  ? 
I  held  him  for  a  spy :  but  the  proof  failing 
(More  courteously,  I  own,  than  pleased  myself), 
I  sent  him  from  the  camp. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

To  him  in  chief 
Prince  Emerick  trusts  his  royal  brother's  health. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Hide  nothing,  I  conjure  you  !  What  of  him  ? 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

With  pomp  of  words  beyond  a  soldier's  cunning, 
And  shrugs  and  wrinkled  brow,  he  smiles  and  whis- 
pers ! 
Talks  in  dark  words  of  women's  fancies ;  hints 
That 't  were  a  useless  and  cruel  zeal 
To  rob  a  dying  man  of  any  hope, 
However  vain,  that  soothes  him :  and,  in  fine, 
Denies  all  chance  of  offspring  from  the  Queen. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

The  venomous  snake !  My  heel  was  on  its  head, 
And  (fool !)  I  did  not  crush  it ! 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Nay,  he  fears 
Zapolya  will  not  long  survive  her  husband. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Manifest  treason !  Even  this  brief  delay 

Half  makes  me  an  accomplice (If  he  live), 

[Is  moving  toward  the  palace. 
If  he  but  live  and  know  me,  all  may 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Halt!  [Slops  him. 
On  pain  of  death,  my  Lord  !  am  I  commanded 
To  stop  all  ingress  to  the  palace. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Thou! 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

No  place,  no  name,  no  rank  excepted — 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Thou ! 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

This  life  of  mine,  O  take  it,  Lord  Kiuprili ! 

I  give  it  as  a  weapon  to  thy  hands, 

Mine  own  no  longer.     Guardian  of  Illyria, 

Useless  to  thee,  'tis  worthless  to  myself. 

Thou  art  the  framer  of  my  nobler  being : 

Nor  does  there  live  one  virtue  in  my  soul, 

One  honorable  hope,  but  calls  thee  father. 

Yet  ere  thou  dost  resolve,  know  that  yon  palace 

Is  guarded  from  within,  that  each  access 

Is  throng'd  by  arm'd  conspirators,  watch'd  by  ruffians 

Pamper'd  with  gifts,  and  hot  upon  the  spoil 

Which  that  false  promiser  still  trails  before  them. 

I  ask  but  this  one  boon — reserve  my  life 

Till  I  can  lose  it  for  the  realm  and  thee! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

My  heart  is  rent  asunder.     O  my  country, 
O  fallen  Illyria !  stand  I  here  spell-bound  ? 
8  K2 


Did  my  King  love  me  ?  Did  I  earn  his  love  ? 

Have  we  embraced  as  brothers  would  embrace  ? 

Was  I  his  arm,  his  thunder-bolt?  And  now 

Must  I,  hag-ridden,  pant  as  in  a  dream  ? 

Or,  like  an  eagle,  whose  strong  wings  press  up 

Against  a  coiling  serpent's  folds,  can  I 

Strike  but  for  mockery,  and  with  restless  beak 

Gore  my  own  breast  ? — Ragozzi,  thou  art  faithful  ? 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Here  before  Heaven  I  dedicate  my  faith 
To  the  royal  line  of  Andreas. 

RAAB  KIUFRILI. 

Hark,  Ragozzi! 
Guilt  is  a  timorous  thing  ere  perpetration  : 
Despair  alone  makes  wicked  men  be  bold. 
Come  thou  with  me !  They  have  heard  my  voice  in 

flight, 
Have  faced  round,  terror-struck,  and  fear'd  no  longer 
The  whistling  javelins  of  their  fell  pursuers. 
Ha !  what  is  this  ? 

[Black  Flag  displayed  from  the  Tower  of  the  Pal- 
ace :  a  death-bell  tolls,  etc. 
Vengeance  of  Heaven !  He  is  dead. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

At  length  then  'tis  announced.     Alas!  I  fear, 
That  these  black  death-flags  are  but  treason's  signals. 

raab  kiuprili  (looking  forwards  anxiously). 
A  prophecy  too  soon  fulfill'd  !  See  yonder ! 

0  rank  and  ravenous  wolves!  the  death-bell  echoes 
Still  in  the  doleful  air — and  see !  they  come. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Precise  and  faithful  in  their  villany, 

Even  to  the  moment,  that  the  master  traitor 

Had  preordain'd  them. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Was  it  over-haste, 
Or  is  it  scorn,  that  in  this  race  of  treason 
Their  guilt  thus  drops  its  mask,  and  blazons  forth 
Their  infamous  plot  even  to  an  idiot's  sense. 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Doubtless  they  deem  Heaven  too  usurp'd !  Heaven's 

justice 
Bought  like  themselves ! 

[During  this  conversation  music  is  heard,  at  first 
solemn  and  funereal,  and  then  changing  to 
spirited  and  triumphal. 

Being  equal  all  in  crime, 
Do  you  press  on,  ye  spotted  parricides ! 
For  the  one  sole  pre-eminence  yet  doubtful, 
The  prize  of  foremost  impudence  in  guilt  ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

The  bad  man's  cunning  still  prepares  the  way 
For  its  own  outwitting.     I  applaud,  Ragozzi ! 

[Musing  to  himself — then*— 
Ragozzi !  I  applaud, 
In  thee,  the  virtuous  hope  that  dares  look  onward 
And  keeps  the  life-spark  warm  of  future  action 
Beneath  the  cloak  of  patient  sufferance. 
Act  and  appear  as  time  and  prudence  prompt  thee ; 

1  shall  not  misconceive  the  part  thou  playest. 
Mine  is  an  easier  part — to  brave  the  Usurper. 

[Enter  a  procession  of  Emerick's  Adherents, 
Nobles,  Chieftains,  and  Soldiers,  with  Music. 
They  advance  toward  the  front  of  the  Stage, 
Kiuprili  makes  the  signal  for  them  to  slop. — 
The  Music  ceases. 

107 


m 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


LEADER  OF  THE  PROCESSION. 

The  Lord  Kiuprili ! — Welcome  from  the  camp. 

RAAB    KIUPRILI. 

Grave  magistrates  and  chieftains  of  Illyria ! 

In  good  time  come  ye  hither,  if  ye  come 

As  loyal  men  with  honorable  purpose 

To  mourn  what  can  alone  be  mourn'd  ;  but  chiefly 

To  enforce  the  last  commands  of  royal  Andreas, 

And  shield  the  queen,  Zapolya  :  haply  making 

The  mother's  joy  light  up  the  widow's  tears. 

LEADER. 

Our  purpose  demands  speed.     Grace  our  procession ; 
A  warrior  best  will  greet  a  warlike  king. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

This  patent,  written  by  your  lawful  king 
(Lo !  his  own  seal  and  signature  attesting) 
Appoints  as  guardians  of  his  realm  and  offspring, 
The  Queen,  and  the  Prince  Emerick,  and  myself. 

[  Voices  of  Live  King  Emerick  !  an  Emerick  !  an 
Emerick  ! 

What  means  this  clamor?  Are  these  madmen's  voices? 
Or  is  some  knot  of  riotous  slanderers  leagued 
To  infamize  the  name  of  the  king's  brother 
With  a  lie  black  as  Hell  ?  unmanly  cruelty, 
Ingratitude,  and  most  unnatural  treason !    [Murmurs. 
What  mean  these  murmurs  ?  Dare  then  any  here 
Proclaim  Prince  Emerick  a  spotted  traitor  ? 
One  that  has  taken  from  you  your  sworn  faith, 
And  given  you  in  return  a  Judas'  bribe, 
Infamy  now,  oppression  in  reversion, 
And  Heaven's  inevitable  curse  hereafter  ? 

[Loud  murmurs,  followed  by  cries — Emerick  !  No 
Baby  Prince !  No  Changelings  ! 
Yet  bear  with  me  awhile !  Have  I  for  this 
Bled  for  your  safety,  conquer'd  for  your  honor! 
Was  it  for  this,  Illyrians !  that  I  ibrded 
Your  thaw-swoln  torrents,  when  the  shouldering  ice 
Fought  with  the  foe,  and  stain'd  its  jagged  points 
With  gore  from  wounds,  I  felt  not  ?  Did  the  blast 
Beat  on  this  body,  frost-and-famine-numb'd, 
Till  my  hard  flesh  distinguish'd  not  itself 
From  the  insensate  mail,  its  fellow-warrior  ? 
And  have  I  brought  home  with  me  Victory, 
And  with  her,  hand  in  hand,  firm-footed  Peace, 
Her  countenance  twice  lighted  up  with  glory, 
As  if  I  had  charm'd  a  goddess  down  from  Heaven? 
But  these  will  flee  abhorrent  from  the  throne 
Of  usurpation ! 
[Murmurs  increase — and  cries  of  Onward  !  onioard  ! 

Have  you  then  thrown  off  shame, 
And  shall  not  a  dear  friend,  a  loyal  subject, 
Throw  off  all  fear?    I  tell  ye,  the  fair  trophies 
Valiantly  wrested  from  a  valiant  foe, 
Love's  natural  offerings  to  a  rightful  king, 
Will  hang  as  ill  on  this  usurping  traitor, 
This  brother-blight,  this  Emerick,  as  robes 
Of  gold  pluck'd  from  the  images  of  gods 
Upon  a  sacrilegious  robber's  back. 

[During  the  last  four  lines,  enter  Lord  Casimir, 
with  expressions  of  anger  and  alarm. 
casimir. 
Who  is  this  factious  insolent,  that  dares  brand 
The  elected  King,  our  chosen  Emerick  ? 

[Starts — then  approaching  with  timid  resjiect. 
My  father ! 


raab  kiuprili  {turning  away). 

Casimir !  He,  he  a  traitor ! 

Too  soon  indeed,  Ragozzi !  have  I  leamt  it.    [Aside. 

casimir  (with  reverence). 
My  father  and  my  Lord  ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

I  know  thee  not! 

LEADER. 

Yet  the  remembrancing  did  sound  right  filial. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

A  holy  name  and  words  of  natural  duly 
Are  blasted  by  a  thankless  traitor's  utterance. 

CASIMIR. 

O  hear  me,  Sire !  not  lightly  have  I  sworn 

Homage  to  Emerick.    Illyria's  sceptre 

Demands  a  manly  hand,  a  warrior's  grasp. 

The  queen  Zapolya's  self-expected  offspring 

At  least  is  doubtful :  and  of  all  our  nobles, 

The  king  inheriting  his  brother's  heart, 

Hath  honor'd  us  the  most.      Your  rank,  my  Lord ! 

Already  eminent,  is — all  it  can  be — 

Confirmed  :  and  me  the  king's  grace  hath  appointed 

Chief  of  his  council  and  the  lord  high-steward. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

(Bought  by  a  bribe !)  I  know  thee  now  still  less. 

casimir  (struggling  with  his  passion). 
So  much  of  Raab  Kiuprili's  blood  flows  here, 
That  no  power,  save  that  holy  name  of  father, 
Could  shield  the  man  who  so  dishonor'd  me. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

The  son  of  Raab  Kiuprili !  a  bought  bond-slave, 
Guilt's  pander,  treason's  mouth-piece,  a  gay  parrot, 
School'd  to  shrill  forth  his  feeder's  usurp'd  titles, 
And  scream,  Long  live  king  Emerick ! 

LEADER. 

Ay,  King  Emerick ! 
Stand  back,  my  Lord !  Lead  us,  or  let  us  pass. 

SOLDIER. 

Nay,  let  the  general  speak ! 

SOLDIERS. 

Hear  him !  Hear  him  ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Hear  me, 
Assembled  lords  and  warriors  of  Illyria, 
Hear,  and  avenge  me !  Twice  ten  years  have  I 
Stood  in  your  presence,  honor'd  by  the  king, 
Beloved  and  trusted.     Is  there  one  among  you, 
Accuses  Raab  Kiuprili  of  a  bribe  ? 
Or  one  false  whisper  in  his  sovereign's  ear  ? 
Who  here  dare  charge  me  with  an  orphan's  rights 
Outfaced,  or  widow's  plea  left  undefended  ? 
And  shall  I  now  be  branded  by  a  traitor, 
A  bought  bribed  wretch,  who,  being  called  my  son 
Doth  libel  a  chaste  matron's  name,  and  plant 
Hensbane  and  aconite  on  a  mother's  grave  ? 
The  underling  accomplice  of  a  robber, 
That  from  a  widow  and  a  widow's  offspring 
Would  steal  their  heritage  ?  To  God  a  rebel, 
And  to  the  common  father  of  his  country 
A  recreant  ingrate ! 

CASIMIR. 

Sire  !  your  words  grow  dangerous. 
High-flown  romantic  fancies  ill-beseem 
Your  age  and  wisdom.     Tis  a  statesman's  \irtue, 
To  guard  his  country's  safety  by  what  means 
108 


ZAPOLYA. 


99 


It  best  may  be  protected — come  what  will 
Of  these  monks'  morals ! 

raab  kiuprili  (aside). 

Ha !  the  elder  Brutus 
Made  his  soul  iron,  though  his  sons  repented. 
They  boasted  not  their  baseness. 

[Starts,  and  draws  his  sword. 
Infamous  changeling ! 
Recant  this  instant,  and  swear  loyalty, 
And  strict  obedience  to  thy  sovereign's  will ; 
Or,  by  the  spirit  of  departed  Andreas, 

Thou  chest 

[Chiefs,  etc.  rush  to  interpose ;  during  the  tumuli 
enter  E.merick,  alarmed. 

EMERICK. 

Call  out  the  guard !  Ragozzi !  seize  the  assassin. 

Kiuprili  ?   Ha  ! [  With  lowered  voice,  at  the  same 

time  with  one  hand  making  signs  to  the  guard 

to  retire. 

Pass  on,  friends !  to  the  palace. 
[Music  recommences. — The  Procession  passes  into 
the  Palace. — During  which  time  Emerick  and 
Kiuprili  regard  each  other  stedfastly. 

EMERICK. 

What !  Raab  Kiuprili  ?  What !  a  father's  sword 
Against  Ms  o\\  D  son's  breast  ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

'T  would  be  best  excuse  him, 
Were  he  thy  son,  Prince  Emerick.     /  abjure  him. 

EMERICK. 

This  is  my  thanks,  then,  that  I  have  commenced 
A  reign  to  which  the  free  voice  of  the  nobles 
Hath  call'd  me,  and  the  people,  by  regards 
Of  love  and  grace  to  Raab  Kiuprili's  house  ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

What  right  hadst  thou,  Prince  Emerick,  to  bestow 

them  ] 

EMERICK. 

By  what  right  dares  Kiuprili  question  me  ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

By  a  right  common  to  all  loyal  subjects — 

To  me  a  duty  !  As  the  realm's  co-regent, 

Appointed  by  our  sovereign's  last  free  act, 

Writ  by  himself —  [Grasping  the  Patent. 

emerick  (with  a  contemptuous  sneer). 
Ay ! — Writ  in  a  delirium ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

I  likewise  ask,  by  whose  authority 

The  access  to  the  sovereign  was  refused  me  ? 

EMERICK. 

By  whose  authority  dared  the  general  leave 
His  camp  and  army,  like  a  fugitive  ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

A  fugitive,  who,  with  victory  for  his  comrade, 
Ran,  open-eyed,  upon  the  face  of  death ! 
A  fugitive,  with  no  other  fear,  than  bodements 
To  be  belated  in  a  loyal  purpose — 
At  the  command,  Prince  !  of  my  king  and  thine, 
Hither  I  came  ;  and  now  again  require 
Audience  of  Queen  Zapolya ;  and  (the  States 
Forthwith  convened)  that  thou  dost  show  at  large, 
On  what  ground  of  defect  thou  'st  dared  annul 
This  thy  King's  last  and  solemn  act — hast  dared 
Ascend  the  throne,  of  which  the  law  had  named, 
And  conscience  should  have  made  thee,  a  protector. 


EMERICK. 

A  sovereign's  ear  ill  brooks  a  subject's  questioning ! 
Yet  for  thy  past  well-doing — and  because 
'Tis  hard  to  erase  at  once  the  ibnd  belief 
Long  cherish'd,  that  Illyria  had  in  thee 
i\o  dreaming  priest's  slave,  but  a  Roman  lover 
Of  her  true  weal  and  freedom — and  for  this,  too, 
That,  hoping  to  call  forth  to  the  broad  day-light 
And  fostering  breeze  of  glory,  all  descrvings, 
I  still  had  placed  thee  foremost. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Prince !  I  listen. 

EMERICK. 

Unwillingly  I  tell  thee,  that  Zapolya, 

Madden'd  with  grief,  her  erring  hopes  proved  idle — 

CASIMIR. 

Sire!  speak  the  whole  truth!  Say,  her  frauds  detected! 

EMERICK. 

According  to  the  sworn  attests  in  council 

Of  her  physician 

raab  kiuprili  (aside). 

Yes !   the  Jew,  Barzoni 

EMERICK. 

Under  the  imminent  risk  of  death  she  lies, 

Or  irrecoverable  loss  of  reason, 

If  known  friend's  face  or  voice  renew  the  frenzy. 

casimir  (to  Kiuprili). 
Trust  me,  my  Lord !  a  woman's  trick  has  duped  you— 
Us  too — but  most  of  all,  the  sainted  Andreas. 
Even  for  his  own  fair  fame,  his  grace  prays  hourly 
For  her  recovery  that  (the  States  convened) 
She  may  take  counsel  of  her  friends. 
emerick. 

Right,  Casimir! 
Receive  my  pledge,  Lord  General.     It  shall  stand 
In  her  own  will  to  appear  and  voice  her  claims ; 
Or  (which  in  truth  I  hold  the  wiser  course) 
With  all  the  past  pass'd  by,  as  family  quarrels, 
Let  the  Queen-Dowager,  with  unblench'd  honors, 
Resume  her  state,  our  first  Illyrian  matron. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Prince  Emerick !  you  speak  fairly,  and  your  pledge  too 
Is  such,  as  well  would  suit  an  honest  meaning. 

CASIMIR. 

My  Lord !  you  scarce  know  half  his  grace's  goodness. 

The  wealthy  heiress,  high-born  fair  Sarolta, 

Bred  in  the  convent  of  our  noble  ladies, 

Her  relative,  the  venerable  abbess, 

Hath,  at  his  grace's  urgence,  woo'il  and  won  for  me. 

EMERICK. 

Long  may  the  race,  and  long  may  that  name  flourish. 
Winch  your  heroic  deeds,  brave  chief,  have  render'd 
Dear  and  illustrious  to  all  true  niyrians ! 

raab  kiuprili  (sternly). 
The  longest  line,  that  ever  tracing  herald 
Or  found  or  feign'd,  placed  by  a  beggar's  soul, 
Hath  but  a  mushroom's  date  in  the  comparison : 
And  with  the  soul,  the  conscience  is  coeval, 
Yea,  the  soul's  essence. 

EMERICK. 

Conscience,  good  my  Lord, 
Is  but  the  pulse  of  reason.     Is  it  conscience, 
That  a  free  nation  should  be  handed  down, 
Like  the  dull  clods  beneath  our  feet,  by  chance 
And  the  blind  law  of  lineage  ?  That  whether  infant, 
Or  man  matured,  a  wise  man  or  an  idiot, 

109 


100 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Hero  or  natural  coward,  shall  have  guidance 

Of  a  free  people's  destiny ;  should  fall  out 

In  the  mere  lottery  of  a  reckless  nature, 

Where  few  the  prizes  and  the  blanks  are  countless  ? 

Or  haply  that  a  nation's  fate  should  hang 

On  the  bald  accident  of  a  midwife's  handling 

The  unclosed  sutures  of  an  infant's  skull  ? 

CASIMIR. 

What  better  claim  can  sovereign  wish  or  need, 
Than  the  free  voice  of  men  who  love  their  country? 
Those  chiefly  who  have  fought  for't  ?  Who,  by  right, 
Claim  for  their  monarch  one,  who  having  obey'd 
So  hath  best  learnt  to  govern ;  who,  having  suffer'd, 
Can  feel  for  each  brave  sufferer  and  reward  him  ? 
Whence  sprang  the  name  of  Emperor  ?  Was  it  not 
By  Nature's  fiat?  In  the  storm  of  triumph, 
'Mid  warriors'  shouts,  did  her  oracular  voice 
Make  itself  heard :  Let  the  commanding  spirit 
Possess  the  station  of  command ! 

KAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Prince  Emerick, 
Your  cause  will  prosper  best  in  your  own  pleading. 

emerick  (aside  to  Casimir). 
Ragozzi  was  thy  school-mate — a  bold  spirit ! 
Bind  him  to  us ! — Thy  father  thaws  apace ! 

[Then  aloud. 
Leave  us  awhile,  my  Lord ! — Your  friend,  Ragozzi, 
Whom  you  have  not  yet  seen  since  his  return, 
Commands  the  guard  to-day. 

[Casimir  retires  to  the  Guard-House ;  and  after  a 
time  appears  before  it  with  Chef  Ragozzi. 
We  are  alone. 
What  further  pledge  or  proof  desires  Kiuprili  ? 
Then,  with  your  assent 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Mistake  not  for  assent 
The  unquiet  silence  of  a  stern  Resolve, 
Throttling  the  impatient  voice.     I  have  heard  thee, 

Prince ! 
And  I  have  watch'd  thee,  too ;  but  have  small  faith  in 
A  plausible  tale  told  with  a  flirting  eye. 

[Emerick  turns  as  about  to  call  for  the  Guard. 
In  the  next  moment  I  am  in  thy  power, 
In  this  thou  art  in  mine.     Stir  but  a  step, 
Or  make  one  sign — I  swear  by  this  good  sword, 
Thou  diest  that  instant. 


Ha,  ha ! — Well,  Sir ! — Conclude  your  homily. 

raab  kiuprili  (in  a  somewhat  suppressed  voice.) 
A  tale  which,  whether  true  or  false,  comes  guarded 
Against  all  means  of  proof,  detects  itself. 
The  Queen  mew'd  up — this  too  from  anxious  care 
And  love  brought  forth  of  a  sudden,  a  twin  birth 
With  the  discovery  of  her  plot  to  rob  thee 
Of  a  rightful  throne ! — Mark  how  the  scorpion,  False- 
hood, 
Coils  round  in  its  own  perplexity,  and  fixes 
Its  sting  in  its  own  head ! 

emerick. 

Ay !  to  the  mark ! 
Raab  Kiuprili  (aloud):  [he  and  Emerick  stand- 
ing at  equi-distance  from  the  Palace  and 
the  Guard-House. 


Wouldst  thou   have  pilfer'd  from  our  school-boys 

themes 
These  shallow  sophisms  of  a  popular  choice  ? 
What  people  ?  How  convened  ?  or,  if  convened, 
Must  not  the  magic  power  that  charms  together 
Millions  of  men  in  council,  needs  have  power 
To  win  or  wield  them  ?  Better,  O  far  better 
Shout  forth  thy  titles  to  yon  circling  mountains, 
And  with  a  thousand-fold  reverberation' 
Make  the  rocks  flatter  thee,  and  the  volleying  air, 
Unbribed,  shout  back  to  thee,  King  Emerick  ! 
By  wholesome  laws  to  embank  the  sovereign  power, 
To  deepen  by  restraint,  and  by  prevention 
Of  lawless  will  to  amass  and  guide  the  flood 
In  its  majestic  channel,  is  man's  task 
And  the  true  patriot's  glory !  In  all  else 
Men  safelier  trust  to  Heaven,  than  to  themselves 
When  least  themselves  in  the  mad  whirl  of  crowds 
Where  folly  is  contagious,  and  too  oft 
Even  wise  men  leave  their  better  sense  at  home, 
To  chide  and  wonder  at  them  when  return'd. 

emerick  (aloud). 
Is 't  thus,  thou  scofFst  the  people  !  most  of  all, 
The  soldiers,  the  defenders  of  the  people  ? 

raab  kiuprili  (aloud). 

0  most  of  all,  most  miserable  nation, 

For  whom  th'  Imperial  power,  enormous  bubble ! 
Is  blown  and  kept  aloft,  or  burst  and  shatter'd 
By  the  bribed  breath  of  a  lewd  soldiery ! 
Chiefly  of  such,  as  from  the  frontiers  far 
(Which  is  the  noblest  station  of  true  warriors), 
In  rank  licentious  idleness  beleaguer 
City  and  court,  a  venom'd  thorn  i'  the  side 
Of  virtuous  kings,  the  tyrant's  slave  and  tyrant, 
Still  ravening  for  fresh  largess  !  but  with  such 
What  title  claim'st  thou,  save  thy  birth  ?  What  merits 
Which  many  a  liegeman  may  not  plead  as  well, 
Brave  though  I  grant  thee  ?  If  a  life  outlabor'd 
Head,  heart,  and  fortunate  arm,  in  watch  and  war, 
For  the  land's  fame  and  weal ;  if  large  acquests, 
Made  honest  by  th'  aggression  of  the  foe 
And  whose  best  praise  is,  that  they  bring  us  safety ; 
If  victory,  doubly-wreathed,  whose  under-garland 
Of  laurel-leaves  looks  greener  and  more  sparkling 
Through  the  gray  olive-branch ;  if  these,  Prince  Eme- 
rick! 
Give  the  true  title  to  the  throne,  not  thou — 
No !  (let  Illyria,  let  the  infidel  enemy 
Be  judge  and  arbiter  between  us !)  I, 

1  were  the  rightful  sovereign ! 

emerick. 

I  have  faith 
That  thou  both  think'st  and  hopest  it    Fair  Zapolya, 
A  provident  lady — 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Wretch,  beneath  all  answer  ■ 

EMERICK. 

Offers  at  once  the  royal  bed  and  throne ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

To  be  a  kingdom's  bulwark,  a  king's  glory, 
Yet  loved  by  both,  and  trusted,  and  trust-worthy, 
Is  more  than  to  be  king ;  but  see !  thy  rage 
Fights  with  thy  fear.     I  will  relieve  thee !  Ho ! 

r  To  the  Guard. 


Hadst  thou  believed  thine  own  tale,  hadst  thou  fancied  emerick. 

Thyself  the  rightful  successor  of  Andreas,  |  Not  for  thy  sword,  but  to  entrap  thee,  ruffian 

110 


ZAPOLYA. 


101 


I       Thus  long  I  have  listen'd — Guard — ho!   from  the 
Palace. 
Tfie  Guard  post  from   the    Guard-House    with 
Chef    Ragozzi   at  their  head,   and   then   a 
number  from  the  Palace — Chef  Ragozzi  de- 
mands Kiuprili's  sword,  and  apprehends  him. 

CASIMIR. 

0  agony !  (To  Emerick).  Sire,  hear  me ! 

[7b  Kiuprili,  who  turns  from  him. 
Hear  me,  Father ! 

EMERICK. 

Take  in  arrest  that  traitor  and  assassin ! 

Who  pleads  for  his  life,  strikes  at  mine,  his  sovereign's. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

As  the  co-regent  of  the  realm,  1  stand 
Amenable  to  none  save  to  the  States, 
Met  in  due  course  of  law.     But  ye  are  bond-slaves, 
Yet  witness  ve  that  before  God  and  man 

1  here  impeach  Lord  Emerick  of  foul  treason, 
And  on  strong  grounds  attaint  him  with  suspicion 
Of  murder — 

EMERICK. 

Hence  with  the  madman! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Your  Queen's  murder, 
The  royal  orphan's  murder :  and  to  the  death 
Defy  him,  as  a  tyrant  and  usurper. 

[Hurried  off  by  Ragozzi  and  the  Guard. 

EMERICK. 

Ere  twice  the  sun  hath  risen,  by  my  sceptre 
This  insolence  shall  be  avenged. 

CASIMIR. 

O  banish  him ! 
This  infamy  will  crush  me.     0  for  my  sake, 
Banish  him,  my  liege  lord  ! 

emerick  (scornfully). 

What .'  to  the  army  ? 
Be  calm,  young  friend !  Nought  shall  be  done  in  anger. 
The  child  o'erpowers  the  man.     In  this  emergence 
I  must  take  counsel  for  us  both.     Retire. 

[Exit  Casimir  in  agitation. 
emerick  (alone,  loolis  at  a  Calendar). 
The  changeful  planet,  now  in  her  decay, 
Dips  down  at  midnight,  to  be  seen  no  more. 
With  her  shall  sink  the  enemies  of  Emerick, 
Cursed  by  the  last  look  of  the  waning  moon  ; 
And  my  bright  destiny,  with  sharpen'd  horns, 
Shall  greet  me  fearless  in  the  new-born  crescent. 

[Exit. 
Scene  changes  to  another  view,  namely,  the  back  of  the 
Palace — a  Wooded  Park,  and  Mountains. 

Enter  Zapolya,  with  an  Infant  in  her  arms. 

ZAPOLYA. 

Hush,  dear  one!  hush!  My  trembling  arm  disturbs 

thee! 
Thou,  the  Protector  of  the  helpless !  thou, 
The  widow's  Husband  and  the  orphan's  Father, 
Direct  my  steps !  Ah  whither  ?  O  send  down 
Thv  angel  to  a  houseless  babe  and  mother, 
Driven  forth  into  the  cruel  widerness ! 
Hush,  sweet  one!   Thou  art  no  Hagar's  offspring: 

thou  art 
The  rightful  heir  of  an  anointed  king ! 
What  sounds  are  those  ?  It  is  the  vesper  chant 
Of  laboring  men  returning  to  their  home ! 
Their  queen  has  no  home !  Hear  me,  heavenly  Father! 


And  let  this  darkness 

Be  as  the  shadow  of  thy  outspread  wings 
To  hide  and  shield  us!  Start'st  thou  in  thy  slumbers? 
Thou  canst  not  dream  of  savage  Emerick.     Hush ! 
Betray  not  thy  poor  mother !  For  if  they  seize  thee, 
I  shall  grow  mad  indeed,  and  they'll  believe 
Thy  wicked  uncle's  lie.     Ha!  what?  A  soldier? 

[Site  starts  back — and  enter  Chef  Ragozzi. 
chef  ragozzi. 
Sure  Heaven  befriends  us.    Well!  he  hath  escaped! 

0  rare  tune  of  a  tyrant's  promises 
That  can  enchant  the  serpent  treachery 

From  forth  its  lurking-hole  in  the  heart.     "  Ragozzi  ! 

"  O  brave  Ragozzi!  Count!  Commander!  What  not?" 

And  all  this  too  for  nothing  !  a  poor  nothing ! 

Merely  to  play  the  underling  in  the  murder 

Of  my  best  friend  Kiuprili!  His  own  son — monstrous! 

Tyrant!  I  owe  thee  thanks,  and  in  good  hour 

Will  I  repay  thee,  for  that  thou  thought's^  me  too 

A  serviceable  villain.     Could  I  now 

But  gain  some  sure  intelligence  of  the  queen : 

Heaven  bless  and  guard  her ! 

zapolya  (coming  fearfully  forward). 

Art  thou  not  Ragozzi  ? 
chef  ragozzi. 
The  Queen !  Now  then  the  miracle  is  full ! 

1  see  Heaven's  wisdom  in  an  over-match 

For  the  devil's  cunning.     This  way,  madam,  haste ! 

zapolya. 
Stay !  Oh,  no !  Forgive  me  if  I  wrong  thee  ! 
This  is  thy  sovereign's  child  :  Oh,  pity  us, 
And  be  not  treacherous!  [Kneeling 

chef  ragozzi  (raising  her). 
Madam !  For  mercy's  sake ! 

zapolya. 
But  tyrants  have  a  hundred  eyes  and  arms ! 

chef  ragozzi. 
Take  courage,  madam!  'Twere  too  horrible, 
(I  can  not  do 't)  to  swear  I  'm  not  a  monster ! — 
Scarce  had  I  barr'd  the  door  on  Raab  Kiuprili — 

zapolya. 
Kiuprili!  how? 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

There  is  not  time  to  tell  it. 
The  tyrant  call'd  me  to  him,  praised  my  zeal 
(And  be  assured  I  overtopt  his  cunning 
And  seem'd  right  zealous).  But  time  wrastes :  in  fine 
Bids  me  dispatch  my  trustiest  friends,  as  couriers 
With  letters  to  the  army.     The  thought  at  once 
Flash 'd  on  me.    I  disguised  my  prisoner — 

ZAPOLYA. 

What!  Raab  Kiuprili? 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Yes !  my  noble  general ! 
I  sent  him  off,  with  Emerick's  own  packet, 
Haste,  and  post  haste — Prepared  to  follow  him 

ZAPOLYA. 

Ah,  how?  Is  it  joy  or  fear?  My  limbs  seem  sinking! — 

chef  ragozzi  (supporting  her). 
Heaven  still  befriends  us.     I  have  left  my  charger, 
A  gentle  beast  and  fleet,  and  my  boy's  mule, 
One  that  can  shoot  a  precipice  like  a  bird, 
Just  where  the  wood  begins  to  climb  the  mountains. 
The  course  we'll  thread  will  mock  the  tyrant's  guesses, 
Or  scare  the  followers.    Ere  we  reach  the  main  road, 
The  Lord  Kiuprili  will  have  sent  a  troop 

111 


102 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


To  escort  me.    Oh,  thrice  happy  when  he  finds 
The  treasure  which  I  convoy ! 


One  brief  moment, 
That,  praying  for  strength  I  may  have  strength.  This 

babe, 
Heaven's  eye  is  on  it,  and  its  innocence 
Is,  as  a  prophet's  prayer,  strong  and  prevailing ! 
Through    thee,    dear    babe !    the    inspiring  thought 

possess'd  me, 
When  the  loud  clamor  rose,  and  all  the  palace 
Emptied  itself — (They  sought  my  life,  Ragozzi !) 
Like  a  swift  shadow  gliding,  I  made  way 
To  the  deserted  chamber  of  my  Lord. — 

[Then  to  the  infant. 
And  thou  didst  kiss  thy  father's  lifeless  lips, 
And  in  thy  helpless  hand,  sweet  slumberer ! 
Still  clasp'st  the  signet  of  thy  royalty. 
As  I  removed  the  seal,  the  heavy  arm 
Dropt  from  the  couch  aslant,  and  the  stiff  finger 
Seem'd  pointing  at  my  feet.     Provident  Heaven ! 
Lo,  I  was  standing  on  the  secret  door, 
Which,    through    a    long  descent  where  all  sound 

perishes, 

Let  out  beyond  the  palace.     Well  I  knew  it 

But  A  ndreas  framed  it  not !  He  was  no  tyrant ! 

CHEF  RAGOZZI. 

Haste,  madam !  Let  me  take  this  precious  burden ! 
[He  kneels  as  he  takes  the  child. 

ZAPOLYA. 

Take  him !  And  if  we  be  pursued,  I  charge  thee, 
Flee  thou  and  leave  me  !  Flee  and  save  thy  king ! 

[Then  as  going  off,  she  looks  back  on  the  palace. 
Thou  tyrant's  den,  be  call'd  no  more  a  palace ! 
The  orphan's  angel  at  the  throne  of  Heaven 
Stands  up  against  thee,  and  there  hover  o'er  thee 
A  Queen's,  a  Mother's,  and  a  Widow's  curse. 
Henceforth  a  dragon's  haunt,  fear  and  suspicion 
Stand  sentry  at  thy  portals !  Faith  and  honor. 
Driven  from  the  throne,  shall  leave  the  attainted  na- 
tion: 
And,  for  the  iniquity  that  houses  in  thee, 
False  glory,  thirst  of  blood,  and  lust  of  rapine 
(Fateful  conjunction  of  malignant  planets), 
Shall  shoot  their  blastments  on  the  land.  The  fathers 
Henceforth  shall  have  no  joy  in  their  young  men, 
And  when  they  cry  :  Lo  !  a  male  child  is  born  ! 
The  mother  shall  make  answer  with  a  groan. 
For  bloody  usurpation,  like  a  vulture, 
Shall  clog  its  beak  within  Illyria's  heart. 
Remorseless  slaves  of  a  remorseless  tyrant ! 
They  shall  be  moek'd  with  sounds  of  Uberty, 
And  liberty  shall  be  proclaim'd  alone 
To  thee,  O  Fire !  O  Pestilence !  O  Sword  ! 
Till  Vengeance  hath  her  fill. — And  thou,  snatch'd 

hence, 
(Again  to  the  infant.)  poor  friendless  fugitive !  with 

Mother's  wailing, 
Offspring  of  Royal  Andreas,  shalt  return 
With  trump  and  timbrel  clang,  and  popular  shout 
In  triumph  to  the  palace  of  thy  fathers !       [Exeunt. 


PART  n. 


THE  SEQUEL,  ENTITLED  "  THE  USURPER'S 
FATE." 


ADDITIONAL  CHARACTERS. 
MEN. 

Old  Bathory,  a  Mountaineer. 

Bethlen  Bathory,  the  Young  Prince  Andreas,  sir, 

posed  Son  of  Old  Bathory. 
Lord  Rudolph,  a  Courtier,  but  friend  to  the  Queen's 

party. 
Laska,  Steward  to  Casimir,  betrothed  to  Glycine. 
Pestalutz,  an  Assassin,  in  Emerick's  employ. 

WOMEN. 
Lady  Sarolta,  Wife  of  Lord  Casimir. 
Glycine,  Orphan  Daughter  of  Chef  Ragozzi. 

Between  the  flight  of  the  Queen,  and  the  civil  war 
which  immediately  followed,  and  in  which  Emerick 
remained  the  victor,  a  space  of  twenty  years  is  sup- 
posed to  have  elapsed. 


ACT  I. 

SCENE  I. 

A   Mountainous   Country.     Bathory's  Dwelling  at 
the  end  of  the  Stage. 

Enter  Lady  Sarolta  and  Glycine, 
glycine. 
Well,  then !  our  round  of  charity  is  finish'd. 
Rest,  Madam !  You  breathe  quick. 
sarolta. 

What!  tired,  Glycine ? 
No  delicate  court  dame,  but  a  mountaineer 
By  choice  no  less  than  birth,  I  gladly  use 
The  good  strength  Nature  gave  me. 

glycine. 

That  last  cottage 
Is  built  as  if  an  eagle  or  a  raven 
Had  chosen  it  for  her  nest. 

sarolta. 

So  many  are 
The  sufferings  which  no  human  aid  can  reach, 
It  needs  must  be  a  duty  doubly  sweet 
To  heal  the  few  we  can.     Well !  let  us  rest. 

glycine. 
There  ?     [Pointing  to  Bathory's  dwelling  Sarolta 
answering,  points  to  where  she  tlien  stands. 
sarolta. 
Here !  For  on  this  spot  Lord  Casimir 
Took  his  last  leave.     On  yonder  mountain  ridge 
I  lost  the  misty  image  which  so  long 
Linger'd  or  seem'd  at  least  to  linger  on  it. 

GLYCYNE. 

And  what  if  even  now,  on  that  same  ridge, 

A  speck  should  rise,  and  still  enlarging,  lengthening 

As  it  clomb  downwards,  shape  itself  at  last 

To  a  numerous  cavalcade,  and  spurring  foremost, 

Who  but  Sarolta's  own  dear  Lord  return'd 

From  his  high  embassy  ? 

112 


ZAPOLYA. 


103 


Thou  hast  hit  my  thought ! 
All  the  long  day,  from  yester-morn  to  evening, 
The  restless  hope  flutler'd  about  my  heart. 
Oh,  we  are  querulous  creatures  !  Little  less 
Than  all  things  can  suffice  to  make  us  happy ; 
And  little  more  than  nothing  is  enough 
To  discontent  us. — Were  he  come,  then  should  I 
Repine  he  had  not  arrived  just  one  day  earlier 
To  keep  his  birth-day  here,  in  his  ovvn  birth-place. 

GLYCINE. 

But  our  best  sports  belike,  and  gay  processions 
Would  to  my  Lord  have  seem'd  but  work-day  sights 
Compared  with  those  the  royal  court  affords. 

SAROLTA. 

I  have  small  wish  to  see  them.     A  spring  morning, 

With  its  wild  gladsome  minstrelsy  of  birds, 

And  its  bright  jewelry  of  flowers  and  dew-drops 

(Each  orbed  drop  an  orb  of  glory  in  it), 

Would  put  them  all  in  eclipse.  This  sweet  retirement 

Lord  Casimir's  wish  alone  would  have  made  sacred  : 

But  in  good  truth,  his  loving  jealousy 

Did  but  command,  what  I  had  else  entreated. 

GLYCINE. 

And  yet  had  I  been  born  Lady  Sarolta, 
Been  wedded  to  the  noblest  of  the  realm, 
So  beautiful  besides,  and  yet  so  stately 

SAROLTA. 

Hush !  innocent  flatterer ! 

GLYCINE. 

Nay !  to  my  poor  fancy 
The  royal  court  would  seem  an  earthly  heaven, 
Made  for  such  stars  to  shine  in,  and  be  gracious. 

SAROLTA. 

So  doth  the  ignorant  distance  still  delude  us  ! 

Thy  fancied  heaven,  dear  girl,  like  that  above  thee, 

In  its  mere  self,  a  cold,  drear,  colorless  void, 

Seen  from  below  and  in  the  large,  becomes 

The  bright  blue  ether,  and  the  seat  of  gods ! 

Well !  but  this  broil  that  scared  you  from  the  dance  ? 

And  w-as  not  Laska  there  :  he,  your  betroth'd  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Yes,  madam !  he  was  there.     So  was  the  maypole, 
For  we  danced  round  it. 

SAROLTA. 

Ah,  Glycine !  why, 
Why  did  you  then  betroth  yourself? 

GLYCINE. 

Because 
My  own  dear  lady  wish'd  it !  't  was  you  ask'd  me ! 

SAROLTA. 

Yes,  at  my  Lord's  request,  but  never  wish'd, 
My  poor  affectionate  girl,  to  see  thee  wretched. 
Thou  know'st  not  yet  the  duties  of  a  wife. 

GLYCINE. 

Oh,  yes !  It  is  a  wife's  chief  duty,  madam, 
To  stand  in  awe  of  her  husband,  and  obey  him ; 
And,  I  am  sure,  I  never  shall  see  Laska 
But  I  shall  tremble. 

SAROLTA. 

Not  with  fear,  I  think, 
For  you  still  mock  him.  Bring  a  seat  from  the  cottage. 
[Exit  Glycine  into  the  cottage,  Sarolta  continues 
her  speech,  looking  after  her. 
Something  above  thy  rank  there  hangs  about  thee, 
And  in  thy  countenance,  thy  voice,  and  motion, 


Yea,  e'en  in  thy  simplicity,  Glycine, 
A  fine  and  feminine  grace,  that  makes  me  feel 
More  as  a  mother  than  a  mistress  to  thee ! 
Thou  art  a  soldier's  orphan  !  that — the  courage, 
Which  rising  in  thine  eye,  seems  oft  to  give 
A  new  soul  to  its  gentleness,  doth  prove  thee  ! 
Thou  art  sprung  too  of  no  ignoble  blood, 
Or  there 's  no  faith  in  instinct ! 
[Angry  voices  and  clamor  within,  re-enter  Glycine. 

GLYCINE. 

Oh,  madam !  there 's  a  party  of  your  servants, 
And  my  Lord's  steward,  Laska,  at  their  head, 
Have  come  to  search  for  old  Bathory's  son, 
Bethlen,  that  brave  young  man  !  't  was  he,  my  lady, 
That  took  our  parts,  and  beat  off  the  intruders ; 
And  in  mere  spite  and  malice,  now  they  charge  him 
With  bad  words  of  Lord  Casimir  and  the  king. 
Pray  don't  believe  them,  madam!  This  way!  This 

way ! 
Lady  Sarolta 's  here.  [Calling  without 

SAROLTA. 

Be  calm,  Glycine. 
Enter  Laska  and  Servants  with  Old  Bathory. 
laska  {to  Bathory). 
We  have  no  concern  with  you !  What  needs  your 
presence  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

What !  Do  you  think  I  '11  suffer  my  brave  boy 
To  be  slander'd  by  a  set  of  coward-ruffians, 
And  leave  it  to  their  malice, — yes,  mere  malice .' — 
To  tell  its  own  tale  ? 

[Laska  and  Servants  bow  to  Lady  Sarolta 

sarolta. 

Laska !  What  may  this  mean  ? 
laska  (pompously,  as  commencing  a  set  speech). 
Madam !  and  may  it  please  your  ladyship ! 
This  old  man's  son,  by  name  Bethlen  Bathory, 
Stands  charged,  on  weighty  evidence,  that  he, 
On  yester-eve,  being  his  lordship's  birth-day, 
Did  traitorously  defame  Lord  Casimir : 
The  lord  high-steward  of  the  realm,  moreover 

sarolta. 
Be  brief!  We  know  his  titles ! 

LASKA. 

And  moreover 
Raved  like  a  traitor  at  our  liege  King  Emerick. 
And  furthermore,  said  witnesses  make  oath, 
Led  on  the  assault  upon  his  lordship's  servants ; 
Yea,  insolently  tore,  from  this,  your  huntsman, 
His  badge  of  livery  of  your  noble  house, 
And  trampled  it  in  scorn. 

SAROLTA  (to  the  Servants  who  offer  to  speak). 

You  have  had  your  spokesman . 
Where  is  the  young  man  thus  accused  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

I  know  not : 
But  if  no  ill  betide  him  on  the  mountains, 
He  will  not  long  be  absent ! 

SAROLTA. 

Thou  art  his  father  ? 

OLD  BATHORV. 

None  ever  with  more  reason  prized  a  son : 
Yet  I  hate  falsehood  more  than  I  love  him. 
But  more  than  one,  now  in  my  lady's  presence, 
Wirness'd  the  affray,  besides  these  men  of  malice ; 

And  if  I  swerve  from  truth 

113 


104 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


GLYCINE. 

Yes !  good  old  man ! 
My  lady !  pray  believe  him  ! 

SAROLTA. 

Hush,  Glycine ! 
Be  silent,  I  command  you.  [Then  to  Bathory. 

Speak !  we  hear  you ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

My  tale  is  brief     During  our  festive  dance, 

Your  servants,  the  accusers  of  my  son, 

Offer'd  gross  insults,  in  unmanly  sort, 

To  our  village  maidens.     He  (could  he  do  less  T) 

Rose  in  defence  of  outraged  modesty, 

And  so  persuasive  did  his  cudgel  prove 

(Your  hectoring  sparks  so  over  brave  to  women 

Are  always  cowards),  that  they  soon  took  flight, 

And  now  in  mere  revenge,  like  baffled  boasters, 

Have  framed  this  tale,  out  of  some  hasty  words 

Which  their  own  threats  provoked. 

SAROLTA. 

Old  man !  you  talk 
Too  bluntly !  Did  your  son  owe  no  respect 
To  the  livery  of  our  house  1 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Even  such  respect 
As  the  sheep's  skin  should  gain  for  the  hot  wolf 
That  hath  begun  to  worry  the  poor  lambs ! 

LASKA. 

Old  insolent  ruffian ! 

GLYCINE. 

Pardon  !  pardon,  madam ! 
I  saw  the  whole  affray.     The  good  old  man 
Means  no  offence,  sweet  lady ! — You,  yourself, 
Laska !  know  well,  that  these  men  were  the  ruffians ! 
Shame  on  you ! 

sarolta  (speaks  wit?i  affected  anger). 
What !  Glycine !  Go,  retire ! 

[Exit  Glycine,  mournfully. 
Be  it  then  that  these  men  faulted.  Yet  yourself, 
Or  better  still  belike  the  maidens'  parents, 
Might  have  complain'd  to  its.     Was  ever  access 
Denied  you  ?  Or  free  audience  ?  Or  are  we 
Weak  and  unfit  to  punish  our  own  servants  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

So  then !  So  then !  Heaven  grant  an  old  man  patience ! 
And  must  the  gardener  leave  his  seedling  plants, 
Leave  his  young  roses  to  the  rooting  swine, 
While  he  goes  ask  their  master,  if  perchance 
His  leisure  serve  to  scourge  them  from  their  ravage  ? 

LASKA. 

Ho !  Take  the  rude  clown  from  your  lady's  presence ! 
I  will  report  her  further  will ! 

SAROLTA. 

Wait,  then, 
Till  thou  hast  learnt  it !  Fervent,  good  old  man  ! 
Forgive  me  that,  to  try  thee,  I  put  on 
A  face  of  sternness,  alien  to  my  meaning ! 

[Then  speaks  to  the  Servants. 
Hence !  leave  my  presence !  and  you,  Laska !  mark 

me ! 
Those  rioters  are  no  longer  of  my  household ! 
If  we  but  shake  a  dew-drop  from  a  rose, 
In  vain  would  we  replace  it,  and  as  vainly 
Restore  the  tear  of  wounded  modesty 
To  a  maiden's  eye  familiarized  to  license. — 
But  these  men,  Laska — 


laska  (aside). 

Yes,  now  'tis  coming. 

SAROLTA. 

Brutal  aggressors  first,  then  baffled  dastards, 
That  they  have  sought  to  piece  out  their  revenge 
With  a  tale  of  words  lured  from  the  lips  of  ange. 
Stamps  them  most  dangerous ;  and  till  I  want 
Fit  means  for  wicked  ends,  we  shall  not  need 
Their  services.     Discharge  them !  You,  Bathory ! 
Are  henceforth  of  my  household  !  I  shall  place  you 
Near  my  own  person.     When  your  son  returns, 
Present  him  to  us. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Ha !  what,  strangers*  here ! 
What  business  have  they  in  an  old  man's  eye  ? 
Your  goodness,  lady — and  it  came  so  sudden — 
I  cannot — must  not — let  you  be  deceived. 
I  have  yet  another  tale,  but —  [Then  to  Sarolta  aside. 
Not  for  all  ears! 
sarolta. 
I  oft  have  pass'd  your  cottage,  and  still  praised 
Its  beauty,  and  that  trim  orchard-plot,  whose  blossoms 
The  gusts  of  April  shower'd  aslant  its  thatch. 
Come,  you  shall  show  it  me !  And  while  you  bid  it 
Farewell,  be  not  ashamed  that  I  should  witness 
The  oil  of  gladness  glittering  on  the  water 
Of  an  ebbing  grief. 

[Bathory  bowing,  shows  her  into  his  cottage 
laska  (alone). 

Vexation !  baffled !  school'd  ! 
Ho !  Laska  !  wake !  why  ?  what  can  all  this  mean  ? 
She  sent  away  that  cockatrice  in  anger ! 
Oh  the  false  witch  !  It  is  too  plain,  she  loves  him 
And  now,  the  old  man  near  my  lady's  person, 
She  '11  see  this  Bethlen  hourly ! 

[Laska  flings  himself  into  the  seat.    Glycine 
peeps  in  timidly. 

GLYCINE. 

Laska!  Laska! 
Is  my  lady  gone  ? 

laska  (surlily). 
Gone. 

glycine. 
Have  you  yet  seen  him  ? 
Is  he  return'd  ? 

[Laska  starts  up  from  his  seat 
Has  the  seat  stung  you,  Laska  ? 
laska. 
No !  serpent !  no ;  'tis  you  that  sting  me ;  you ! 
What!  you  would  cling  to  him  again! 
glycine. 
Whom? 

LASKA. 

Bethlen!  Bethlen! 
Yes ;  gaze  as  if  your  very  eyes  embraced  him ! 
Ha !  you  forget  the  scene  of  yesterday  ! 
Mute  ere  he  came,  but  then — Out  on  your  screams, 
And  your  pretended  fears ! 

glycine. 

Your  fears,  at  least, 
Were  real,  Laska!  or  your  trembling  limbs 
And  white  cheeks  play'd  the  hypocrites  most  vilely  ! 


*  Refers  to  the  tear,  which  he  fee/s  starling  in  his  ere.    The 
following  line  was  borrowed  unconsciously  from  Mr.  Wor 
worth's  Excursion. 

114    ' 


ZAPOLYA. 


105 


LASKA. 

I  fear !  whom  ?  What  ? 

GLYCINE. 

I  know,  what  I  should  fear, 
Were  I  in  Laska's  place. 

LASKA. 

What? 

GLYCINE. 

My  own  conscience, 
For  having  fed  my  jealousy  and  envy 
With  a  plot,  made  out  of  other  men's  revenges, 
Against  a  brave  and  innocent  young  man's  life ! 
Yet,  yet,  pray  tell  me ! 

LASKA  (malignantly). 

You  will  know  too  soon. 

GLYCINE. 

Would  I  could  find  my  lady  !  though  she  chid  me — 
Yet  this  suspense —  [Going. 

LASKA. 

Stop !  stop  !  one  question  only — 
*      I  am  quite  calm — 

GLYCINE. 

Ay,  as  the  old  song  says, 
Calm  as  a  tiger,  valiant  as  a  dove. 
Nay  now,  I  have  marr'd  the  verse :  well !  this  one 
question — 

LASKA. 

Are  you  not  bound  to  me  by  your  own  promise  ? 
And  is  it  not  as  plain — 

GLYCINE. 

Halt !  that  'a  two  questions. 

LASKA. 

Pshaw !  Is  it  not  as  plain  as  impudence, 

That    you're  in  love  with  this   young  swaggering 

beggar, 
Bethlen  Bathory  ?  When  he  was  accused, 
Why  press'd  you  forward  ?  Why  did  you  defend  him  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Question  meet  question  :  that 's  a  woman's  privilege. 

Why,  Laska,  did  you  urge  Lord  Casimir 

To  make  my  lady  force  that  promise  from  me  ? 

LASKA. 

So  then,  you  say,  Lady  Sarolta  forced  you  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Could  I  look  up  to  her  dear  countenance, 

And  say  her  nay  ?  As  far  back  as  I  wot  of, 

All  her  commands  were  gracious,  sweet  requests. 

How  could  it  be  then,  but  that  her  requests 

Must  needs  have  sounded  to  me  as  commands  ? 

And  as  for  love,  had  I  a  score  of  loves, 

I  'd  keep  them  all  for  my  dear,  kind,  good  mistress. 

LASKA. 

Not  one  for  Bethlen ! 

GLYCINE. 

Oh  !  that 's  a  different  thing. 
To  be  sure  he 's  brave,  and  handsome,  and  so  pious 
To  his  good  old  father.     But  for  loving  him — 
Nay,  there,  indeed  you  are  mistaken,  Laska  ! 
Poor  youth  !  I  rather  think  I  grieve  for  him  ; 
For  I  sigh  so  deeply  when  I  think  of  him ! 
Arid  if  I  see  him,  the  tears  come  in  my  eyes, 
And  my  heart  beats :  and  all  because  I  dreamt 
Phat  the  war-wolf*  had  gored  him  as  he  hunted 
In  the  haunted  forest! 


*  For  the  best  account  of  the  War-wolf  or  Lycamhropus,  see 
iJrayton's  Moon-calf,  Chalmers'  English  Poets,  vol.  iv.  p. 
13  e. 


LASKA. 

You  dare  own  all  this  ? 
Your  lady  will  not  warrant  promise-breach. 
Mine,  pamper'd  Miss!  you  shall  be  ;  and  I'll  make 

you 
Grieve  for  him  with  a  vengeance.    Odds,  my  fingers 
Tingle  already!  [Makes  threatening  signs. 

glycine  (aside). 
11a !  Bethlen  coming  this  way  ! 
[Glycine  then  cries  out  as  if  afraid  of  being  India, 
Oh,  save  me  !  save  me  !  Pray  don't  kill  me,  Laska! 
Enter  Bethlen  in  a  Hunting  Dress. 
bethlen. 
What,  beat  a  woman ! 

laska  (to  Glycine). 
O  you  cockatrice  ! 
bethlen. 
Unmanly  dastard,  hold ! 

laska  (pompously). 

Do  you  chance  to  know 
Who— I — am,  Sir? — (S'death  how  black  he  looks', 

bethlen. 
I  have  started  many  strange  beasts  in  my  time, 
But  none  less  like  a  man,  than  this  before  me 
That  lifts  his  hand  against  a  timid  female. 

laska. 
Bold  youth  !  she 's  mine. 

GLYCINE. 

No,  not  my  master  yet, 
But  only  is  to  be  ;  and  all  because 
Two  years  ago  my  lady  ask'd  me,  and 
I  promised  her,  not  him  ;  and  if  sAe'll  let  me, 
I  '11  hate  you,  my  Lord's  steward. 
bethlen. 

Hush,  Glycine ' 

GLYCINE. 

Yes,  I  do,  Bethlen ;  for  he  just  now  brought 
False  witnesses  to  swear  away  your  life : 
Your  life,  and  old  Bathory's  too. 

BETHLEN. 

Bathory's ! 

Where  is  my  father  ?  Answer,  or Ha  !  gone  ! 

[Laska  during  this  time  slinks  off  the  Stage,  using 
tlireatetiing  gestures  to  Glycine, 
glycine. 
Oh,  heed  not  him  !  I  sawr  you  pressing  onward, 
And  did  but  feign  alarm.     Dear  gallant  youth, 
It  is  your  life  they  seek ! 

BETHLEN. 

My  life  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Alas! 
Lady  Sarolta  even — 

BETHLEN. 

She  does  not  know  me  ! 

GLYCINE. 

Oh  that  she  did  !  she  could  not  then  have  spoken 
With  such  stern  countenance.  But  though  she  spuria 

me, 
I  will  kneel,  Bethlen — 

BETHLEN. 

Not  for  me,  Glycine  ! 
What  have  I  done  ?  or  whom  have  I  offended  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Rash  words,  'tis  said,  and  treasonous,  of  the  king. 
[Bethlein  mutters  to  himself  indignantly 
glycine  (aside). 
So  looks  the  statue,  in  our  hall,  o'  the  god, 
The  shaft  just  flown  that  killed  the  serpent! 
115 


106 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


BETHLEN  (muttering  aside). 


GLYCINE. 

Ah,  often  have  I  wish'd  you  were  a  king. 

You  would  protect  the  helpless  everywhere, 

As  you  did  us.     And  I,  too,  should  not  then 

Grieve  for  you,  Bethlen,  as  I  do ;  nor  have 

The  tears  come  in  my  eyes ;  nor  dream  bad  dreams 

That  you  were  kill'd  in  the  forest;  and  then  Laska 

Would  have  no  right  to  rail  at  me,  nor  say 

(Yes,  the  base  man,  he  says)  that  I — I  love  you. 

BETHLEN. 

Pretty  Glycine  !  wert  thou  not  betrothed — 
But  in  good  truth  I  know  not  what  I  speak. 
This  luckless  morning  I  have  been  so  haunted 
Willi  my  own  fancies,  starting  up  like  omens, 
That  I  feel  like  one,  who  waking  from  a  dream 
Both  asks  and  answers  wildly  — But  Bathory  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Hist !  't  is  my  lady's  step !  She  must  not  see  you ! 

[Bethlen  retires. 
Enter  from  the  Cottage  Sarolta  and  Bathory. 

sarolta. 
Go,  seek  your  son !  I  need  not  add,  be  speedy — 
You  here,  Glycine  ?  [Exit  Bathory. 

glycine. 

Pardon,  pardon,  Madam  ! 
If  you  but  saw  the  old  man's  son,  you  would  not, 
You  could  not  have  him  harm'd. 

sarolta. 

Be  calm,  Glycine ! 

GLYCINE. 

No,  I  shall  break  my  heart.  [Sobbing. 

sarolta  (taking  her  hand). 

Ha !  is  it  so  ? 
O  strange  and  hidden  power  of  sympathy, 
That  of  like  fates,  though  all  unknown  to  each, 
Dost  make  blind  instincts,  orphan's  heart  to  orphan's 
Drawing  by  dim  disquiet ! 

glycine. 

Old  Bathory — 

sarolta. 
Seeks  his  brave  son.     Come,  wipe  away  thy  tears. 
Yes,  in  good  truth,  Glycine,  this  same  Bethlen 
Seems  a  most  noble  and  deserving  youth. 

glycine. 
My  lady  does  not  mock  me  ? 

SAROLTA. 

Where  is  Laska  ? 
Has  he  not  told  thee  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Nothing.  In  his  fear — 
Anger,  I  mean — stole  off — I  am  so  flutter'd — 
Left  me  abruptly — 

SAROLTA, 

His  shame  excuses  him ! 
He  is  somewhat  hardly  task'd ;  and  in  discharging 
His  own  tools,  cons  a  lesson  for  himself. 
Bathory  and  the  youth  henceforward  live 
Safe  in  my  Lord's  protection. 

GLYCINE. 

The  saints  bless  you  ! 
Shame  on  my  graceless  heart !  How  dared  I  fear 
Lady  Sarolta  could  be  cruel ' 


SAROLTA. 

Come, 
Be  yourself,  girl ! 

GLYCINE. 

0,  'tis  so  full  here.      [At  her  heart 
And  now  it  cannot  harm  him  if  I  tell  you, 
That  the  old  man's  son — 

SAROLTA. 

Is  not  that  old  man's  son ! 
A  destiny,  not  unlike  thine  own,  is  his. 
For  all  I  know  of  thee  is,  that  thou  art 
A  soldier's  orphan  :  left  when  rage  intestine 
Shook  and  ingulf 'd  the  pillars  of  Illyria. 
This  other  fragment,  thrown  back  by  that  same  earth- 
quake, 
This,  so  mysteriously  inscribed  by  Nature, 
Perchance  may  piece  out  and  interpret  thine. 

Command  thyself!  Be  secret !  His  true  father 

Hear'st  thou  ? 

glycine  (eagerly). 
O  tell— 
bethlen  (who  had  overheard  the  last  few  words,  now 
rushes  out). 
Yes,  tell  me,  Shape  from  Heaven ! 
Who  is  my  father  ? 

sarolta  (gazing  with  surprise). 

Thine?  Thy  father?  Rise!' 

GLYCINE. 

Alas !  He  hath  alarm'd  you,  my  dear  lady  ! 

sarolta. 
His  countenance,  not  his  act ! 

GLYCINE. 

Rise,  Bethlen !  Rise  ! 

bethlen. 
No ;  kneel  thou  too !  and  with  thy  orphan's  tongue 
Plead  for  me !  I  am  rooted  to  the  earth, 
And  have  no  power  to  rise !  Give  me  a  father  ! 
There  is  a  prayer  in  those  uplifted  eyes 
That  seeks  high  Heaven  !  But  I  wili  overtake  it, 
And  bring  it  back,  and  make  it  plead  for  me 
In  thine  own  heart!  Speak!  speak!  Restore  to  me 
A  name  in  the  world  ! 

sarolta, 
By  that  blest  Heaven  I  gazed  at 
I  know  not  who  thou  art.     And  if  I  knew, 
Dared  I — But  rise  ! 

bethlen. 
Blest  spirits  of  my  parents, 
Ye  hover  o'er  me  now  !  Ye  shine  upon  me ! 
And  like  a  flower  that  coils  forth  from  a  ruin, 
I  feel  and  seek  the  light,  I  cannot  see ! 

sarolta. 
Thou  see'st  yon  dim  spot  on  the  mountain's  ridge, 
But  what  it  is  thou  know'st  not      Even  such 
Is  all  I  know  of  thee — haply,  brave  youth, 
Is  all  Fate  makes  it  safe  for  thee  to  know ! 

bethlen. 
Safe  ?  safe  ?  O  let  me  then  inherit  danger, 
And  it  shall  be  rny  birth-right ! 

sarolta  (aside). 

That  look  again  ! — 
The  wood  which  first  incloses,  and  then  skirts 
The  highest  track  that  leads  across  the  mountains- 
Thou  know'st  it,  Bethlen  ? 

bethlen. 

Lady,  'twas  my  wont 
116 


ZAPOLYA. 


107 


To  roam  there  in  my  childhood  oft  alone, 
And  liuitior  to  myself  the  name  of  father. 
For  still  Bathory  (why,  till  now  I  guess'd  not) 
Would  never  hear  it  from  my  lips,  but  sighing 

Gazed  upward.   Yet  of  late  an  idle  terror 

glycine.     * 
Madam,  that  wood  is  haunted  by  the  war-wolves, 

Vampires,  and  monstrous 

sarolta  (with  a  smile). 

Moon-calves,  credulous  girl 
Haply  some  o'ergrown  savage  of  the  forest 
Hath  his  lair  there,  and  fear  hath  framed  the  rest. 

[Then  speaking  again  to  Bethlen. 
After  that  last  great  battle  (O  young  man ! 
Thou  wakest  anew  my  life's  sole  anguish),  that 
Which  fix'd  Lord  Emerick  on  his  throne,  Bathory 
Led  by  a  cry,  far  inward  from  the  track, 
In  the  hollow  of  an  old  oak,  as  in  a  nest, 
Did  find  thee,  Bethlen,  then  a  helpless  babe : 
The  robe,  that  wrapt  thee,  was  a  widow's  mantle. 

BETHLEN. 

An  infant's  weakness  doth  relax  my  frame. 

0  say — I  fear  to  ask 

SAROLTA. 

And  I  to  tell  thee. 

BETHLEN. 

Strike !  O  strike  quickly !  See,  I  do  not  shrink. 

[Striking  his  breast. 

1  am  stone,  cold  stone. 

SAROLTA. 

Hid  in  a  brake  hard  by, 
Scarce  by  both  palms  supported  from  the  earth, 
A  wounded  lady  lay,  whose  life  fast  waning 
Seem'd  to  survive  itself  in  her  fixt  eyes, 
That  strain'd  towards  the  babe.    At  length  one  arm 
Painfully  from  her  own  weight  disengaging, 
She  pointed  first  to  Heaven,  then  from  her  bosom 
Drew  forth  a  golden  casket.    Thus  entreated 
Thy  foster-father  took  thee  in  his  arms, 
And,  kneeling,  spake  :  If  aught  of  this  world's  com- 
fort 
Can  reach  thy  heart,  receive  a  poor  man's  troth, 
That  at  my  life's  risk  I  will  save  thy  child ! 
Her  countenance  work'd,  as  one  that  seem'd  pre- 
paring 
A  loud  voice,  but  it  died  upon  her  lips 
In  a  faint  whisper,  "  Fly !    Save  him !  Hide — hide 
all!" 

BETHLEN. 

And  did  he  leave  her  ?  What !  Had  I  a  mother  ? 
And  left  her  bleeding,  dying  ?  Bought  I  vile  life 
With  the  desertion  of  a  dying  mother  ? 
Oh  agony ! 

GLYCINE. 

Alas!  thou  art  bewilder'd, 
And  dost  forget  thou  wert  a  helpless  infant ! 

BETHLEN. 

What  else  can  I  remember,  but  a  mother 
Mangled  and  left  to  perish  ? 

SAROLTA. 

Hush,  Glycine ! 
It  is  the  ground-swell  of  a  teeming  instinct : 
Let  it  but  lift  itself  to  air  and  sunshine. 
And  it  will  find  a  mirror  in  the  waters, 
It  now  makes  boil  above  it.    Check  him  not ! 

BETHLEN. 

O  that  I  were  diffused  among  the  waters 
That  pierce  into  the  secret  depths  of  earth, 
And  find  their  way  in  darkness  !  Would  that  I 
Could  spread  myself  upon  the  homeless  winds ! 


And  I  would  seek  her!  for  she  is  not  dead ! 
She  can  not  die  !  O  pardon,  gracious  lady , 
You  were  about  to  say,  that  he  return'd — 

SAROLTA. 

Deep  Love,  the  godlike  in  us,  still  believes 
Its  objects  as  immortal  as  itself! 

BETHLEN. 

And  found  her  still — 

SAROLTA. 

Alas !  he  did  return : 
He  left  no  spot  unsearch'd  in  all  the  forest, 
But  she  (I  trust  me  by  some  friendly  hand) 
Had  been  borne  off 

BETHLEN. 

O  whither  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Dearest  Bethlen ! 
I  wrould  that  you  could  weep  like  me  !  O  do  not 
Gaze  so  upon  the  air  ! 

sarolta  (continuing  the  story). 

While  he  was  absent,  I 
A  friendly  troop,  't  is  certain,  scour'd  the  wood. 
Hotly  pursued  indeed  by  Emerick. 

BETHLEN. 

Emerick ! 
Oh  Hell! 

glycine  (to  silence  him). 
Bethlen ! 

bethlen. 
Hist !  I  '11  curse  him  in  a  whisper ! 
This  gracious  lady  must  hear  blessings  only. 
She  hath  not  yet  the  glory  round  her  head, 
Nor  those   strong   eagle  wings,  which  made  swift 

way 
To  that  appointed  place,  which  I  must  seek : 
Or  else  she  were  my  mother ! 

SAROLTA. 

Noble  youth! 
From  me  fear  nothing  !  Long  time  have  I  owed 
Offerings  of  expiation  for  misdeeds 
Long  pass'd  that  weigh  me  down,  though  innocent ! 
Thy  foster-father  hid  the  secret  from  thee, 
For  he  perceived  thy  thoughts  as  they  expanded, 
Proud,  restless,  and  ill-sorting  with  thy  state ! 
Vain  was  his  care !  Thou  'st  made  thyself  suspected 
E  'en  where  Suspicion  reigns,  and  asks  no  proof 
But  its  own  fears !  Great  Nature  hath  endow'd  thee 
With  her  best  gifts  !  From  me  thou  shalt  receive 
All  honorable  aidance  !  But  haste  hence  ! 
Travel  will  ripen  thee,  and  enterprise 
Beseems  thy  years !  Be  thou  henceforth  my  soldier  ! 
And  whatsoe'er  betide  thee,  still  believe 
That  in  each  noble  deed,  achieved  or  suffer'd, 
Thou  solvest  best  the  riddle  of  thy  birth  ! 
And  may  the  light  that  streams  from  thine  own 

honor 
Guide  thee  to  that  thou  seekest ! 

GLYCINE. 

Must  he  leave  us  ? 
bethlen. 
And  for  such  goodness  can  I  return  nothing. 
But  some  hot  tears  that  sting  mine  eyes  ?  Some  sighs 
That  if  not  breathed  would  swell  my  heart  to  sti- 
fling ? 
May  Heaven  and  thine  own  virtues,  high-born  lady 
Be  as  a  shield  of  fire,  far,  far  aloof 
To  scare  all  evil  from  thee !  Yet,  if  fate 
Hath  destined  thee  one  doubtful  hour  of  danger, 
From  the  uttermost  region  of  the  earth,  methinks, 
Swift  as  a  spirit  invoked,  I  should  be  with  thee ! 
117 


108 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


And  then,  perchance,  I  might  have  power  to  unbosom 
These  thanks  that  struggle  here.    Eyes  fair  as  thine 
Have  gazed  on  mc  with  tears  of  love  and  anguish, 
Which  these  eyes  saw  not,  or  beheld  unconscious; 
And  tones  of  anxious  fondness,  passionate  prayers, 
Have   been  talk'd  to  me  !    But  this  tongue  ne'er 

soothed 
A  mother's  ear,  lisping  a  mother's  name  ! 
O,  at  how  dear  a  price  have  I  been  loved, 
And  no  love  could  return  !  One  boon  then,  lady  ! 
Where'er  thou  bidd'st,  I  go  thy  faithful  soldier, 
But  first  must  trace  the  spot,  where  she  lay  bleeding 
Who  gave  me  life.    No  more  shall  beast  of  ravine 
Affront  with  baser  spoil  that  sacred  forest ! 
Or  if  avengers  more  than  human  haunt  there, 
'fake  they  what  shape  they  list,  savage  or  heavenly, 
They  shall  make  answer  to  me,  though  my  heart's 

blood 
Should  be  the  spell  to  bind  them.    Blood  calls  for 

blood ! 

[Exit  Bethlkn. 

SAROLTA. 

Ah  !  it  was  this  I  fear'd.    To  ward  off  this 
Did  I  withhold  from  him  that  old  Bathory 
Returning,  hid  beneath  the  self-same  oak, 
Where  the  babe  lay,  the  mantle,  and  some  jewel 
Bound  on  his  infant  arm. 

GLYCINE. 

Oh,  let  me  fly 
And  stop  him  !  Mangled  limbs  do  there  lie  scatter'd 
Till  the  lured  eagle  bears  them  to  her  nest. 
And  voices  have  been  heard !  And  there  the  plant 

grows 
That  being  eaten  gives  the  inhuman  wizard 
Power  to  put  on  the  fell  hyena's  shape. 

SAROLTA. 

AVhat  idle  tongue  hath  witclfd  thee,  Glycine  ? 
I  hoped  that  thou  hadst  learnt  a  nobler  faith. 

GLYCINE. 

O  chide  me  not,  dear  lady  !  question  Laska, 
Or  the  old  man. 

SAROLTA. 

Forgive  me,  I  spake  harshly. 
It  is  indeed  a  mighty  sorcery 
That  doth  enthral  thy  young  heart,  my  poor  girl : 
And  what  hath  Laska  told  thee  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Three  days  past 
A  courier  from  the  king  did  cross  that  wood  ; 
A  wilful  man,  that  arm'd  himself  on  purpose : 
And  never  hath  been  heard  of  from  that  time ! 

[Sound  of  horns  without. 

SAROLTA. 

Hark  !  dost  thou  hear  it  ? 

GLYCINE. 

'T  is  the  sound  of  horns ! 
Our  huntsmen  are  not  out ! 

SAROLTA. 

Lord  Casimir 
Would  not  come  thus !  [Horns  again. 

GLYCINE. 

Still  louder 

SAROLTA. 

Haste  we  hence ! 
For  I  believe  in  part  thy  tale  of  terror ! 
But,  trust  me,  't  is  the  inner  man  transform'd  : 
Beasts  in  the  shape  of  men  are  worse  than  war- 
wolves. 


[Sarolta  and  Glycine  exeunt.  Trumpets  etc.  louder 
Enter  Emerick,  Lord  Rudolph,  Laska,  and 
Huntsmen  and  Attendants. 

RUDOLPH. 

A  gallant  chase,  Sire. 

EMERICK. 

Ay,  but  this  new  quarry 
That  we  last  started  seems  worth  all  the  rest. 

[Then  to  Laska 
And  you — excuse  me — what 's  your  name  ? 

LASKA. 

Whatever 
Your  Majesty  may  please. 

EMERICK. 

Nay,  that 's  too  late,  man. 
Say,  what  thy  mother  and  thy  godfather 
Were  pleased  to  call  thee  ? 

LASKA. 

Laska,  my  liege  Sovereign. 

EMERICK. 

Well,  my  liege  subject  Laska !    And  you  are 
Lord  Casimir's  steward  ? 

LASKA. 

And  your  majesty's  creature 

EMERICK. 

Two  gentle  dames  made  off  at  our  approach. 
Which  was  your  lady  ? 

LASKA. 

My  liege  lord,  the  taller. 
The  other,  please  your  grace,  is  her  poor  handmaid, 
Long  since  betrothed  to  me.    But  the  maid 's  fro- 

ward — 
Yet  would  your  grace  but  speak — 

EMERICK. 

Hum,  master  stewnrd 
I  am  honor'd  with  this  sudden  confidence. 
Lead  on.  [To  Laska,  then  to  Rudolph 

Lord  Rudolph,  you  '11  announce  our  coming 
Greet  fair  Sarolta  from  me,  and  entreat  her 
To  be  our  gentle  hostess.    Mark,  you  add 
How  much  we  grieve,  that  business  of  the  state 
Hath  forced  us  to  delay  her  lord's  return. 

lord  rudolph  (aside). 
Lewd,  ingrate  tyrant!  Yes,  I  will  announce  thee. 


Now  onward  all. 


[Exeunt  ultzndanis 


emerick  (solus). 
A  fair  one,  by  my  faith ! 
If  her  face  rival  but  her  gait  and  stature, 
My  good  friend  Casimir  had  his  reasons  too. 
"  Her  tender  health,  her  vow  of  strict  retirement, 
Made  early  in  the  convent — His  word  pledged — " 
All  fictions,  all  !  fictions  of  jealousy. 
Well !  if  the  mountain  move  not  to  the  prophet, 
The  prophet  must  to  the  mountain !  In  this  Laska 
There  's  somewhat  of  the  knave  mix'd  up  wiih  dolt 
Through  the  transparence  of  the  fool,  methought, 
I  saw  (as  I  could  lay  my  finger  on  it) 
The  crocodile's  eye,  that  peer'd  up  from  the  bottom 
This  knave  may  do  us  service.    Hot  ambition 
Won  me  the  husband.    Now  let  vanity 
And  the  resentment  for  a  forced  seclusion 
Decoy  the  wife !  Let  him  be  deem'd  the  aggressor 
Whose  cunning  and  distrust  began  the  game ! 

[Exit, 
118 


ZAPOLYA. 


100 


ACT  II. 
SCENE  I. 
A  savage  wood.     At  one  side  a  cavern,  overhung  with 
ivy.     Zapolya  and   Raab   Kiuprih   discovered: 
both,  but  especially  the  latter,  in  rude  and  savage 
garmi  rifs. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Heard  you  then  aught  while  I  was  slumbering  ? 

ZAPOLYA. 

Nothing, 
Only  your  face  became  convulsed.     We  miserable ! 
Is  Heaven's  last* mercy  lied  ?  Is  sleep  grown  treach- 
erous ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

0  for  a  sleep,  for  sleep  itself  to  rest  in ! 

1  dreamt  I  had  met  with  food  beneath  a  tree, 
And  I  was  seeking  you,  when  all  at  once 
My  feet  became  entangled  in  a  net : 

Still  more  entangled  as  in  rage  I  tore  it. 

At  length  I  freed  myself,  had  sight  of  you, 

But  as  I  hasten'd  eagerly,  again 

I  found  my  frame  encumber'd  :  a  huge  serpent 

Twined  round  my  chest,  but  tightest  round  my  throat. 

ZAPOLYA. 

Alas  !  'twas  lack  of  food  .  for  hunger  chokes! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

And  now  I  saw  you  by  a  shrivell'd  child 
Strangely  pursued.     You  did  not  fly,  yet  neither 
Touch'd  you  the  ground  methought,  but  close  above  it 
Did  seem  to  .shoot  yourself  along  the  air, 
And  as  you  pass'd  mc,  turn'd  your  face  and  shriek'd. 

ZAPOLYA. 

I  did  in  truth  send  forth  a  feeble  shriek, 
Scarce  knowing  why.  Perhaps  the  mock'd  sense  craved 
To  hair  the  scream,  which  you  but  seem'd  to  utter. 
For  your  whole  face  look'd  like  a  mask  of  torture ! 
Yet  a  child's  image  doth  indeed  pursue  me 
Shrivell'd  with  toil  and  penury ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Nay !  what  ails  you  ? 

ZAPOLYA. 

A  wondrous  faintness  there  comes  stealing  o'er  me. 
Is  it  Death's  taagthening  shadow,  who  comes  onward, 
life's  settin^Rn  behind  him  ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Cheerly !  The  dusk 
Will  quickly  shroud  us.     Ere  the  moon  be  up, 
Trust  me  I  '11  bring  thee  food ! 

ZAPOLYA. 

Hunger's  tooth  has 
Gnawn  itself  blunt.     O,  I  could  queen  it  w'ell 
O'er  my  own  sorrows  as  my  rightful  subjects. 
But  wherefore,  O  revered  Kiuprili !  wherefore 
Did  my  importunate  prayers,  my  hopes  and  fancies, 
Force  thee  from  thy  secure  though  sad  retreat  ? 
Would  that  my  tongue  had  then  cloven  to  my  mouth  ! 
But  Heaven  is  just !  With  tears  I  conquer'd  thee, 
And  not  a  tear  is  left  me  to  repent  with ! 
lladst  thou  not  done  already — hadst  thou  not 
Sufler'd — oh,  more  than  e'er  man  feign'd  of  friend- 
ship ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Yet  be  thou  comforted  !  What !  hadst  thou  faith 
When  I  turn'd  back  incredulous?  "Fwas  thy  light 
That  kindled  mine.     And  shall  it  now  go  out, 
And  leave  thy  soul  in  darkness  ?  Yet  look  up, 
L2 


And  think  thou  see'st  thy  sainicd  lord  commission'd 

And  on  his  way  to  aid  us!  Whence  those  late  dreams. 

Which  ;itter  Mich  long  interval  of  hopeless 

And  silent  resignation,  all  at  once 

Night  after  night  commanded  thy  return 

Hither  ?  and  still  presented  in  clear  vision 

This  wood  as  in  a  scene  ?  this  very  cavern  ? 

Thou  darest  not  doubt  that  Heaven's  especial  hand 

Work'd  in  those  signs.   The  hour  of  thy  deliverance 

Is  on  the  stroke  : — for  Misery  cannot  add 

Grief  to  thy  griefs,  or  Patience  to  thy  sufferance ! 

ZAPOLYA. 

Cannot !  Oh,  what  if  thou  wert  taken  from  me  ? 
Nay,  thou  saidst  well :  for  that  and  death  were  one 
Life's  grief  is  at  its  height  indeed ;  the  hard 
Necessity  of  this  inhuman  state 
Has  made  our  deeds  inhuman  as  our  vestments. 
Housed  in  this  wild  wood,  with  wild  usages, 
Danger  our  guest,  and  famine  at  our  portal — 
Wolf-like  to  prowl  in  the  shepherd's  fold  by  night ! 
At  once  for  food  and  safety  to  affrighten 
The  traveller  from  his  road — 

[Glycine  is  heard  singing  without 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Hark !  heard  you  not 
A  distant  chant ! 


SONG,  by  Glycine. 

A  sunny  shaft  did  I  behold, 

From  sky  to  earth  it  slanted  ; 
And  poised  therein  a  bird  so  bold — 

Sweet  bird,  thou  wert  enchanted ! 

He  sunk,  he  rose,  he  twinkled,  he  troll'd 
Within  that  shaft  of  sunny  mist  ; 

His  eyes  of  fire,  his  beak  of  gold, 
All  else  of  amethyst ! 

And  thus  he  sang  :  "  Adieu !  adieu ! 
Love's  dreams  prove  seldom  true. 
The  blossoms,  they  make  no  delay : 
The  sparkling  dew-drops  will  not  stay. 
Sweet  month  of  May, 
We  must  away ; 
Far,  far  away  ! 
To-day!  to-day!" 

ZAPOLYA. 

Sure  'tis  some  blest  spirit! 
For  since  thou  slewcst  the  usurper's  emissary 
That  plunged  upon  us,  a  more  than  mortal  fear 
Is  as  a  wall,  that  wards  off"  the  beleaguerer 
And  starves  the  poor  besieged.  [Song  again. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

It  is  a  maiden's  voice  !  quick  to  the  cave  ! 

ZAPOLYA. 

Hark  !  her  voice  falters !  [Exit  Zapolya. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

She  must  not  enter 
The  cavern,  else  I  will  remain  unseen ! 

[Kiuprili  retires  to  one  side  of  the  stage :  Glycine 
enters  singing. 

glycine  {fearfully). 
A  savage  place  !  saints  shield  me!  Bethlen  !  Bethlen! 
Not  here  ? — There 's  no  one  here  !  I  '11  sing  again. 

[Sing*  again. 
119 


no 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


If  I  do  not  hear  my  own  voice,  I  shall  fancy 
Voices  in  all  chance  sounds !  [Starts. 

'Tvvas  some  dry  branch 
Oropt  of  itself!  Oh,  he  went  forth  so  rashly, 
Took  no  food  with  him — only  his  arms  and  boar-spear! 
What  if  I  leave  these  cakes,  this  cruse  of  wine, 
Here  by  this  cave,  and  seek  him  with  the  rest  ? 

raab  kiuprili  (unseen). 
Leave  them  and  flee ! 

glycine  (shrieks,  then  recovering). 
Where  are  you  ? 
RAAB  kiuprili  (still  unseen). 

Leave  them ! 

GLYCINE. 

'T is  Glycine! 
Speak  to  me,  Bethlen  !  speak  in  your  own  voice ! 
All  silent ! — If  this  were  the  war-wolf's  den ! 
Twas  not  his  voice  !  — 

[Glycine  leaves  the  provisions,  and  exit  fearfully. 
Kiuprili  comes  forward,  seizes  them  and  carries 
them  into  the  cavern.  Glycine  returns,  having 
recovered  herself. 

GLYCINE. 

Shame !  Nothing  hurt  me  ! 
If  some  fierce  beast  have  gored  him,  he  must  needs 
Speak  with  a  strange  voice.     Wounds  cause  thirst 
and  hoarseness ! 

Speak, Bethlen!  or  but  moan.  St — St No — Bethlen! 

If  I  turn  back,  and  he  should  be  found  dead  here, 

[She  creeps  nearer  and  nearer  to  the  cavern. 
I  should  go  mad ! — Again !  'T  was  my  own  heart ! 
Hush,  coward  heart !  better  beat  loud  with  fear, 
Than  break  with  shame  and  anguish  ! 

[As  she  approaches  to  enter  the  cavern,  Kiuprili 
stops  her.     Glycine  shrieks. 

Saints  protect  me ! 
raab  kiuprili. 
Swear  then  by  all  thy  hopes,  by  all  thy  fears — 

glycine. 
Save  me ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Swear  secrecy  and  silence ! 
glycine. 

I  swear ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Tell  what  thou  art,  and  what  thou  seekest  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Only 
A  harmless  orphan  youth,  to  bring  him  food — 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Wherefore  in  this  wood  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Alas !  it  was  his  purpose — 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

With  what  intention  came  he  ?  Wouldst  thou  save  him, 
Hide  nothing ! 

GLYCINE. 

Save  him !  O  forgive  his  rashness ! 
He  is  good,  and  did  not  know  that  thou  wert  human 

RAAB  kiuprili  {repeals  the  word). 
Human  ? 

[Then  sternly. 
With  what  design  ? 

GLYCINE. 

To  kill  thee,  or 
If  that  thou  wert  a  spirit,  to  compel  thee 


By  prayers,  and  with  the  shedding  of  his  blood, 
To  make  disclosure  of  his  parentage. 
But  most  of  all — 

zapolya  (rushing  out  from  the  cavern). 

Heaven's  blessing  on  thee !  Speak  , 

GLYCINE. 

Whether  his  Mother  live,  or  perish'd  here ! 

ZAPOLYA. 

Angel  of  Mercy,  I  was  perishing 
And  thou  didst  bring  me  food  :  and  now  thou  bring'st 
The  sweet,  sweet  food  of  hope  and  consolation 
To   a   mother's  famish'd  heart!    His   name,  'sweet 
maiden! 

GLYCINE. 

E'en  till  this  morning  we  were  wont  to  name  him 
Bethlen  Bathory ! 

ZAPOLYA. 

Even  till  this  morning  ? 
This  morning  ?  when  my  weak  faith  fail'd  me  wholly ! 
Pardon,  O  thou  that  portion'st  out  our  sufferance, 
And  fill'st  again  the  widow's  empty  cruse ! 
Say  on ! 

GLYCINE. 

The  false  ones  charged  the  valiant  youth 
With  treasonous  words  of  Emerick — 

ZAPOLYA. 

Ha !  my  son ! 

GLYCINE. 

And  of  Lord  Casimir — 

raab  kiuprili  (aside), 
0  agony !  my  son ! 

GLYCINE. 

But  my  dear  lady — 

ZAPOLYA  and  RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Who? 

GLYCINE. 

Lady  Sarolta 
Frown'd  and  discharged  these  bad  men. 

raab  kiuprili  (turning  off  and  to  himself). 

Righteous  Heaven 
Sent  me  a  daughter  once,  and  I  repined 
That  it  was  not  a  son.     A  son  was  given  me. 
My  daughter  died,  and  I  scarce  shed  a  tear  : 
And  lo!  that  son  became  my  curse  ajwl  infamy. 

zapolya  (embraces  GlycSq. 
Sweet  innocent!  and  you  came  here  to  seek  him. 
And  bring  him  food.     Alas  !  thou  fear'st  ? 

GLYCINE. 

Not  much  ! 
My  own  dear  lady,  when  I  was  a  child 
Embraced  me  oft,  but  her  heart  never  beat  so. 
For  I  too  am  an  orphan,  motherless ! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI  (to  ZAPOLYA). 

O  yet  beware,  lest  hope's  brief  flash  but  deepen 
The  after  gloom,  and  make  the  darkness  stormy  ! 
In  that  last  conflict,  following  our  escape, 
The  usurper's  cruelty  had  clogg'd  our  flight 
With  many  a  babe,  and  many  a  childing  mother. 
This  maid  herself  is  one  of  numberless 
Planks  from  the  same  vast  wreck. 

[Then  to  Glycine  ogam. 
Well !  Casimir's  wife-  - 

GLYCINE. 

She  is  always  gracious,  and  so  praised  the  old  man 
That  his  heart  g'erflow'd,  and  made  discovery 
That  in  this  wood — 

120 


ZAPOLYA. 


Ill 


ZAPOLYA  (in  agitation). 
O  speak ! 

GLYCINE. 

A  wounded  lady — 
[Z  apoly  A  faints — they  both  support  her. 

GLYCINE. 

Is  this  his  mother  ? 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

She  would  fain  believe  it, 
Weak  though  the  proofs  be.     Hope  draws  towards 

itself 
The  flame  with  which  it  kindles. 

[Horn  heard  without. 
To  the  cavern ! 
Quick!  quick! 

GLYCINE. 

Perchance  some  huntsmen  of  the  king's. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Emerick  ? 

GLYCINE. 

He  came  this  morning — 
[They  retire  to  the  cavern,  bearing  Zapolya.    Tlien 
enter  Bethlen  armed  with  a  boar-spear. 

BETHLEN. 

I  had  a  glimpse 
Of  some  fierce  shape ;  and  but  that  Fancy  often 
Is  Nature's  intermeddler,  and  cries  halves 
With  the  outward  sight,  I  should  believe  I  saw  it 
Bear  off  some  human  prey.     O  my  preserver ! 
Bathory  !  Father !  Yes,  thou  deservest  that  name  ! 
Thou  didst  not  mock  me !  These  are  blessed  findings ! 
The  secret  cipher  of  my  destiny 

[Looking  at  his  signet. 
Stands  here  inscribed  :  it  is  the  seal  of  fate ! 
Ha  ! — {Observing  the  cave).    Had  ever  monster  fitting 

lair,  'tis  yonder! 
Thou  yawning  Den,  I  well  remember  thee ! 
Mine  eyes  deceived  me  not.    Heaven  leads  me  on ! 
Now  for  a  blast,  loud  as  a  king's  defiance, 
To  rouse  the  monster  couchant  o'er  his  ravine ! 

[Blows  the  horn — then  a  pause. 
Another  blast !  and  with  another  swell 
To  you,  ye  charmed  watchers  of  this  wood  ! 
If  haply  I  have  come,  the  rightful  heir 
Of  vengeance  :  if  in  me  survive  the  spirits 
Of  those,  whose  guiltless  blood  flowed  streaming  here! 
[Blows  again  louder. 
Still  silent  ?  Is  the  monster  gorged  ?  Heaven  shield  me ! 
Thou,  faithful  spear!  be  both  my  torch  and  guide. 
[As  Bethlen  is  about  to  enter,  Kiuprili  speaks 

from  the  cavern  unseen. 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Withdraw  thy  foot!  Retract  thine  idle  spear, 
And  wait  obedient ! 

bethlen  (mi  amazement). 

Ha !  What  art  thou  ?  speak ! 
raab  kiuprili  (still  unseen). 
Avengers! 

bethlen. 
By  a  dying  mother's  pangs, 
E'en  such  am  I.     Receive  me  ! 

raab  kiuprili  (still  unseen). 

Wait !  Beware ! 
At  thy  first  step,  thou  treadest  upon  the  light 
Thenceforth  must  darkling  flow,  and  sink  in  darkness! 

bethlen. 
Ha !  see  my  boar-spear  trembles  like  a  reed  !— 


Oh,  fool !  mine  eyes  are  duped  by  my  own  shudder- 
ing.— 

Those  piled  thoughts,  built  up  in  solitude. 
Year  following  year,  that  press'd  upon  my  heart 
As  on  the  altar  of  some  unknown  God, 
Then,  as  if  touch'd  by  fire  from  heaven  descending, 
Blazed  up  within  me  at  a  father's  name — 
Do  they  desert  me  now ! — at  my  last  trial  ? 
Voice  of  command !  and  thou,  O  hidden  Light ! 
I  have  obey'd !  Declare  ye  by  what  name 
I  dare  invoke  you !  Tell  what  sacrifice 
Will  make  you  gracious. 

raab  kiuprili  (still  unseen). 

Patience  !  Truth !  Obedience 
Be  thy  whole  soul  transparent !  so  the  Light 
Thou  seekest  may  enshrine  itself  within  thee ! 
Thy  name  ? 

BETHLEN. 

Ask  rather  the  poor  roaming  savage, 
Whose  infancy  no  holy  rite  had  blest. 
To  him,  perchance  rude  spoil  or  ghastly  trophy, 
In  chase  or  battle  won,  have  given  a  name. 
I  have  none — but  like  a  dog  have  answer'd 
To  the  chance  sound  which  he  that  ted  me  call'd  me 

raab  kiuprili  (still  unseen). 
Thy  birth-place  ? 

BETHLEN. 

Deluding  spirits,  do  ye  mock  me  ? 
Question  the  Night!  Bid  Darkness  tell  its  birth-place? 
Yet  hear !  Within  yon  old  oak's  hollow  trunk, 
Where  the  bats  cling,  have  I  survey 'd  my  cradle! 
The  mother-falcon  hath  her  nest  above  it, 

And  in  it  the  wolf  litters ! 1  invoke  you, 

Tell  me,  ye  secret  ones !  if  ye  beheld  me 
As  I  stood  there,  like  one  who  having  delved 
For  hidden  gold  hath  found  a  talisman, 
O  tell !  what  rites,  what  offices  of  duty 
This  cygnet  doth  command  ?  What  rebel  spirits 
Ow-e  homage  to  its  Lord  ? 

raab  kiuprili  (still  unseen). 

More,  guiliier,  mightier, 
Than  thou  mayest  summon!  Wait  the  destined  hour! 

BETHLEN. 

0  yet  again,  and  with  more  clamorous  prayer, 

1  importune  ye  !  Mock  me  no  more  with  shadows ! 
This  sable  mantle — tell,  dread  voice !  did  this 
Enwrap  one  fatherless  ? 

zapolya  (unseen). 

One  fatherless ! 

BETHLEN  (starting). 
A  sweeter  voice ! — A  voice  of  love  and  pity ! 
Was  it  the  soften'd  echo  of  mine  own  ? 
Sad  echo !  but  the  hope  it  kill'd  was  sickly, 
And  ere  it  died  it  had  been  mourn'd  as  dead ! 
One  other  hope  yet  lives  within  my  soul ; 
Quick  let  me  ask ! — while  yet  this  siifling  fear, 
This  stop  of  the  heart,  leaves  utterance  ! — Are — are 

these 
The  sole  remains  of  her  that  gave  me  life  ? 
Have  I  a  mother? 

[Zapolya  rushes  out  to  embrace  him.  Bethlen  starts 
Ha! 
zapolya  (embracing  him). 

My  son  !  my  son ! 
A  wretched — Oh  no,  no!  a  blest — a  happy  mother. 
[They  embrace.  Kiuprili  and  Glycine  come  forward 
and  the  curtain  drops. 

121 


112 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


ACT  III. 

SCENE  I. 

A  stately  Room  in  Lord  Casimir's  Castle. 

Enter  Emerick  and  Laska. 

EMERICK. 

I  do  perceive  thou  hast  a  tender  conscience, 
Laska,  in  all  things  that  concern  thine  own 
Interest  or  safety. 

LASKA. 

In  this  sovereign  presence 
I  can  fear  nothing,  but  your  dread  displeasure. 

emerick. 
Perchance,  thou  think'st  it  strange,  that  I  of  all  men 
Should  covet  thus  the  love  of  fair  Soralta, 
Dishonoring  Casimir  ? 

LASKA. 

Far  be  it  from  me ! 
Your  Majesty's  love  and  choice  bring  honor  with  them. 

emerick. 
Perchance,  thou  hast  heard,  that  Casimir  is  my  friend, 
Fought  for  me,  yea,  for  my  sake,  set  at  nought 
A  parent's  blessing ;  braved  a  father's  curse  ? 

laska  (aside). 
Would  I  but  knew  now,  what  his  Majesty  meant ! 
Oh  yes,  Sire !  'tis  our  common  talk,  how  Lord 
Kiuprili,  my  Lord's  father — 

EMERICK. 

'Tis  your  talk, 
Is  it,  good  statesman  Laska  ? 
laska. 

No,  not  mine. 
Not  mine,  an  please  your  Majesty !  There  are 
Some  insolent  malcontents  indeed  that  talk  thus — 
Nay  worse,  mere  treason.     As  Bathory's  son, 
The  fool  that  ran  into  the  monster's  jaws. 

EMERICK. 

Well,  'tis  a  loyal  monster  if  he  rids  us 

Of  traitors !  But  art  sure  the  youth 's  devoured  ? 

LASKA. 

Not  a  limb  left,  an  please  your  Majesty ! 
And  that  unhappy  girl — 

EMERICK. 

Thou  followed'st  her 
Into  the  wood  ?  [Laska  bows  assent. 

Henceforth  then  I  '11  believe 
That  jealousy  can  make  a  hare  a  lion. 

LASKA. 

Scarce  had  I  got  the  first  glimpse  of  her  veil, 
When,  with  a  horrid  roar  that  made  the  leaves 
Of  the  wood  shake — 

EMERICK. 

Made  thee  shake  like  a  leaf! 

LASKA. 

The  war- wolf  leapt;  at  the  first  plunge  he  seized  her; 
Forward  I  rush'd ! 

EMERICK. 

Most  marvellous ! 

LASKA. 

Hurl'd  my  javelin ; 
Which  from  his  dragon-scales  recoiling — 

EMERICK. 

Enough ! 
And   take,    friend,   this   advice.     When   next    thou 
tonguest  it, 


Hold  constant  to  thy  exploit  with  this  monster, 
And  leave  untouch'd  your  common  talk  aforesaid, 
What  your  Lord  did,  or  should  have  done. 

LASKA. 

My  talk 
The  saints  forbid !  I  always  said,  for  my  part, 
"  Was  not  the  king  Lord  Casimir's  dearest  friend  ? 
Was  not  that  friend  a  king  ?   Whale'er  he  did 
'Twas  all  from  pure  love  to  his  Majesty." 

EMERICK. 

And  this  then  was  thy  talk?  While  knave  and  coward, 

Both  strong  within  thee,  wrestle  for  the  uppermost, 

In  slips  the  fool  and  takes  the  place  of  both. 

Babbler !  Lord  Casimir  did,  as  thou  and  all  men. 

He  loved  himself,  loved  honors,  wealth,  dominion. 

All  these  were  set  upon  a  father's  head : 

Good  truth  !  a  most  unlucky  accident ! 

For  he  but  wish'd  to  hit  the  prize  ;  not  graze 

The  head  that  bore  it :  so  with  steady  eye 

Off  flew  the  parricidal  arrow. — Even 

As  Casimir  loved  Emerick,  Emerick 

Loves  Casimir,  intends  him  no  dishonor. 

He  wink'd  not  then,  for  love  of  me  forsooth ! 

For  love  of  me  now  let  him  wink !  Or  if 

The  dame  prove  half  as  wise  as  she  is  fair, 

He  may  still  pass  his  hand,  and  find  all  smooth. 

[Passing  his  hand  across  his  brow. 

LASKA. 

Your  Majesty's  reasoning  has  convinced  me. 

emerick   (.with  a   slight  start,  as  one  who  had  been 
talking  aloud  to  himself:  then  with  scorn). 

Thee! 
'Tis  well !  and  more  than  meant.  For  by  my  faith 
I  had  half  forgotten  thee, — Thou  hast  the  key  1 

[Laska  bows. 
And  in  your  lady's  chamber  there 's  full  space  ? 

LASKA. 

Between  the  wall  and  arras  to  conceal  you. 

emerick. 
Here !  This  purse  is  but  an  earnest  of  thy  fortune, 
If  thou  provest  faithful.     But  if  thou  betrayest  me, 
Hark  you ! — the  wolf  that  shall  drag  thee  to  his  den 
Shall  be  no  fiction. 

[Exit  Emerick.    Laska  manet  with  a  key  in  one 
hand,  and  a  purse  in  the  other. 

laska. 
Well  then !  Here  I  stand, 
Like  Hercules,  on  either  side  a  goddess. 
Call  this  [Looking  at  the  purse 

Preferment ;  this  (Holding  up  the  key),  Fidelity  ! 
And  first  my  golden  goddess  :  what  bids  she  ? 
Only  : — "  This  way,  your  Majesty  .'  hush.     The  house 

hold 
Are  all  safe  lodged." — Then,  put  Fidelity 
Within  her  proper  wards,  just  turn  her  round — 
So — the  door  opens — and  for  all  the  rest, 
'Tis  the  king's  deed,  not  Laska's.     Do  but  this, 
And — "I'm  the  mere  earnest  of  your  future  fortunes." 
But  what  says  the  other  ? — Whisper  on  !  I  hear  you ! 
[Putting  the  key  to  his  ear. 
All  very  true ! — but,  good  Fidelity ! 
If  I  refuse  king  Emerick,  will  you  promise, 
And  swear,  now,  to  unlock  the  dungeon-door, 
And  save  me  from  the  hangman?  Ay!  you're  silent' 
What !  not  a  word  in  answer  ?  A  clear  nonsuit ! 
Now  for  one  look  to  see  that  all  are  lodged 

122 


ZAPOLYA. 


113 


At  the  due  distance — then — yonder  lies  the  road 
For  Laska  and  his  royal  friend  king  Emerick! 

[Exit  Laska.    Then  enter  Batiioky  and  Bethlex. 

BETHLEN. 

He  look'd  as  if  he  were  some  God  disguised 
In  nn  old  warrior's  venerable  shape. 
To  guard  and  guide  my  mother.     Is  there  not 
Chapel  or  oratory  in  this  mansion  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Even  so. 

BETHLEX. 

From  that  place  then  am  I  to  take 
A  helm  and  breasl plate,  both  inlaid  with  gold, 
And  the  good  sword  that  once  was  Raab  Kiuprili's. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Those  very  arms  this  day  Sarolta  shovv'd  me — 
With  wistful  look.     I'm  lost  in  wild  conjectures! 

BETHLEN. 

0  tempt  me  not,  e'en  with  a  wandering  guess, 
To  break  the  first  command  a  mother's  will 
Imposed,  a  mother's  voice  made  known  to  me ! 
"Ask  not,  my  son,"  said  she,  "  our  names  or  thine. 
The  shadow  of  the  eelipse  is  passing  off 

The  full  orb  of  thy  destiny  !  Already 
The  victor  Crescent  glitters  forth,  and  sheds 
O'er  the  yet  lingering  haze  a. phantom  light. 
Thou  canst  not  hasten  it!  Leave  then  to  Heaven 
The  WOM  of  Hue,  n  ;  and  with  a  silent  spirit 
SympaUtae  with  the  powers  that  work  in  siltnce!" 
Thus  spake  she,  and  she  look'd  as  she  were  then 
Fresh  lrom  some  heavenly  vision ! 

[Re-enter  Laska,  not  perceiving  them. 
laska. 

All  asleep ! 
[TJien  observing  Bethlex,  stands  in  idiot-affright. 

1  must  speak  to  it  first — Put — put  the  question  ! 

I'll  confess  all !  [Stammeritig  with  fear. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Laska  !  what  ails  thee,  man  ? 


There! 


laska  {pointing  to  Bethlen). 

OLD  BATHORY. 

I  see  notlring !  where  ? 


LASKA. 

He  does  not  see  it ! 
Bethlen,  torment  me  not ! 

BETHLEX. 

Soft !  Rouse  him  gently ! 
He  hath  outwatch'd  his  hour,  and  half  asleep, 
With  eyes  half  open,  mingles  sight  with  dreams. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Ho!  Laska!  Don't  you  know  us!  'tis  Bathory 
And  Bethlen! 

laska  {recovering  himself  1. 

Good  now !  Ha !  ha !  an  excellent  trick. 
Afraid!  Nay,  no  offence;  but  I  must  laugh. 
But  are  you  sure  now,  that  'tis  you,  yourself 

BETHLEN  {holding  up  his  hand  as  if  to  strike  him). 
Wouldst  be  convinced  ? 

laska. 

No  nearer,  pray!  consider! 
If  it  should  prove  his  ghost,  the  touch  would  freeze  me 
To  a  tomb-stone.    No  nearer ! 


BETHLEX. 


The  fool  is  drunk ! 


laska  {stiU  more  recovering). 
Well  now!  I  love  a  brave  man  to  my  heart 
I  myself  braved  the  monster,  and  would  fain 
Have  saved  the  false  one  from  the  fate  she  tempted 

OLD  BATHORY. 

You,  Laska? 

bethlex  {to  Bathory). 
Mark !  Heaven  grant  it  may  be  so ! 
Glycine  ? 

laska. 
She !  I  traced  her  by  the  voice. 
You'll  scarce  believe  me,  when  I  say  I  heard 
The  close  of  a  song :  the  poor  wretch  had  been 

singing ; 
As  if  she  wish'd  to  compliment  the  war-wolf 
At  once  with  music  and  a  meal ! 

BETHLEN  {tO  BATHORY). 

Mark  that ! 
laska. 
At  the  next  moment  I  beheld  her  running, 
Wringing  her  hands  with,  Bethlen  !  0  poor  Bethlen  ! 
I  almost  fear,  the  sudden  noise  I  made, 
Rushing  impetuous  through  the  brake,  alarm'd  her. 
She  stopt,  then  mad  with  fear,  turn'd  round  and  ran 
Into  the  monster's  gripe.     One  piteous  scream 
I  heard.     There  was  no  second — I — 

BETHLEX._ 

Stop  there ! 
We  '11  spare  your  modesty  !  Who  dares  not  honor 
Laska's  brave  tongue,  and  high  heroic  fancy  i 

laska. 
You  too,  Sir  Knight,  have  come  back  safe  and  sound ! 
You  play'd  the  hero  at  a  cautious  distance  ! 
Or  was  it  that  you  sent  the  poor  girl  forward 
To  stay  the  monster's  stomach  ?  Dainties  quickly 
Pall  on  the  taste  and  cloy  the  appetite ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Laska,  beware !  Forget  not  what  thou  art ! 
Shouldst  thou  but  dream  thou  'rt  valiant,  cross  thyself! 
And  ache  all  over  at  the  dangerous  fancy! 

laska. 
What  then  !  you  swell  upon  my  lady's  favor. 
High  lords,  and  perilous  of  one  day's  growth ! 
But  other  judges  now  sit  on  the  lunch  ! 
And  haply,  Laska  hath  found  audience  there, 
Where  to  defend  the  treason  of  a  son 
Might  end  in  lifting  up  both  Son  and  Father 
Still  higher;  to  a  height  from  which  indeed 
You  both  may  drop,  but,  spite  of  fate  and  fortune, 
Will  be  secured  from  falling  to  the  ground. 
'Tis  possible  too,  young  man!  that  royal  Emerick, 
At  Laska's  rightful  suit,  may  make  inquiry 
By  whom  seduced,  the  maid  so  strangely  missing — 

BETHLEN. 

Soft !  my  good  Laska !  might  it  not  suffice, 
If  to  yourself,  being  Lord  Casimir's  steward, 
I  should  make  record  of  Glycine's  fate  ? 

laska. 
'T  is  well !  it  shall  content  me  !  though  your  fear 
Has  all  the  credit  of  these  lower'd  tones. 

[Then  very  pompously 
First,  we  demand  the  manner  of  her  death  ? 

BETHLEN. 

Nay !  that's  superfluous !  Have  you  not  just  told  us 
That  you  yourself,  led  by  impetuous  valor, 
Witness'd  the  whole  ?  My  tale 's  of  later  date. 
123 


114 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


After  the  fate,  from  which  your  valor  strove 
In  vain  to  rescue  the  rash  maid,  I  saw  her! 

LASKA. 

Glycine  ? 

BETHLEN. 

Nay !  Dare  I  accuse  wise  Laska, 
Whose  words  find  access  to  a  monarch's  ear, 
Of  a  base,  braggart  lie  ?  It  must  have  been 
Her  spirit  that  appear'd  to  me.     But  haply 
I  come  too  late  ?  It  has  itself  deliver'd 
Its  own  commission  to  you? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

'T  is  most  likely ! 
And  the  ghost  doubtless  vanish'd,  when  we  enter'd 
And  found  brave  Laska  staring  wide — at  nothing ! 

LASKA. 

Tis  well!  You've  ready  wits!  I  shall  report  them, 
With  all  due  honor,  to  his  Majesty ! 
Treasure  them  up,  I  pray  !  a  certain  person, 
Whom  the  king  flatters  with  his  confidence, 
Tells  you,  his  royal  friend  asks  startling  questions ! 
'Tis  but  a  hint!  And  now  what  says  the  ghost? 

BETHLEN. 

Listen !  for  thus  it  spake  :  "Say  thou  to  Laska, 
Glycine,  knowing  all  thy  thoughts  engross'd 
In  thy  new  office  of  king's  fool  and  knave, 
Foreseeing  thou'lt  forget  with  thine  own  hand 
To  make  due  penance  for  the  wrongs  thou'st  caused  her, 
For  thu  soul's  safety,  doth  consent  to  take  it 
From  Belhlen's  cudgel" — thus.  [Beats  him  off. 

Off"!  scoundrel!  off! 
[Laska  runs  away. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

The  sudden  swelling  of  this  shallow  dastard 

Tells  of  a  recent  storm :  the  first  disruption 

Of  the  black  cloud  that  hangs  and  threatens  o'er  us. 

BETHLEN. 

E'en  this  reproves  my  loitering.     Say  where  lies 
The  oratory  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Ascend  yon  flight  of  stairs! 
Midway  the  corridor  a  silver  lamp 
Hangs  o'er  the  entrance  of  Sarolta's  chamber, 
And  facing  it,  the  low-arch'd  oratory ! 
Me  thou  'It  find  watching  at  the  outward  gate : 
For  a  petard  might  burst  the  bars,  unheard 
By  the  drenched  porter,  and  Sarolta  hourly 
Expects  Lord  Casimir,  spite  of  Emerick's  message  ! 

BETHLEN. 

There  I  will  meet  you !  And  till  then  good  night ! 
Dear  good  old  man,  good  night ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

O  yet  one  moment! 
What  I  repell'd,  when  it  did  seem  my  own, 
I  cling  to,  now  'tis  parting — call  me  father! 
It  can  not  now  mislead  thee.     O  my  son, 
Ere  yet  our  tongues  have  learnt  another  name, 
Bethlen ! — say — Father  to  me ! 

BETHLEN. 

Now,  and  for  ever" 
My  father !  other  sire  than  thou,  on  earth 
I  never  had,  a  dearer  could  not  have ! 
From  the  base  earth  you  raised  me  to  your  arms, 
And  I  would  leap  from  off  a  throne,  and  kneeling, 
Ask  Heaven's  blessing  from  thy  lips.    My  father! 


BATHORY. 

Go!  Go! 

[Bethlen  breaks  off  and  exit.     Bathory  looks 
affectionately  after  him. 
May  every  star  now  shining  over  us, 
Be  as  an  angel's  eye,  to  watch  and  guard  him . 

[Exit  Bathory. 

Scene  changes  to  a  splendid  Bed-Chamber,  hung 
with  tapestry.  Sarolta  in  an  elegant  Night 
Dress,  and  an  Attendant. 

ATTENDANT. 

We  all  did  love  her,  Madam ! 

SAROLTA. 

She  deserved  it ! 
Luckless  Glycine  !  rash,  unhappy  girl ! 
'T  was  the  first  time  she  e'er  deceived  me. 

ATTENDANT. 

She  was  in  love,  and  had  she  not  died  thus, 
With  grief  for  Bethlen's  loss,  and  fear  of  Laska, 
She  would  have  pined  herself  to  death  at  home. 

SAROLTA. 

Has  the  youth's  father  come  back  from  his  search  ? 

ATTENDANT. 

He  never  will,  I  fear  me,  O  dear  lady ! 

That  Laska  did  so  triumph  o'er  the  old  man — 

It  was  quite  cruel — "You'll  be  sure,"  said  te, 

"To  meet  with  part  at  least  of  your  son  Bethlen, 

Or  the  war-wolf  must  have  a  quick  digestion  ! 

Go!  Search  the  wood  by  all  means!  Go!  I  pray  you!" 

SAROLTA. 

Inhuman  wretch ! 

ATTENDANT. 

And  old  Bathory  answer'd 
With  a  sad  smile,  "It  is  a  witch's  prayer, 
And  may  Heaven  read  it  backwards."    Though  she 

was  rash, 
'T  was  a  small  fault  for  such  a  punishment ! 

SAROLTA. 

Nay!  'twras  my  grief,  and  not  my  anger  spoke. 
Small  fault  indeed !  but  leave  me,  my  good  girl ! 
I  feel  a  weight  that  only  prayer  can  lighten. 

[Exit  Attendant- 
O  they  were  innocent,  and  yet  have  perish'd 
In  their  May  of  life ;  and  Vice  grows  old  in  triumph 
Is  it  Mercy's  hand,  that  for  the  bad  man  holds 

Life's  closing  gate  ? 

Still  passing  thence  petitionary  hours 
To  woo  the  obdurate  spirit  to  repentance  ? 
Or  would  this  chillness  tell  me,  that  there  is 
Guilt  too  enormous  to  be  duly  punish'd, 
Save  by  increase  of  guilt  ?  The  Powers  of  Evil 
Are  jealous  claimants.     Guilt  too  hath  its  ordeal, 
And  Hell  its  own  probation ! — Merciful  Heaven, 
Rather  than  this,  pour  down  upon  thy  suppliant 
Disease,  and  agony,  and  comfortless  want ! 
O  send  us  forth  to  wander  on,  unshelter'd ! 
Make  our  food  bitter  with  despised  tears ! 
Let  viperous  scorn  hiss  at  us  as  we  pass! 
Yea,  let  us  sink  down  at  our  enemy's  gate, 
And  beg  forgiveness  and  a  morsel  of  bread ! 
With  all  the  heaviest  worldly  visitations. 
Let  the  dire  father's  curse  that  hovers  o'er  ua 
Work  out  its  dread  fulfilment,  and  the  spirit 
Of  wrong'd  Kiuprili  be  appeased.     But  only, 
Only,  0  merciful  in  vengeance !  let  not 

124 


ZAPOLYA. 


115 


Thut  plague  turn  inward  on  my  Casimir's  soul! 
Scare  thence  the  fiend  Ambition,  and  restore  him 
To  his  own  heart !  O  save  him  !  Save  my  husband  ! 
[During  the  latter  part  of  this  speech,  Emkrick 
cvmes  forward  from  his  hiding-place.  Sarolta 
teeing  him,  without  recognizing  him. 
In  such  a  shape  a  father's  curse  should  come. 

KMERICK  {advancing). 
Fear  not ! 

SAROLTA. 

Who  art  thou  ?  Robber !  Traitor ! 

EMERICK. 

Friend ! 
Who  in  good  hour  hath  startled  these  dark  fancies, 
Rapacious  traitors,  that  would  fain  depose 
Joy,  love,  and  beauty,  from  their  natural  thrones : 
Those  lips,  those  angel  eyes,  that  regal  forehead. 

SAROLTA. 

Strengthen  me,  Heaven !  I  must  not  seem  afraid  ! 

[Aside. 
The  king  to-night  then  deigns  to  play  the  masker. 
What  seeks  your  Majesty  ? 

EMERICK. 

Sarolta's  love ; 
And  Emerick's  power  lies  prostrate  at  her  feet 

SAROLTA. 

Heaven  guard  the  sovereign's  power  from  such  de- 
basement ! 
Far  rather,  Sire,  let  it  descend  in  vengeance 
On  the  base  ingrate,  on  the  faithless  slave 
Who  dared  unbar  the  doors  of  these  retirements ! 
For  whom?  Has  Casimir  deserved  this  insult? 
O  my  misgiving  heart !  If — if— from  Heaven 
Yet  not  from  you,  Lord  Emerick ! 

EMERICK. 

Chiefly  from  me. 
Has  he  not  like  an  ingrate  robb'd  my  court 
Of  Beauty's  star,  and  kept  my  heart  in  darkness ! 
First  then  on  him  I  will  administer  justice — 
If  not  in  mercy,  yet  in  love  and  rapture.  [Seizes  her 

SAROLTA. 

Help!  Treason!  Help! 

EMERICK. 

Call  louder !  Scream  again ! 
Here 's  none  can  hear  you ! 

SAROLTA. 

Hear  me,  hear  me,  Heaven ! 

EMERICK. 

Nay,  why  this  rage  ?  Who  best  deserves  you  ?  Casimir, 
Emerick's  bought  implement,  the  jealous  slave 
That  mews  you  up  with  bolts  and  bars  ?  or  Emerick, 
Who  proffers  you  a  throne  ?  Nay,  mine  you  shall  be. 
Hence  with  this  fond  resistance !  Yield  ;  then  live 
This  month  a  widow,  and  the  next  a  queen ! 

SAROLTA. 

Yet,  for  one  brief  moment  [Struggling. 

Unhand  me,  I  conjure  you. 

[She  throws  him  off,  and  rushes  totcards  a  toilet. 

Emerick  follows,  and  as  she  takes  a  dagger, 

he  grasps  it  in  her  hand. 

emerick. 

Ha !  ha !  a  dagger ; 
A  seemly  ornament  for  a  lady's  casket ! 
'Tia  held,  devotion  is  akin  to  love, 


But  yours  is  tragic !  Love  in  war !  It  charms  me, 
And  makes  your  beauty  worth  a  king's  embraces  ! 

'During  this  speech,  Bethlen  enters  armed). 

bethlen. 
Ruffian,  forbear !  Turn,  turn  and  front  my  sword  ! 

emerick 
Pish !  who  is  this  ? 

SAROLTA. 

O  sleepless  eye  of  Heaven ! 
A  blest,  a  blessed  spirit!  Whence  earnest  thou? 
May  I  still  call  thee  Bethlen  ? 
bethlen. 

Ever,  lady, 
Your  faithful  soldier! 

EMERICK. 

Insolent  slave !  Depart ! 
Know'st  thou  not  me  ? 

bethlen. 
I  know  thou  art  a  villain 
And  coward !  That,  thy  devilish  purpose  marks  thee ! 
What  else,  this  lady  must  instruct  my  sword ! 

SAROLTA. 

Monster,  retire !  O  touch  him  not,  thou  blest  one ! 
This  is  the  hour,  that  fiends  and  damned  spirits 
Do  walk  the  earth,  and  take  what  form  they  list ! 
Yon  devil  hath  assumed  a  lung's ! 
bethlen. 

Usurp'd  it ! 

EMERICK. 

The  king  will  play  the  devil  with  thee  indeed ! 
But  that  I  mean  to  hear  thee  howl  on  the  rack, 
I  would  debase  this  sword,  and  lay  thee  prostrate, 
At  this  thy  paramour's  feet ;  then  drag  her  forth 
Stain'd  with  adulterous  blood,  and  [Then  to  Sarolta 
— Mark  you,  traitress ! 
Strumpeted  first,  then  turn'd  adrift  to  beggary! 
Thou  prayed'st  for't  too. 

SAROLTA. 

Thou  art  so  fiendish  wicked, 
That  in  thy  blasphemies  I  scarce  hear  thy  threats. 

BETHLEN 

Lady,  be  calm !  fear  not  this  king  of  the  buskin ! 
A  king  ?  Oh  laughter !  A  king  Bajazet ! 
That  from  some  vagrant  actor's  tyring-room, 
Hath  stolen  at  once  liis  speech  and  crown ! 

EMERICK. 

Ah!  treason! 
Thou  hast  been  lesson'd  and  trick'd  up  for  this ! 
As  surely  as  the  wax  on  thy  death-warrant 
Shall  take  the  impression  of  this  royal  signet, 
So  plain  thy  face  hath  ta'en  the  mask  of  rebel ! 
[Emerick  points  his  hand  haughtily  towards  Beth- 
len, ivho  catching  a  sight  of  the  signet,  seizes 
his  hand  and  eagerly  observes  the  signet,  then 
flings  the  hand  back  vnth  indignant  joy. 
bethlen. 
It  must  be  so!  'Tis  e'en  the  counterpart! 
But  with  a  foul  usurping  cipher  on  it! 
The  light  hath   flash'd    from  Heaven,  and  I  must 

follow  it ! 
O  curst  usurper !  O  thou  brother-murderer ! 
That  madest  a  star-bright  queen  a  fugitive  widow ! 
Who  fill'st  the  land  with  curses,  being  thyself 
All  curses  in  one  tyrant !  see  and  tremble  ! 
This  is  Kiuprili's  swrord  that  now  hangs  o'er  thee! 
Kiuprili's  blasting  curse,  that  from  its  point 
125 


11G 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Shoots  lightnings  at  thee !  Hark  !  in  Andreas'  name, 
Heir  of  his  vengeance !  hell-hound  !  I  defy  thee. 
[Thei/  fight,  and  just  as  Emerick  is  disarmed,  in 

rush  Casimir,  Old  Bathory,  and  attendants. 

Casimir  runs  in  between  the  combatants,  and 

parts  them :  in  the  struggle  Bethlen's  sword 

is  thrown  down. 

CASIMIR. 

The  king  disarm'd  too  by  a  stranger!  Speak! 
What  may  this  mean  ? 

EMERICK. 

Deceived,  dishonor'd  lord ! 
Ask  thou  yon  fair  adultress !  She  will  tell  thee 
A  tale,  which  wouldst  thou  be  both  dupe  and  traitor, 
Thou  wilt  believe  against  thy  friend  and  sovereign ! 
Thou  art  present  now,  and  a  friend's  duty  ceases  : 
To  thine  own  justice  leave  I  thine  own  wrongs. 
Of  half  thy  vengeance,  I  perforce  must  rob  thee, 
For  that  the  sovereign  claims.     To  thy  allegiance 
I  now  commit  this  traitor  and  assassin. 

[Then  to  the  Attendants. 
Hence  with  him  to  the  dungeon !  and  to-morrow, 
Ere  the  sun  rises, — hark  !  your  heads  or  his  ! 

BETHLEN. 

Can  Hell  work  miracles  to  mock  Heaven's  justice  ? 

EMERICK. 

Who  speaks  to  him  dies !  The  traitor  that  has  menaced 
His  king,  must  not  pollute  the  breathing  air, 
Even  with  a  word  ! 

casimir  (to  Bathory). 

Hence  with  him  to  the  dungeon! 
[Exit  Bethlen,  hurried  off  by  Bathory  and 
Attendants. 

EMERICK. 

We  hunt  to-morrow  in  your  upland  forest : 

Thou  (to  Casimir)  wilt  attend  us  :    and  wilt  then 

explain 
This  sudden  and  most  fortunate  arrival. 

[Exit  Emerick  ;  manent  Casimir  and  Sarolta. 
sarolta. 
My  lord!  my  husband!  look  whose  sword  lies  yonder! 
[Pointing  to  the  sword  which  Bethlen  had  been 
disarmed  of  by  the  Attendants. 
It  is  Kiuprili's ;  Casimir,  'tis  thy  father's! 
And  wielded  by  a  stripling's  arm,  it  baffled, 
Yea,  fell  like  Heaven's  own  lightnings  on  that  Tar- 
quin. 

casimir. 
Hush !  hush !  [In  an  under  voice. 

I  had  detected  ere  I  left  the  city 
The  tyrant's  curst  intent.     Lewd,  damn'd  ingrate  ! 
For  him  did  I  bring  down  a  father's  curse  ! 
Swift,  swift  must  be  our  means !  To-morrow's  sun 
Sets  on  his  fate  or  mine !  O  blest  Sarolta ! 

[Embracing  her. 
No  other  prayer,  late  penitent,  dare  I  offer, 
But  that  thy  spotless  virtues  may  prevail 
O'er  Casimir's  crimes  and  dread  Kiuprili's  curse  ! 

[Exeunt  consulting. 


ACT  IV. 

SCENE  I. 

A  Glade  m  a  Wood. 

Enter  Casimir,  looking  anxiously  around. 

casimir. 

This  needs  must  be  the  spot !  O,  here  he  comes ! 


Enter  Lord  Rudolph. 

Well  met,  Lord  Rudolph! 

Your  whisper  was  not  lost  upon  my  ear, 
And  I  dare  trust — 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

Enough !  the  time  is  precious ! 
You  left  Temeswar  late  on  yester-eve  ? 
And  sojoum'd  there  some  hours  ? 

casimir. 

1  did  so ! 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

Heard  you 
Aught  of  a  hunt  preparing  ? 

casimir. 

Yes ;  and  met 
The  assembled  huntsmen ! 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

Was  there  no  word  given  1 
casimir. 
The  word  for  me  was  this ; — The  royal  Leopard 
Chases  thy  milk-white  dedicated  Hind. 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

Your  answer  ? 

CASIMIR. 

As  the  word  proves  false  or  true, 
Will  Casimir  cross  the  hunt,  or  join  the  huntsmen ! 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

The  event  redeem'd  their  pledge  ? 

CASIMIR. 

It  did,  and  therefore 
Have  I  sent  back  both  pledge  and  invitation. 
The  spotless  Hind  hath  fled  to  them  for  shelter, 
And  bears  with  her  my  seal  of  fellowship ! 

[They  take  hands,  etc. 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

But  Emerick !  how  when  you  reported  to  him 
Sarolta's  disappearance,  and  the  flight 
Of  Bethlen  with  his  guards  ? 

CASIMIR. 

0  he  received  it 
As  evidence  of  their  mutual  guilt :  in  fine, 
With  cozening  warmth  condoled  with,  and  dismi.ss'd 
me. 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

I  enter'd  as  the  door  was  closing  on  you  : 

His  eye  was  fix'd,  yet  seem'd  to  follow  you, 

With  such  a  look  of  hate,  and  scorn  and  triumph, 

As  if  he  had  you  in  the  toils  already, 

And  were  then  choosing  where  to  stab  you  first. 

But  hush !  draw  back ! 

CASIMIR. 

This  nook  is  at  the  farthest 
From  any  beaten  track. 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

There !  mark  them !   . 
[Points  to  where  Laska  and  Pestalutz  ctos% 
the  Stage. 

casimir. 

Laska " 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

One  of  the  two  I  recognized  this  morning  ; 
His  name  is  Pestalutz :  a  trusty  ruffian, 
Whose  face  is  prologue  still  to  some  dark  murdei 
Beware  no  stratagem,  no  trick  of  message, 
Dispart  you  from  your  servants. 

casimir  (aside). 

I  deserve  it. 
126 


' 


ZAPOLYA. 


117 


The  comrade  of  that  ruffian  its  my  servant; 
Thfl  one  I  tripled  most  and  most  preferr'd. 
But  we  must  part.     What  makes  the  king  so  late  ? 
It  was  his  wont  to  be  an  early  stirrer. 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

And  his  main  policy 
To  enthral  the  sluggard  nature  in  ourselves 
Is,  in  good  truth,  the  better  half  of  the  secret 
To  enthral  the  world  :  for  the  will  governs  all. 
See,  the  sky  lowers!  the  cross-winds  waywardly 
Chase  the  fantastic  masses  of  the  clouds 
Willi  a  wild  mockery  of  the  coming  hunt! 

CAStMtn. 
Mark  yonder  mass !  I  make  it  wear  the  shape 
Of  a  huge  ram  that  butts  with  head  depress 'd. 

lord  Rudolph  (smiling). 
Belike,  some  stray  sheep  of  the  oozy  flock, 
Which,  if  bards  lie  not,  the  Sea-shepherds  tend, 
Glaucus  or  Proteus.     But  my  fancy  shapes  it 
A  monster  couchant  on  a  rocky  shelf. 

CASIMIR. 

Mark  too  the  edges  of  the  lurid  mass — 
Restless,  as  if  some  idly-vexing  Sprite, 
On  swift  wing  coasting  by,  with  techy  hand 
Pluck'd  at  the  ringlets  of  the  vaporous  Fleece. 
These  are  sure  signs  of  conflict  nigh  at  hand, 
And  elemental  war ! 

[A  single  Trumpet  heard  at  a  distance. 

LORD  RUDOLPH. 

That  single  blast 
Announces  that  the  tyrant's  pawing  courser 
Neighs  at  the  gate  [A  volley  of  Trumpets. 

Hark !  now  the  king  comes  forth ! 
For  ever  midst  this  crash  of  horns  and  clarions 
He  mounts  his  steed,  which  proudly  rears  an-end 
While  he  looks  round  at  ease,  and  scans  the  crowd, 
Vain  of  his  stately  form  and  horsemanship  ! 
I  must  away !  my  absence  may  be  noticed. 

CASIMIR. 

Oft  as  thou  canst,  essay  to  lead  the  hunt 
Hard  by  the  forest  skirts ;  and  ere  high  noon 
Expect  our  sworn  confederates  from  Temeswar. 
I  trust,  ere  yet  this  clouded  sun  slopes  westward, 
That  Emerick's  death,  or  Casimir's,  will  appease 
The  manes  of  Zapolya  and  Kiuprili ! 

[Exit  Rudolph  and  manet  Casimir. 

The  traitor,  Laska! 

And  yet  Sarolta,  simple,  inexperienced, 
Could  see  him  as  he  was,  and  often  warn'd  me. 
Whence  learn'd  she  this  ? — O  she  was  innocent ! 
And  to  be  innocent  is  nature's  wisdom ! 
The  lledge-dove  knows  the  prowlers  of  the  air, 
Fear'd  soon  as  seen,  and  flutters  back  to  shelter. 
And  the  young  steed  recoils  upon  his  haunches, 
The  never-yet-seen  adder's  hiss  first  heard. 
O  surer  than  Suspicion's  hundred  eyes 
Is  that  fine  sense,  which  to  the  pure  in  heart, 
By  mere  oppugnancy  of  their  own  goodness, 
Reveals  the  approach  of  evil.     Casimir  ! 
O  fool !  O  parricide!  through  yon  wood  didst  thou, 
With  fire  and  sword,  pursue  a  patriot  father, 
A  widow  and  an  orphan.     Darest  thou  then 
{Curse-laden  wretch),  put  forth  these  hands  to  raise 
The  ark,  all  sacred,  of  thy  country's  cause  ? 
Look  down  in  pity  on  thy  son,  Kiuprili ; 
And  let  this  deep  abhorrence  of  his  crime, 
M 


I'nstain'd  with  selfish  fears,  be  his  atonement ! 

0  strengthen  him  to  nobler  compensation 
In  the  deliverance  of  his  bleeding  country! 

[Exit  Casimik 

Scene  changes  to  the  month  of  a  Cavern,  as  in  Act  II 
Zatolya  and  GLYCINE  discovered. 

ZAPOLYA. 

Our  friend  is  gone  to  seek  some  safer  cave. 
Do  not  then  leave  me  long  alone,  Glycine ! 
Having  enjoy'd  thy  commune,  loneliness, 
That  but  oppress'd  me  hitherto,  now  scares. 

GLYCINE. 

1  shall  know  Bethlen  at  the  furthest  distance, 
And  the  same  moment  I  descry  him,  lady, 

I  will  return  to  you.  [Exit  Glycine 

Enter  Old  Bathory,  speaking  as  he  enters. 
old  batiiory. 
Who  hears  ?  A  friend ! 
A  messenger  from  him  who  bears  the  signet ! 

[Zapolya,  who  had  been  gazing  affectionately  after 
Glycine,  starts  at  Bathory's  voice. 
He  hath  the  watch-word  ! — Art  thou  not  Bathory  ? 

OLD  BATHORY'. 

0  noble  lady !  greetings  from  your  son  ! 

[Bathory  kneels 

ZAPOLYA. 

Rise  !  rise  !  Or  shall  I  rather  kneel  beside  thee, 
And  call  down  blessings  from  the  wealth  of  Heaven 
Upon  thy  honor'd  head  1  When  thou  last  saw'st  me 

1  would  full  fain  have  knelt  to  thee,  and  could  not, 
Thou  dear  old  man !  How  oft  since  then  in  dreams 
Have  I  done  worship  to  thee,  as  an  angel 
Bearing  my  helpless  babe  upon  thy  wings ! 

OLD  BATHORY'. 

O  he  was  born  to  honor !  Gallant  deeds 
And  perilous  hath  he  wrought  since  yester-eve. 
Now  from  Temeswar  (for  to  him  was  trusted 
A  life,  save  thine,  the  dearest)  he  hastes  hither — 

ZAPOLYA. 

Lady  Sarolta  mean'st  thou? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

She  is  safe. 
The  royal  brute  hath  overleapt  his  prey, 
And  when  he  turn'd,  a  sworded  Virtue  faced  him. 
My  own  brave  boy — O  pardon,  noble  lady  ! 
Your  son 

ZAPOLYA. 

Hark !  Is  it  he  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

I  hear  a  voice 
Too  hoarse  for  Bethlen's!  'T  was  his  scheme  and  hope, 
Long  ere  the  hunters  could  approach  the  forest, 
To  have  led  you  hence. — Retire. 

ZAPOLYA. 

O  life  of  terrors ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

In  the  cave's  mouth  we  have  such 'vantage-ground 
That  even  this  old  arm — 

[Exeunt  Zapolya  and  Bathory  into  the  Cant 

Enter  Laska  and  Pestalutz. 
laska. 

Not  a  step  further! 
pestalutz. 
Dastard!  was  this  your  promise  to  the  king? 

127 


118 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


LASKA. 

I  have  fulfill'd  his  orders ;  have  walk'd  with  you 
As  with  a  friend  ;  have  pointed  out  Lord  Casimir : 
And  now  I  leave  you  to  take  care  of  him. 
For  the  king's  purposes  are  doubtless  friendly. 

pestalutz  {affecting  to  start). 
Be  on  your  guard,  man ! 

Laska  (in  affright). 

Ha !  what  now  1 

PESTALUTZ. 

Behind  you 
'Twas  one  of  Satan's  imps,  that  grinn'd,  and  threat- 

en'd  you 
For  your  most  impudent  hope  to  cheat  his  master ! 

LASKA. 

Pshaw !  What,  you  think  'tis  fear  that  makes  me 
leave  you  ? 

PESTALUTZ. 

Is't  not  enough  to  play  the  knave  to  others, 
But  thou  must  lie  to  thine  own  heart  ? 

laska  (pompously). 
Friend !  Laska  will  be  found  at  his  own  post, 
Watching  elsewhere  for  the  king's  interest. 
There's  a  rank  plot  that  Laska  must  hunt  down, 
'Twixt  Bethlen  and  Glycine ! 

pestalutz  (with  a  sneer). 

What !  the  girl 
Whom  Laska  saw  the  war-wolf  tear  in  pieces  ? 
laska  (throwing  down  a  bow  and  arrows). 
Well !  there 's  my  arms !  Hark !  should  your  javelin 

fail  you, 
These  points  are  tipt  with  venom. 

[Starts  and  sees  Glycine  without. 
By  Heaven !  Glycine ! 
Now,  as  you  love  the  king,  help  me  to  seize  her! 
[They  run  out  after  Glycine,  and  she  shrieks  with- 
out :  then  enter  Bathory  from  the  Cavern. 

OLD  BATIIORY. 

Rest,  lady,  rest !  I  feel  in  every  sinew 

A  young  man's  strength  returning !  Which  way  went 

they? 
The  shriek  came  thence. 

[Clash  of  swords,  and  Bethlen's  voice  heard  from 

behind   the   Scejies  ;    Glycine  enters  alarmed ; 

then,  as  seeing  Laska's  bow  and  arrows. 

glycine. 

Ha  !  weapons  here  ?  Then,  Bethlen,  thy  Glycine 

Will  die  with  thee  or  save  thee ! 

[She  seizes  them  and  rushes  out.  Bathory  following 
her.  Lively  and  irregular  Music,  and  Peasants 
with  hunting -spears  cross  the  stage,  singing  cho- 
rally. 

CHORAL  SONG. 
Up,  up!  ye  dames,  ye  lasses  gay! 
To  the  meadows  u-ip  away. 
Tis  you  must  tend  the  flocks  this  morn, 
And  scare  the  small  birds  from  the  corn. 
Not  a  soul  at  home  may  stay  : 

For  the  shepherds  must  go 

With  lance  and  bow 
To  hunt  the  wolf  in  the  woods  to-day. 

Leave  the  hearth  and  leave  the  house 
To  the  cricket  and  the  mouse  : 


Find  grannam  out  a  sunny  seat, 
With  babe  and  lambkin  at  her  feet. 
Not  a  soul  at  home  may  stay  : 
For  the  shepherds  must  go 
With  lance  and  bow 
To  hunt  the  wolf  in  the  woods  to-day. 
Re-enter,  as  the  Huntsmen  pass  off,  Bathory,  Bethlen 
and  Glycine, 
glycine  (leaning  on  Bethlen). 
And  now  once  more  a  woman 

bethlen. 

Was  it  then 
That  timid  eye,  was  it  those  maiden  hands 
That  sped  the  shaft  which  saved  me  and  avenged  me  ? 

old  bathory  (to  Bethlen  extdtingly). 
'Twas  a  vision  blazon'd  on  a  cloud 
By  lightning,  shaped  into  a  passionate  scheme 
Of  life  and  death !  I  saw  the  traitor,  Laska, 
Stoop  and  snatch  up  the  javelin  of  his  comrade ; 
The  point  was  at  your  back,  when  her  shaft  reach  d 

him 
The  coward  turn'd,  and  at  the  self-same  instant 
The  braver  villain  fell  beneath  your  sword. 

Enter  Zapolya. 
zapolya. 
Bethlen !  my  child  !  and  safe  too ! 
bethlen. 

Mother !  Queen ! 
Royal  Zapolya !  name  me  Andreas  ! 
Nor  blame  thy  son,  if  being  a  king,  he  yet 
Hath  made  his  own  arm,  minister  of  his  justice. 
So  do  the  Gods  who  lanch  the  thunderbolt! 

ZAPOLYA. 

O  Raab  Kiuprili !  Friend  !  Protector !  Guide  ! 
In  vain  we  trench'd  the  altar  round  with  waters, 
A  flash  from  Heaven  hath  toueh'd  the  hidden  incense — 

BETHLEN  (hastily). 
And  that  majestic  form  that  stood  beside  thee 
Was  Raab  Kiuprili ! 

ZAPOLYA. 

It  was  Raab  Kiuprili ; 
As  sure  as  thou  art  Andreas,  and  the  lung. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Hail  Andreas!  hail  my  king!  [Triumphantly 

ANDREAS. 

Stop,  thou  revered  one ! 
Lest  we  offend  the  jealous  .destinies 
By  shouts  ere  victory.     Deem  it  then  thy  duty 
To  pay  this  homage,  when  'tis  mine  to  claim  it. 

glycine. 
Accept  thine  hand-maid's  service  !  [Kneeling 

ZAPOLYA 

Raise  her,  son ! 

0  raise  her  to  thine  arms !  she  saved  thy  life, 

And  through  her  love  for  thee,  she  saved  thy  mother's 
Hereafter  thou  shalt  know,  that  this  dear  maid 
Hath  other  and  hereditary  claims 
Upon  thy  heart,  and  with  Heaven-guarded  instinct 
But  carried  on  the  work  her  sire  began ! 

ANDREAS. 

Dear  maid  !  more  dear  thou  canst  not  be  !  the  rest 
Shall  make  my  love  religion.     Haste  we  hence; 
For  as  I  reach'd  the  skirts  of  this  high  forest, 

1  heard  the  noise  and  uproar  of  the  chase, 
Doubling  its  echoes  from  the  mountain  fuot. 

128 


ZAPOLYA. 


119 


GLYCINE. 

Hark  !  sure  the  hunt  approaches. 

[Horn  witlwut,  and  afterwards  distant  thunder. 

ZAPOLYA. 

O  Kiuprili! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

The  demon-hunters  of  the  middle  air 
Are  in  full  cry,  and  scare  with  arrowy  fire 
The  guilty !  Hark !  now  here,  now  there,  a  hom 
Swells  singly  with  irregular  blast !  the  tempest 
Has  scatter'd  them ! 

[Horns  Iieard  as  from  different  places  at  a  distance. 

ZAPOLYA. 

O  Heavens !  where  stays  Kiuprili  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

The  wood  will  be  surrounded !  leave  me  here. 

ANDREAS. 

My  mother !  let  me  see  thee  once  in  safety, 
I  too  will  hasten  back,  with  lightning's  speed, 
To  seek  the  hero ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Haste !  my  life  upon  it, 
I  '11  guide  him  safe 

ANDREAS  {thunder  again). 

Ha !  what  a  crash  was  there ! 
Heaven  seems  to  claim  a  mightier  criminal 

[Pointing  without  to  the  body  of  Pestalutz. 
Than  yon  vile  subaltern. 

ZAPOLYA. 

Your  behest,  High  Powers, 
Low  I  obey !  to  the  appointed  spirit, 
That  hath  so  long  kept  watch  round  this  drear  cavern, 
In  fervent  faith,  Kiuprili,  I  intrust  thee ! 

[Exeunt  Zapolya,  Andreas,  and  Glycine, 
Andreas  having  in  haste  dropt  his  sword. 
Manet  Bathory. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Yon  bleeding  corse,  {pointing  to  Pestalutz's  body) 

may  work  us  mischief  still : 
Once  seen,  'twill  rouse  alarm  and  crowd  the  hunt 
From  all  parts  towards  this  spot    Stript  of  its  armor, 
I  '11  drag  it  hither. 

[Exit  Bathory.    After  a  while  several  Hunters 
cross  the  stage  as  scattered.  Some  time  after, 
enter  Kiuprili  in  his  disguise,  fainting  with 
fatigue,  and  as  pursued. 
raab  kiuprili  {throwing  off  his  disguise). 
Since  Heaven  alone  can  save  me,  Heaven  alone 
Shall  be  my  trust. 

[Then  speaking  as  to  Zapolya  in  the  Cavern. 
Haste !  haste !  Zapolya,  flee ! 
[He  enters  the  Cavern,  and  then  returns  in  alarm. 
Gone !  Seized  perhaps  ?  Oh  no,  let  me  not  perish 
Despairing  of  Heaven's  justice !  Faint,  disarm'd, 
Each  sinew  powerless,  senseless  rock  sustain  me ! 
Thou  art  parcel  of  my  native  land. 

[Then  observing  the  sword. 
A  sword ! 
Ha !  and  my  sword !  Zapolya  hath  escaped, 
The  murderers  are  baffled,  and  there  lives 
An  Andreas  to  avenge  Kiuprili's  fall ! — 
There  was  a  time,  when  this  dear  sword  did  flash 
As  dreadful  as  the  storm-fire  from  mine  arms : 
I  can  scarce  raise  it  now — yet  come,  fell  tyrant ! 
And  bring  with  thee  my  shame  and  bitter  anguish, 
To  end  his  work  and  thine !  Kiuprili  now 
Can  take  the  death-blow  as  a  soldier  should. 


Re-enter  Bathory,  with  the  dead  body  of  Pestalutz. 

old  bathory. 
Poor  tool  and  victim  of  another's  guilt ! 
Thou  follow'st  heavily  :  a  reluctant  weight ! 
Good  truth,  it  is  an  undeserved  honor 
That  in  Zapolya  and  Kiuprili's  cave 
A  wretch  like  thee  should  find  a  burial-place. 

[Then  observing  Kiuprili. 
'Tis  he! — in  Andreas'  and  Zapolya's  name 
Follow  me,  reverend  form  ?  Thou  needst  not  speak, 
For  thou  canst  be  no  other  than  Kiuprili .' 

kiuprili. 
And  are  they  safe  ?  [Noise  without. 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Conceal  yourself,  my  Lord  . 
I  will  mislead  them ! 

KIUPRILI. 

Is  Zapolya  safe  ? 

OLD  BATHORY. 

I  doubt  it  not ;  but  haste,  haste,  I  conjure  you ! 

[As  he  retires,  in  rushes  Casimir. 
casimir  {entering). 

Monster ! 
Thou  shalt  not  now  escape  me ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Stop,  Lord  Casimir! 
It  is  no  monster. 

CASIMIR. 

Art  thou  too  a  traitor  ? 
Is  this  the  place  where  Emerick's  murderers  lurk  ? 
Say  where  is  he  that,  trick'd  in  this  disguise, 
First  lured  me  on,  then  scared  my  dastard  followers? 
Thou  must  have  seen  him.  Say  where  is  th'  assassin  ? 
old  bathory  {pointing  to  the  body  of  Pestalutz). 
There  lies  the  assassin !  slain  by  that  same  sword 
That  was  descending  on  his  curst  employer, 
When  entering  thou  beheld'st  Sarolta  rescued ! 

CASIMIR. 

Strange  providence !  what  then  was  he  who  fled  me  ? 
[Bathory  points  to  the  Cavern,  whence  Kiuprili 
advances. 

Thy  looks  speak  fearful  things !  Whither,  old  man  ! 
Would  thy  hand  point  me  ? 

old  bathory. 

Casimir,  to  thy  father. 
casimir  {discovering  Kiuprili). 
The  curse !  the  curse  !  Open  and  swallow  me, 
Unsteady  earth !  Fall,  dizzy  rocks  !  and  hide  me ! 

OLD  BATHORY  {to  KlUPRILl). 

Speak,  speak,  my  Lord  ! 

kiuprili  {holds  out  the  sword  to  Bathory). 
Bid  him  fulfil  his  work ! 
casimir. 
Thou  art  Heaven's  immediate  minister,  dread  spirit ! 
O  for  swreet  mercy,  take  some  other  form, 
And  save  me  from  perdition  and  despair ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

He  lives ! 

CASIMIR. 

Lives !  A  father's  curse  can  never  die ! 
kiuprili  (m  a  tone  of  pity). 
O  Casimir !  Casimir ! 

OLD  BATHORY. 

Look !  he  doth  forgive  you ! 
Hark!  'tis  the  tyrant's  voice. 

[Emerick's  voice  without 
129 


120 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


CASIMIR. 

I  kneel,  I  kneel ! 
Retract  thy  curse  !  O,  by  my  mother's  ashes, 
Have  pity  on  thy  self-abhorring  child  ! 
If  not  for  me,  yet  for  my  innocent  wife, 
Yet  for  my  country's  sake,  give  my  arm  strength, 
Permitting  me  again  to  call  thee  father ! 

KIUPRILI. 

Son,  I  forgive  thee !  Take  thy  father's  sword ; 
When  thou  shalt  lift  it  in  thy  country's  cause, 
[n  that  same  instant  doth  thy  father  bless  thee ! 

[Kiuprili  and  Casimir  embrace  ;  they  all  retire 
to  the  Cavern  supporting  Kiuprili.  Casimir 
as  by  accident  drops  his  robe,  and  Bathory 
throws  it  over  the  body  of  Pestalutz. 
emerick  {entering). 
Fools !  Cowards !  follow — or  by  Hell  I  '11  make  you 
Find  reason  to  fear  Emerick,  more  than  all 
The  mummer-fiends  that  ever  masqueraded 
As  gods  or  wood-nymphs  ! — 

Then  sees  the  body  of  Pestalutz,  covered  by 
Casimir's  cloak. 

Ha!  'tis  done  then! 
Our  necessary  villain  hath  proved  faithful, 
And  there  lies  Casimir,  and  our  last  fears ! 

Well !— Ay,  well ! 

And  is  it  not  well  ?  For  though  grafted  on  us, 
And  filFd  too  with  our  sap,  the  deadly  power 
Of  the  parent  poison-tree  lurk'd  in  its  fibres : 
There  was  too  much  of  Raab  Kiuprili  in  him: 
The  old  enemy  look'd  at  me  in  his  face, 
E'en  when  his  words  did  flatter  me  with  duty. 

[As  Emerick  moves  towards  the  body,  enter  from 
the  Cavern  Casimir  and  Bathory. 

old  bathory  (pointing  to  where  the  noise  is,  and  aside 

to  Casimir). 
This  way  they  come ! 

casimir  (aside  to  Bathory). 

Hold  them  in  check  awhile. 
The  path  is  narrow  !  Rudolph  will  assist  thee. 

emerick  (aside,  not  perceiving  Casimir  and  Bathory, 

and  looking  at  the  dead  body). 
And  ere  I  ring  the  alarum  of  my  sorrow, 
I  '11  scan  that  face  once  more,  and  murmur — Here 
Lies  Casimir,  the  last  of  the  Kiuprilis ! 

[  Uncovers  the  face,  and  starts. 
Hell !  't  is  Pestalutz  ! 

casimir  (coming  forward). 

Yes,  thou  ingrate  Emerick! 
'Tis  Pestalutz!  'tis  thy  trusty  murderer! 
To  quell  thee  more,  see  Raab  Kiuprili's  sword ! 

EMERICK. 

Curses  on  it,  and  thee !  Think'st  thou  that  petty  omen 
Dare  whisper  fear  to  Emerick's  destiny  ? 
Ho !  Treason !  Treason  ! 

CASIMIR. 

Then  have  at  thee,  tyrant! 
[They  fight.    Emerick  falls. 
emerick. 
Betray 'd  and  baffled 

By  mine  own  tool ! Oh !  [Dies. 

CASIMIR  (triumphantly). 

Hear,  hear,  my  father! 
Thou  shouldst  have  witness'd  thine  own  deed.     0 

father! 
Wake  from  that  envious  swoon!  The  tyrant's  fallen ! 
Thy  sword  hath  conquer'd  !  As  I  lifted  it. 


Thy  blessing  did  indeed  descend  upon  me  ; 
Dislodging  the  dread  curse.     It  flew  forth  from  me 
And  lighted  on  the  tyrant ! 

Enter  Rudolph,  Bathory,  and  Attendants. 

Rudolph  and  bathory  (entering). 

Friends !  friends  to  Casimir ! 

CASIMIR. 

Rejoice,  Illyrians  !  the  usurper's  fallen. 

RUDOLPH. 

So  perish  tyrants !  so  end  usurpation ! 

CASIMIR. 

Bear  hence  the  body,  and  move  slowly  on ! 

One  moment 

Devoted  to  a  joy,  that  bears  no  witness, 
I  follow  you,  and  we  will  greet  our  countrymen 
With  the  two  best  and  fullest  gifts  of  Heaven — 
A  tyrant  fallen,  a  patriot  chief  restored  ! 

[Exeunt  Casimir  into  the  Cavern.    Tlie  rest  on 
the  opposite  side. 

Scene  changes  to  a  splendid  Chamber  in  Casimir's 
Castle.    Confederates  discovered. 

first  confederate. 
It  cannot  but  succeed,  friends.     From  this  palace 
E'en  to  the  wood,  our  messengers  are  posted 
With  such  short  interspace,  that  fast  as  sound 
Can  travel  to  us,  we  shall  learn  the  event ! 

Enter  another  Confederate. 
What  tidings  from  Temeswar? 

second  confederate. 

With  one  voice 
Th'  assembled  chieftains  have  deposed  the  tyrant ; 
He  is  proclaim'd  the  public  enemy, 
And  the  protection  of  the  law  withdrawn. 

first  confederate. 
Just  doom  for  him,  who  governs  without  law ! 
Is  it  known  on  whom  the  sovereignty  will  fall  ? 

second  confederate. 
Nothing  is  yet  decided  :  but  report 
Points  to  Lord  Casimir.     The  grateful  memory 
Of  his  renowned  father 

Enter  Sarolta. 

Hail  to  Sarolta. 
sarolta. 
Confederate  friends !    I  bring  to  you  a  joy 
Worthy  our  noble  cause  !  Kiuprili  lives, 
And  from  his  obscure  exile,  hath  return'd 
To  bless  our  country.     More  and  greater  tidings 
Might  I  disclose ;  but  that  a  woman's  voice 
Would  mar  the  wondrous  tale.    Wait  we  for  him 
The  partner  of  the  glory — Raab  Kiuprili  ; 
For  he  alone  is  worthy  to  announce  it. 

[Shouts  of  "  Kiuprili,  Kiuprili !"  and  "  The  Tyrant 's 
fallen !"  without.  Then  enter  Kiuprili,  Casimir, 
Rudolph,  Bathory,  and  Attendants,  after  the 
clamor  has  subsided. 

raab  kiuprili. 
Spare  yet  your  joy,  my  friends !  A  higher  waits  you : 
Behold  your  Queen ! 

Enter  from  oj>posile  side,  Zapolya  and  Andreas 
royally  attired,  with  Glycine, 
confederates. 
Comes  she  from  heaven  to  bless  ua  * 
130 


THE  PICCOLOMIXI. 


121 


OTHER  CONFEDERATES. 

It  is!  It  is! 

ZAPOLYA. 

Heaven's  work  of  grace  is  full ! 
Kiuprili,  thou  art  safe! 

RAAB  KIUPRILI. 

Royal  Zapolya ! 
To  the  heavenly  powers,  pay  we  our  duty  first ; 
Who  not  alone  preserved  thee,  but  for  thee 
And  for  our  country,  the  one  precious  branch 
Of  Andreas'  royal  house.     O  countrymen, 
Behold  your  King !  And  thank  our  country's  genius. 
That  the  same  means  which  have  preserved  our 

sovereign, 
Have  likewise  rear'd  him  worthier  of  the  throne 
By  virtue  than  by  birth.     The  undoubted  proofs 
Pledged  by  his  royal  mother,  and  this  old  man 
(Whose  name  henceforth  be  dear  to  all  Illyrians), 
We  haste  to  lay  before  the  assembled  council. 

ALL. 

Hail,  Andreas !  Hail,  Illyria's  rightful  king  ! 

ANDREAS. 

Supported  thus,  O  friends  !  't  were  cowardice 

Unworthy  of  a  royal  birth,  to  shrink 

From  the  appointed  charge.     Yet,  while  we  wait 

The  awful  sanction  of  convened  Illyria, 

In  this  brief  while,  O  let  me  feel  myself 

The  child,*the  friend,  the  debtor! — Heroic  mother! — 

But  what  can  breath  add  to  that  sacred  name  ? 

Kiuprili!  gift  of  Providence,  to  teach  us 

That  loyalty  is  but  the  public  form 

Of  the  sublimest  friendship,  let  my  youth 

Climb  round  thee,  as  the  vine  around  its  elm : 

Thou  my  support,  and  J  thy  faithful  fruitage. 

My  heart  is  full,  and  these  poor  words  express  not 

They  are  but  an  art  to  check  its  over-swelling. 

Bathory !  shrink  not  from  my  filial  arms  ! 

Now-,  and  from  henceforth,  thou  shalt  not  forbid  me 

To  call  thee  father !  And  dare  I  forget 


The  powerful  intercession  of  thy  virtue, 

Lady  Sarolta  >.  Still  acknowledge  me 

Thy  faithful  soldier! — But  what  invocation 

Shall  my  full  soul  address  to  thee,  Glycine  ? 

Thou  sword,  that  leap'st  from  forth  a  bed  of  roses ! 

Thou  falcon-hearted  dove  ? 

ZAPOLYA. 

Hear  that  from  me,  son ! 
For  ere  she  lived,  her  father  saved  thy  life, 
Thine,  and  thy  fugitive  mother's ! 

CASIMIR. 

Chef  Ragozzi ! 

0  shame  upon  my  head  !  I  would  have  given  her 
To  a  base  slave  ! 

ZAPOLYA. 

Heaven  overruled  thy  purpose, 
And  sent  an  angel  (Pointing  to  Sarolta)  to  thy  house 

to  guard  her ! 
Thou  precious  bark!  freighted  with  all  our  treasures ! 

[To  Andreas. 
The  sport  of  tempests,  and  yet  ne'er  the  victim, 
How  many  may  claim  salvage  in  thee  ! 

(Pointing  to  Glycine).         Take  her,  son ! 
A  queen  that  brings  with  her  a  richer  dowry 
Than  orient  kings  can  give  ! 

SAROLTA. 

A  banquet  waits  ! — 
On  this  auspicious  day,  for  some  few  hours 

1  claim  to  be  your  hostess.     Scenes  so  awful 
With  flashing  light,  force  wisdom  on  us  all ! 
E'en  women  at  the  distaff  hence  may  see, 
That  bad  men  may  rebel,  but  ne'er  be  free; 
May  whisper,  when  the  waves  of  faction  foam, 
None  love  their  country,  but  w'ho  love  their  home ; 
For  freedom  can  with  those  alone  abide, 

WTho  wear  the  golden  chain,  with  honest  pride, 
Of  love  and  duty,  at  their  own  fire-side : 
While  mad  ambition  ever  doth  caress 
Its  own  sure  fate,  in  its  own  restlessness  ! 


&tic  JJiccolotuiu  i ;  ot\  tfic  iFirst  JSart  of  WEalUmtHn. 

A    DRAMA. 

TRANSLATED  FROM  THE  GERMAN  OF  SCHILLER. 


PREFACE. 


It  was  my  intention  to  have  prefixed  a  Life  of  W7al- 
lenstein  to  this  translation;  but  I  found  that  it  must 
either  have  occupied  a  space  wholly  disproportionate 
to  the  nature  of  the  publication,  or  have  been  merely 
n  meagre  catalogue  of  events  narrated  not  more 
fully  than  they  already  are  in  the  Play  itself  The 
recent  translation,  likewise,  of  Schiller's  History  of 
the  Thirty  Years'  War  diminished  the  motives  thereto. 
MS 


In  the  translation  I  endeavored  to  render  my  Author 
literally  wherever  I  was  not  prevented  by  absolute 
differences  of  idiom ;  but  I  am  conscious,  that  in  two 
or  three  short  passages  I  have  been  guilty  of  dilating 
the  original ;  and,  from  anxiety  to  give  the  full 
meaning,  have  weakened  the  force.  In  the  metre  I 
have  availed  myself  of  no  other  liberties  than  those 
which  Schiller  had  permitted  to  himself,  except  the 
occasional  breaking-up  of  the  line  by  the  substitu- 
tion of  a  trochee  for  an  iambic ;  of  which  liberty,  so 
frequent  in  our  tragedies,  I  find  no  instance  in  these 
dramas 

S.  T.  Coleridge 
131 


122 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


THE  PICCOLOMINI,  ETC. 


ACT  I. 

SCENE  I. 

An  old  Gothic  Chamber  in  the  Council-House  at  Pilsen, 
decorated  with  Colors  and  other  War  Insignia. 

Illo  with  Butler  and  Isolani. 

ILLO. 

Ye  have  come  late — but  ye  are  come !  The  distance, 
Count  Isolan,  excuses  your  delay. 

ISOLANI. 

Add  this  too,  that  we  come  not  empty-handed. 
At  Donauwert*  it  was  reported  to  us, 
A  Swedish  caravan  was  on  its  way 
Transporting  a  rich  cargo  of  provision, 
Almost  six  hundred  wagons.     This  my  Croats 
Plunged  down  upon  and  seized,  this  weighty  prize  ! — 
We  bring  it  hither 

ILLO. 

Just  in  time  to  banquet 
The  illustrious  company  assembled  here. 

BUTLER. 

'Tis  all  alive !  a  stirring  scene  here  ! 

ISOLANI. 

Ay! 

The  very  churches  are  all  full  of  soldiers. 

[Casts  his  eye  around. 
And  in  the  Council-house  too,  I  observe, 
You're  settled,  quite  at  home!  Well,  well!  we  soldiers 
Must  shift  and  suit  us  in  what  way  we  can. 

ILLO. 

We  have  the  colonels  here  of  thirty  regiments. 
Vou  '11  find  Count  Tertsky  here,  and  Tiefenbach, 
Kolatto,  Goetz,  Maradas,  Hinnersam, 

The  Piccolomini,  both  son  and  father 

You  '11  meet  with  many  an  unexpected  greeting 
From  many  an  old  friend  and  acquaintance.     Only 
Galas  is  wanting  still,  and  Altringer. 

BUTLER. 

Expect  not  Galas. 

ILLO  (hesitating). 
How  so  ?  Do  you  know 

isolani  (interrupting  him). 
Max.  Piccolomini  here  ? — O  bring  me  to  him. 
I  see  him  yet  ('tis  now  ten  years  ago, 
We  were  engaged  with  Mansfeld  hard  by  Dessau), 
I  see  the  youth,  in  my  mind's  eye  I  see  him, 
Leap  his  black  war-horse  from  the  bridge  adown, 
And  t'ward  his  father,  then  in  extreme  peril, 
Beat  up  against  the  strong  tide  of  the  Elbe. 
The  down  was  scarce  upon  his  chin!  I  hear 
He  has  made  good  the  promise  of  his  youth, 
And  the  full  hero  now  is  finish'd  in  him. 

ILLO. 

You  '11  see  him  yet  ere  evening.     He  conducts 
The  Duchess  Friedland  hither,  and  the  Princesst 
From  Carnthen.     We  expect  them  here  at  noon. 


*  A  town  about  12  German  miles  N.  E.  of  Ulm. 
t  The  dukes  in  Germany  being  always  reigning  powers,  their 
eons  and  daughters  are  entitled  Princes  and  Princesses. 


BUTLER. 

Both  wife  and  daughter  does  the  Duke  call  hither  ? 
He  crowds  in  visitants  from  all  sides. 


ISOLANI. 


Hm! 


So  much  the  better !  I  had  framed  my  mind 
To  hear  of  naught,  but  warlike  circumstance, 
Of  marches,  and  attacks,  and  batteries : 
And  lo !  the  Duke  provides,  that  something  too 
Of  gentler  sort,  and  lovely,  should  be  present 
To  feast  our  eyes. 

illo  (who  has  been  standing  in  the  attitude  of  medi 

iotion,  to  Butler,  whom  he  leads  a  little  on  one 

side). 
And  how  came  you  to  know 
That  the  Count  Galas  joins  us  not  ? 

BUTLER. 

Because 
He  importuned  me  to  remain  behind. 

illo  (with  warmth). 
And  you  ? — You  hold  out  firmly  ? 

[Grasping  his  hand  with  affection. 
Noble  Butler! 

BUTLER. 

After  the  obligation  which  the  Duke 

Had  laid  so  newly  on  me 

illo. 

I  had  forgotten 
A  pleasant  duty — Major-General, 
I  wish  you  joy ! 

ISOLANI. 

What,  you  mean,  of  his  regiment  ? 
I  hear,  too,  that  to  make  the  gift  still  sweeter, 
The  Duke  has  given  him  the  very  same 
In  which  he  first  saw  service,  and  since  then, 
Work'd  himself,  step  by  step,  through  each  preferment. 
From  the  ranks  upwards.     And  verily,  it  gives 
A  precedent  of  hope,  a  spur  of  action 
To  the  whole  corps,  if  once  in  their  remembrance 
An  old  deserving  soldier  makes  his  way. 

BUTLER. 

I  am  perplex'd  and  doubtful,  whether  or  no 

I  dare  accept  this  your  congratulation. 

The  Emperor  has  not  yet  confirm'd  the  appointment 

ISOLANI. 

Seize  it,  friend !  Seize  it !  The  hand  which  in  tha> 

post 
Placed  you,  is  strong  enough  to  keep  you  there, 
Spite  of  the  Emperor  and  his  Ministers  ? 

ILLO. 

Ay,  if  we  would  but  so  consider  it ! — 

If  we  would  all  of  us  consider  it  so ! 

The  Emperor  gives  us  nothing ;  from  the  Duke 

Comes  all — whate'er  we  hope,  whate'er  we  have 

isolani  (to  Illo  J. 
My  noble  brother!  did  I  tell  you  how 
The  Duke  will  satisfy  my  creditors  ? 
Will  be  himself  my  banker  for  the  future, 
Make  me  once  more  a  creditable  man ! — 
And  this  is  now  the  third  time,  think  of  that ! 
This  kingly-minded  man  has  rescued  me 
From  absolute  ruin,  and  restored  my  honor. 

ILLO. 

O  that  his  power  but  kept  pace  with  his  wishes ! 
Why,  friend!   he'd   give  the  whole  world    to  his 

soldiers. 
But  at  Vienna,  brother! — here's  the  grievance! — 
What  politic  schemes  do  they  not  lav  to  shorten 
132 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


123 


His  arm.  and  where  they  can,  to  clip  his  pinions. 
Then  these  new  dainty  requisitions !  these, 
Which  this  same  Questenberg  brings  hither ! — 

BUTLER. 

Ay! 
These  requisitions  of  the  Emperor, — 
I  too  have  heard  about  them ;  but  I  hope 
The  Duke  will  not  draw  back  a  single  inch ! 

ILLO. 

Not  from  his  right  most  surely,  unless  first 
— From  office ! 

butler  {shocked  and  confused). 
Know  you  aught  then  ?   You  alarm  me. 
isolani  (at  the  same  time  with  Butler,  and  in  a  hur- 
rying voice). 
We  should  be  ruin'd,  every  one  of  us ! 
illo. 

No  more ! 
Yonder  I  see  our  worthy  friend*  approaching 
With  the  Lieutenant  General,  Piccolomini. 

butler  (sliaking  his  head  significantly). 
I  fear  we  shall  not  go  hence  as  we  came. 


SCENE  II. 
Enter  Octavio  Piccolomini  and  Questenberg. 
octavio  (still  in  the  distance). 
Ay,  ay !  more  still !  Still  more  new  visitors  ! 
Acknowledge,  friend !  that  never  was  a  camp, 
Which  held  at  once  so  many  heads  of  heroes. 

[Approaching  nearer 
Welcome,  Count  Isolani ! 

isolani. 

My  noble  brother, 
Even  now  am  I  arrived  ;  it  had  been  else  my  duty — 

octavio. 
And  Colonel  Butler — trust  me,  I  rejoice 
Thus  to  renew  acquaintance  with  a  man 
Whose  worth  and  services  I  know  and  honor. 
See,  see,  my  friend  ! 

There  might  we  place  at  once  before  our  eyes 
The  sum  of  war's  whole  trade  and  mystery — 
[Tb  Questenberg,  presenting  Butler  and  Isolani 

at  the  same  time  to  him. 
These  two  the  total  sum — Strength  and  Dispatch. 

questenberg  (to  Octavio). 
And  lo  !  betwixt  them  both,  experienced  Prudence ! 
octavio  (presenting  Questenberg  to  Butler  and 

Isolani). 
The  Chamberlain  and  War-commissioner  Questen- 
berg, 
The  bearer  of  the  Emperor's  behests, 
The  long-tried  friend  and  patron  of  all  soldiers, 
We  honor  in  this  noble  visitor.        [Universal  silence. 

illo  (moving  towards  Questenberg). 
'Tis  not  the  first  time,  noble  Minister, 
You  have  shown  our  camp  this  honor. 
questenberg. 

Once  before, 
I  stood  before  these  colors. 

ILLO. 

Perchance  too  you  remember  where  that  was. 
It  was  at  Znaim  t  in  Moravia,  where 


You  did  present  yourself  upon  the  part 
Of  the  Emperor,  to  supplicate  our  Duke 
That  he  would  straight  assume  the  chief  command. 

questenberg. 
To  supplicate?   Nay,  noble  General ! 
So  far  extended  neither  my  commission 
(At  least  to  my  own  knowledge)  nor  my  zeal. 

ILLO. 

Well,  well,  then — to  compel  him,  if  you  choose. 
I  can  remember  me  right  well,  Count  Tilly 
Had  suffer'd  total  rout  upon  the  Lech. 
Bavaria  lay  all  open  to  the  enemy, 
Whom  there  was  nothing  to  delay  from  pressing 
Onwards  into  the  very  heart  of  Austria. 
At  that  time  you  and  Werdenberg  appear'd 
Before  our  General,  storming  him  with  prayers. 
And  menacing  the  Emperor's  displeasure, 
Unless  he  took  compassion  on  this  wretchedness. 

ISOLANI  (steps  up  to  them). 
Yes,  yes,  'tis  comprehensible  enough, 
Wherefore  with  your  commission  of  to-day 
You  were  not  all  too  willing  to  remember 
Your  former  one. 

questenberg. 

Why  not,  Count  Isolan  ? 
No  contradiction  sure  exists  between  them. 
It  was  the  urgent  business  of  that  time 
To  snatch  Bavaria  from  her  enemy's  hand  ; 
And  my  commission  of  to-day  instructs  me 
To  free  her  from  her  good  friends  and  protectors. 

ILLO. 

A  worthy  office !    After  with  our  blood 

We  have  wrested  this  Bohemia  from  the  Saxon, 

To  be  swept  out  of  it  is  all  our  thanks, 

The  sole  reward  of  all  our  hard-won  victories. 

questenberg. 
Unless  that  wretched  land  be  doomed  to  suffer 
Only  a  change  of  evils,  it  must  be 
Freed  from  the  scourge  alike  of  friend  and  foe. 

ILLO. 

What?   'Twas  a  favorable  year;  the  boors 
Can  answer  fresh  demands  already. 


questenberg. 


Nay, 


*  Spoken  with  a  sneer. 

t  A  town  not  far  from  the  Mine-Mountains,  on  the  high  road 
from  Vienna  to  Prague. 


If  you  discourse  of  herds  and  meadow-grounds — 

ISOLANI. 

The  war  maintains  the  war.    Are  the  boors  ruin'd, 
The  Emperor  gains  so  many  more  new  soldiers. 

questenberg. 
And  is  the  poorer  by  even  so  many  subjects. 

isolani. 
Poh !   We  are  all  his  subjects. 

QUESTENBERG. 

Yet  with  a  difference,  General !   The  one  fills 

With  profitable  industry  the  purse, 

The  others  are  well  skill'd  to  empty  it. 

The  sword  has  made  the  Emperor  poor;  the  plow 

Must  reinvigorate  his  resources. 

isolani. 

Sure ! 
Times  are  not  yet  so  bad.    Methinks  I  see 

[Examining  with  his  eye  the  dress  and  ornaments 
of  Questenberg. 
Good  store  of  gold  that  still  remains  uncoin'd, 

133 


124 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


QUESTENBERG. 

Thank  Heaven !  that  means  have  been  found  out  to 

hide 
Some  little  from  the  fingers  of  the  Croats. 

ILLO. 

There  !    The  Stawata  and  the  Martinitz, 

On  whom  the  Emperor  heaps  his  gifts  and  graces, 

To  the  heart-burning  of  all  good  Bohemians — 

Those  minions  of  court  favor,  those  court  harpies, 

Who  fatten  on  the  wrecks  of  citizens 

Driven  from  their  house  and  home — who  reap  no 

harvests 
Save  in  the  general  calamity — 
Who  now,  with  kingly  pomp,  insult  and  mock 
The  desolation  of  their  country — these, 
Let  these,  and  such  as  these,  support  the  war, 
The  fatal  war,  which  they  alone  enkindled ! 

BUTLER. 

And  those  state-parasites,  who  have  their  feet 
So  constantly  beneath  the  Emperor's  table, 
Who  cannot  let  a  benefice  fall,  but  they 
Snap  at  it  with  dog's  hunger — they,  forsooth, 
Would  pare  the  soldier's  bread,  and  cross  his  reckon- 
ing! 

ISOLANI. 

My  life  long  will  it  anger  me  to  think, 
How  when  I  went  to  court  seven  years  ago, 
To  see  about  new  horses  for  our  regiment, 
How  from  one  antechamber  to  another 
They  dragg'd  me  on,  and  left  me  by  the  hour  . 
To  kick  my  heels  among  a  crowd  of  simpering 
Feast-fatten'd  slaves,  as  if  I  had  come  thither 
A  mendicant  suitor  for  the  crumbs  of  favor 
That  fall  beneath  their  tables.     And,  at  last, 
Whom  should  they  send  me  but  a  Capuchin ! 
Straight  I  began  to  muster  up  my  sins 
For  absolution — but  no  such  luck  for  me  ! 
This  was  the  man,  this  capuchin,  with  whom 
I  was  to  treat  concerning  the  army  horses : 
And  I  was  forced  at  last  to  quit  the  field, 
The  business  unaccomplish'd.     Afterwards 
The  Duke  procured  me,  in  three  days,  what  I 
Could  not  obtain  in  thirty  at  Vienna. 

QUESTENBERG. 

Yes,  yes !  your  travelling  bills  soon  found  their  way 

to  us: 
Too  well  I  know  we  have  still  accounts  to  settle. 

ILLO. 

War  is  a  violent  trade ;  one  cannot  always 

Finish  one's  work  by  soft  means ;  every  trifle 

Must  not  be  blacken'd  into  sacrilege. 

If  we  should  wait  till  you,  in  solemn  council, 

With  due  deliberation  had  selected 

The  smallest  out  of  four-and-twenty  evils, 

I'  faith  we  should  wait  long. — 

"Dash!  and  through  with  it!" — That's  the  better 

watchword. 
Then  after  come  what  may  come.  'Tis  man's  nature 
To  make  the  best  of  a  bad  tiling  once  past, 
A  bitter  and  perplex'd  "  what  shall  I  do?" 
Is  worse  to  man  than  worst  necessity. 

QUESTENBERG. 

Ay,  doubtless,  it  is  true :  the  Duke  does  spare  us 
The  troublesome  task  of  choosing. 

BUTLER. 

Yes,  the  Duke 
Cares  with  a  father's  feelings  for  his  troops; 
But  how  the  Emperor  feels  lor  us,  we  see. 


QUESTENBERG. 

His  cares  and  feelings  all  ranks  share  alike, 
Nor  will  he  offer  one  up  to  another. 

ISOLANI. 

And  therefore  thrusts  he  us  into  the  deserts 
As  beasts  of  prey,  that  so  he  may  preserve 
His  dear  sheep  fattening  in  his  fields  at  home. 

questenberg  (with  a  sneer). 
Count !  this  comparison  you  make,  not  I. 

BUTLER. 

Why,  were  we  all  the  court  supposes  us, 
'Twere  dangerous,  sure,  to  give  us  liberty 

QUESTENBERG. 

You  have  taken  liberty — it  was  not  given  you. 

And  therefore  it  becomes  an  urgent  duty 

To  rein  it  in  with  curbs. 

octavio  (interposing  and  addressing  Questenberg) 

My  noble  friend, 
This  is  no  more  than  a  remembrancing 
That  you  are  now  in  camp,  and  among  warriors. 
The  soldier's  boldness  constitutes  his  freedom. 
Could  he  act  daringly,  unless  he  dared 
Talk  even  so  ?    One  runs  into  the  other. 
The  boldness  of  this  worthy  officer, 

[Pointing  to  BuTLER. 
Which  now  has  but  mistaken  in  its  mark, 
Preserved,  when  naught  but  boldness  could  preserve 

it, 
To  the  Emperor  his  capital  city,  Prague, 
In  a  most  formidable  mutiny 

Of  the  whole  garrison.  [Military  music  at  a  distance 
Hah !  here  they  come 

ILLO. 

The  sentries  are  saluting  them  :  this  signal 
Announces  the  arrival  of  the  Duchess. 

octavio  (to  Questenberg). 
Then  my  son  Max.  too  has  returned.     'T  was  he 
Fetch 'd  and  attended  them  from  Carnthen  hither 

ISOLANI  (to  Illo). 
Shall  we  not  go  in  company  to  greet  them  ? 

ILLO. 

Well,  let  us  go. — Ho !  Colonel  Butler,  come. 

[To  Octavio 
You  '11  not  forget,  that  yet  ere  noon  we  meet 
The  noble  Envoy  at  the  General's  palace. 

[Exeunt  all  but  Questenberg  and  Octavio. 


SCENE  III. 


Questenberg  and  Octavio. 
questenberg  (with  signs  of  aversion  and  astonishment). 
What  have  I  not  been  forced  to  hear,  Octavio ! 
What  sentiments !  what  fierce,  uncurb'd  defiance  ! 
And  were  this  spirit  universal — 
octavio. 

Hm! 
You  are  now  acquainted  with  three-fourths  of  the 
army. 

questenberg. 
Where  must  we  seek  then  for  a  second  host 
To  have  the  custody  of  this  ?   That  Illo 
Thinks  worse,  I  fear  me,  than  he  speaks.    And  then 
This  Butler  too — he  cannot  even  conceal 
The  passionate  workings  of  his  ill  intentions. 

octavio. 
Quickness  of  temper — irritated  pride  ; 
'Twas  nothing  more.     I  cannot  give  up  But]  r 
134 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


125 


I  know  a  spell  that  will  soon  dispossess 
The  e\il  spirit  in  him. 

questenberg  (walking  upand  down  in  evident  disquiet) 

Friend,  friend ! 
O !  this  is  worse,  far  worse,  than  we  had  suffer'd 
Ourselves  to  dream  of  at  Vienna.    There 
We  saw  it  only  with  a  courtier's  eyes, 
Eyes  dazzled  by  the  splendor  of  the  throne. 
We  had  not  seen  the  War-chief,  the  Commander, 
The  man  all-powerful  in  his  camp.    Here,  here, 
'Tis  quite  another  thing. 

Here  is  no  Emperor  more — the  Duke  is  Emperor. 
Alas,  my  friend  !  alas,  my  noble  friend ! 
This  walk  which  you  have  ta'en  me  through  the  camp 
Strikes  my  hopes  prostrate. 

OCTAVIO. 

Now  you  see  yourself 
Of  what  a  perilous  kind  the  office  is, 
Which  you  deliver  to  me  from  the  Court. 
The  least  suspicion  of  the  General 
Costs  me  my  freedom  and  my  life,  and  would 
But  hasten  his  most  desperate  enterprise. 

QUESTENBERG. 

Where  was  our  reason  sleeping  when  we  trusted 
This  madman  with  the  sword,  and  placed  such  power 
In  such  a  hand  ?  I  tell  you,  he  '11  refuse, 
Flatly  refuse,  to  obey  the  Imperial  orders. 
Friend,  he  can  do  't,  and  what  he  can,  he  will. 
And  then  the  impunity»of  his  defiance — 
Oh  !  what  a  proclamation  of  our  weakness ! 

OCTAVIO. 

D'  ye  think  too,  he  has  brought  his  wife  and  daughter 

Without  a  purpose  hither  ?  Here  in  camp ! 

And  at  the  very  point  of  time,  in  which 

We  're  arming  for  the  war  ?  That  he  has  taken 

These,  the  last  pledges  of  his  loyalty, 

Away  from  out  the  Emperor's  domains — 

This  is  no  doubtful  token  of  the  nearness 

Of  some  eruption ! 

QUESTENBERG. 

How  shall  we  hold  footing 
Beneath  this  tempest,  which  collects  itself 
And  threats  us  from  all  quarters  ?  The  enemy 
Of  the  empire  on  our  borders,  now  already 
The  master  of  the  Danube,  and  still  farther, 
And  farther  still,  extending  every  hour ! 
In  our  interior  the  alarum-bells 
Of  insurrection — peasantry  in  arms — 
All  orders  discontented — and  the  army, 
Just  in  the  moment  of  our  expectation 
Of  aidance  from  it — lo !  this  very  army 
Seduced,  run  wild,  lost  to  all  discipline, 
Loosen'd,  and  rent  asunder  from  the  state 
And  from  their  sovereign,  the  blind  instrument 
Of  the  most  daring  of  mankind,  a  weapon 
Of  fearful  power,  which  at  his  will  he  wields ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Nay,  nay,  friencl !  let  us  not  despair  too  soon. 
Men's  words  are  ever  bolder  than  their  deeds : 
And  many  a  resolute,  who  now  appears 
Made  up  to  all  extremes,  will,  on  a  sudden 
Find  in  his  breast  a  heart  he  wot  not  of, 
Let  but  a  single  honest  man  speak  out 
The  true  name  of  his  crime !  Remember  too, 
We  stand  not  yet  so  wholly  unprotected. 
Counts  Altringer  and  Galas  have  maintain'd 


Their  little  army  faithful  to  its  duty, 

And  daily  it  becomes  more  numerous. 

Nor  can  he  take  us  by  surprise  :  you  know 

I  hold  him  all  encompass'd  by  my  listeners. 

Whate'er  he  does,  is  mine,  even  while  'tis  doing — 

No  step  so  small,  but  instantly  I  hear  it ; 

Yea,  his  own  mouth  discloses  it. 

QUESTENBERG. 

'Tis  quite 
Incomprehensible,  that  he  detects  not 
The  foe  so  near ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Beware,  you  do  not  think, 
That  I,  by  lying  arts,  and  complaisant 
Hypocrisy,  have  skulked  into  his  graces : 
Or  with  the  substance  of  smooth  professions 
Nourish  his  all-confiding  friendship !  No — 
Compell'd  alike  by  prudence,  and  that  duty 
Which  we  all  owe  our  country,  and  our  sovereign. 
To  hide  my  genuine  feelings  from  him,  yet 
Ne'er  have  I  duped  him  with  base  counterfeits ! 

QUESTENBERG. 

It  is  the  visible  ordinance  of  Heaven. 

OCTAVIO. 

I  know  not  what  it  is  that  so  attracts 

And  links  him  both  to  me  and  to  my  son. 

Comrades  and  friends  we  always  were — long  hab 

Adventurous  deeds  perform'd  in  company, 

And  all  those  many  and  various  incidents 

Which  store  a  soldier's  memory  with  affections, 

Had  bound  us  long  and  early  to  each  other — 

Yet  I  can  name  the  day,  when  all  at  once 

His  heart  rose  on  me,  and  his  confidence 

Shot  out  in  sudden  growth.    It  was  the  morning 

Before  the  memorable  fight  at  Lutzner. 

Urged  by  an  ugly  dream,  I  sought  him  out, 

To  press  him  to  accept  another  charger. 

At  distance  from  the  tents,  beneath  a  tree, 

I  found  him  in  a  sleep.    When  I  had  waked  him 

And  had  related  all  my  bodings  to  him, 

Long  time  he  stared  upon  me,  like  a  man 

Astounded  ;  thereon  fell  upon  my  neck, 

And  manifested  to  me  an  emotion 

That  far  outstripp'd  the  worth  of  that  small  service. 

Since  then  his  confidence  has  follow'd  me 

With  the  same  pace  that  mine  has  fled  from  him. 

QUESTENBERG. 

You  lead  your  son  into  the  secret  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

No! 

QUESTENBERG. 

What !  and  not  warn  him  either  what  bad  hands 
His  lot  has  placed  him  in  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

I  must  perforce 
Leave  him  in  wardship  to  his  innocence. 
His  young  and  open  soul— dissimulation 
Is  foreign  to  its  habits !  Ignorance 
Alone  can  keep  alive  the  cheerful  air, 
The  unembarrass'd  sense  and  light  free  spirit 
That  make  the  Duke  secure. 

questenberg  (anxiously). 
My  honor'd  friend  !  most  highly  do  I  deem 

Of  Colonel  Piccolomini — yet — if 

Reflect  a  little 

135 


126 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Hush! 


OCTAVIO. 

I  must  venture  it. 
-There  he  comes ! 


SCENE  IV. 


Max.  Piccolomini,  Octavio  Piccolomini, 
questenberg. 

MAX. 

Ha !  there  he  is  himself.    Welcome,  my  father ! 

[He  embraces  his  father.    As  he  turns  round,  he 

observes  Questenberg,  and  draws  back  with 

a  cold  and  reserved  air. 
You  are  engaged,  I  see.  I  '11  not  disturb  you. 

OCTAVIO. 

How,  Max.  ?  Look  closer  at  this  visitor. 
Attention,  Max.,  an  old  friend  merits — Reverence 
Belongs  of  right  to  the  envoy  of  your  sovereign. 

max.  (drily). 
Von  Questenberg ! — Welcome — if  you  bring  with  you 
Aught  good  to  our  head-quarters. 

questenberg  (seizing  his  hand). 

Nay,  draw  not 
Your  hand  away,  Count  Piccolomini ! 
Not  on  mine  own  account  alone  I  seized  it, 
And  nothing  common  will  I  say  therewith. 

[Taking  the  hands  of  both. 
Octavio — Max.  Piccolomini ! 

0  savior  names,  and  full  of  happy  omen ! 

Ne'er  will  her  prosperous  genius  turn  from  Austria, 
While  two  such  stars,  with  blessed  influences 
Beaming  protection,  shine  above  her  hosts. 

MAX. 

Heh ! — Noble  minister !  You  miss  your  part. 

You  came  not  here  to  act  a  panegyric. 

You  're  sent,  I  know,  to  find  fault  and  to  scold  us — 

1  must  not  be  beforehand  with  my  comrades. 

octavio  (to  Max.). 
He  comes  from  court,  where  people  are  not  quite 
So  well  contented  with  the  Duke,  as  here. 

MAX. 

What  now  have  they  contrived  to  find  out  in  him  ? 

That  he  alone  determines  for  himself 

What  he  himself  alone  doth  understand ! 

Well,  therein  he  does  right,  and  will  persist  in 't. 

Heaven  never  meant  him  for  that  passive  thing 

That  can  be  struck  and  hammer'd  out  to  suit 

Another's  taste  and  fancy.    He  '11  not  dance 

To  every  tune  of  every  minister : 

It  goes  against  his  nature — he  can't  do  it. 

He  is  possess'd  by  a  commanding  spirit, 

And  his  too  is  the  station  of  command. 

And  well  for  us  it  is  so !  There  exist 

Few  fit  to  rule  themselves,  but  few  that  use 

Their  intellects  intelligently. — Then 

Well  for  the  whole,  if  there  be  found  a  man, 

Who  makes  himself  what  nature  destined  him, 

The  pause,  the  central  point  to  thousand  thousands — 

Stands  fix'd  and  stately,  like  a  firm-built  column, 

Where  all  may  press  with  joy  and  confidence. 

Now  such  a  man  is  Wallenstein  ;  and  if 

Another  better  suits  the  court — no  other 

But  such  a  one  as  he  can  serve  the  army 

QUESTENBERG 

The  army  ?  Doubtless ! 


octavio  (to  Questenberg). 

Hush  !  Suppress  it,  friend ! 
Unless  some  end  were  answer'd  by  the  utterance. — 
Of  him  there  you  '11  make  nothing. 

max.  (continuing). 

In  their  distress 
They  call  a  spirit  up,  and  when  he  comes, 
Straight  their  flesh   creeps  and  quivers,   and   they 

dread  him 
More  than  the  ills  for  which  they  call'd  him  up. 
The  uncommon,  the  sublime,  must  seem  and  be 
Like  things  of  every  day. — But  in  the  field, 
Ay,  there  the  Present  Being  makes  itself  felt 
The  personal  must  command,  the  actual  eye 
Examine.    If  to  be  the  chieftain  asks 
All  that  is  great  in  nature,  let  it  be 
Likewise  his  privilege  to  move  and  act 
In  all  the  correspondencies  of  greatness. 
The  oracle  within  him,  that  which  lives, 
He  must  invoke  and  question — not  dead  books, 
Not  ordinances,  not  mould-rotted  papers. 

OCTAVIO. 

My  son !  of  those  old  narrow  ordinances 

Let  us  not  hold  too  lightly.  They  are  weights 

Of  priceless  value,  which  oppress'd  mankind 

Tied  to  the  volatile  will  of  their  oppressors. 

For  always  formidable  was  the  league 

And  partnership  of  free  power  with  free  will. 

The  way  of  ancient  ordinance,  though  it  winds, 

Is  yet  no  devious  way.    Straight  forward  goes 

The  lightning's  path,  and  straight  the  fearful  path 

Of  the  cannon-ball.    Direct  it  flies  and  rapid, 

Shattering  that  it  may  reach,  and  shattering  what  u 

reaches. 
My  son  !  the  road,  the  human  being  travels, 
That,  on  which  blessing  comes  and  goes,  doth  follow 
The  river's  course,  the  valley's  playful  windings, 
Curves  round  the  corn-field  and  the  hill  of  vines, 
Honoring  the  holy  bounds  of  property ! 
And  thus  secure,  though  late,  leads  to  its  end. 

questenberg. 
O  hear  your  father,  noble  youth !  hear  him, 
Who  is  at  once  the  hero  and  the  man. 


My  son,  the  nursling  of  the  camp  spoke  in  thee  ! 
A  war  of  fifteen  years 
Hath  been  thy  education  and  thy  school. 
Peace  hast  thou  never  witness'd !  There  exists 
A  higher  than  the  warrior's  excellence. 
In  war  itself  war  is  no  ultimate  purpose. 
The  vast  and  sudden  deeds  of  violence, 
Adventures  wild,  and  wonders  of  the  moment, 
These  are  not  they,  my  son,  that  generate 
The  Calm,  the  Blissful,  and  the  enduring  Mighty ! 
Lo  there  !  the  soldier,  rapid  architect ! 
Builds  his  light  town  of  canvas,  and  at  once 
The  whole  scene  moves  and  bustles  momently, 
With  arms,  and  neighing  steeds,  and  mirth  and  quarrel 
The  motley  market  fills ;  the  roads,  the  streams 
Are  crowded  with  new  freights,  trade  stirs  and  hurries 
But  on  some  morrow  morn,  all  suddenly, 
The  tents  drop  down,  the  horde  renews  its  march 
Dreary,  and  solitary  as  a  church-yard 
The  meadow  and  down-trodden  seed-plot  lio 
And  the  year's  harvest  is  gone  utterly 
136 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


127 


O  let  the  Emperor  make  peace,  my  father ! 
Most  gladly  would  I  give  the  blood-stain'd  laurel 
For  the  first  violet*  of  the  leafless  spring, 
Pluck'd  in  those  quiet  fields  where  I  have  journey'd  ! 

OCTAVIO. 

What  ails  thee  ?  What  so  moves  thee  all  at  once  ? , 

MAX. 

Peace  have  I  ne'er  beheld  ?  I  have  beheld  it. 

From  thence  am  I  come  hither :  O !  that  sight, 

It  glimmers  still  before  me,  like  some  landscape 

Left  in  the  distance, — some  delicious  landscape ! 

My  road  conducted  me  through  countries  where 

The  war  has  not  yet  reach'd.  Life,  life,  my  father — 

My  venerable  father,  Life  has  charms 

Which  we  have  ne'er  experienced.    We  have  been 

But  voyaging  along  its  barren  coasts, 

Like  some  poor  ever-roaming  horde  of  pirates, 

That,  crowded  in  the  rank  and  narrow  ship, 

House  on  the  wild  sea  with  wild  usages, 

Nor  know  aught  of  the  main  land,  but  the  bays 

Where  safeliest  they  may  venture  a  thieves'  landing. 

Whate'er  in  the  inland  dales  the  land  conceals 

Of  fair  and  exquisite,  O !  nothing,  nothing, 

Do  we  behold  of  that  in  our  rude  voyage. 

octavio  (attentive,  with  an  appearance  of 
uneasiness). 
And  so  your  journey  has  reveal'd  this  to  you  ? 

MAX. 

'Twas  the  first  leisure  of  my  life.    O  tell  me, 

What  is  the  meed  and  purpose  of  the  toil, 

The  painful  toil,  which  robb'd  me  of  my  youth, 

Left  me  a  heart  unsoul'd  and  solitary, 

A  spirit  uninform'd,  unornamented, 

For  the  camp's  stir  and  crowd  and  ceaseless  larum, 

The  neighing  war-horse,  the  air-shattering  trumpet, 

The  unvaried,  still  returning  hour  of  duty, 

Word  of  command,  and  exercise  of  arms — 

There  's  nothing  here,  there  's  nothing  in  all  this 

To  satisfy  the  heart,  the  gasping  heart ! 

Mere  bustling  nothingness,  where  the  soul  is  not — 

This  cannot  be  the  sole  felicity, 

These  cannot  be  man's  best  and  only  pleasures ! 

octavio. 
Much  hast  thou  learnt,  my  son,  in  this  short  journey. 

MAX. 

O !  day  thrice  lovely !  when  at  length  the  soldier 

Returns  home  into  life ;  when  he  becomes 

A  fellow-man  among  his  fellow-men. 

The  colors  are  unfurl'd,  the  cavalcade 

Marshals,  and  now  the  buzz  is  hush'd,  and  hark ! 

Now  the  soft  peace-march  beats,  home,  brothers,  home ! 

The  caps  and  helmets  are  all  garlanded 

With  green  boughs,  the  last  plundering  of  the  fields. 

The  city  gates  fly  open  of  themselves, 

They  need  no  longer  the  petard  to  tear  them. 

The  ramparts  are  all  fill'd  with  men  and  women, 

With  peaceful  men  and  women,  that  send  onwards 

Kisses  and  welcomings  upon  the  air, 

Which  they  make  breezy  with  affectionate  gestures. 

From  all  the  towers  rings  out  the  merry  peal, 


In  the  original. 

Den  blut'gen  Lorbeer  geb  ich  hin  mit  Freuden 
Furs  erste  Veilchen,  das  der  Mserz  uns  bringt, 
Das  diirflige  Pfand  der  neuverjiingten  Erde. 


The  joyous  vespers  of  a  bloody  day. 

0  happy  man,  O  fortunate !  for  whom 

The  well-known  door,  the  faithful  arms  are  open, 
The  faithful  tender  arms  with  mute  embracing. 
auESTKNBERG  (apjxirently  much  affected). 
O !  that  you  should  speak 
Of  such  a  distant,  distant  time,  and  not 
Of  the  to-morrow,  not  of  this  to-day. 

max  {turning  round  to  him,  quick  and  vehement). 
Where  lies  the  fault  but  on  you  in  Vienna ! 

1  will  deal  openly  with  you,  Questenberg. 
Just  now,  as  first  I  saw  you  standing  here, 
(I  '11  own  it  to  you  freely)  indignation 
Crowded  and  press'd  my  inmost  soul  together. 
'Tis  ye  that  hinder  peace,  ye! — and  the  warrior, 
It  is  the  warrior  that  must  force  it  from  you. 
Ye  fret  the  General's  life  out,  blacken  him, 
Hold  him  up  as  a  rebel,  and  Heaven  knows 

What  else  still  worse,  because  he  spares  the  Saxons, 

And  tries  to  awaken  confidence  in  the  enemy ; 

Which  yet 's  the  only  way  to  peace :  for  if 

War  intermit  not  during  war,  how  then 

And  whence  can  peace  come  ? — Your  own  plagues 

fall  on  you ! 
Even  as  I  love  what 's  virtuous,  hate  I  you. 
And  here  make  I  this  vow,  here  pledge  myself; 
My  blood  shall  spurt  out  for  this  Wallenstein, 
And  my  heart  drain  off,  drop  by  drop,  ere  ye 
Shall  revel  and  dance  jubilee  o'er  his  ruin.       [Exit 


SCENE  V. 

Questenberg,  Octavio  Piccolomini. 

questenberg. 
Alas,  alas  !  and  stands  it  so  ? 

[Then  in  pressing  and  impatient  tones. 
What,  friend !  and  do  we  let  him  go  away 
In  this  delusion — let  him  go  away  ? 
Not  call  him  back  immediately,  not  open 
His  eyes  upon  the  spot  ? 

octavio  (recovering  himself  out  of  a  deep  study) 
He  has  now  open'd  mine, 
And  I  see  more  than  pleases  me. 

QUESTENBERG. 

What  is  it  ? 
octavio. 

Curse  on  this  journey ! 

QUESTENBERG. 

But  why  so  ?  What  is  it  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

Come,  come  along,  friend !  I  must  follow  up 
The  ominous  track  immediately.  Mine  eyes 
Are  open'd  now7,  and  I  must  use  them.  Come ! 

[Draws  Questenberg  on  with  him. 

QUESTENBERG. 

What  now  ?   Where  go  you  then  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

To  her  herself 

QUESTENBERG. 

octavio  (interrupting  him,  and  correcting  himself). 
To  the  Duke.  Come,  let  us  go — 'Tis  done,  '.is  dune 
I  see  the  net  that  is  thrown  over  him. 
Oh !  he  returns  not  to  me  as  he  went. 

QUESTENBERG 

Nay.  but  explain  yourself. 

137 


128 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


OCTAVIO. 

And  that  I  should  not 
Foresee  it,  not  prevent  this  journey !  Wherefore 
Did  I  keep  it  from  him  ? — You  were  in  the  right. 
I  should  have  vvarn'd  him !  Now  it  is  too  late. 

aUESTE.NBERG. 

But  what 's  too  late  ?  Bethink  yourself,  my  friend, 
That  you  are  talking  absolute  riddles  to  me. 

octavio  {more  collected). 
Come  !  to  the  Duke's.    Tis  close  upon  the  hour, 
Which  he  appointed  you  for  audience.    Come ! 
A  curse,  a  threefold  curse,  upon  this  journey  ! 

[He  leads  Questenberg  off. 


SCENE  VI. 


Changes  to  a  spacious  Chamber  in  the  House  of  the 
Duke  of  Friedland. — Servants  employed  in  putting 
the  tables  and  chairs  in  order.  During  this  enters 
Seni,  like  an  old  Italian  doctor,  in  black  and  clothed 
somewhat  fantastically.  He  carries  a  white  staff, 
with  which  he  marks  out  the  quarters  of  the  heaven. 

FIRST    SERVANT. 

Come — to  it,  lads,  to  it !  Make  an  end  of  it.  I  hear 
the  sentry  call  out,  "  Stand  to  your  arms !"  They  will 
be  there  in  a  minute. 

SECOND  SERVANT. 

Why  were  we  not  told  before  that  the  audience 
would  be  held  here  ?  Nothing  prepared — no  orders 
— no  instructions — 

THIRD  SERVANT. 

Ay,  and  why  was  the  balcony-chamber  counter- 
manded, that  with  the  great  worked  carpet  ? — there 
one  can  look  about  one. 

FIRST  SERVANT. 

Nay,  that  you  must  ask  the  mathematician  there. 
He  says  it  is  an  unlucky  chamber. 

SECOND  SERVANT. 

Poh !  stuff  and  nonsense  !  That 's  what  I  call  a  hum. 
A  chamber  is  a  chamber ;  what  much  can  the  place 
signify  in  the  affair  ? 

seni  {with  gravity). 
My  son,  there's  nothing  insignificant, 
Nothing  !  But  yet  in  every  earthly  thing 
First  and  most  principal  is  place  and  time. 
first  servant  {to  the  second). 

Say  nothing  to  him,  Nat.  The  Duke  himself  must 
let  him  have  his  own  will. 

seni  {counts  the  chairs,  half  in  a  loud,  half  in  a  low 

voice,  till  he  comes  to  eleven,  which  he  repeats). 
Eleven !  an  evil  number !  Set  twelve  chairs. 
Twelve !  twelve  signs  hath  the  zodiac  :  five  and  seven, 
J'he  holy  numbers,  include  themselves  in  twelve. 
second  servant. 
And  what  may  you  have  to  object  against  eleven  ? 
I  should  like  to  know  that  now. 

seni. 
Eleven  is  transgression ;  eleven  oversteps 
The  ten  commandments. 

second  servant. 
That 's  good !  and  why  do  you  call  five  a  holy 
number  ? 

seni. 
Five  is  the  soul  of  man :  for  even  as  man 
Is  mingled  up  of  gaod  and  evil,  so 


The  five  is  the  first  number  that 's  made  up 
Of  even  and  odd. 

second  servant. 
The  foolish  old  coxcomb ! 

first  servant. 
Ey!  let  him  alone  though.    I  like  to  hear  him; 
there  is  more  in  liis  words  than  can  be  seen  at  firs* 
sight. 

third  servant. 
Off,  they  come. 

SECOND  SERVANT. 

There  !  at  the  side-door. 

[They  hurry  off.  Seni  follows  slowly.  A  Page 
brings  the  staff  of  command  on  a  red  cushion, 
and  places  it  on  the  table  near  the  Duke's  chair. 
They  are  announced  from  without,  and  the 
wings  of  the  door  fly  open. 


SCENE  VII. 

Wallenstein,  Duchess. 

wallenstein. 
You  went  then  through  Vienna,  were  presented 
To  the  Queen  of  Hungary  ? 

DUCHESS. 

Yes ;  and  to  the  Empress  too, 
And  by  both  Majesties  were  we  admitted 
To  loss  the  hand. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  how  was  it  received, 
That  I  had  sent  for  wife  and  daughter  hither 
To  the  camp,  in  winter-time  ? 

DUCHESS. 

I  did  even  that 
Which  you  commission'd  me  to  do.    I  told  them, . 
You  had  determined  on  our  daughter's  marriage, 
And  wish'd,  ere  yet  you  went  into  the  field, 
To  show  the  elected  husband  his  betrothed. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  did  they  guess  the  choice  which  I  had  made  ? 

DUCHESS. 

They  only  hoped  and  wish'd  it  may  have  fallen 
Upon  no  foreign  nor  yet  Lutheran  noble. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  you — what  do  you  wish,  Elizabeth  ? 

DUCHESS. 

Your  will,  you  know,  was  always  mine. 
wallenstein  {after  a  pause). 

Well  then  ? 
And  in  all  else,  of  what  kind  and  complexion 
Was  your  reception  at  the  court  ? 

[The  Duchess  casts  her  eyes  on  the  ground,  and 
remains  silent. 
Hide  nothing  from  me.    How  were  you  received  ? 

duchess. 
O!  my  dear  Lord,  all  is  not  what  it  was. 
A  canker-worm,  my  Lord,  a  canker-worm 
Has  stolen  into  the  bud. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Ay !  is  it  so  ? 
What,  they  were  lax  ?  they  fail'd  of  the  old  respect 

duchess. 
Not  of  respect.    No  honors  were  omitted, 
No  outward  courtesy  I  but  in  the  place 
Of  condescending,  confidential  kindness, 
Familiar  and  endearing,  there  were  given  me 
13ti 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


129 


Only  these  honors  and  that  solemn  courtesy. 
Ah !  and  the  tenderness  which  was  put  on, 
It  was  llic  guise  of  pity,  not  of  favor. 
Nj!  Albrecht's  wife.  Duke  Albrecht's  princely  wife, 
Count  Harrach's  noble  daughter,  should  not  so — 
Not  wholly  so  should  she  have  been  received. 
WALLEXSTEIN. 

Yes,  yes ;  they  have  ta'en  offence.    My  latest  con- 
duct. 
They  rail'd  at  it,  no  doubt. 

DUCHESS. 

O  that  they  had  ! 
1  have  been  long  accustom'd  to  defend  you, 
To  heal  and  pacify  distemper'd  spirits. 
No ;  no  one  rail'd  at  you.     They  wrapp'd  them  up, 
O  Heaven  !  in  such  oppressive,  solemn  silence  ! — 
Here  is  no  every-day  misunderstanding, 
No  transient  pique,  no  cloud  that  passes  over : 
Something  most  luckless,  most  unhealable, 
Has  taken  place.     The  Queen  of  Hungary 
Used  formerly  to  call  me  her  dear  aunt, 
And  ever  at  departure  to  embrace  me — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

A'ow  she  omitted  it  ? 

duchess  (wiping  away  her  tears,  after  a  pause). 
She  did  embrace  me, 
But  then  first  when  I  had  already  taken 
My  formal  leave,  and  when  the  door  already 
Had  closed  upon  me,  then  did  she  come  out 
In  haste,  as  she  had  suddenly  bethought  herself, 
And  press'd  me  to  her  bosom,  more  with  anguish 
Than  tenderness. 

wallexsteix  (seizes  her  hand  soothingly). 
Nay.  now  collect  yourself. 
And  what  of  Eggenberg  and  Lichtenstein, 
And  of  our  other  friends  there  ? 

duchess  (shaking  her  head). 

I  saw  none. 

WALLEXSTEIN. 

The  ambassador  from  Spain,  who  once  was  wont 
To  plead  so  warmly  for  me  I — 
duchess. 

Silent,  silent ! 

WALLEXSTEIN. 

These  suns  then  are  eclipsed  for  us.    Henceforward 
Must  we  roll  on,  our  own  fire,  our  own  light. 

duchess. 
And  were  it — were  it,  my  dear  Lord,  in  that 
Which  moved  about  the  court  in  buzz  and  whisper, 
But  in  the  country  let  itself  be  heard 
Aloud — in  that  which  Father  Lamormain 

In  sundry  hints  and 

wallexstein  (eagerly). 

Lamormain !  what  said  he  1 

duchess. 
That  you're  accused  of  having  daringly 
O'erstepp'd  the  powers  intrusted  to  you,  charged 
With  traitorous  contempt  of  the  Emperor 
And  his  supreme  behests.     The  proud  Bavarian, 
He  and  the  Spaniards  stand  up  your  accusers — 
That  there's  a  storm  collecting  over  you 
Of  far  more  fearful  menace  than  that  former  one 
Which  whirl'd  you  headlong  down  at  Regensburg. 

And  people  talk,  said  he,  of Ah! — 

[Stifling  extreme  emotion. 


WALLEXSTEIN. 

10  N 


Proceed ! 


I  cannot  utter  it ! 


WALLEXSTEIN. 

Proceed ! 

DUCHESS. 

They  talk- 

WALLEXSTK1X. 


Well ! 


Of  a  second- 


-Dismission. 


duchess. 
—(catches  her  voice  and  hesitates'; 

WALLEXSTEIN. 

Second 

DUCHESS. 

More  disgraceful 


WALLENSTEIN. 

Talk  they  ? 
[Strides  across  the  Chamber  in  vehement  agitatio 
O  !  they  force,  they  thrust  me 
With  violence  against  my  own  will,  onward  ! 

duchess  (presses  near  to  him,  in  entreaty). 
O !  if  there  yet  be  time,  my  husband  !  if 
By  giving  way  and  by  submission,  this 
Can  be  averted — my  dear  Lord,  give  way ! 
Win  down  your  proud  heart  to  it !   Tell  that  heart, 
It  is  your  sovereign  Lord,  your  Emperor, 
Before  whom  you  retreat.    O  let  no  longer 
Low  tricking  malice  blacken  your  good  meaning 
With  venomous  glosses.    Stand  you  up 
Shielded  and  helm'd  and  weapon'd  with  the  truth 
And  drive  before  you  into  uttermost  shame 
These  slanderous  liars  !  Few  firm  friends  have  we- 
You  know  it ! — The  swift  growth  of  our  good  fortune 
It  hath  but  set  us  up  a  mark  for  hatred. 
What  are  we,  if  the  sovereign's  grace  and  favor 
Stand  not  before  us  ? 


SCENE  VIII. 

Enter  the  Countess  Tertsky,  leading  in  her  hand  tli-- 
Princess  Thekla,  richly  adorned  with  Brilliants. 

Couxtess,  Thekla,  Wallensteix,  Duchess. 

countess. 
How,  sister !    What,  already  upon  business ! 

[Observing  the  countenance  of  the  Duchess 
And  business  of  no  pleasing  kind  I  see, 
Ere  he  has  gladden'd  at  his  child.   The  first 
Moment  belongs  to  joy.     Here,  Friedland !  father ! 
This  is  thy  daughter. 

[Thekla  approaches  with  a  shy  and  timid  air,  and 
lends  herself  as  about  to  kiss  his  hand.  He  receives 
her  in  his  arms,  and  remains  standing  for  sonif 
time  lost  in  the  feeling  of  her  presence. 

WALLEXSTEIN. 

Yes !  pure  and  lovely  hath  hope  risen  on  me  : 
I  take  her  as  the  pledge  of  greater  fortune. 

duchess. 
'Twas  but  a  little  child  when  you  departed 
To  raise  up  that  great  army  for  the  Emperor : 
And  after,  at  the  close  of  the  campaign, 
When  you  return'd  home  out  of  Pomerania, 
Your  daughter  was  already  in  the  convent, 
Wherein  she  has  rernain'd  till  now. 

WALLEXSTEIN. 

The  while 
139 


130 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


We  in  the  field  here  gave  our  cares  and  toils 
To  make  her  great,  and  fight  her  a  free  way 
To  the  loftiest  earthly  good  ;  lo !  mother  Nature 
Within  the  peaceful  silent  convent  walls 
Has  done  her  part,  and  out  of  her  free  grace 
Hath  she  bestovv'd  on  the  beloved  child 
The  godlike ;  and  now  leads  her  thus  adorn'd 
To  meet  her  splendid  fortune,  and  my  hope. 

DUCHESS  (to  TltEKLA). 

Thou  wouldst  not  have  recognized  thy  father, 
Wouldst  thou,  my  child  ?    She  counted  scarce  eight 

years, 
When  last  she  saw  your  face. 

THEKLA. 

O  yes,  yes,  mother ! 
At  the  first  glance  ! — My  father  is  not  alter'd. 
The  form  that  stands  before  me  falsifies 
No  feature  of  the  image  that  hath  lived 
So  long  within  me  ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  voice  of  my  child  !   • 

[Then  after  a  pause. 
I  was  indignant  at  my  destiny, 
That  it  denied  me  a  man-child  to  be 
Heir  of  my  name  and  of  my  prosperous  fortune, 
And  re-illume  my  soon  extinguish'd  being 
In  a  proud  line  of  princes. 
I  wrong'd  my  destiny.     Here  upon  this  head, 
So  lovely  in  its  maiden  bloom,  will  I 
Let  fall  the  garland  of  a  life  of  war, 
Nor  deem  it  lost,  if  only  1  can  wreath  it, 
Transmitted  to  a  regal  ornament, 
Around  these  beauteous  brows. 

[He  clasps  her  in  his  arms  as  Piccolomini  enters. 


SCENE  IX. 


Enter  Max.  Piccolomini,  and  some  time  after  Count 
Tertsky,  the  others  remaining  as  before. 

COUNTESS. 

There  comes  the  Paladin  who  protected  us. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Max. !  Welcome,  ever  welcome  !  Always  wert  thou 
The  morning-star  of  my  best  joys ! 

MAX. 

My  General 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Till  now  it  was  the  Emperor  who  rewarded  thee, 
I  but  the  instrument.     This  day  thou  hast  bound 
The  father  to  thee,  Max. !  the  fortunate  father, 
And  this  debt  Friedland's  self  must  pay. 

■     MAX. 

My  prince ! 
You  made  no  common  hurry  to  transfer  it. 
I  come  with  shame :  yea,  not  without  a  pang! 
For  scarce  have  I  arrived  here,  scarce  deliver'd 
The  mother  and  the  daughter  to  your  arms, 
But  there  is  brought  to  me  from  your  equerry 
A  splendid  richly-plated  hunting-dress 

So  to  remunerate  me  for  my  troubles 

Yes,  yes,  remunerate  me  !  Since  a  trouble 
It  must  be,  a  mere  office,  not  a  favor 
Which  I  leapt  forward  to  receive,  and  which 
1  came  already  with  full  heart  to  thank  you  for. 


No !  'twas  not  so  intended,  that  my  business 
Should  be  my  highest  best  good-fortune ! 

[Tertsk  y  enters,  and  delivers  letters  to  the  DuKU 
which  he  breaks  open  hurryingly. 
countess  (to  Max.). 
Remunerate  your  trouble !    For  his  joy 
He  makes  you  recompense.    'Tis  not  unfitting 
For  you,  Count  Piccolomini,  to  feel 
So  tenderly — my  brother  it  beseems 
To  show  himself  for  ever  great  and  princely. 

THEKLA. 

Then  I  too  must  have  scruples  of  his  love ; 
For  his  munificent  hands  did  ornament  me 
Ere  yet  the  father's  heart  had  spoken  to  me. 

MAX. 

Yes ;  'tis  his  nature  ever  to  be  giving 
And  making  happy. 

[He  grasps  the  hand  of  the  Duchess  with  still  in- 
creasing warmth. 

How  my  heart  pours  out 
Its  all  of  thanks  to  him !  O !  how  I  seem 
To  utter  all  things  in  the  dear  name  Friedland. 
While  I  shall  live,  so  long  will  I  remain 
The  captive  of  this  name  :  in  it  shall  bloom 
My  every  fortune,  every  lovely  hope. 
Inextricably  as  in  some  magic  ring 
In  this  name  hath  my  destiny  charm-bound  me ! 
countess  (who  during  this  time  has  been  anxiously 
watching  the  Duke,  and  remarks  that  he  is  lost  in 
thought  over  the  letters). 
My  brother  wishes  us  to  leave  him.     Come. 
wallenstein  (turns  himself  round  quick,  collects  him- 
self, and  speaks  icilh  cheerfulness  lo  the  Duchess), 
Once  more  I  bid  thee  welcome  to  the  camp. 
Thou  art  the  hostess  of  this  court.     You,  Max., 
Will  now  again  administer  your  old  office, 
While  we  perform  the  sovereign's  business  here. 
[Max.  Piccolomini  offers  the  Duchess  his  arm  ;  (he 
Countess  accompanies  the  Princess, 
tertsky  (calling  after  him). 
Max.,  we  depend  on  seeing  you  at  the  meeting. 


SCENE  X. 


Wallenstein,  Count  Tertsky. 

wallenstein  (in  deep  thought  to  himself). 
She  hath  seen  all  things  as  they  are — It  is  so, 
And  squares  completely  with  my  other  notices. 
Tliev  have  determined  finally  in  Vienna, 
Have  given  me  my  successor  already; 
It  is  the  king  of  Hungary,  Ferdinand, 
The  Emperor's  delicate  son  !  he  's  now  their  saviur 
He's  the  new  star  that's  rising  now  !  Of  us 
They  think  themselves  already  fairly  rid, 
And  as  we  were  deceased,  the  heir  already 
Is  entering  on  possession — Therefore — dispatch  ! 
[As  he  turns  round  he  observes  Tertsky,  and  gives 
him  a  letter. 
Count  Altringer  will  have  himself  excused. 
And  Galas  too — I  like  not  this ! 
tertsky. 

And  if 
Thou  loiterest  longer,  all  will  fall  away, 
One  following  the  other. 

wallenstein. 
Altringer 

140 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


131 


Is  master  of  the  Tyrol  passes.     I  must  forthwith 
Send  some  one  to  him,  that  he  let  not  in 
The  Spaniards  on  me  from  the  Milanese. 

Well,  and  the  old  Sesin,  that  ancient  trader 

In  contraband  negotiations,  he 

Has  shown  himself  again  of  late.     What  brings  he 

From  the  Count  Thur  ? 

TERTSKY. 

The  Count  communicates, 
He  has  found  out  the  Swedish  chancellor 
At  Halberstadt,  where  the  convention's  held, 
Who  says,  you  've  tired  him  out,  and  that  he  '11  have 
No  further  dealings  with  you. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  why  so  ? 

TERTSKY. 

He  says,  you  are  never  in  earnest  in  your  speeches ; 
That  you  decoy  the  Swedes — to  make  fools  of  them ; 
Will  league  yourself  with  Saxony  against  them, 
And  at  last  make  yourself  a  riddance  of  them 
With  a  paltry  sum  of  money. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

So  then,  doubtless, 
Yes,  doubtless,  this  same  modest  Swede  expects 
That  I  shall  yield  him  some  fair  German  tract 
For  his  prey  and  booty,  that  ourselves  at  last 
On  our  own  soil  and  native  territory, 
May  be  no  longer  our  own  lords  and  masters ! 
An  excellent  scheme !  No,  no !  They  must  be  off, 
Off,  off!  away !  we  want  no  such  neighbors. 

TERTSKY. 

Nay,  yield  them  up  that  dot,  that  speck  of  land — 
It  goes  not  from  your  portion.     If  you  win 
The  game,  what  matters  it  to  you  who  pays  it  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Off  with  them,  off!  Thou  understand'st  not  this. 
Never  shall  it  be  said  of  me,  I  parcell'd 
My  native  land  away,  dismember'd  Germany, 
Betray'd  it  to  a  foreigner,  in  order 
To  come  with  stealthy  tread,  and  filch  away 
My  own  share  of  the  plunder — Never!  never! — 
No  foreign  power  shall  strike  root  in  the  empire, 
And  least  of  all,  these  Goths  !  these  hunger-wolves ! 
Who  send  such  envious,  hot  and  greedy  glances 
Towards  the  rich  blessings  of  our  German  lands ! 
I  '11  have  their  aid  to  cast  and  draw  my  nets, 
But  not  a  single  fish  of  all  the  draught 
Shall  they  come  in  for. 

TERTSKY. 

You  will  deal,  however, 
More  fairly  with  the  Saxons  ?  They  lose  patience 
While  you  shift  ground  and  make  so  many  curves. 
Say,  to  what  purpose  all  these  masks  ?  Your  friends 
Are  plunged  in  doubts,  baffled,  and  led  astray  in  you. 
There 's  Oxenstein,  there 's  Arnheim — neither  knows 
What  he  should  think  of  your  procrastinations, 
And  in  the  end  I  prove  the  liar ;  all 
Passes  through  me.     I  have  not  even  your  hand- 
writing. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  never  give  my  handwriting ;  thou  knowest  it 

TERTSKY. 

But  how  can  it  be  known  that  you're  in  earnest, 

If  the  act  follows  not  upon  the  word  ? 

You  must  yourself  acknowledge,  that  in  all 

Your  intercourses  hitherto  with  the  enemy, 

You  might  have  done  with  safety  all  you  have  done, 


Had  you  meant  nothing  further  than  to  gull  him 
For  the  Emperor's  service. 

wallenstein  (after  a  jmitsc,  during  which  he 
looks  narrowly  on  TSRTSKl  , 

And  from  whence  dost  than  know 
That  I'm  not  gulling  him  for  the  Emperor's  service  ? 
Whence  knowest  thou  that  I  'm  not  gulling  all  of  you? 
Dost  thou  know  me  so  well  ?  When  made  I  thee 
The  intendant  of  my  secret  purposes  ? 
I  am  not  conscious  that  I  ever  open'd 
My  inmost  thoughts  to  thee.  The  Emperor,  it  is  true. 
Hath  dealt  with  me  amiss;  and  if  I  would, 
I  coidd  repay  him  with  usurious  interest 
For  the  evil  he  hath  done  me.    It  delights  me 
To  know  my  power;  but  whether  I  shall  use  it, 
Of  that,   I  should   have   thought   that  thou  couldst 

speak 
No  wiselier  than  thy  fellows. 

TERTSKY. 

So  hast  thou  always  play'd  thy  game  with  us. 

[Enter  Ilj  o 


SCENE  XI. 


ILLO,   WALLENSTEIN,   TERTSKY. 
WALLENSTEIN. 

How  stand  affairs  without  ?  Are  they  prepared  ? 

ILLO. 

You  '11  find  them  in  the  very  mood  you  wish 
They  know  about  the  Emperor's  requisitions, 
And  are  tumultuous. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

How  hath  Isolan 
Declared  himself? 

ILLO. 

He's  yours,  both  soul  and  body, 
Since  you  built  up  again  his  Faro-bank. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  which  way  doth  Kolatto  bend  ?  Hast  thou 
Made  sure  of  Tiefenbach  and  Deodate  ? 

ILLO. 

What  Piccolomini  does,  that  they  do  too. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

You  mean,  then,  I  may  venture  somewhat  with  them  ? 

ILLO. 

— If  you  are  assured  of  the  Piccolomini. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Not  more  assured  of  mine  own  self. 

TERTSKY. 

And  yet 
I  would  you  trusted  not  so  much  to  Octavio, 
The  fox ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Thou  teachest  me  to  know  my  man  ? 
Sixteen  campaigns  I  have  made  with  that  old  warrior 
Besides,  I  have  his  horoscope  : 
We  both  are  born  beneath  like  stars — in  short, 

[  With  an  air  of  mystery 
To  this  belongs  its  own  particular  aspect, 
If  therefore  thou  canst  warrant  me  the  rest 

ILLO. 

There  is  among  them  all  but  this  one  voice, 
You  must  not  lay  down  the  command.    I  hear 
They  mean  to  send  a  deputation  to  you. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

If  I  'm  in  aught  to  bind  myself  to  them, 
They  too  must  bind  themselves  to  me. 

141 


132 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Of  course. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Their  words  of  honor  they  must  give,  their  oaths, 
Give  them  in  writing  to  me,  promising 
Devotion  to  my  service  unconditional. 

ILLO. 

Why  not  ? 

TERTSKY. 

Devotion  unconditional? 
The  exception  of  their  duties  towards  Austria 
They'll  always  place  among  the  premises. 
With  this  reserve 

wallenstein  {shaking  his  head). 
All  unconditional .' 
No  premises,  no  reserves. 

ILLO. 

A  thought  has  struck  me. 
Does  not  Count  Tertsky  give  us  a  set  banquet 
This  evening  ? 

TERTSKY. 

Yes ;  and  all  the  Generals 
Have  been  invited. 

illo  (to  Wallenstein). 

Say,  will  you  here  fully 
Commission  me  to  use  my  own  discretion  ? 
I  '11  gain  for  you  the  Generals'  words  of  honor, 
Even  as  you  wish. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Gain  me  their  signatures! 
How  you  come  by  them,  that  is  your  concern. 

ILLO. 

And  if  I  bring  it  to  you,  black  on  white, 
That  all  the  leaders  who  are  present  here 
Give  themselves  up  to  you,  without  condition ; 
Say,  will  you  then — then  will  you  show  yourself 
In  earnest,  and  with  some  decisive  action 
Make  trial  of  your  luck  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  signatures! 
Gain  me  the  signatures. 

ILLO. 

Seize,  seize  the  hour, 
Ere  it  slips  from  you.     Seldom  comes  the  moment 
In  life,  which  is  indeed  sublime  and  weighty. 
To  make  a  great  decision  possible, 
O  !  many  things,  all  transient  and  all  rapid, 
Must  meet  at  once  :  and,  haply,  they  thus  met 
May  by  that  confluence  be  enforced  to  pause 
Time  long  enough  for  wisdom,  though  too  short, 
Far,  far  too  short  a  time  for  doubt  and  scruple ! 
This  is  that  moment.     See,  our  army  chieftains, 
Our  best,  our  noblest,  are  assembled  around  you, 
Their  king-like  leader !  On  your  nod  they  wait. 
The  single  threads,  which  here  your  prosperous  for- 
tune 
Hath  woven  together  in  one  potent  web 
Instinct  with  destiny,  O  let  them  not 
Unravel  of  themselves.    If  you  permit 
These  chiefs  to  separate,  so  unanimous 
Bring  you  them  not  a  second  time  together. 
Tis  the  high  tide  that  heaves  the  stranded  ship, 
And  every  individual's  spirit  waxes 
In  the  great  stream  of  multitudes.     Behold 
They  are  still  here,  here  still !  But  soon  the  war 
Bursts  them  once  more  asunder,  and  in  small 
Particular  anxieties  and  interests 
Scatters  their  spirit,  and  the  sympathy 


Of  each  man  with  the  whole.     He  who  to-day 
Forgets  himself,  forced  onward  with  the  stream, 
Will  become  sober,  seeing  but  himself, 
Feel  only  his  own  weakness,  and  with  speed 
Will  face  about,  and  march  on  in  the  old 
High  road  of  duty,  the  old  broad  trodden  road, 
And  seek  but  to  make  shelter  in  good  plight. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  time  is  not  yet  come. 

TERTSKY. 

So  you  say  always. 
But  when  will  it  be  time  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

When  I  shall  say  it 

ILLO. 

You'll  wait  upon  the  stars,  and  on  their  hours, 
Till  the  earthly  hour  escapes  you.    O,  believe  me, 
In  your  own  bosom  are  your  destiny's  stars. 
Confidence  in  yourself,  prompt  resolution, 
This  is  your  Venus !  and  the  soul  malignant, 
The  only  one  that  harmeth  you,  is  Doubt. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Thou  speakest  as  thou  understand'st.     How  oft 
And  many  a  time  I've  told  thee,  Jupiter, 
That  lustrous  god,  was  setting  at  thy  birth. 
Thy  visual  power  subdues  no  mysteries ; 
Mole-eyed,  thou  mayest  but  burrow  in  the  earth, 
Blind  as  that  subterrestrial,  who  with  wan, 
Lead-color'd  shine  lighted  thee  into  life. 
The  common,  the  terrestrial,  thou  mayest  see, 
With  serviceable  cunning  knit  together 
The  nearest  with  the  nearest;  and  therein 
I  trust  thee  and  believe  thee  !  but  whate'er 
Full  of  mysterious  import  jVature  weaves 
And  fashions  in  the  depths — the  spirit's  ladder, 
That  from  this  gross  and  visible  world  of  dust 
Even  to  the  starry  world,  with  thousand  rounds, 
Builds  itself  up;  on  which  the  unseen  powers 
Move  up  and  down  on  heavenly  ministries — 
The  circles  in  the  circles,  that  approach 
The  central  sun  with  ever-narrowing  orbit — 
These  see  the  glance  alone,  the  unsealed  eye, 
Of  Jupiter's  glad  children  born  in  lustre. 

[He  walks  across  the  chamber,  then  returns,  and 
standing  still,  proceeds. 
The  heavenly  constellations  make  not  merely 
The  day  and  nights,  summer  and  springy  not  merely 
Signify  to  the  husbandman  the  seasons 
Of  sowing  and  of  harvest.     Human  action, 
That  is  the  seed  too  of  contingencies, 
Strew'd  on  the  dark  land  of  futurity 
In  hopes  to  reconcile  the  powers  of  fate. 
Whence  it  behoves  us  to  seek  out  the  seed-time, 
To  watch  the  stare,  select  their  proper  hours, 
And  trace  with  searching  eye  the  heavenly  houses 
Whether  the  enemy  of  growth  and  thriving 
Hide  himself  not,  malignant,  in  his  comer. 
Therefore  permit  me  my  own  time.     Meanwhile 
Do  you  your  part.     As  yet  I  cannot  say 
What  I  shall  do — only,  give  way  I  will  not. 
Depose  me  too  they  shall  not.     On  these  points 
You  may  rely. 

page  {entering). 
My  Lords,  the  Generals. 


WALLENSTEIN. 


Let  them  come  in. 


142 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


133 


scene  xn. 

Wallenstein,  Tertsky.Illo. — To  them  enter  Ques- 
tenberg, Octavio  and  Max.  Piccolomini,  But- 
ler, Isolaxi,  Maradas,  and  three  other  Generals. 
Wallenstein  motions  Questexberg,  who  in  con- 
sequence takes  the  chair  it i recti y  opposite  to  him;  the 
others  follow,  arranging  themselves  according  to 
their  rank.     There  reigns  a  momentary  silence. 

wallexstein. 
I  have  understood,  'tis  true,  the  sum  and  import 
Of  your  instructions,  Questenberg;    have  weigh'd 

them, 
And  form'd  my  final,  absolute  resolve : 
Yet  it  seems  fitting,  that  the  Generals 
Should  hear  the  will  of  the  Emperor  from  your  mouth. 
May 't  please  you  then  to  open  your  commission 
Before  these  noble  Chieftains  ? 

questenberg 

I  am  ready 
To  obey  you ;  but  will  first  entreat  your  Highness, 
And  all  these  noble  Chieftains,  to  consider, 
The  Imperial  dignity  and  sovereign  right 
Speaks  from  my  mouth,  and  not  my  own  presumption. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

We  excuse  all  preface. 

questenberg. 

When  his  Majesty 
The  Emperor  to  his  courageous  armies 
Presented  in  the  person  of  Duke  Friedland 
A  most  experienced  and  renown'd  commander, 
He  did  it  in  glad  hope  and  confidence 
To  give  thereby  to  the  fortune  of  the  war 
A  rapid  and  auspicious  change.     The  onset 
Was  lavorable  to  his  royal  wishes. 
Bohemia  was  deliver'd  from  the  Saxons, 
The  Swede's  career  of  conquest  check'd !  These  lands 
Began  to  draw  breath  freely,  as  Duke  Friedland 
From  all  the  streams  of  Germany  forced  hither 
The  scatter'd  armies  of  the  enemy ; 
Hither  invoked  as  round  one  magic  circle 
The  Rhinegrave,  Bernhard,  Banner,  Oxenstein, 
Yea,  and  that  never-conquer'd  King  himself; 
Here  finally,  before  the  eye  of  Niirnberg, 
The  fearful  game  of  battle  to  decide. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

May't  please  you,  to  the  point. 

qiestenberg. 
In  Nurnberg's  camp  the  Swedish  monarch  left 
His  fame — in  Liitzen's  plains  his  life.     But  who 
Stood  not  astounded,  when  victorious  Friedland 
After  this  day  of  triumph,  this  proud  day, 
March'd  toward  Bohemia  with  the  speed  of  flight, 
And  vanish'd  from  the  theatre  of  war; 
While  the  young  Weimar  hero  forced  his  way 
Into  Franconia,  to  the  Danube,  like 
Some  delving  winter-stream,  which,  where  it  rushes, 
Makes  its  own  channel ;  with  such  Sudden  speed 
He  march'd,  and  now  at  once  'fore  Regenspurg 
Stood  to  the  affright  of  all  good  Catholic  Christiaas. 
Then  did  Bavaria's  well-deserving  Prince 
Entreat  swift  aidance  in  his  extreme  need  ; 
The  Emperor  sends  seven  horsemen  to  Duke  Fried- 
land, 
Seven  horsemen  couriers  sends  he  with  the  entreaty 
He  superadds  h  s  own,  and  supplicates 
Where  as  the  sovereign  lord  he  can  command. 
N2 


In  vain  his  supplication !  At  this  moment 
The  Duke  hears  only  his  old  hate  and  grudge, 
Barters  the  general  good  to  gratify 
Private  revenge — and  so  falls  Regenspurg. 

\\   M.I.KNSTF.IN 

Max.,  to  what  period  of  the  war  alludes  he? 
My  recollection  fails  me  here ! 


He  means 


When  we  were  in  Silesia. 


WALLENSTEIN. 

Ay  !  is  it  so  ? 
But  what  had  we  to  do  there  ? 

MAX. 

•        To  beat  out 
The  Swedes  and  Saxons  from  the  province. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

True , 

In  that  description  which  the  Minister  gave 
I  seem'd  to  have  forgotten  the  whole  war. 

[To  Questenberg. 
Well,  but  proceed  a  little. 

questenberg. 

Yes ;  at  length 
Beside  the  river  Oder  did  the  Duke 
Assert  his  ancient  fame.     Upon  the  fields 
Of  Steinau  did  the  Swedes  lay  down  their  arms, 
Subdued  without  a  blow.     And  here,  with  others 
The  righteousness  of  Heaven  to  his  avenger 
Deliver'd  that  long-practised  stirrer-up 
Of  insurrection,  that  curse-laden  torch 
And  kindler  of  this  war,  Matthias  Thur. 
But  he  had  fallen  into  magnanimous  hands  ; 
Instead  of  punishment  he  found  reward, 
And  with  rich  presents  did  the  Duke  dismiss 
The  arch-foe  of  his  Emperor. 

WALLENSTEIN  (laughs). 

I  know, 
I  know  you  had  already  in  Vienna 
Your  windows  and  balconies  all  forestall'd 
To  see  him  on  the  executioner's  cart. 
I  might  have  lost  the  battle,  lost  it  too 
With  infamy,  and  still  retain'd  your  graces- 
But,  to  have  cheated  them  of  i  spectacle, 
Oh !  that  the  good  folks  of  Vicuna  never, 
No,  never  can  forgive  me'. 

QUESTENBERG. 

So  Silesia 
Was  freed,  and  all  things  loudly  call'd  the  Duke 
Into  Bavaria,  now  press'd  hard  on  all  sides. 
And  he  did  put  his  troops  in  motion:  slowly, 
Quite  at  his  ease,  and  by  the  longest  road 
He  traverses  Bohemia  ;  but  ere  ever 
He  hath  once  seen  the  enemy,  faces  round, 
Breaks  up  the  march,  and  takes  to  winter-quarters 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  troops  were  pitiably  destitute 
Of  every  necessary,  every  comfort. 
The  winter  came.     What  thinks  his  Majesty 
His  troops  are  made  of?  A  n't  we  men?  subjecteu 
Like  other  men  to  wet,  and  cold,  and  all 
The  circumstances  of  necessity  ? 
O  miserable  lot  of  the  poor  soldier! 
Wherever  he  comes  in,  all  flee  before  him, 
And  when  he  goes  away,  the  general  curse 
Follows  him  on  his  route.     All  must  be  seized, 

143 


184 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Nothing  is  given  him.     And  compell'd  to  seize 
From  every  man,  he's  every  man's  abhorrence. 
Behold,  here  stand  my  Generals.     Karaffa! 
Count  Deodate  !  Butler !  Tell  this  man 
How  long  the  soldiers'  pay  is  in  arrears. 

BUTLER. 

Already  a  full  year. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  'tis  the  hire 
That  constitutes  the  hireling's  name  and  duties, 
The  soldier's  pay  is  the  soldier's  covenant* 

QUESTENBERG. 

Ah  !  this  is  a  far  other  tone  from  that, 

In  which  the  Duke  spoke  eight,  nine  years  ago. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Yes !  'tis  my  fault,  I  know  it :  I  myself 

Have  spoilt  the  Emperor  by  indulging  him. 

Nine  years  ago,  during  the  Danish  war, 

T  raised  him  up  a  force,  a  mighty  force, 

Forty  or  fifty  thousand  men,  that  cost  him 

Of  his  own  purse  no  doit.     Through  Saxony 

The  fury  goddess  of  the  war  march'd  on, 

E'en  to  the  surf-rocks  of  the  Baltic,  bearing 

The  terrors  of  his  name.     That  was  a  time ! 

In  the  whole  Imperial  realm  no  name  like  mine 

Honor'd  with  festival  and  celebration — 

And  Albrecht  Wallenstein,  it  was  the  title 

Of  the  third  jewel  in  his  crown! 

But  at  the  Diet,  when  the  Princes  met 

At  Regensburg,  there,  there  the  whole  broke  out, 

There  'twas  laid  open,  there  it  was  made  known, 

Out  of  what  money-bag  I  had  paid  the  host. 

And  what  was  now  my  thank,  what  had  I  now, 

That  I,  a  faithful  servant  of  the  Sovereign, 

Had  loaded  on  myself  the  people's  curses, 

And  let  the  Princes  of  the  empire  pay 

The  expenses  of  this  war,  that  aggrandizes 

The  Emperor  alone — What  thanks  had  I  ? 

What  ?  I  was  ofFer'd  up  to  their  complaints, 

Dismiss'd,  degraded  ! 

QUESTENBERG. 

But  your  Highness  knows 
What  little  freedom  he  possess'd  of  action 
In  that  disastrous  Diet. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Death  and  hell ! 
I  had  that  which  could  have  procured  him  freedom, 
No !  since  't  was  proved  so  inauspicious  to  me 
To  serve  the  Emperor  at  the  empire's  cost, 
I  have  been  taught  far  other  trains  of  thinking 
Of  the  empire,  and  the  diet  of  the  empire. 
From  the  Emperor,  doubtless,  I  received  this  staff, 
But  now  I  hold  it  as  the  empire's  general — 
For  the  common  weal,  the  universal  interest, 
And  no  more  for  that  one  man's  aggrandizement ! 
But  to  the  point.     What  is  it  that's  desired  of  me  ? 

QUESTENBERG. 

First,  his  Imperial  Majesty  hath  will'd 


*  The  original  is  not  translatable  into  English ; 

Und  sein  Sold 

Muss  dem  Soldaten  werden,  darnach  heisst  er. 
It  might  perhaps  have  been  thus  rendered  : 

And  that  for  which  he  sold  his  services, 
The  soldier  must  receive. 
But  a  false  or  doubtful  etymology  is  no  more  than  a  dull  pun 


That  without  pretexts  of  delay  the  army 
Evacuate  Bohemia. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

In  this  season  ? 
And  to  what  quarter  wills  the  Emperor 
That  we  direct  our  course  ? 

QUESTENBERG. 

To  the  enemy. 
His  Majesty  resolves,  that  Regensburg 
Be  purified  from  the  enemy  ere  Easter, 
That  Lutheranism  may  be  no  longer  preach'd 
In  that  cathedral,  nor  heretical 
Defilement  desecrate  the  celebration 
Of  that  pure  festival. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

My  generals, 
Can  this  be  realized  ? 

ILLO. 

'Tis  not  possible. 

BUTLER. 

It  can't  be  realized. 

QUESTENBERG. 

The  Emperor 
Already  hath  commanded  Colonel  Suys 
To  advance  toward  Bavaria. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  did  Suys  ? 

QUESTENBERG. 

That  which  his  duty  prompted.     He  advanced ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What !  he  advanced  ?  And  I,  his  general, 
Had  given  him  orders,  peremptory  orders, 
Not  to  desert  his  station !  Stands  it  thus 
With  my  authority  ?  Is  this  the  obedience 
Due  to  my  office,  which  being  thrown  aside, 
No  war  can  be  conducted  ?  Chieftains,  speak. 
You  be  the  judges,  generals !  What  deserves 
That  officer,  who  of  his  oath  neglectful 
Is  guilty  of  contempt  of  orders  ? 

ILLO. 

Death. 
wallenstein  (raising  his  voice,  as  all,  but  Illo,  had 

remained  silr.nt,  and  seemingly  scrupidous). 
Count  Piccolomini !  what  has  he  deserved  ? 

max.  piccolomini  (after  a  long  pause). 
According  to  the  letter  of  the  law, 
Death. 

ISOLANI. 

Death. 

BUTLER. 

Death,  by  the  laws  of  war. 
[Questenberg  rises  from  his  seat,  Wallenstein 
follows  ;  all  the.  rest  rise. 

wallenstein. 
To  this  the  law  condemns  him,  and  not  I. 
And  if  I  show  him  favor,  'twill  arise 
From  the  reverence  that  I  owe  my  Emperor 

QUESTENBERG. 

If  so,  I  can  say  nothing  further — here! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  accepted  the  command  but  on  conditions  : 

And  this  the  first,  that  to  the  diminution 

Of  my  authority  no  human  being, 

Not  even  the  Emperor's  self,  should  be  entitled 

To  do  aught,  or  to  say  aught,  with  the  army. 

If  I  stand  warranter  of  the  event, 

144 


THE  PICC0L0MIN1. 


135 


Placing  my  honor  and  my  head  in  pledge, 
Needs  must  I  have  full  mastery  in  all 
The  means  thereto.    What  render'd  this  Gustavus 
Resistless,  and  unconquer'd  upon  earth  ? 
This — that  he  was  the  monarch  in  his  army ! 
A  monarch,  one  who  is  indeed  a  monarch, 
Was  never  yet  subdued  but  by  his  equal. 
But  to  the  point !  The  best  is  yet  to  come. 
Attend  now,  generals ! 

aUESTENBERG. 

The  Prince  Cardinal 
Begins  his  route  at  the  approach  of  spring 
From  the  Milanese ;  and  leads  a  Spanish  army 
Through  Germany  into  the  Netherlands. 
That  he  may  march  secure  and  unimpeded, 
'Tis  the  Emperor's  will  you  grant  him  a  detachment 
Of  eight  horse  regiments  from  the  army  here. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Yes,  yes  !  I  understand  ! — Eight  regiments !  Well, 
Right  well  concerted,  father  Lamormain ! 
Eight  thousand  horse!  Yes,  yes!  'Tis  as  it  should  be! 
I  see  it  coming. 

Q.UESTENBERG. 

There  is  nothing  coming. 
All  stands  in  front :  the  counsel  of  state-prudence, 
The  dictate  of  necessity ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  then  ? 
What,  my  Lord  Envoy  ?  May  I  not  be  suffer'd 
To  understand,  that  folks  are  tired  of  seeing 
The  sword's  hilt  in  my  grasp :  and  that  your  court 
Snatch  eagerly  at  this  pretence,  and  use 
The  Spanish  title,  to  drain  off  my  forces, 
To  lead  into  the  empire  a  new  army 
Unsubjected  to  my  control  ?  To  throw  me 
Plumply  aside, — I  am  still  too  powerful  for  you 
To  venture  that.     My  stipulation  runs, 
That  all  the  Imperial  forces  shall  obey  me 
Where'er  the  German  is  the  native  language. 
Of  Spanish  troops  and  of  Prince  Cardinals 
That  take  their  route,  as  visitors,  through  the  empire, 
There  stands  no  syllable  in  my  stipulation. 
No  syllable  !  And  so  the  politic  court 
Steals  in  a  tiptoe,  and  creeps  round  behind  it ; 
First  makes  me  weaker,  then  to  be  dispensed  with, 
Till  it  dares  strike  at  length  a  bolder  blow 
And  make  short  work  with  me. 
What  need  of  all  these  crooked  ways,  Lord  Envoy  ? 
Straight  forward,  man !  His  compact  with  me  pinches 
The  Emperor.     He  would  that  I  moved  off! — 
Well ! — I  will  gratify  him ! 

[Here   there  commences  an  agitation  among  the 
Generals,  which  increases  continually. 
It  grieves  me  for  my  noble  officers'  sakes! 
I  see  not  yet,  by  what  means  they  will  come  at 
The  moneys  they  have  advanced,  or  how  obtain 
The  recompense  their  services  demand. 
Still  a  new  leader  brings  new  claimants  forward, 
And  prior  merit  superannuates  quickly. 
There  serve  here  many  foreigners  in  the  army, 
And  were  the  man  in  all  else  brave  and  gallant, 
I  was  not  went  to  make  nice  scrutiny 
After  his  pedigree  or  catechism. 
This  will  be  otherwise,  i'  the  time  to  come. 
Well — me  no  longer  it  concerns.     [He  seats  himself. 


MAX.  PICCOLOMINI. 

Forbid  it  Heaven,  that  it  should  come  to  this! 
Our  troops  will  swell  in  dreadful  fermentation — 
The  Emperor  is  abused — it  cannot  be. 

ISOLANI. 

It  cannot  be ;  all  goes  to  instant  wreck. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Thou  hast  said  truly,  faithful  Isolani ! 
What  we  with  toil  and  foresight  have  built  ud 
Will  go  to  wreck — all  go  to  instant  wreck. 
What  then  ?  another  chieftain  is  soon  found, 
Another  army  likewise  (who  dares  doubt  it  ?) 
Will  flock  from  all  sides  to  the  Emperor, 
At  the  first  beat  of  his  recruiting  drum. 

[During  this  speech,  Isolani,  Tertskv,  Illo, 

and   Maradas  talk  confusedly  with  great 

agitation. 

max.  piccolomini  (busily  and  passionately  going 
from  one  to  another,  and  soothing  them. 
Hear,  my  commander !  Hear  me,  generals ! 
Let  me  conjure  you,  Duke !  Determine  nothing, 
Till  we  have  met  and  represented  to  you 
Our  joint  remonstrances. — Nay,  calmer !  Friends ! 
I  hope  all  may  be  yet  set  right  again. 

tertsky. 
Away !  let  us  away !  in  the  antechamber 
Find  we  the  others.  {They  go 

butler  (to  Questenberg). 
If  good  counsel  gain 
Due  audience  from  your  wisdom,  my  Lord  Envoy ! 
You  will  be  cautious  how  you  show  yourself 
In  public  for  some  hours  to  come — or  hardly 
Will  that  gold  key  protect  you  from  maltreatment. 

[Commotions  heard  from  without. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

A  salutary  counsel Thou,  Octavio  ! 

Wilt  answer  for  the  safety  of  our  guest. 
Farewell,  Von  Questenberg! 

[Questenberg  is  about  to  speah. 
Nay,  not  a  word. 
Not  one  word  more  of  that  detested  subject ! 
You  have  perform'd  your  duty — We  know  how 
To  separate  the  office  from  the  man. 

[As  Questenberg  is  going  off  with  Octavio  ; 
Goetz,  Tiefenbach,  Kolatto,  press  in  ; 
several  other  Generals  following  them. 

GOETZ. 

Where 's  he  who  means  to  rob  us  of  our  general  ? 

tiefenbach  (at  the  same  time). 
What  are  we  forced  to  hear?  That  thou  wilt  leave  us? 

kolatto  (at  the  same  time). 
We  will  live  with  thee,  we  will  die  with  thee. 

wallenstein  (with  stateliness,  and  pointing  to  Illo). 
There !  the  Feld-Marshal  knows  our  will.         [Exit. 
[While  all  are  going  off  the  Stage,  the  curtain 
drops. 


ACT  II. 

SCENE  I. 
Scene — A  small  Chamber. 
Illo  and  Tertsky. 
tertsky. 
Now  for  this  evening's  business !  How  intend  you 
To  manage  with  the  generals  at  the  banquet? 
145 


136 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Attend !  We  frame  a  formal  declaration, 

Wherein  we  to  the  Duke  consign  ourselves 

Collectively,  to  be  and  to  remain 

His  both  with  life  and  limb,  and  not  to  spare 

The  last  drop  of  our  blood  for  him,  provided 

So  doing  we  infringe  no  oath  or  duty, 

We  may  be  under  to  the  Emperor. — Mark ! 

This  reservation  we  expressly  make 

In  a  particular  clause,  and  save  the  conscience. 

Now  hear!  This  formula  so  framed  and  worded 

Will  be  presented  to  them  for  perusal 

Before  the  banquet.    No  one  will  find  in  it 

Cause  of  offence  or  scruple.     Hear  now  further ! 

After  the  feast,  when  now  the  vap'ring  wine 

Opens  the  heart,  and  shuts  the  eyes,  we  let 

A  counterfeited  paper,  in  the  which 

This  one  particular  clause  has  been  left  out, 

Go  round  for  signatures. 

TERTSKY. 

How !  think  you  then 
That  they'll  believe  themselves  bound  by  an  oath, 
Which  we  had  trick'd  them  into  by  a  juggle  ? 

ILLO. 

We  shall  have  caught  and  caged  them !  Let  them  then 
Beat  their  wings  bare  against  the  wires,  and  rave 
Loud  as  they  may  against  our  treachery ; 
At  court  their  signatures  will  be  believed 
Far  more  than  their  most  holy  affirmations. 
Traitors  they  are,  and  must  be  ;  therefore  wisely 
Will  make  a  virtue  of  necessity. 

TERTSKY. 

Well,  well,  it  shall  content  me ;  let  but  something 
Be  done,  let  only  some  decisive  blow 
Set  us  in  motion. 

ILLO. 

Besides,  'tis  of  subordinate  importance 
How,  or  how  far,  we  may  thereby  propel 
The  Generals.    'Tis  enough  that  we  persuade 
The  Duke  that  they  are  his — Let  him  but  act 
In  his  determined  mood,  as  if  he  had  them, 
And  he  will  have  them.    Where  he  plunges  in, 
He  mokes  a  whirlpool,  and  all  stream  down  to  it. 

TERTSKY. 

His  policy  is  such  a  labyrinth, 
That  many  a  time  when  I  have  thought  myself 
Close  at  his  side,  he 's  gone  at  once,  and  left  me 
Ignorant  of  the  ground  where  I  was  standing. 
He  lends  the  enemy  his  ear,  permits  me 
To  write  to  them,  to  Arnheim ;  to  Sesina 
Himself  comes  forward  blank  and  undisguised ; 
Talks  with  us  by  the  hour  about  his  plans, 

And  when  I  think  I  have  him — off  at  once 

He  has  slipp'd  from  me,  and  appears  as  if 
He  had  no  scheme,  but  to  retain  his  place. 

ILLO. 

He  give  up  his  old  plans  !  I  '11  tell  you,  friend  ! 
His  soul  is  occupied  with  nothing  else, 
Even  in  his  sleep — They  are  his  thoughts,  his  dreams, 
That  day  by  day  he  questions  for  this  purpose 
The  motions  of  the  planets 

TERTSKY. 

Ay!  you  know 
This  night,  that  is  now  coming,  he  with  Seni 
Shuts  himself  up  in  the  astrological  tower 
To  make  joint  observations — for  I  hear, 


It  is  to  be  a  night  of  weight  and  crisis  ; 

And  something  great,  and  of  long  expectation, 

Is  to  make  its  procession  in  the  heaven. 

ILLO. 

Come !  be  we  bold  and  make  dispatch.    The  work 
In  this  next  day  or  two  must  thrive  and  grow 
More  than  it  has  for  years.     And  let  but  only 

Things  first  turn  up  auspicious  here  below 

Mark  what  I  say — the  right  stars  too  will  show  them- 
selves. 
Come,  to  the  Generals.    All  is  in  the  glow, 
And  must  be  beaten  while  'tis  malleable. 

TERTSKY. 

Do  you  go  thither,  Illo.    I  must  stay, 
And  wait  here  for  the  countess  Tertsky.     Know, 
That  we  too  are  not  idle.    Break  one  string, 
A  second  is  in  readiness. 

ILLO. 

Yes!  Yes! 
I  saw  your  lady  smile  with  such  sly  meaning. 
What's  in  the  wind  ? 


TERTSKY. 

A  secret. 


Hush!  ehe  conies' 
[Exit  Illo. 


SCENE  II. 


(The  Countess  steps  out  from  a  Clout). 
Count  and  Countess  Tertsky. 
tertsky. 
Well — is  she  coming  1 — I  can  keep  him  back 
No  longer. 

countess. 
She  will  be  there  instantly, 
You  only  send  him. 

tertsky. 
I  am  not  quite  certain, 
I  must  confess  it,  Countess,  whether  or  not 
We  are  earning  the  Duke's  thanks  hereby.  You  know 
No  ray  has  broke  out  from  him  on  this  point. 
You  have  o'erruled  me,  and  yourself  know  best 
How  far  you  dare  proceed. 

countess. 

I  take  it  on  me. 
[Talking  to  herself,  while  she  is  advancing 
Here 's  no  need  of  full  powers  and  commissions — 
My  cloudy  Duke  !  we  understand  each  other — 
And  without  words.    What,  could  I  not  unriddle. 
Wherefore  the  daughter  should  be  sent  for  hither, 
Why  first  he,  and  no  other,  should  be  chosen 
To  fetch  her  hither  ?  This  sham  of  betrothing  her 
To  a  bridegroom* when  no  one  knows — No!  no! 
This  may  blind  others  !  I  see  through  thee,  Brother ! 
But  it  beseems  thee  not,  to  draw  a  card 
At  such  a  game.     Not  yet ! — It  all  remains 

Mutely  deliver'd  up  to  my  finessing 

Well — thou  shalt  not  have  been  deceived,  Duke 

Friedland ! 
In  her  who  is  thy  sister. 

servant  {enters). 

The  commanders ! 
tertsky  (to  the  Countess). 
Take  care  you  heat  his  fancy  and  affections — 

*  Tn  Germany,  after  honorable  addresses  have  been  paid  and 
formally  accepted,  the  lovers  are  called  Bride  and  Bridegroom, 
even  though  the  marriage  should  not  take  place  till  years  after- 
wards. 

146 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


137 


Possess  him  with  a  reverie,  and  send  him, 
Absent  and  dreaming,  to  the  banquet;  that 
He  may  not  boggle  at  the  signature. 

COUNTESS. 

Take  you  care  of  your  guests  ! — Go,  send  him  hither. 

TERTSKY. 

All  rots  upon  his  undersigning. 

countess  {interrupting  1dm). 

Go  to  your  guests !  Go 

ILLO  (comes  back). 

Where  art  staying,  Tertsky  ? 
The  house  is  full,  and  all  expeoiing  you. 

TERTSKY. 

Instantly !  Instantly ! 

[To  the  Countess. 
And  let  him  not 
Stay  here  too  long.    It  might  awake  suspicion 
In  the  old  man 

COUNTESS. 

A  truce  with  your  precautions  ! 
[Exeunt  Tertsky  and  Illo. 


SCENE  III. 


Countess,  Max.  Piccolo-mini, 
max.  (peeping  in  on  the  stage  shyly). 
Aunt  Tertsky  !  may  I  venture  ? 

[Advances  to  the  middle  of  the  stage,  and  looks 
around  him  with  uneasiness. 

She 's  not  here ! 
Where  >3  she  ? 

countess. 
Look  but  somewhat  narrowly 
In  yonder  corner,  lest  perhaps  she  lie 
Conceal'd  behind  that  screen. 

MAX. 

There  lie  her  gloves  ! 
[Snatches  at  them,  but  the  Countess  takes  them 
herself. 
You  unkind  Lady !  You  refuse  me  this — 
You  make  it  an  amusement  to  torment  me. 

countess. 
And  this  the  thank  you  give  me  for  my  trouble  ? 

MAX. 

O,  if  you  felt  the  oppression  at  my  heart ! 
Since  we  've  been  here,  so  to  constrain  myself — 
With  such  poor  stealth  to  hazard  words  and  glances — 
These,  these  are  not  my  habits  ! 

COUNTESS. 

Yon  have  still 
Many  new  habits  to  acquire,  young  friend  ! 
But  on  this  proof  of  your  obedient  temper 
I  must  continue  to  insist ;  and  only 
On  this  condition  can  I  play  the  agent 
For  your  concerns. 

MAX. 

But  wherefore  comes  she  not  ? 
Where  is  she  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Into  my  hands  you  must  place  it 
Whole  and  entire.  Whom  could  you  find,  indeed, 
More  zealously  affected  to  your  interest  ? 
No  soul  on  earth  must  know  it — not  your  father. 
He  must  not,  above  all. 

MAX. 

Alas !  what  danger  ? 


Here  is  no  face  on  which  I  might  concentre 
All  the  enraptured  soul  stirs  up  within  me. 

0  Lady  !  tell  me.    Is  all  changed  around  mo  ? 
Or  is  it  only  I  ? 

I  find  myself, 
As  among  strangers !  Not  a  trace  is  left 
Of  all  my  former  wishes,  former  joys. 
Where  has  it  vanish'd  to  I  There  was  a  time 
When  even,  methought,  with  such  a  world  as  this 

1  was  not  discontented.    Now,  how  fiat ! 

I  low  stale!  No  life,  no  bloom,  no  flavor  in  it! 

My  comrades  are  intolerable  to  me. 

My  father — Even  to  him  I  can  say  nothing. 

My  arms,  my  military  duties — O ! 

They  are  such  wearying  toys ! 

COUNTESS. 

But,  gentle  friend! 
I  must  entreat  it  of  your  condescension. 
You  would  be  pleased  to  sink  your  eye,  and  favor 
With  one  short  glance  or  two  this  poor  stale  world 
Where  even  now  much,  and  of  much  moment, 
Is  on  the  eve  of  its  completion. 

MAX. 

Something, 
I  can't  but  know,  is  going  forward  round  me. 
I  see  it  gathering,  crowding,  driving  on, 
In  wild  uncustomary  movements.  Well, 
In  due  time,  doubtless,  it  will  reach  even  me. 
Where  think  you  I  have  been,  dear  lady  ?  Nay, 
No  raillery.    The  turmoil  of  the  camp, 
The  spring-tide  of  acquaintance  rolling  in, 
The  pointless  jest,  the  empty  conversation, 
Oppress'd  and  stiflen'd  me.    I  gasp'd  for  air — 
I  could  not  breathe — I  was  constrain'd  to  fly, 
To  seek  a  silence  out  for  my  full  heart ; 
And  a  pure  spot  wherein  to  feel  my  happiness. 
No  smiling,  Countess  !    In  the  church  was  I. 
There  is  a  cloister  here  to  the  heaven's  gate,* 
Thither  I  went,  there  found  myself  alone. 
Over  the  altar  hung  a  holy  mother  ; 
A  wretched  painting  'twas,  yet  'twas  the  friend 
That  I  was  seeking  in  this  moment.    Ah, 
How  oft  have  I  beheld  that  glorious  form 
In  splendor,  'mid  ecstatic  worshippers  ; 
Yet,  still  it  moved  me  not !  and  now  at  once 
Was  my  devotion  cloudless  as  my  love. 

COUNTESS. 

Enjoy  your  fortune  and  felicity  ! 

Forget  the  world  around  you.    Meantime,  friendsliip 

Shall  keep  strict  vigils  for  you,  anxious,  active. 

Only  be  manageable  when  that  friendship 

Points  you  the  road  to  full  accomplishment. 

How  long  may  it  be  since  you  declared  your  passion  ? 

MAX. 

This  morning  did  I  hazard  the  first  word. 

COUNTESS. 

This  morning  the  first  time  in  twenty  days  ? 

MAX. 

'Twas  at  that  hunting-castle,  betwixt  here 

And  Nepomuck,  where  you  had  join'd  us,  and — 

That  was  the  last  relay  of  the  whole  journey ! 


*  I  am  doubtful  whether  this  be  the  dedication  of  the  cloister, 
or  the  name  of  one  of  the  city  gates,  near  which  it  stood.  I 
have  translated  it  in  the  former  sense ;  but  fearful  of  having 
made  some  blunder,  I  add  the  original. — Es  ist  ein  Kloster  hier 
zur  Hnnmelspforte. 

147 


138 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


In  a  balcony  we  were  standing  mute, 

And  gazing  out  upon  the  dreary  field  : 

Before  us  the  dragoons  were  riding  onward, 

The  safeguard  which  the  Duke  had  sent  us — heavy 

The  inquietude  oi'  parting  lay  upon  me, 

And  trembling  ventured  I  at  length  these  words : 

This  all  reminds  me,  noble  maiden,  that 

To-day  I  must  take  leave  of  my  good  fortune. 

A  few  hours  more,  and  you  will  find  a  father, 

Will  see  yourself  surrounded  by  new  friends, 

And  I  henceforth  shall  be  but  as  a  stranger, 

Lost  in  the  many — "  Speak  with  my  aunt  Tertsky  !" 

With  hurrying  voice  she  interrupted  me. 

She  falter'd.    I  beheld  a  glowing  red 

Possess  her  beautiful  cheeks,  and  from  the  ground 

Raised  slowly  up,  her  eye  met  mine — no  longer 

Did  I  control  myself. 

[The  Princess  Thekla  appears  at  the  door,  and 

remains  standing,  observed  by  the  Countess, 

but  not  by  Piccolomini. 

With  instant  boldness 
I  caught  her  in  my  arms,  my  mouth  touch'd  hers ; 
There  was  a  rustling  in  the  room  close  by ; 
It  parted  us — 'Twas  you.   What  since  has  happen'd, 
You  know. 

countess  {after  a  pause,  with  a  stolen  glance 
at  Thekla). 
And  is  it  your  excess  of  modesty  ; 
Or  are  you  so  incurious,  that  you  do  not 
Ask  me  too  of  my  secret  ? 

MAX. 

Of  your  secret  ? 
countess. 
Why,  yes !  When  in  the  instant  after  you 
I  stepp'd  into  the  room,  and  found  my  niece  there, 
What  she  in  this  first  moment  of  the  heart 
Ta'en  with  surprise — 

max.  {with  eagerness). 
Well? 


SCENE  IV. 

Thekla  (hurries  forward),  Countess,  Max. 

Piccolomini. 

thekla  {to  the  Countess). 

Spare  yourself  the  trouble  : 
That  hears  he  better  from  myself. 

MAX.  {stepping  backward). 

My  Princess ! 
What  have  you  let  her  hear  me  say,  aunt  Tertsky  ? 

thekla  {to  the  Countess). 
Has  he  been  here  long  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Yes ;  and  soon  must  go. 
Where  have  you  stay'd  so  long  ? 

thekla. 

Alas!  my  mother 
Wept  so  again !  and  I — I  see  her  suffer, 
Yet  cannot  keep  myself  from  being  happy. 

MAX. 

Now  once  again  I  have  courage  to  look  on  you. 
To-day  at  noon  I  could  not. 
The  dazzle  of  the  jewels  that  play'd  round  you 
Hid  the  beloved  from  me. 

thekla. 

Then  you  saw  me 
With  your  eye  only — and  not  with  your  heart  ? 


This  morning,  when  I  found  you  in  the  circle 

Of  all  your  kindred,  in  your  father's  arms, 

Beheld  myself  an  alien  in  this  circle, 

O !  what  an  impulse  felt  I  in  that  moment 

To  fall  upon  his  neck,  to  call  him  father  ! 

But  his  stern  eye  o'erpower'd  the  swelling  passion — 

It  dared  not  but  be  silent.    And  those  brilliants, 

That  like  a  crown  of  stars  enwreathed  your  brows, 

They  scared  me  too !  O  wherefore,  wherefore  should  he 

At  the  first  meeting  spread  as  't  were  the  ban 

Of  excommunication  round  you, — wherefore 

Dress  up  the  angel  as  for  sacrifice, 

And  cast  upon  the  light  and  joyous  heart 

The  mournful  burthen  of  his  station  ?  Fitly 

May  love  dare  woo  for  love ;  but  such  a  splendor 

Might  none  but  monarchs  venture  to  approach. 


Hush !  not  a  word  more  of  this  mummery  ; 
You  see  how.  soon  the  burthen  is  thrown  off 

[To  the  Countess. 
He  is  not  in  spirits.    Wherefore  is  he  not  ? 
'Tis  you,  aunt,  that  have  made  him  all  so  gloomy! 
He  had  quite  another  nature  on  the  journey — 
So  calm,  so  bright,  so  joyous  eloquent. 

[To  Max. 
It  was  my  wish  to  see  you  always  so, 
And  never  otherwise ! 


You  find  yourself 
In  your  great  father's  arms,  beloved  lady ! 
All  in  a  new  world,  which  does  homage  to  you, 
And  which,  were 't  only  by  its  novelty, 
Delights  your  eye. 

thekla. 
Yes ;  I  confess  to  you 
That  many  things  delight  me  here  :  this  camp, 
This  motley  stage  of  warriors,  which  renews 
So  manifold  the  image  of  my  fancy, 
And  binds  to  life,  binds  to  reality, 
What  hitherto  had  but  been  present  to  me 
As  a  sweet  dream! 

MAX. 

Alas !  not  so  to  me. 
It  makes  a  dream  of  my  reality. 
Upon  some  island  in  the  ethereal  heights 
I  've  lived  for  these  last  days.    This  mass  of  men 
Forces  me  down  to  earth.    It  is  a  bridge 
That,  reconducting  to  my  former  life, 
Divides  me  and  my  heaven. 

THEKLA. 

The  game  of  life 
Looks'  cheerful,  when  one  carries  in  one's  heart 
The  unalienable  treasure.    'Tis  a  game, 
Which  having  once  review'd,  I  turn  more  joyous 
Back  to  my  deeper  and  appropriate  bliss. 

[Breaking  off,  and  in  a  sportive  tone 
In  this  short  time  that  I  've  been  present  here, 
What  new  unheard-of  things  have  I  not  seen ! 
And  yet  they  all  must  give  place  to  the  wonder 
Which  this  mysterious  castle  guards. 

countess  {recollecting). 

And  what 
Can  this  be  then  ?  Methought  I  was  acquainted 
With  all  the  dusky  corners  of  this  house. 
148 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


130 


THEKLA  {smiling). 
Ay,  but  the  road  thereto  is  watch'd  by  spirits : 
Two  griffins  still  stand  sentry  at  the  door. 

countess  {laughs'). 
The  astrological  tower ! — How  happens  it 
That  this  same  sanctuary,  whose  access 
Is  to  all  others  so  impracticable, 
Opens  before  you  even  at  your  approach  ? 

THEKLA. 

A  dwarfish  old  man  with  a  friendly  face 

And  snow-white  hairs,  whose  gracious  services 

Were  mine  at  first  sight,  open'd  me  the  doors. 

MAX. 

That  is  the  Duke's  astrologer,  old  Seni. 

THEKLA. 

He  question'd  me  on  many  points  ;  for  instance, 
When  I  was  bom,  what  month,  and  on  what  day, 
Whether  by  day  or  in  the  night. 

COUNTESS. 

He  wish'd 
To  erect  a  figure  for  your  horoscope. 

THEKLA. 

My  hand  too  he  examined,  shook  his  head 

With  much  sad  meaning,  and  the  fines,  methought, 

Did  not  square  over-truly  with  his  wishes. 

COUNTESS. 

Well,  Princess,  and  what  found  you  in  this  tower  ? 
My  highest  privilege  has  been  to  snatch 
A  side-glance,  and  away  ! 

THEKLA. 

It  was  a  strange 
Sensation  that  came  o'er  me,  when  at  first 
From  the  broad  sunshine  I  stepp'd  in ;  and  now 
The  narrowing  line  of  day-light,  that  ran  after 
The  closing  door,  was  gone ;  and  all  about  me 
'Twas  pale  and  dusky  night,  with  many  shadows 
Fantastically  cast.     Here  six  or  seven 
Colossal  statues,  and  all  kings,  stood  round  me 
In  a  half-circle.     Each  one  in  his  hand 
A  sceptre  bore,  and  on  his  head  a  star ; 
And  in  the  tower  no  other  light  was  there 
But  from  these  stars :  all  seem'd  to  come  from  them 
"  These  are  the  planets,"  said  that  low  old  man, 
•'  They  govern  worldly  fates,  and  for  that  cause 
Are  imaged  here  as  kings.     He  farthest  from  you, 
Spiteful,  and  cold,  an  old  man  melancholy, 
With  bent  and  yellow  forehead,  he  is  Saturn. 
He  opposite,  the  king  with  the  red  light, 
An  arm'd  man  for  the  battle,  that  is  Mars : 
And  both  these  bring  but  little  luck  to  man." 
But  at  his  side  a  lovely  lady  stood, 
The  star  upon  her  head  was  soft  and  bright, 
And  that  was  Venus,  the  bright  star  of  joy. 
On  the  left  hand,  lo !  Mercury,  with  wings. 
Quite  in  the  middle  glitter'd  silver  bright 
A  cheerful  man,  and  with  a  monarch's  mien ; 
And  this  was  Jupiter,  my  father's  star  ; 
And  at  his  side  I  saw  the  Sun  and  Moon. 

MAX. 

O  never  rudely  will  I  blame  his  faith 

In  the  might  of  stars  and  angels!  'Tis  not  merely 

The  human  being's  Pride  that  peoples  space 

With  life  and  mystical  predominance : 

Since  likewise  fat  the  stricken  heart  of  Love 

This  visible  nature,  and  this  common  world, 

Is  all  too  narrow :  yea,  a  deeper  import 


Lurks  in  the  legend  told  my  infant  years 

Than  lies  upon  that  truth,  we  live  to  learn. 

For  fable  is  Love's  world,  his  home,  his  birth-place 

Delightedly  dwells  he  'mong  fays  and  talismans, 

And  spirits  ;  and  delightedly  believes 

Divinities,  being  himself  divine. 

The  intelligible  forms  of  ancient  poets, 

The  (air  humanities  of  old  religion, 

The  Power,  the  Beauty,  and  the  Majesty, 

That  had  her  haunts  in  dale,  or  piny  mountain, 

Or  forest  by  slow  stream,  or  pebbly  spring, 

Or  chasms  and  wat'ry  depths  ;  all  these  have  vanish'd. 

They  live  no  longer  in  the  tiiith  of  reason! 

But  still  the  heart  doth  need  a  language,  still 

Doth  the  old  instinct  bring  back  the  old  names, 

And  to  yon  starry  world  they  now  are  gone, 

Spirits  or  gods,  that  used  to  share  this  earth 

With  man  as  with  their  friend  ;*  and  to  the  lover 

Yonder  they  move,  from  yonder  visible  sky 

Shoot  influence  down :  and  even  at  this  day 

'Tis  Jupiter  who  brings  whate'er  is  great, 

And  Venus  who  brings  every  thing  that's  fair! 

THEKLA. 

And  if  this  be  the  science  of  the  stars, 

I  too,  with  glad  and  zealous  industry, 

Will  learn  acquaintance  with  this  cheerful  faith. 

It  is  a  gentle  and  affectionate  thought, 

That  in  immeasurable  heights  above  us, 

At  our  first  birth,  the  wreath  of  love  was  woven, 

With  sparkling  stars  for  flowers. 

COUNTESS. 

Xot  only  roses, 
But  thorns  too  hath  the  heaven  ;  and  well  for  you 
Leave  they  your  wreath  of  love  inviolate  : 
What  Venus  twined,  the  bearer  of  glad  fortune, 
The  sullen  orb  of  Mars  soon  tears  to  pieces. 

MAX. 

Soon  will  his  gloomy  empire  reach  its  close. 

Blest  be  the  General's  zeal :  into  the  laurel 

Will  he  inweave  the  olive-branch,  presenting 

Peace  to  the  shouting  nations.     Then  no  wish 

Will  have  remain'd  for  his  great  heart !  Enough 

Has  he  perform'd  for  glory,  and  can  now 

Live  for  himself  and  his.     To  his  domains 

Will  he  retire ;  he  has  a  stately  seat 

Of  fairest  view  at  Gitschin  ;  Reichenberg, 

And  Friedland  Castle,  both  lie  pleasantly — 

Even  to  the  foot  of  the  huge  mountains  here 

Stretches  the  chase  and  covers  of  his  forests : 

His  ruling  passion,  to  create  the  splendid, 

He  can  indulge  without  restraint;  can  give 

A  princely  patronage  to  every  art, 

And  to  all  worth  a  sovereign's  protection. 

Can  build,  can  plant,  can  watch  the  starry  courses — 

COUNTESS. 

Yet  I  would  have  you  look,  and  look  again, 
Before  you  lay  aside  your  arms,  young  friend  ! 
A  gentle  bride,  as  she  is,  is  well  worth  it, 
That  you  should  woo  and  win  her  with  the  sword. 

MAX. 

O,  that  the  sword  could  win  her ! 

COUNTESS. 

What  was  thai .' 


*  No  more  of  talk,  where  god  or  angel  guest 
With  man,  as  with  his  friend  familiar,  used 
To  sit  indulgent.  Paradise  Lost,  B.  IX 

149 


140 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Did  you  hear  nothing  ?  Seem'd,  as  if  I  heard 
Tumult  and  larum  in  the  banquet-room. 

[Exit  Countess. 


SCENE  V. 
Thekla  and  Max.  Piccolomini. 

thekla  (as  soon  as  the  Countess  is  out  of  sight,  in  a 

quick  low  voice  to  Piccolomini). 
Do  n't  trust  them !    They  are  false ! 

MAX. 

Impossible ! 

THEKLA. 

Trust  no  one  here  but  me.     I  saw  at  once, 
They  had  a  purpose. 

MAX. 

Purpose  !  but  what  purpose  ? 
And  how  can  we  be  instrumental  to  it  ? 

THEKLA. 

I  know  no  more  than  you ;  but  yet  believe  me  : 
There 's  some  design  in  this  !   To  make  us  happy, 
To  realize  our  union — trust  me,  love  ! 
They  but  pretend  to  wish  it. 

MAX. 

But  these  Tertskys 

Why  use  we  them  at  all  ?    Why  not  your  mother  ? 
Excellent  creature !  she  deserves  from  us 
A  full  and  filial  confidence. 

THEKLA. 

She  doth  love  you, 
Doth  rate  you  high  before  all  others — but — 
But  such  a  secret — she  would  never  have 
The  courage  to  conceal  it  from  my  father. 
For  her  own  peace  of  mind  we  must  preserve  it 
A  secret  from  her  too. 

MAX. 

Why  any  secret  ? 
I  love  not  secrets.     Mark,  what  I  will  do. 
I'll  throw  me  at  your  father's  feet — let  him 
Decide  upon  my  fortunes  ! — He  is  true, 
He  wears  no  mask — he  hates  all  crooked  ways — 
He  is  so  good,  so  noble ! 

thekla  (falls  on  his  neck). 
That  are  you ! 

MAX. 

You  knew  him  only  since  this  morn,  but  I 
Have  lived  ten  years  already  in  his  presence. 
And  who  knows  whether  in  this  very  moment 
He  is  not  merely  waiting  for  us  both 
To  own  our  loves,  in  order  to  unite  us  ? 

You  are  silent  ? 

You  look  at  me  with  such  a  hopelessness ! 
What  have  you  to  object  against  your  father  ? 

THEKLA. 

I  ?  Nothing.  Only  he 's  so  occupied — 
He  has  no  leisure  time  to  think  about 
The  happiness  of  us  two.  [Taking  his  hand  tenderly. 

Follow  me ! 
Let  us  not  place  too  great  a  faith  in  men. 
These  Tertskys — we  will  still  be  grateful  to  them 
For  every  kindness,  but  not  trust  them  further 
Than  they  deserve ; — and  in  all  else  rely — 
On  our  own  hearts  ! 

MAX. 

O !  shall  we  e'er  be  happy  ? 


THEKLA. 

Are  we  not  happy  now  ?    Art  thou  not  mine  ? 

Am  I  not  thine  ?    There  lives  within  my  soul 

A  lofty  courage — 't  is  love  gives  it  me ! 

I  ought  to  be  less  open — ought  to  hide 

My  heart  more  from  thee — so  decorum  dictates  : 

But  where  in  this  place  cotildst  thou  seek  for  truth. 

If  in  my  mouth  thou  didst  not  find  it  ? 


SCENE  VI. 


To  them  enters  the  Countess  Tertsky. 

countess  (in  a  pressing  manner). 

Come ! 
My  husband  sends  me  for  you — It  is  now 
The  latest  moment. 

[They  not  appearing  to  attend  to  what  the  says 
she  steps  between  them. 
Part  you  ! 

THEKLA. 

O,  not  yet ! 
It  has  been  scarce  a  moment. 

COUNTESS. 

Ay  !    Then  time 
Flies  swiftly  with  your  Highness,  Princess  niece  ' 

MAX. 

There  is  no  hurry,  aunt. 

countess. 

Away!  away! 
The  folks  begin  to  miss  you.  Twice  already 
His  father  has  ask'd  for  him. 

THEKLA. 

Ha !  his  father  ! 

COUNTESS. 

You  understand  that,  niece  ! 

THEKLA. 

Why  needs  he 
To  go  at  all  to  that  society  ? 
'Tis  not  his  proper  company.    They  may 
Be  worthy  men,  but  he's  too  young  for  them. 
In  brief,  he  suits  not  such  society. 

COUNTESS. 

You  mean,  you  'd  rather  keep  him  wholly  here  ? 

thekla  (with  energy). 
Yes !  you  have  hit  it,  aunt !   That  is  my  meaning 
Leave  him  here  wholly !   Tell  the  company — 

countess. 
What  ?  have  you  lost  your  senses,  niece  ? — 
Count,  you  remember  the  conditions.     Come  ' 

max.  (to  Thekla). 
Lady,  I  must  obey.    Farewell,  dear  lady ! 
[Thekla  turns  away  from  him  with  a  quick  motion 
What  say  you  then,  dear  lady  ? 

thekla  (without  looking  at  him). 

Nothing.    Go  ! 

MAX. 

Can  I,  when  you  are  angry 

[He  draivs  up  to  her,  their  eyes  meet,  she  stands 
silent  a  moment,  then  throws  herself  into  his 
arms ;  he  jjresses  her  fast  to  his  heart. 

COUNTESS. 

Off!    Heavens !  if  any  one  should  come  . 

Hark  !  What 's  that  noise  !  it  comes  this  way. Off! 

Max.  tears  himself  away  out  of  her  arms,and  goes. 
The  Countess  accompanies  him.    Thekla 
150 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


141 


follows  him  with  h"r  eyes  at  first,  walks  rest- 
lessly across  the  room,  tlien  slops,  and  remains 
Standing,  lost  in  thought.  A  guitar  lies  on  the 
table,  she  seizes  it  as  hi/  a  sudden  emotion,  and 
after  she  has  pla>/ed  a  while  an  irregular  and 
melancholy  symphony,  she  falls  gradually  into 
the  music,  and  sings. 

thf.kla  (plays  and  sings). 
The  cloud  doth  gather,  the  greenwood  roar, 
The  damsel  paces  along  the  shore; 
The  billows  they  tumble  with  might,  with  might ; 
And  she  flings  out  her  voice  to  the  darksome  night ; 

Her  bosom  is  swelling  with  sorrow ; 
The  world  it  is  empty,  the  heart  will  die, 
There 's  nothing  to  wish  for  beneath  the  sky  : 
Thou  Holy  One,  call  thy  child  away ! 
I've  lived  and  loved,  and.that  was  to-day — 

Make  ready  my  grave-clothes  to-morrow.* 


scene  vn. 

Countess  (returns),  Thekla. 

countess. 
Fie,  lady  niece  !  to  throw  yourself  upon  him, 
Like  a  poor  gift  to  one  who  cares  not  for  it, 
And  so  must  be  flung  after  him  !  For  you, 
Duke  Friedland's  only  child,  I  should  have  thought, 
It  had  been  more  beseeming  to  have  shown  yourself 
More  chary  of  your  person. 

thekla  {rising). 

And  what  mean  vou  ? 


*  I  found  it  not  in  my  power  to  translate  this  song  with  literal 
fidelity,  preserving  at  the  same  time  the  Alcaic  Movement ;  and 
have  therefore  added  the  original  with  a  prose  translation.  Some 
of  my  readers  may  be  more  fortunate. 

thekla  (spielt  und  si?igt). 
Der  Eichwald  brauset,  die  Wolken  ziehn, 
Das  Msegdlein  wandelt  an  Ufers  Griin, 
Es  bricht  sich  die  Welle  mit  Macht,  mit  Macht, 
LTnd  sie  singt  hinaus  in  die  finstre  Nacht, 

Das  Auge  von  Weinen  getriibet . 
Das  Herz  ist  gestorben,  die  Welt  ist  leer, 
Und  weiter  giebt  sie  dem  Wunsche  nichts  mehr. 
Du  Heilige,  rufe  dein  Kind  zuriick, 
Ich  habe  genossen  das  irdische  Gliick, 

Ich  habe  gelebt  und  geleibet. 

LITERAL  TRANSLATION. 

thekla  (plays  and  sings). 
The  oak-forest  bellows,  the  clouds  gather,  the  damsel  walks 
to  and  fro  on  the  green  of  the  shore :  the  wave  breaks  with 
might,  with  might,  and  she  sines  out  into  the  dark  night,  her 
eye  discolored  with  weeping  :  the  heart  is  dead,  the  world  is 
empty,  and  further  gives  it  nothing  more  to  the  wish.  Thou  Holy 
One,  cflll  thy  child  home.  I  have  enjoyed  the  happiness  of  this 
world,  I  have  lived  and  have  loved. 

I  cannot  but  add  here  an  imitation  of  this  song,  with  which 
the  author  of  "The  Tale  of  Rosamond  Gray  and  Blind  Mar- 
garet" has  favored  me.  and  which  appears  to  me  to  have  caught 
the  happiest  manner  of  our  old  ballads. 

The  clouds  are  blackening,  the  storms  threat'ning, 

The  cavern  doth  mutter,  the  greenwood  moan; 
Billows  are  breaking,  the  damsel's  heart  aching. 
Thus  in  the  dark  nipht  she  singeth  alone, 
Her  eye  upward  roving: 
The  world  is  empty,  the  heart  is  dead  surely, 

In  this  world  plainly  all  seeroeth  amiss  ; 
To  thy  heaven.  Holy  One.  lake  home  thy  little  one. 
I  have  partnken  of  all  earth's  bliss, 
Both  living  and  loving. 
O 


countess. 

I  mean,  niece,  that  you  should  not  have  forgotten 
Who  you  are,  and  who  he  is.     But  perchance 
That  never  once  occurr'd  to  you. 

THEKLA. 

What  then  ? 

COUNTESS. 

That   you  're    the   daughter   of  the    Prince,   Duke 
Friedland. 

THEKLA. 

Well — and  what  farther  ? 

COUNTESS 

What  ?  a  pretty  question  ! 

THEKLA. 

He  was  lorn  that  which  we  have  but  become 
He's  of  an  ancient  Lombard  family 
Son  of  a  reigning  princess. 

COUNTESS. 

Are  you  dreaming  ? 
Talking  in  sleep?  An  excellent  jest,  forsooth! 
We  shall  no  doubt  right  courteously  entreat  him 
To  honor  with  his  hand  the  richest  heiress 
In  Europe. 

THEKLA. 

That  will  not  be  necessary. 

COUNTESS. 

Methinks  'twere  well  though  not  to  run  the  hazard 

THEKLA. 

His  father  loves  him  :  Count  Octavio 
Will  interpose  no  difficulty 

COUNTESS. 

His.' 
His  father !  His  .'  but  yours,  niece,  what  of  yours  ? 

THEKLA. 

Why  I  begin  to  think  you  fear  his  father, 
So  anxiously  you  hide  it  from  the  man ! 
His  father,  his,  I  mean. 

countess  (looks  at  her  as  scrutinizing'). 
Niece,  you  are  false. 

THEKLA. 

Are  you  then  wounded  ?  O,  be  friends  with  me ! 

COUNTESS. 

You  hold  your  game  for  won  already.     Do  not 
Triumph  too  soon  ! — 

thekla  (interrupting  her,  and  attempting  to  soothe 
her). 
Nay,  now,  be  friends  with  me 

COUNTESS.  ' 

It  is  not  yet  so  far  gone. 

THEKLA. 

I  believe  you. 

COUNTESS. 

Did  you  suppose  your  father  had  laid  out 

His  most  important  life  in  toils  of  war. 

Denied  himself  each  quiet  earthly  bliss, 

Had  banish'd  slumber  from  his  tent,  devoted 

His  noble  head  to  care,  and  for  this  only, 

To  make  a  happier  pair  of  you?  At  length 

To  draw  you  from  your  convent,  and  conduct 

In  cusy  triumph  to  your  arms  the  man 

That  chanced  to  please  your  eyes !  All  this,  methinks 

He  might  have  purchased  at  a  cheaper  rate. 

THEKLA. 

That  which  he  did  not  plant  for  me  might  yet 
Bear  me  fair  fruitage  of  its  own  accord. 
And  if  my  friendly  and  affectionate  fate, 

151 


142 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Out  of  his  fearful  and  enormous  being, 
Will  but  prepare  the  joys  of  life  for  me — 

COUNTESS. 

Thou  sce'st  it  with  a  lovelorn  maiden's  eyes. 
Cast  thine  eye  round,  bethink  thee  who  thou  art. 
Into  no  house  of  joyance  hast  thou  stepp'd, 
For  no  espousals  dost  thou  find  the  walls 
Deck'd  out,  no  guests  the  nuptial  garland  wearing. 
Here  is  no  splendor  but  of  arms.     Or  think'st  thou 
That  all  these  thousands  are  here  congregated 
To  lead  up  the  long  dances  at  thy  wedding ! 
Thou  see'st  thy  father's  forehead  full  of  thought, 
Thy  mother's  eye  in  tears :  upon  the  balance 
Lies  the  great  desliny  of  all  our  house. 
Leave  now  the  puny  wish,  the  girlish  feeling, 

0  thrust  it  far  behind  thee !  Give  thou  proof, 
Thou'rt  the  daughter  of  the  Mighty — his 
Who  where  he  moves  creates  the  wonderful. 
Not  to  herself  the  woman  must  belong, 
Annex'd  and  bound  to  alien  destinies : 

But  she  performs  the  best  part,  she  the  wisest, 
Who  can  transmute  the  alien  into  self, 
Meet  and  disarm  necessity  by  choice ; 
And  what  must  be,  take  freely  to  her  heart, 
And  bear  and  foster  it  with  mother's  love. 

THEKLA. 

Such  ever  was  my  lesson  in  the  convent. 

1  had  no  loves,  no  wishes,  knew  myself 
Only  as  his — his  daughter,  his,  the  Mighty! 
His  fame,  the  echo  of  whose  blast  drove  to  me 
From  the  far  distance,  waken'd  in  my  soul 
No  other  thought  than  this — I  am  appointed 
To  offer  up  myself  in  passiveness  to  him. 

COUNTESS. 

That  is  thy  fate.     Mould  thou  thy  wishes  to  it. 
I  and  thy  mother  gave  thee  the  example. 

THEKLA. 

My  fate  hath  shown  me  him,  to  whom  behoves  it 
That  I  should  offer  up  myself.     In  gladness 
Him  will  I  follow. 

COUNTESS 

Not  thy  fate  hath  shown  him  ! 
Thy  heart,  say  rather — 'twas  thy  heart,  my  child  ! 

THEKLA. 

Fate  hath  no  voice  but  the  heart's  impulses. 
I  am  all  his !  His  present — his  alone, 
Is*  this  new  life,  which  lives  in  me  ?  He  hath 
A  right  to  his  own  creature.     What  was  I 
Ere  his  fair  love  infused  a  soul  into  me  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Thou  wouldst  oppose  thy  father  then,  should  he 
Have  otherwise  determined  with  thy  person  ? 

[Thekla  remains  silent.    The  Countess  continues. 
Thou  mean'st  to  force  him  to  thy  liking  ? — Child, 
His  name  is  Friedland. 

THEKLA. 

My  name  too  is  Friedland. 
He  shall  have  found  a  genuine  daughter  in  me. 

COUNTESS. 

What!  he  has  vanqnish'd  all  impediment, 
And  in  the  wilful  mood  of  his  own  daughter 
Shall  a  new  struggle  rise  for  him  ?  Child  !  child  ! 
As  yet  thou  hast  seen  thy  father's  smiles  alone  ; 
The  eye  of  his  rage  thou  hast  not  seen.    Dear  child, 
I  will  not  frighten  thee.     To  that  extreme, 
I  trust,  it  ne'er  shall  come.     His  will  is  yet 


Unknown  to  me:  'tis  possible  his  aims 
May  have  the  same  direction  as  thy  wish. 
But  this  can  never,  never  be  his  will 
That  thou,  the  daughter  of  his  haughty  fortunes 
Should'st  e'er  demean  thee  as  a  love-sick  maiden  ; 
And  like  some  poor  cost-nothing,  fling  thyself 
Toward  the  man,  who,  if  that  high  prize  ever 
Be  destined  to  await  him,  yet,  with  sacrifices 
The  highest  love  can  bring,  must  pay  for  it. 

[Exit  Countess. 

thekla  {who  during  the  last  speech  had  been  standing 

evidently  lost  in  her  reflections). 
I  thank  thee  for  the  hint.     It  turns 
My  sad  presentiment  to  certainty. 
And  it  is  so ! — Not  one  friend  have  we  here, 
Not  one  true  heart !  we  've  nothing  but  ourselves ! 

0  she  said  rightly — no  auspicious  signs 
Beam  on  this  covenant  of  our  affections. 
This  is  no  theatre,  where  hope  abides : 

The  dull  thick  noise  of  war  alone  stirs  here  ; 
And  Love  himself,  as  he  were  arm'd  in  steel, 
Steps  forth,  and  girds  him  for  the  strife  of  death. 

[Music  from  the  banquet-room  is  heard. 
There's  a  dark  spirit  walking  in  our  house, 
And  swiftly  will  the  Destiny  close  on  us. 
It  drove  me  hither  from  my  calm  asylum, 
It  mocks  my  soul  with  charming  witchery, 
It  lures  me  forward  in  a  seraph's  shape ; 

1  see  it  near,  I  see  it  nearer  floating, 

It  draws,  it  pulls  me  with  a  godlike  powrer — 
And  lo !  the  abyss — and  thither  am  I  moving — 
I  have  no  power  within  me  not  to  move  ! 

[The  music  from  the  banquet-room  becomes  louder. 
O  when  a  house  is  doom'd  in  fire  to  perish, 
Many  and  dark,  heaven  drives  his  clouds  together. 
Yea,  shoots  his  lightnings  down  from  sunny  heights, 
Flames  burst  from  out  the  subterraneous  chasms, 
*And  fiends  and  angels  mingling  in  their  fury, 
Sling  fire-brands  at  the  burning  edifice. 

[Exit  Thekla. 


SCENE  VIII. 


A  large  Saloon  lighted  up  with  festal  Splendor ;  in 
the  midst  of  it,  and  in  the  Centre  of  the  Stage,  a 
Table  richly  set  out,  at  which  eight  Generals  are 
sitting,  among  whom  are  Octavio  Piccolomini, 
Tertsky,  and  Maradas.  Right  and  left  of  /his. 
but  farther  back,  two  other  Tables,  at  each  of  which 
six  Persons  are  placed.  The  Middle  Door,  which 
is  standing  open,  gives  to  the  Prospect  a  fourth 
Table,  with  the  same.  Number  of  Persons.  More 
forward  stands  the  Sideboard.  The  whole  front  if 
the  Stage  is  kept  open  for  the  Pages  and  Servants  in 
waiting.  All  is  in  motion.  The  Band  of  Music 
belonging  to  Tertsky's  Regiment  march  across  the 
Stage,  and  draw  up  round  the  Tables.  Before  fhe.i/ 
arc  quite  off  from  the  Front  of  the  Stage,  Max. 
Piccolomini  appears,  Tertsky  advances  towards 


*  There  are  few,  who  will  not  have  taste  enough  to  lau^h 
at  the  two  concluding  lines  of  this  soliloquy  ;  and  still  fewer,  I 
would  fain  hope,  who  would  not  haw  been  more  dispose]  to 
shudder,  had  I  given  a  faithful  translation.  For  the  readers 
of  German  I  have  added  the  original  - 

Hlind-wiithend  schleuilert  selhst  der  Gott  der  Freude 
Den  Pechkranz  in  das  brennendo  Gebfflude. 
152 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


143 


him  with  a  Paper,  Isolani  comes  up  to  meet  him 
with  a  Beaker  or  Service-Cup. 

Tertsky,  Isola.ni,  Max.  Piccolomini. 

ISOLANI. 

Here  brother,  what  we  love  !  Why,  where  hast  been  ? 

Off  to  thy  place — quick !  Tertsky  here  has  given 

The  mother's  holiday  wine  up  to  free  booty. 

Here  it  goes  on  as  at  the  Heidelberg  castle. 

Already  hast  thou  lost  the  best.     They  're  giving 

At  yonder  table  ducal  crowns  in  shares; 

There    Sternberg's  lands  and  chattels  are  put  up, 

With  Eggenberg's,  Stawata's,  Lichtenstein's, 

And  all  the  great  Bohemian  feodalities. 

Be  nimble,  lad !  and  something  may  turn  up 

For  thee — who  knows  ?   off— to  thy  place  !  quick ! 

march ! 
riEFEN'BACii  and  Goetz  (call  out  from  the  second  and 
third  tables). 
Count  Piccolomini ! 

TERTSKY. 

Stop,  ye  shall  have  him  in  an  instant. — Read 
This  oath  here,  whether  as  'tis  here  set  forth, 
The  wording  satisfies  you.     They  've  all  read  it, 
Each  in  his  turn,  and  each  one  will  subscribe 
His  individual  signature. 

max.  (reads). 
"  Ingratis  servire  nefas." 

IS0LANI. 

That  sounds  to  my  ears  very  much  like  Latin, 
And  being  interpreted,  pray  what  may 't  mean  ? 

TERTSKY. 

No  honest  man  will  serve  a  thankless  master. 

MAX. 

"  Inasmuch  as  our  supreme  Commander,  the  illus- 
trious Duke  of  Friedland,  in  consequence  of  the  man- 
ifold affronts  and  grievances  which  he  has  received, 
had  expressed  his  determination  to  quit  the  Emperor, 
but  on  our  unanimous  entreaty  has  graciously  con- 
sented to  remain  still  with  the  army,  and  not  to  part 
from  us  without  our  approbation  thereof,  so  we,  col- 
lectively and  each  in  particular,  in  the  stead  of  an  oath 
personally  taken,  do  hereby  oblige  ourselves — like- 
wise by  him  honorably  and  faithfully  to  hold,  and  in 
nowise  whatsoever  from  him  to  part,  and  to  be  ready 
to  shed  for  his  interests  the  last  drop  of  our  blood,  so 
far,  namely,  as  our  oath  to  the  Emperor  will  permit. 
(These  last  words  are  repeated  by  Isolani.)  In  testi- 
mony of  which  we  subscribe  our  names." 

TERTSKY. 

Now ! — are  you  willing  to  subscribe  this  paper  ? 

ISOLANI. 

Why  should  he  not  ?    All  officers  of  honor 
Can  «?o  it,  ay,  must  do  it. — Pen  and  ink  here ! 

TERTSKY. 

Nay,  let  it  rest  till  after  meal. 

isolani  (drawing  Max.  along). 
Come,  Max. 
[Both  seat  themselves  at  their  table. 


SCENE  IX. 

Tertsky,  Neumann, 
tertsky  (beckons  to  Neumann  who  is  waiting  at  the 

side-table,  and  steps  forward  with  him  to  the  edge  of 

the  stage). 
Have  you  the  copy  with  you,  Neumann  ?    Give  it 
It  may  be  changed  for  the  other ! 

NEUMANN. 

I  have  copied  it 
Letter  by  letter,  line  by  line ;  no  eye 
Would  e'er  discover  other  difference, 
Save  only  the  omission  of  that  clause, 
According  to  your  Excellency's  order. 

TERTSKY. 

Right !  lay  it  yonder,  and  away  with  this — 
It  has  perform'd  its  business — to  the  fire  with  it-  - 
[Neumann  lays  the  copy  on  the  table,  and  steps 
back  again  to  the  side-table. 


SCENE  X. 


Illo  (comes  out  from  the  second  chamber),  Tertsky 

ILLO. 

How  goes  it  with  young  Piccolomini  ? 

tertsky. 
All  right,  I  think.     He  has  started  no  objection. 

ILLO. 

He  is  the  only  one  I  fear  about — 

He  and  his  father.     Have  an  eye  on  both ! 

TERTSKY. 

How  looks  it  at  your  table  ?  you  forget  not 
To  keep  them  warm  and  stirring  ? 

ILLO. 

O,  quite  cordial, 
They  are  quite  cordial  in  the  scheme.  We  have  them. 
And  'tis  as  I  predicted  too.     Already 
It  is  the  talk,  not  merely  to  maintain 
The  Duke  in  station.   "  Since  we  're  once  for  all 
Together  and  unanimous,  why  not," 
Says  Montecuculi,  "  ay,  why  not  onward, 
And  make  conditions  with  the  Emperor 
There  in  his  own  Vienna  ? "    Trust  me,  Count, 
Were  it  not  for  these  said  Piccolomini, 
We  might  have  spared  ourselves  the  cheat. 

TERTSKY. 

And  Butlei 
How  goes  it  there  ?   Hush ! 


SCENE  XL 


To  them  enter  Butler  from  the  second  table. 

BUTLER. 

Don't  disturb  yourselves. 
Field  Marshal,  I  have  understood  you  perfectly. 
Good  luck  be  to  the  scheme ;  and  as  for  me, 

[  With  an  air  of  mystery. 
You  may  depend  upon  me. 

illo  (with  vivacity). 

May  we,  Butler  ? 
butler. 
With  or  without  the  clause,  all  one  to  me ! 
You  understand  me  ?    My  fidelity 
The  Duke  may  put  to  any  proof — I  'm  with  him  ! 
Tell  liim  so !  I  'm  the  Emperor's  officer, 

153 


144 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


As  long  as  'tis  his  pleasure  to  remain 

The  Emperor's  general !  and  Friedland's  servant, 

As  soon  as  it  shall  please  him  to  become 

His  own  lord. 

TERTSKY. 

You  would  make  a  good  exchange. 
No  stern  economist,  no  Ferdinand, 
Is  he  to  whom  you  plight  your  services. 

butler  {with  a  haughty  look). 
I  do  not  put  up  my  fidelity 
To  sale,  Count  Tertsky !    Half  a  year  ago 
I  would  not  have  advised  you  to  have  made  me 
An  overture  to  that,  to  which  I  now 
Offer  myself  of  my  own  free  accord. — 
But  that  is  past !  and  to  the  Duke,  Field  Marshal, 
I  bring  myself  together  with  my  regiment. 
And  mark  you,  'tis  my  humor  to  believe, 
The  example  which  I  give  will  not  remain 
Without  an  influence. 

ILLO. 

Who  is  ignorant, 
That  the  whole  army  look  to  Colonel  Butler, 
As  to  a  light  that  moves  before  them  ? 

BUTLER. 

Ey? 
Then  I  repent  me  not  of  that  fidelity 
Which  for  the  length  of  forty  years  I  held, 
If  in  my  sixtieth  year  my  old  good  name 
Can  purchase  for  me  a  revenge  so  full. 
Start  not  at  what  I  say,  sir  Generals ! 
My  real  motives — they  concern  not  you. 
And  you  yourselves,  I  trust,  could  not  expect 
That  this  your  game  had  crook'd  my  judgment — or 
That  fickleness,  quick  blood,  or  such  like  cause, 
Has  driven  the  old  man  from  the  track  of  honor, 
Which  he  so  long  had  trodden. — Come,  my  friends ! 
I  'm  not  thereto  determined  with  less  firmness, 
Because  I  know  and  have  look'd  steadily 
At  that  on  which  I  have  determined. 


Say, 
And  speak  roundly,  what  are  we  to  deem  you  ? 

BUTLER. 

A  friend !  I  give  you  here  my  hand  !  I  'm  your's 

With  all  I  have.  Not  only  men,  but  money 

Will  the  Duke  want. — Go,  tell  him,  sirs ! 

I've  earn'd  and  laid  up  somewhat  in  his  service. 

I  lend  it  him  ;  and  is  he  my  survivor, 

It  has  been  already  long  ago  bequeath'd  him. 

He  is  my  heir.     For  me,  I  stand  alone 

Here  in  the  world ;  naught  know  I  of  the  feeling 

That  binds  the  husband  to  a  wife  and  children. 

My  name  dies  with  me,  my  existence  ends. 


'Tis  not  your  money  that  he  needs — a  heart 
Like  yours  weighs  tons  of  gold  down,  weighs  down 
millions ! 

BUTLER. 

I  came  a  simple  soldier's  boy  from  Ireland 

To  Prague — and  with  a  master,  whom  I  buried. 

From  lowest  stable  duty  I  climb'd  up, 

Such  was  the  fate  of  war,  to  this  high  rank, 

The  plaything  of  a  whimsical  good  fortune. 

And  Wallenstein  too  is  a  child  of  luck  ; 

J  love  a  fortune  that  is  like  my  own. 


All  powerful  souls  have  kindred  with  each  other. 

BUTLER. 

This  is  an  awful  moment !  to  the  brave, 
To  the  determined,  an  auspicious  moment. 
The  Prince  of  Weimar  arms,  upon  the  Maine 
To  found  a  mighty  dukedom.    He  of  Halberstadt, 
That  Mansfeld,  wanted  but  a  longer  life 
To  have  mark'd  out  with  his  good  sword  a  lordship 
That  should  reward  his  courage.    Who  of  these 
Equals  our  Friedland  ?  there  is  nothing,  nothing 
So  high,  but  he  may  set  the  ladder  to  it ! 

TERTSKY 

That 's  spoken  like  a  man ! 

Butler. 
Do  you  secure  the  Spaniard  and  Italian — 
I  '11  be  your  warrant  for  the  Scotchman  Lesly. 
Come,  to  the  company! 

TERTSKY. 

Where  is  the  master  of  the  cellar  ?   Ho ! 

Let  the  best  wines  come  up.    Ho !  cheerly,  boy ! 

Luck  comes  to-day,  so  give  her  hearty  welcome. 

[Exeunt,  each  to  his  table 


SCENE  XII. 


T/ie  Master  of  the  Cellar  advancing  with  Neumann. 
Servants  passing  backwards  and  forwards. 
master  of  the  cellar. 
The  best  wine !   O :  if  my  old  mistress,  his  lady 
mother,  could  but  see  these  wild  goings  on,  she  would 
turn  herself  round  in  her  grave.  Yes,  yes,  sir  officer . 
'tis  all  down  the  hill  with  this  noble  house  !  no  end, 
no  moderation  !    And  this  marriage  with  the  Duke's 
sister,  a  splendid  connexion,  a  very  splendid  connex- 
ion !  but  I  will  tell  you,  sir  officer,  it  looks  no  good. 

NEUMANN. 

Heaven  forbid!    Why,  at  this  very  moment  the 
whole  prospect  is  in  bud  and  blossom ! 
master  of  the  cellar. 

You  think  so  ? — Well,  well !  much  may  bo  said 
on  that  head. 

FIRST  SERVANT  (COmes). 

Burgundy  for  the  fourth  table. 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

Now,  sir  Lieutenant,  if  this  an't  the  seventieth 
flask— 

FIRST  SERVANT. 

Why,  the  reason  is,  that  German  lord,  Tiefen- 
bach,  sits  at  that  table. 

master  of  the  cellar  (continuing  his  discourse 
to  Neumann). 

They  are  soaring  too  high.  They  would  rival 
kings  and  electors  in  their  pomp  and  splendor;  and 
wherever  the  Duke  leaps,  not  a  minute  does  my  gra- 
cious master,  the  count,  loiter  on  the  brink (to  the 

Servants.) — What  do  you  stand  there  listening  for  ?  I 
will  let  you  know  you  have  legs  presently.  Off!  see 
to  the  tables,  see  to  the  flasks !    Look  there !    Count 
Palfi  has  an  empty  glass  before  him ! 
runner  (comes). 

The  great  service-cup  is  wanted,  sir;  that  rich 
gold  cup  with  the  Bohemian  arms  on  it.  The  Count 
says  you  know  which  it  is. 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

Ay !  that  was  made  for  Frederick's  coronation  by 
154 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


145 


She  artist  William — there  was  not  such  another  prize 
in  the  whole  booty  at  Prague. 

RUNNER. 

The  same ! — a  health  is  to  go  round  in  him. 

master  OF  the  cellar  {shaking  his  head  while  he 
fetches  and  rinses  the  cups). 
This  will  be  something  for  the  tale-bearers — this 
goes  to  Vienna. 

NEUMANN. 

Permit  me  to  look  at  it. — Well,  this  is  a  cup  in- 
deed !  How  heavy !  as  well  as  it  may  be,  being  all 
gold. — And  what  neat  things  are  embossed  on  it! 
how  natural  and  elegant  they  look! — There,  on 
that  first  quarter,  let  me  see.  That  proud  Amazon 
there  on  horseback,  she  that  is  taking  a  leap  over 
the  crosier  and  mitres,  and  carries  on  a  wand  a  hat 
together  with  a  banner,  on  which  there  's  a  goblet 
represented.  Can  you  tell  me  what  all  diis  signifies  i 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

The  woman  whom  you  see  here  on  horseback,  is 
the  Free  Election  of  the  Bohemian  Crown.  That  is 
signified  by  the  round  hat,  and  by  that  fiery  steed  on 
which  she  is  riding.  The  hat  is  the  pride  of  man ; 
for  he  who  cannot  keep  his  hat  on  before  kings  and 
emperors  is  no  free  man. 

NEWMANN. 

But  what  is  the  cup  there  on  the  banner  ? 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

The  cup  signifies  the  freedom  of  the  Bohemian 
Church,  as  it  was  in  our  forefathers'  times.  Our  fore- 
fathers in  the  wars  of  the  Hussites  forced  from  the 
Pope  this  noble  privilege :  for  the  Pope,  you  know, 
will  not  grant  the  cup  to  any  layman.  Your  true 
Moravian  values  nothing  beyond  the  cup ;  it  is  his 
costly  jewel,  and  has  cost  the  Bohemians  their  precious 
blood  in  many  and  many  a  battle. 

NEWMANN. 

And  what  says  that  chart  that  hangs  in  the  air 
there,  over  it  all  ? 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

That  signifies  the  Bohemian  letter-royal,  which  we 
forced  from  the  Emperor  Rudolph — a  precious,  never 
to  be  enough  valued  parchment,  that  secures  to  the 
new  church  the  old  privileges  of  free  ringing  and 
open  psalmody.  But  since  he  of  Steirmark  has  ruled 
over  us,  that  is  at  an  end  ;  and  after  the  battle  at 
Prague,  in  which  Count  Palatine  Frederick  lost  crown 
and  empire,  our  faith  hangs  upon  the  pulpit  and  the 
altar — and  our  brethren  look  at  their  homes  over 
their  shoulders ;  but  the  letter-royal  the  Emperor 
himself  cut  to  pieces  with  hjs  scissars. 

NEUMANN. 

Why,  my  good  master  of  the  cellar !  you  are  deep 
read  in  the  chronicles  of  your  country ! 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

So  were  my  forefathers,  and  for  that  reason  were 
the  minstrels,  and  served  under  Procopius  and  Ziska. 
Peace  be  with  their  ashes !  Well,  well !  they  fought 
for  a  good  cause  though — There  !  carry  it  up ! 

NEWMANN. 

Stay!  let  me  but  look  at  this  second  quarter.  Look 
there  .'  That  is,  when  at  Prague  Castle  the  Imperial 
Counsellors,  Martinitz  and  Stawata,  were  hurled 
down  head  over  heels.  'Tis  even  so!  there  stands 
Count  Thur,  who  commands  it. 

[Runner  takes  the  service-cup  and  goes  off  with  it. 


MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

O  let  me  never  more  hear  of  that  day.  It  was  the 
three-and-twenticth  of  May,  in  the  year  of  our  Lord 
one  thousand,  six  hundred,  and  eighteen.  It  seems 
to  me  as  it  were  but  yesterday — from  that  unlucky 
day  it  all  began,  all  the  heart-aches  of  the  country. 
Since  that  day  it  is  now  sixteen  years,  and  there  lias 
never  once  been  peace  on  the  earth. 

[Health  drunk  aloud  at  the  second  table 
The  Prince  of  Weimar !  Hurra  ! 

[At  the  third  and  fourth  table 
Long  live  Prince  William !  Long  live  Duke  Bernard ! 
Hurra ! 

[Music  strikes  up 

FIRST  SERVANT. 

Hear  'em  !  Hear  'em  !  What  an  uproar ! 

second  servant  {comes  in  running). 
Did  you  hear  I   They  have  drunk  the  prince  of 
Weimar's  health. 

THIRD  SERVANT. 

The  Swedish  Chief  Commander ! 

first  servant  {speaking  at  the  same  time). 
The  Lutheran ! 

SECOND  SERVANT. 

Just  before,  when  Count  Deodate  gave  out  the 
Emperor's  health,  they  were  all  as  mum  as  a  nibbling 
mouse. 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

Po,  po!  When  the  wine  goes  in,  strange  things 
come  out.  A  good  servant  hears,  and  hears  not ! — 
You  should  be  nothing  but  eyes  and  feet,  except 
when  you  are  called  to. 

SECOND  SERVANT. 

[To  the  Runner,  to  whom  he  gives  secretly  a  flask 
of  wine,  keeping  his  eye  on  the  Master  of  the 
Cellar,  standing  between  him  and  the  Runner. 
Quick,  Thomas!  before  the  Master  of  the  Cellar 
runs  this  way — t  is  a  flask  of  Frontignac  ! — Snapped 
it  up  at  the  third  tabic — Canst  go  off  with  it  ? 
runner  {hides  it  in  his  pocket). 
All  right! 

[Exit  the  Second  Servant. 
third  servant  {aside  to  the  First). 
Be  on  the  hark.  Jack !    that  we  may  have  right 
plenty  to  tell  to  father  Quivoga — He  will  give  us 
right  plenty  of  absolution  in  return  for  it. 

FIRST  SERVANT. 

For  that  very  purpose  I  am  always  having  some- 
thing to  do  behind  Illo's  chair. — He  is  the  man  for 
speeches  to  make  you  stare  with ! 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR  {to  NEUMANN). 

Who,  pray,  may  that  swarthy  man  be,  he  with  the 
cross,  that  is  chatting  so  confidentially  with  Esterhats? 

NEWMANN. 

Ay !  he  too  is  one  of  those  to  whom  they  confide 
too  much.  He  calls  himself  Maradas,  a  Spaniard  is 
he. 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR  {impatiently). 

Spaniard !  Spaniard  ! — I  tell  you,  friend,  nothing 
good  comes  of  those  Spaniards.  All  these  outlandish 
fellows*  are  little  better  than  rogues. 


11 


*  There  is  a  humor  in  the  original  which  cannot  be  given  in 
the  translation.  "  Die  If elschen  alle,"  etc.  which  word  in  clas- 
sical German  means  the  Italians  alone;  but  in  its  first  sense, 
and  at  present  in  the  vulgar  use  of  the  word,  signifies  foreigners 
in  general.  Our  word  walnuts,  I  suppose,  means  outlandish 
nuts — Wallae  nuces,  in  German  "Welsche  Nusse."    T. 

155 


02 


146 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


NEWMANN. 

Fy,  fy  !  you  should  not  say  so,  friend.  There  are 
among  them  our  very  best  generals,  and  those  on 
whom  the  Duke  at  this  moment  relies  the  most. 

MASTER  OF  THE  CELLAR. 

[Taking  the  flask  out  of  the  Runner's  pocket. 
My  son,  it  will  be  broken  to  pieces  in  your  pocket. 
[Tertsky  hurries  in,  fetches  away  the  paper,  arid 
calls  to  a  Servant  for  Pen  and  Ink,  and  goes  to 
the  back  of  the  Stage. 
master  of  the  cellar  {to  the  Servants). 
The  Lieutenant-General  stands   up.^-Be   on  the 
watch. — Now !  They  break  up. — Off,  and  move  back 
the  forms. 

[They  rise  at  all  the  tables,  the  Servants  hurry  off 
the  front  of  the  Stage  to  the  tables ;  part  of  the 
guests  come  forward. 


SCENE  XIII. 


Octavio  Piccolomini  enters  into  conversation  with 
Maradas,  and  both  place  themselves  quite  on  the 
edge  of  the  Stage  on  one  side  of  the  Proscenium. 
On  the  side  directly  opposite,  Max.  Piccolomini,  bi/ 
himself,  lost  in  thought,  and  taking  no  part  in  any 
thing  that  is  going  forward.  The  middle  space  be- 
tween both,  but  rather  more  distant  from. the  edge  of 
the  Stage,  is  filed  up  by  Butler,  Isolani,  Goetz, 
Tiefenbach,  and  Kolatto. 

isolani  {wihile  the  Company  is  corning  forward). 
Good  night,  good  night,  Kolatto !  Good  night,  Lieu- 
tenant-General ! — I  should  rather  say,  good  morning. 
goetz  (to  Tiefenbach). 
Noble  brother !  (making  the  usual  compliment  after 
meals). 
tiefenbach. 
Ay!  'twas  a  royal  feast  indeed. 

GOETZ. 

Yes,  my  Lady  Countess  understands  these  matters. 
Her  mother-in-law,  Heaven  rest  her  soul,  taught  her 
— Ah!  that  was  a  housewife  for  you! 
tiefenbach. 

There  was  not  her  like  in  all  Bohemia  for  setting 
out  a  table. 

octavio  (aside  to  Maradas). 

Do  me  the  favor  to  talk  to  me — talk  of  what  you 
will — or  of  nothing.  Only  preserve  the  appearance 
at  least  of  talking.  I  would  not  wish  to  stand  by 
myself,  and  yet  I  conjecture  that  there  will  be  goings 
on  here  worthy  of  our  attentive  observation.  (He 
continues  to  fix  his  eye  on  the  whole  following  scene). 
isolani  (on  the  point  of  going). 

Lights!  lights! 

tertsky  (advancing  with  the  Paper  to  Isolani). 

Noble  brother;    two  minutes  longer! — Here   is 
something  to  subscribe. 

ISOLANI. 

Subscribe  as  much  as  you  like — but  you  must  ex- 
cuse me  from  reading  it. 

tertsky. 
There  is  no  need.    It  is  the  oath,  which  you  have 
already  read. — Only  a  few  marks  of  your  pen! 

[Isolani  hands  over  the  Paper  to  Octavio  respect- 
fully. 

TERTSKY. 

Nay,  nay,  first  come  first  served.    There  is  no  pre- 


cedence here.  (Octavio  i-uns  over  the  Paper  with 
apparent  indifference.  Tertsky  watches  hivi  at  some 
distance). 

goetz  (to  Tertsky) 
Noble  Count !  with  your  permission — Good  night 

tertsky. 
Where 's  the  hurry  ?  Come,  one  other  composing 
draught.  (To  the  servants)— Hoi 

GOETZ. 

Excuse  me — an't  able. 


A  thimble-full ! 

goetz. 
Excuse  me. 

TIEFENBACH  (sits  down). 

Pardon  me,  nobles ! — This  standing  does  not  agree 
with  me. 

TERTSKY. 

Consult  only  your  own  convenience,  General ! 

TIEFENBACH. 

Clear  at  head,  sound  in  stomach — only  my  legs 
won't  carry  me  any  longer. 

isolani  {pointing  at  his  corpulence). 
Poor  legs  !  how  should  they  ?  such  an  unmerciful 
load  !  (Octavio  subscribes  his  name,  and  reaches  over 
the  Paper  to  Tertsky,  who  gives  it  to  Isolani;  and 
he  goes  to  the  table  to  sign  his  name). 

tiefenbach. 
'Twas  that  war  in  Pomerania  that  first  brought  it 
on.   Out  in  all  weathers — ice  and  snow — no  help  for 
it. — I  shall  never  get  the  better  of  it  all  the  days  of 
my  life. 

goetz. 
Why,  in  simple  verity,  your  Swede  makes  no  nice 
inquiries  about  the  season. 

tertsky  (observing  Isolani,  whose  hand  trembles 
excessively,  so  that  he  can  scarce  direct  his  pen).  Have 
you  had  that  ugly  complaint  long,  noble  brother? — 
Dispatch  it. 

ISOLANI. 

The  sins  of  youth!  I  have  already  tried  the  cha- 
lybeate waters.    Well — I  must  bear  it. 

[Tertsky  gives  the  Paper  to  Maradas  ;  he  steps 
to  the  table  to  subscribe. 

octavio  (advancing  to  Butler). 
You  are  not  over-fond  of  the  orgies  of  Bacchus, 
Colonel!    I  have  observed  it.     You  would,  I  think, 
find  yourself  more  to  your  liking  in  the  uproar  of  a 
battle,  than  of  a  feast. 

butler. 
I  must  confess,  'tis  not  in  my  way. 

octavio  (stepping  nearer  lohimfriendlily). 
Nor  in  mine  either,  I  can  assure  you ;  and  I  am 
not  a  little  glad,  my  much-honored  Colonel  Butler,  that 
we  agree  so  well  in  our  opinions.  A  half-dozen  good 
friends  at  most,  at  a  small  round  table,  a  glass  of 
genuine  Tokay,  open  hearts,  and  a  rational  conversa 
tion — that 's  my  taste  ! 

BUTLER. 

And  mine  too,  when  it  can  be  had. 

[The  paper  comes  to  Tiefenbach,  who  glances 
over  it  at  the  same  time  v>ith  Goetz  and 
Kolatto.  Maradas  in  the  mean  time  re- 
turns to  Octavio.  All  this  takes  place,  the 
conversation  with  Butler  proceeding  un- 
interrupted. 

156 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


147 


octavio  {introducing  Maradas  to  Butler. 

Don  Ballhasar  Maradas  !    likewise  a  man  of  our 

stamp,  and  long  ago  your  admirer.       [Butler  bows. 

octavio  (continuing). 

You  are  a  stranger  here — 't  was  but  yesterday  you 

arrived — you  are  ignorant  of  the  ways  and  means 

here.    'T  is  a  wretched  place — I  know,  at  our  age 

one  loves  to  be  snug  and  quiet — What  if  you  moved 

your  lodgings  ? — Come,  be  my  visitor.  (Butler  makes 

a  low  bow).    Nay,  without  compliment ! — For  a  friend 

like  you,  I  have  still  a  corner  remaining. 

butler  (coldly). 

Your  obliged   humble   servant,    my  Lord   Lieu- 

tenant-General ! 

[The  paper  comes  to  Butler,  who  goes  to  the  table 
to  subscribe  it.     The  front  of  the  stage  is  va- 
cant, so  that  both  the  Piccolominis,  each  on 
the  side  where  he  had  been  from  the  com- 
mencement of  the  scene,  remain  alone. 
octavio  {after  having  some  time  ivatched  his  son  in 
silence,  advances  somewhat  nearer  to  him).    You  were 
long  absent  from  us,  friend ! 
max. 

I urgent  business  detained  me. 

octavio. 
And,  I  observe,  you  are  still  absent ! 

MAX. 

You  know  this  crowd  and  bustle  always  makes 
me  silent. 

octavio  (advancing  still  nearer). 

May  I  be  permitted  to  ask  what  the  business  was 
that  detained  you  ?  Tertsky  knows  it  without 
asking! 

MAX. 

What  does  Tertsky  know  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

He  was  the  only  one  who  did  not  miss  you. 
isolani  (who  has  been  attending  to  them  from  some 
distance,  steps  up). 
Well  done,  father!    Rout  out  his  baggage  :    Beat 
up  his  quarters!  there  is  something  there  that  should 
not  be. 

tertsky  (with  the  paper). 
Is  there  none  wanting  ?     Have  the  whole  sub- 
scribed >. 

octavio. 
All. 

tertsky  (calling  aloud). 
Ho !  Who  subscribes  ? 

butler  (to  Tertsky). 
Count  the  names.   There  ought  to  be  just  thirty. 

tertsky. 
Here  is  a  cross. 

tiefenbach. 
That 's  my  mark. 

ISOLANI. 

He  cannot  write  ;   but  his  cross  is  a  good  cross, 
and  is  honored  by  Jews  as  well  as  Christians. 
octavio  (presses  on  to  Max.). 
Come,  General !  let  us  go.    It  is  late. 

tertsky. 
One  Piccolomini  only  has  signed. 

ISOLAM  (pointing  to  Max.). 
Look !  that  is  your  man,  that  statue  there,  who 
has  had  neither  eye,  ear,  nor  tongue  for  us  the  whole 
evening.    (Max.  receives  the  paper  from  Tertsky, 
which  he  looks  upon  vacantly). 


SCENE  XIV. 

To  these  enter  Illo  from  the  inner  room.  He  has  in 
his  hand  the  golden  service-cup,  and  is  extremely 
distempered  with  drinking:  Goetz  and  Butler 
follow  him,  endeavoring  to  keep  him  back. 

illo. 
What  do  you  want  ?  Let  me  go. 

goetz  and  butler. 
Drink  no  more,  Illo !  For  heaven's  sake,  drink  no 
more. 

illo  (goes  up  to  Octavio,  and  shakes  him  cordially 
by  the  hand,  and  then  drinks). 
Octavio !  I  bring  this  to  you !  Let  all  grudge  be 
drowned  in  this  friendly  bowl !  I  know  well  enough, 
ye  never  loved  me — Devil  take  me  ! — and  I  never 
loved  you! — I  am  always  even  with  people  in  that 
way ! — Let  what 's  past  be  past — that  is,  you  under- 
stand— forgotten  !  I  esteem  you  infinitely.  (Em- 
bracing him  repeatedly).  You  have  not  a  dearer 
friend  on  earth  than  I — but  that  you  know.  The 
fellow  that  cries  rogue  to  you  calls  me  villain — and 
I  '11  strangle  him  ! — my  dear  friend  ! 

tertsky  (whispering  to  him). 
Art  in  thy  senses  ?  For  heaven's  sake,  Illo,  think 
where  you  are ! 

illo  (aloud). 
What  do  you  mean  ? — There  are  none  but  friends 
here,  are  there  ?  (Looks  round  the  whole  circle  with  a 
jolly  and  triumphant  air.)    Not  a  sneaker  among  us, 
thank  Heaven ! 

tertsky  (to  Butler,  eagerly). 
Take  him  off  with  you,  force  him  off,  I  entreat 
you,  Butler ! 

butler  (to  Illo). 
Field  Marshal !  a  word  with  you.    (Leads  him  to 
the  sideboard.) 

illo  (cordially). 
A  thousand  for  one ;  Fill — Fill  it  once  more  up 
to  the  brim. — To  this  gallant  man's  health  ! 
isolani  (to  Max.,  who  all  the  while  has  been  staring 
on  the  paper  with  fxed  but  vacant  eyes). 
Slow  and  sure,  my  noble  brother  ? — Hast  parsed 
it  all  yet  ? — Some  words  yet  to  go  through  ? — Ha  ! 
max.  {waking  as  from  a  dream). 
What  am  I  to  do  ? 

tertsky,  and  at  the  same  time  isolani. 
Sign  your  name.  (Octavio  directs  his  eyes  on  him 
with  intense  anxiety). 

max.  (returns  the  paper). 
Let  it  stay  till  to-morrow.    It  is  business — to-day  I 
am  not  sufficiently  collected.     Send  it  to   me   to- 
morrow. 

tertsky. 
Nay,  collect  yourself  a  little. 

ISOLANI. 

Awake,  man  !  awake  ! — Come,  thy  signature,  and 
have  done  with  it !  What  ?  Thou  art  the  youngest 
in  the  whole  company,  and  wouldst  be  wiser  than 
all  of  us  together  ?  Look  there  !  thy  father  has 
signed — we  have  all  signed. 

tertsky  (to  Octavio). 
Use  your  influence.    Instruct  him. 
octavio. 
My  son  is  at  the  age  of  discretion. 

illo  (leaves  the  service-cup  on  the  sideboard). 
What 's  the  dispute  ? 

157 


148 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


TERTSKY. 

He  declines  subscribing  the  paper. 

MAX. 

I  say,  it  may  as  well  stay  till  to-morrow. 

ILLO. 

It  cannot  stay.  We  have  all  subscribed  to  it — 
and  so  must  you. — You  must  subscribe. 

MAX. 

Illo,  good  night ! 

ILLO. 

No !  You  come  not  off  so !  The  Duke  shall  learn 
who  are  his  friends.  (All  collect  round  Illo  and 
Max.) 

MAX. 

What  my  sentiments  are  towards  the  Duke,  the 
Duke  knows,  every  one  knows — what  need  of  this 
wild  stuff? 

ILLO. 

This  is  the  thanks  the  Duke  gets  for  his  partiality 
to  Italians  and  foreigners. — Us  Bohemians  he  holds 
for  little  better  than  dullards — nothing  pleases  him 
but  what 's  outlandish. 

tertsky  (in  extreme  embarrassment,  to  the  Command- 
ers, who  at  Illo's  words  give  a  sudden  start,  as 
preparing  to  resent  them). 

It  is  the  wine  that  speaks,  and  not  his  reason. 
Attend  not  to  him,  I  entreat  you. 

ISOLANI  (v)ith  a  bitter  laugh). 
Wine  invents  nothing :  it  only  tattles. 

ILLO. 

He  who  is  not  with  me  is  against  me.  Your  tender 
consciences  !  Unless  they  can  slip  out  by  a  back- 
door, by  a  puny  proviso 

tertsky  (interrupting  him). 
He  is  stark  mad — don't  listen  to  him! 

illo  (raising  his  voice  to  the  highest  pitch). 
Unless  they  can  slip  out  by  a  proviso. — What  of 
the  proviso  ?  The  devil  take  this  proviso ! 
max.  (has  his  attention  roused,  and  looks  again  into  the 
paper). 

What  is  there  here  then  of  such  perilous  import  ? 
You  make  me  curious — I  must  look  closer  at  it. 
tertsky  (in  a  low  voice  to  Illo). 
What  are  you  doing,  Illo  ?  You  are  ruining  us. 

TIEFEN'BACH    (to  KOLATTO). 

Ay,  ay !  I  observed,  that  before  we  sat  down  to 
supper,  it  was  read  differently. 

GOETZ. 

Why,  I  seemed  to  think  so  too. 

ISOLANI. 

What  do  I  care  for  that  ?  Where  there  stand  other 
names,  mine  can  stand  too. 

TIEFENBACH. 

Before  supper  there  was  a  certain  proviso  therein, 
or  short  clause  concerning  our  duties  to  the  Em- 
peror. 

butler  (to  one  of  the  Commanders). 

For  shame,  for  shame !  Bethink  you.  What  is  the 
main  business  here?  The  question  now  is,  whether 
we  shall  keep  our  General,  or  let  him  retire.  One 
must  not  take  these  things  too  nicely  and  over-scru- 
pulously. 

isolani  (to  one  of  the  Generals). 

Did  the  Duke  make  any  of  these  provisoes  when 
he  gave  you  your  regiment? 

tertsky  (to  Goetz). 

Or  when  he  gave  you  the  office  of  arrny-pur- 
veyancer,  which  brings  you  in  yearly  a  thousand 
pistoles  ! 


ILLO. 

He  is  a  rascal  who  makes  us  out  to  be  rogues.  If 
there  be  any  one  that  wants  satisfaction,  let  him  say 
so, — I  am  his  man. 

TIEFENBACH. 

Softly,  softly !  'T  was  but  a  word  or  two. 
max.  (having  read  the  paper  gives  it  back). 
Till  to-morrow,  therefore ! 

illo  (stammering  with  rage  and  fury,  loses  all  com* 
mand  over  himself,  and  presents  the  paper  to  Max. 
with  one  hand,  and  his  sword  in  the  other). 

Subscribe — Judas ! 

ISOLANI. 

Out  upon  you,  Illo ! 

octavio,  tertsky,  butler  (all  together). 
Down  with  the  sword ! 
MAX.  (rushes  on  him  sudderily  and  disarms  him,  then 

to  Count  Tertsky). 
Take  him  off  to  bed. 

[Max.  leaves  the  stage.  Illo  cursing  and  raving  is 
held  back  by  some  of  the  Officers,  and  amidst 
a  universal  confusion  the  Curtain  drops. 


ACT  III. 
SCENE  I. 

A  Chamber  in  Piccolomini's  Mansion. — It  is  Night. 

Octavio  Piccolomini.     A  Valet  de  Chambre,  with 
Lights. 

octavio. 

And  when  my  son  comes  in,  conduct  him  hither. 

What  is  the  hour  ? 

VALET. 

'T  is  on  the  point  of  morning. 

OCTAVIO. 

Set  down  the  light.    We  mean  not  to  undress 
You  may  retire  to  sleep. 

[Exit  Valet.  Octavio  paces,  musing,  across  tie 
chamber  ;  Max.  Piccolomini  enters  unob- 
served, and  looks  at  his  father  for  some  mo- 
ments in  silence. 

max. 
Art  thou  offended  with  me  ?  Heaven  knows 
That  odious  business  was  no  fault  of  mine. 
'T  is  true,  indeed,  I  saw  thy  signature. 
What  thou  hadst  sanction'd,  should  not,  it  might  seem, 
Have  come  amiss  to  me.    But — 't  is  my  nature — 
Thou  know'st  that  in  such  matters  I  must  follow 
My  own  light,  not  another's. 

octavio  (goes  up  to  him,  and  embraces  him)- 
Follow  it, 

0  follow  it  still  further,  my  best  son ! 
To-night,  dear  boy  !  it  hath  more  faithfully 
Guided  thee  than  the  example  of  thy  father. 

MAX. 

Declare  thyself  less  darkly. 

octavio. 

I  will  do  so. 
For  after  what  has  taken  place  this  night, 
There  must  remain  no  secrets  'twixt  us  two. 

[Both  seat  themselvi  & 
Max.  Piccolomini !  what  thinkest  thou  of 
The  oath  that  was  sent  round  for  signatures  >. 
max. 

1  hold  it  for  a  thing  of  harmless  import, 
Although  I  love  not  these  set  declarations. 

158 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


149 


OCTAVIO. 

And  on  no  other  ground  hast  thou  refused 
The  signature  they  lain  had  wrested  from  thee  ? 

MAX. 

It  was  a  serious  business 1  was  absent — 

The  affair  itself  seem'd  not  so  urgent  to  me. 

OCTAVIO. 

Be  open,  Max.    Thou  hadst  then  no  suspicion  ? 

MAX. 

Suspicion  !  what  suspicion  ?  Not  the  least. 

OCTAVIO. 

Thank  thy  good  Angel,  Piccolomini : 

He  drew  thee  back  unconscious  from  the  abyss. 

MAX. 

I  know  not  what  thou  meanest 

OCTAVIO. 

I  will  tell  thee. 
Fain  would  they  have  extorted  from  thee,  son, 
The  sanction  of  thy  name  to  villany  ; 
Yea,  with  a  single  flourish  of  thy  pen, 
Made  thee  renounce  thy  duty  and  thy  honor ! 

max  (rises). 
Octavio ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Patience  !  Seat  yourself.    Much  yet 
Hast  thou  to  hear  from  me,  friend ! — hast  for  years 
Lived  in  incomprehensible  illusion. 
Before  thine  eyes  is  Treason  drawing  out 
As  black  a  web  as  e'er  was  spun  for  venom : 
A  power  of  hell  o'erclouds  thy  understanding. 
I  dare  no  longer  stand  in  silence — dare 
No  longer  see  thee  wandering  on  in  darkness, 
Nor  pluck  the  bandage  from  tliine  eyes. 

MAX. 

My  father ! 
Yet,  ere  thou  speakest,  a  moment's  pause  of  thought! 
If  your  disclosures  should  appear  to  be 
Conjectures  only — and  almost  I  fear 
They  will  be  nothing  further — spare  them !  I 
Am  not  in  that  collected  mood  at  present, 
Th:;t  I  could  listen  to  them  quietly. 

OCTAVIO. 

The  deeper  cause  thou  hast  to  hate  this  light, 

The  more  impatient  cause  have  I,  my  son, 

To  force  it  on  thee.    To  the  innocence 

And  wisdom  of  thy  heart  I  could  have  trusted  thee 

With  calm  assurance — but  I  see  the  net 

Preparing — and  it  is  thy  heart  itself 

Alarms  me  for  thine  innocence — that  secret, 

[Fixing  /lis  eye  stedfastly  on  his  son's  face. 
Which  thou  concealest,  forces  mine  from  me. 

[Max.  attempts  to  answer,  but  hesitates,  and  casts 
his  eyes  to  the  ground  embarrassed. 
octavio  [after  a  pause). 

Know,  then,  they  are  duping  thee  J  —  a  most  foul 
game 

With  thee  and  with  us  all — nay,  hear  me  calmly — 

The  Duke  even  now  is  playing.    He  assumes 

The  mask,  as  if  he  would  forsake  the  army ; 

And  in  this  moment  makes  he  preparations 

That  army  from  the  Emperor  to  steal, 

And  carry  it  over  to  the  enemy ! 

MAX. 

That  low  Priest's  legend  I  know  well,  but  did  not 
Expect  to  hear  it  from  thy  mouth. 

OCTAVIO. 

That  mouth, 


From  which  thou  hearest  it  at  this  present  moment, 
Doth  warrunt  thee  that  it  is  no  Priest's  legend. 


How  mere  a  maniac  they  supposed  the  Duke! 
What,  he  can  meditate  ? — the  Duke  ? — can  dream 
That  he  can  lure  away  full  thirty  thousand 
Tried  troops  and  true,  all  honorable  soldiers, 
More  than  a  thousand  noblemen  among  them, 
From  oaths,  from  duty,  from  their  honor  lure  them, 
And  make  them  all  unanimous  to  do 
A  deed  that  brands  them  scoundrels  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

Such  a  deed, 
With  such  a  front  of  infamy,  the  Duke 
Noways  desires — what  he  requires  of  us 
Bears  a  far  gentler  appellation.    Nothing 
He  wishes,  but  to  give  the  Empire  peace. 
And  so,  because  the  Emperor  hates  this  peace, 
Therefore  the  Duke — the  Duke  will  force  him  to  it. 
All  parts  of  the  empire  will  he  pacify, 
And  for  his  trouble  will  retain  in  payment 
(What  he  has  already  in  his  gripe) — Bohemia ! 

MAX. 

Has  he,  Octavio,  merited  of  us, 

That  we — that  we  should  think  so  vilely  of  him  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

What  we  would  think  is  not  the  question  here, 
The  affair  speaks  for  itself — and  clearest  proofs ! 
Hear  me,  my  son — 't  is  not  unknown  to  thee, 
In  what  ill  credit  with  the  court  we  stand. 
But  little  dost  thou  know,  or  guess,  what  tricks, 
What  base  intrigues,  what  lying  artifices, 
HaVe  been  employ'd — for  this  sole  end — to  sow 
Mutiny  in  the  camp !  All  bands  are  loosed — 
Loosed  all  the  bands,  that  link  the  officer 
To  his  liege  Emperor,  all  that  bind  the  soldier 
Affectionately  to  the  citizen. 
Lawless  he  stands,  and  threateningly  beleaguers 
The  state  he 's  bound  to  guard.    To  such  a  height 
'Tis  swoln,  that  at  this  hour  the  Emperor 
Before  Ins  armies — his  own  armies — trembles  ; 
Yea,  in  his  capital,  his  palace,  fears 
The  traitors'  poniards,  and  is  meditating 

To  hurry  off  and  hide  his  tender  offspring 

Not  from  the  Swedes,  not  from  the  Lutherans — 
No  !  from  his  own  troops  hide  and  hurry  them ! 

MAX. 

Cease,  cease !  thou  torturest,  shatterest  me.     I  know 
That  oft  we  tremble  at  an  empty  terror ; 
But  the  false  phantasm  brings  a  real  misery 

OCTAVIO. 

It  is  no  phantasm.     An  intestine  war, 
Of  all  the  most  unnatural  and  cruel, 
Will  burst  out  into  flames,  if  instantly 
We  do  not  fly  and  stifle  it.     The  Generals 
Are  many  of  them  long  ago  won  over; 
The  subalterns  are  vacillating — whole 
Regiments  and  garrisons  are  vacillating, 
To  foreigners  our  strong-holds  are  intrusted  ,• 
To  that  suspected  Schafgotch  is  the  whole 
Force  of  Silesia  given  up :  to  Tertsky 
Five  regiments,  foot  and  horse — to  Isolani, 
To  Illo,  Kinsky,  Butler,  the  best  troops. 


Likewise  to  both  of  us. 


159 


150 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


OCTAVIO. 

Because  the  Duke 
Believes  he  has  secured  us — means  to  lure  us 
Still  further  on  by  splendid  promises. 
To  me  he  portions  forth  the  princedoms,  Glatz 
And  Sagan ;  and  too  plain  I  see  the  angel 
With  which  he  doubts  not  to  catch  thee. 


No!  no! 


I  tell  thee — no ! 


OCTAVIO. 

O  open  yet  thine  eyes ! 
And  to  what  purpose  think'st  thou  he  has  call'd  us 
Hither  to  Pilsen  ?  to  avail  himself 
Of  our  advice  ? — 0  when  did  Friedland  ever 
Need  our  advice  ? — Be  calm,  and  listen  to  me. 
To  sell  ourselves  are  we  called  hither,  and 
Decline  we  that — to  be  his  hostages. 
Therefore  doth  noble  Galas  stand  aloof; 
Thy  father,  too,  thou  wouldst  not  have  seen  here, 
If  higher  duties  had  not  held  him  fetter'd. 

MAX. 

He  makes  no  secret  of  it — needs  make  none — 
That  we  're  called  hither  for  his  sake — he  owns  it. 
He  needs  our  aidance  to  maintain  himself— 
He  did  so  much  for  us ;  and  't  is  but  fair 
That  we  too  should  do  somewhat  now  for  him. 

OCTAVIO. 

And  know'st  thou  what  it  is  which  we  must  do  ? 
That  Illo's  drunken  mood  betray'd  it  to  thee. 
Bethink  thyself— what  hast  thou  heard,  what  seen  ? 
The  counterfeited  paper — the  omission 
Of  that  particular  clause,  so  full  of  meaning, 
Does  it  not  prove,  that  they  would  bind  us  down 
To  nothing  good  ? 

MAX. 

That  counterfeited  paper 
Appears  to  me  no  other  than  a  trick 
Of  Illo's  own  device.     These  underhand 
Traders  in  great  men's  interests  ever  use 
To  urge  and  hurry  all  things  to  the  extreme. 
They  see  the  Duke  at  variance  with  the  court, 
And  fondly  think  to  serve  him,  when  they  widen 
The  breach  irreparably.    Trust  me,  father, 
The  Duke  knows  nothing  of  all  this. 

OCTAVIO. 

It  grieves  me 
That  I  must  dash  to  earth,  that  I  must  shatter 
A  faith  so  specious  !  but  I  may  not  spare  thee  ! 
For  this  is  not  a  time  for  tenderness. 
Thou  must  take  measures,  speedy  ones — must  act. 
I  therefore  will  confess  to  thee,  that  all 
Which  I've  intrusted  to  thee  now — that  all 
Which  seems  to  thee  so  unbelievable, 
That — yes,  I  will  tell  thee — (o  pause) — Max. !  I  had 

it  all 
From  his  own  mouth — from  the  Duke's  mouth  I  had  it. 

max.  (in  excessive  agitation). 
No ! — no ! — never ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Himself  confided  to  me 
What  I,  'tis  true,  had  long  before  discover'd 
By  other  means — himself  confided  to  me, 
That  'twas  his  settled  plan  to  join  the  Swedes; 
And,  at  the  head  of  the  united  armies, 
Compel  the  Emperor 


MAX. 

He  is  passionate  : 
The  Court  has  stung  him — he  is  sore  all  over 
With  injuries  and  affronts ;  and  in  a  moment 
Of  irritation,  what  if  he,  for  once, 
Forgot  himself?  He's  an  impetuous  man. 

OCTAVIO. 

Nay,  in  cold  blood  he  did  confess  this  to  me  • 
And  having  construed  my  astonishment 
Into  a  scruple  of  his  power,  he  show'd  me 
His  written  evidences — show'd  me  letters, 
Both  from  the  Saxon  and  the  Swede,  that  gave 
Promise  of  aidance,  and  defined  the  amount 

MAX. 

It  cannot  be  ! — can  not  be  ! — can  not  be ! 

Dost  thou  not  see,  it  cannot  ? 

Thou  wouldst  of  necessity  have  shown  him 

Such  horror,  such  deep  lothing — that  or  he 

Had  taken  thee  for  his  better  genius,  or 

Thou  stood'st  not  now  a  living  man  before  me — 

OCTAVIO. 

I  have  laid  open  my  objections  to  him, 
Dissuaded  him  with  pressing  earnestness  ; 
But  my  abhorrence,  the  full  sentiment 
Of  my  whole  heart — that  I  have  still  kept  sacred 
To  my  own  consciousness. 

MAX. 

And  thou  hast  been 
So  treacherous  ?  That  looks  not  like  my  father ! 
I  trusted  not  thy  words,  when  thou  didst  tell  me 
Evil  of  him !  much  less  can  I  now  do  it, 
That  thou  calumniatest  thy  own  self. 

OCTAVIO. 

I  did  not  thrust  myself  into  his  secrecy. 

MAX. 

Uprightness  merited  his  confidence. 

OCTAVIO. 

He  was  no  longer  worthy  of  sincerity. 

MAX. 

Dissimulation,  sure,  was  still  less  worthy 
Of  thee,  Octavio ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Gave  I  him  a  cause 
To  entertain  a  scruple  of  my  honor  ? 

MAX. 

That  he  did  not,  evinced  his  confidence. 

OCTAVIO. 

Dear  son,  it  is  not  always  possible 
Still  to  preserve  that  infant  purity 
Which  the  voice  teaches  in  our  inmost  heart, 
Still  in  alarum,  for  ever  on  the  watch 
Against  the  wiles  of  wicked  men:  e'en  Virtue 
Will  sometimes  bear  away  her  outward  robes 
Soil'd  in  the  wrestle  with  Iniquity. 
This  is  the  curse  of  every  evil  deed, 
That,  propagating  still,  it  brings  forth  evil. 
I  do  not  cheat  my  better  soul  with  sophisms : 
I  but  perform  my  orders ;  the  Emperor 
Prescribes  my  conduct  to  me.     Dearest  boy, 
Far  better  were  it,  doubtless,  if  we  all 
Obey'd  the  heart  at  all  times ;  but  so  doing, 
In  this  our  present  sojourn  with  bad  men, 
We  must  abandon  many  an  honest  object. 
'T  is  now  our  call  to  serve  the  Emperor ; 
By  what  means  he  can  best  be  served — (he  heart 
May  whisper  what  it  will — this  is  our  call ! 

160 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


151 


It  seems  a  thing  appointed,  that  to-day 
I  should  not  comprehend,  not  understand  thee. 
The  Duke,  thou  say'st,  did  honestly  pour  out 
1  Lis  heart  to  thee,  but  for  an  evil  purpose ; 
And  thou  dishonestly  hast  cheated  him 
For  a  good  purpose !  Silence,  I  entreat  thee — 
My  friend,  thou  stealest  not  from  me — 
Let  me  not  lose  my  father ! 

octavio  (suppressing  resentment). 
As  yet  thou  know'st  not  all,  my  son.    I  have 
Yet  somewhat  to  disclose  to  thee.         [After  a  pause. 

Duke  Friedland 
Hath  made  his  preparations.     He  relies 
Upon  his  stars.    He  deems  us  unprovided, 
And  thinks  to  fall  upon  us  by  surprise. 
Yea,  in  his  dream  of  hope,  he  grasps  already 
The  golden  circle  in  his  hand.    He  errs. 
We  too  have  been  in  action — he  but  grasps 
His  evil  fate,  most  evil,  most  mysterious ! 

MAX. 

0  nothing  rash,  my  sire  !  By  all  that 's  good 
Let  me  invoke  thee — no  precipitation ! 

OCTAVIO. 

With  light  tread  stole  he  on  his  evil  way, 
And  light  tread  hath  Vengeance  stole  on  after  him. 
Unseen  she  stands  already,  dark  behind  him — 
But  one  step  more — he  shudders  in  her  grasp ! 
Thou  hast  seen  Questenberg  with  me.    As  yet 
Thou  know'st  but  his  ostensible  commission : 
He  brought  with  him  a  private  one,  my  son ! 
And  that  was  for  me  only. 

MAX. 

May  I  know  it  ? 

octavio  (seizes  the  patent). 

Max.! 
[A  pause, 

In  this  disclosure  place  I  in  thy  hands 

The  Empire's  welfare  and  thy  father's  life. 
Dear  to  thy  inmost  heart  is  Wallenstein : 
A  powerful  tie  of  love,  of  veneration, 
Hath  knit  thee  to  him  from  thy  earliest  youth. 
Thou  nourishest  the  wish. — O  let  me  still 
Anticipate  thy  loitering  confidence  ! 
The  hope  thou  nourishest  to  knit  thyself 
Yet  closer  to  him 

MAX. 

Father 

OCTAVIO. 

O  my  son ! 

1  trust  thy  heart  undoubtingly.    But  am  I 
Equally  sure  of  thy  collectedness  ? 

Wilt  thou  be  able,  with  calm  countenance, 
To  enter  this  man's  presence,  when  that  I 
Have  trusted  to  thee  his  whole  fate  ? 

MAX. 

According 
As  thou  dost  trust  me,  father,  with  his  crime. 

[Octavio  takes  a  paper  Out  of  Ids  escritoire,  and 
gives  it  to  him. 

MAX. 

What  ?  how  ?  a  full  Imperial  patent ! 

octavio. 

Read  it. 
max.  (just  plances  on  it). 
Duke  Friedland  sentenced  and  condemn'd ! 


octavio. 

Even  so- 
max.  (throws  down  the  paper). 
O  this  is  too  much !  O  unhappy  error ! 

octavio. 
Read  on.     Collect  thyself. 

max.  (after  he  has  read  further,  with  a  look  of  affright 
and  astonishment  on  his  father. 

How!  what!  Thou!  thou! 

OCTAVIO. 

But  for  the  present  moment,  till  the  King 
Of  Hungary  may  safely  join  the  army, 
Is  the  command  assign'd  to  me. 

MAX. 

And  think'st  thou 
Dost  thou  believe,  that  thou  wilt  tear  it  from  him  ? 
O  never  hope  it ! — Father  !  father  !  father ! 
An  inauspicious  office  is  enjoin'd  thee. 
This  paper  here — this  !  and  wilt  thou  enforce  it  ? 
The  mighty  in  the  middle  of  his  host, 
Surrounded  by  his  thousands,  him  wouldst  thou 
Disarm — degrade !  Thou  art  lost,  both  thou  and  all 
of  us. 

OCTAVIO. 

What  hazard  I  incur  thereby,  I  know. 
In  the  great  hand  of  God  I  stand.    The  Almighty 
Will  cover  with  his  shield  the  Imperial  house, 
And  shatter,  in  his  wrath,  the  work  of  darkness. 
The  Emperor  hath  true  servants  still ;  and  even 
Here  in  the  camp,  there  are  enough  brave  men 
Who  for  the  good  cause  will  fight  gallantly. 
The  faithful  have  been  warn'd — the  dangerous 
Are  closely  watch'd.     I  wait  but  the  first  step, 
And  then  immediately 

MAX. 

What!  on  suspicion? 
Immediately  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

The  Emperor  is  no  tyrant. 
The  deed  alone  he  '11  punish,  not  the  wish. 
The  Duke  hath  yet  his  destiny  in  his  power. 
Let  him  but  leave  the  treason  uncompleted, 
He  will  be  silently  displaced  from  office, 
And  make  way  to  his  Emperor's  royal  son. 
An  honorable  exile  to  his  castles 
Will  be  a  benefaction  to  him  rather 
Than  punishment.     But  the  first  open  step 

MAX. 

What  callest  thou  such  a  step  ?  A  wicked  step 
Ne'er  will  he  take ;  but  thou  mightest  easily, 
Yea,  thou  hast  done  it,  misinterpret  him. 

OCTAVIO. 

Nay,  howsoever  punishable  were 

Duke  Friedland's  purposes,  yet  still  the  steps 

Which  he  hath  taken  openly,  permit 

A  mild  construction.    It  is  my  intention 

To  leave  this  paper  wholly  unenforced 

Till  some  act  is  committed  which  convicts  him 

Of  a  high-treason,  without  doubt  or  plea, 

And  that  shall  sentence  him. 


But  who  the  judge  \ 

OCTAVIO. 


Thyself. 


For  ever,  then,  this  paper  will  lie  idle 
161 


152 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


OCTAVIO. 

Too  soon,  I  fear,  its  powers  must  all  be  proved. 
After  the  counter-promise  of  this  evening, 
It  cannot  be  but  he  must  deem  himself 
Secure  of  the  majority  with  us ; 
And  of  the  army's  general  sentiment 
He  hath  a  pleasing  proof  in  that  petition 
Whicn  tnou  delivered'st  to  him  from  the  regiments. 
Add  this  too — I  have  letters  that  the  Rhinegrave 
Hath  changed  his  route,  and  travels  by  forced  marches 
To  the  Bohemian  Forests.    What  this  purports, 
Remains  unknown ;  and,  to  confirm  suspicion, 
This  night  a  Swedish  nobleman  arrived  here. 

MAX. 

I  have  thy  word.  Thou  'It  not  proceed  to  action 
Before  thou  hast  convinced  me — me  myself. 

OCTAVIO. 

Is  it  possible  ?  Still,  after  all  thou  know'st, 
Canst  thou  believe  still  in  his  innocence  ? 

max.  {with  enthusiasm). 
Thy  judgment  may  mistake  ;  my  heart  can  not. 

[Moderates  his  voice  and  manner. 
These  reasons  might  expound  thy  spirit  or  mine ; 
But  they  expound  not  Friedland — I  have  faith : 
For  as  he  knits  his  fortunes  to  the  stars, 
Even  so  doth  he  resemble  them  in  secret, 
Wonderful,  still  inexplicable  courses ! 
Trust  me,  they  do  him  wrong.    All  will  be  solved 
These  smokes  at  once  will  kindle  into  flame — 
The  edges  of  this  black  and  stormy  cloud 
Will  brighten  suddenly,  and  we  shall  view 
The  unapproachable  glide  out  in  splendor. 

OCTAVIO. 

I  will  await  it. 


SCENE  II. 


Octavio  and  Max.  as  before.   To  them  the  Valet  of 
the  Chamber. 

octavio. 
How  now,  then  ? 

valet. 
A  dispatch  is  at  the  door. 

OCTAVIO. 

So  early  ?  From  whom  comes  he  then  ?  Who  is  it  ? 

VALET. 

That  he  refused  to  tell  me. 

OCTAVIO. 

Lead  him  in : 
And.  hark  you — let  it  not  transpire. 

[Exit  Valet  ;  the  Cornet  steps  in. 

OCTAVIO. 

Ha !  Cornet — is  it  you  1  and  from  Count  Galas  ? 
Give  me  your  letters. 

CORNET. 

The  Lieutenant-General 
Trusted  it  not  to  letters. 

octavio 

And  what  is  it  ? 
cornet. 
He  bade  me  tell  you — Dare  I  speak  openly  here  ? 

octavio. 
My  son  knows  all. 

cornet. 
We  have  him. 


OCTAVIO. 

Whom? 

CORNET. 

Sesina, 
The  old  negotiator. 

octavio  {eagerly). 
And  you  have  him  ? 

CORNET. 

In  the  Bohemian  Forest  Captain  Mohrbrand 
Found  and  secured  him  yester-morning  early : 
He  was  proceeding  then  to  Regensburg, 
And  on  him  were  dispatches  for  the  Swede. 

octavio. 
And  the  dispatches 

CORNET. 

The  Lieutenant-General 
Sent  them  that  instant  to  Vienna,  and 
The  prisoner  with  them. 

OCTAVIO. 

This  is,  indeed,  a  tiding ! 
That  fellow  is  a  precious  casket  to  us, 
Inclosing  weighty  things. — Was  much  found  on  him  ? 

CORNET. 

I  think,  six  packets,  with  Count  Tertsky's  arms. 

OCTAVIO. 

None  in  the  Duke's  own  hand  ? 


CORNET. 


Not  that  I  know 


And  old  Sesina  ? 


CORNET. 

He  was  sorely  frighten'd, 
When  it  was  told  him  he  must  to  Vienna. 
But  the  Count  Altringer  bade  him  take  heart, 
Would  he  but  make  a  full  and  free  confession. 

OCTAVIO. 

Is  Altringer  then  with  your  Lord  ?  I  heard 
That  he  lay  sick  at  Linz. 

CORNET. 

These  three  days  past 
He's  with  my  master,  the  Lieutenant-General, 
At  Frauenberg.    Already  have  they  sixty 
Small  companies  together,  chosen  men  ; 
Respectfully  they  greet  you  with  assurances, 
That  they  are  only  waiting  your  commands. 

OCTAVIO. 

In  a  few  days  may  great  events  take  place. 
And  when  must  you  return  ? 

CORNET. 

I  wait  your  orders. 

OCTAVIO. 

Remain  till  evening. 

[Cornet  signifies  his  assent  and  obeisance,  and  is 
going. 

No  one  saw  you — ha  ? 

CORNET. 

No  living  creature.    Through  the  cloister  wicket 
The  Capuchins,  as  usual,  let  me  in. 

OCTAVIO. 

Go,  rest  your  limbs,  and  keep  yourself  conceal'd 
I  hold  it  probable,  that  yet  ere  evening 
I  shall  dispatch  you.  The  development 
Of  this  affair  approaches :  ere  the  day, 
That  even  now  is  dawning  in  the  heaven, 

162 


THE  PICOOLOMIXl. 


15JJ 


Ere  this  eventful  day  hath  set,  the  lot 

That  must  decide  our  fortunes  will  be  drawn. 

[Exit  Cornet. 


SCENE  III. 
Octavio  and  Max.  Piccolomini. 

OCTAVIO. 

Well — and  what  now,  son?  All  will  soon  be  clear; 
For  all,  I  'm  certain,  went  through  that  Sesina. 

max.  (who  through  the  whole  of  the  foregoing  scene 
has  been  in  a  violent  and  visible  struggle  of  feelings, 
at  length  starts  as  one  resolved). 

I  will  procure  me  light  a  shorter  way. 

Farewell. 

OCTAVIO. 

Where  now  ? — Remain  here. 


To  the  Duke. 


MAX. 

octavio  (alarmed). 
What 


max.  (returning). 
If  thou  hast  believed  that  I  shall  act 

A  part  in  this  thy  play 

Thou  hast  miscalculated  on  me  grievously. 

My  way  must  be  straight  on.   True  with  the  tongue, 

False  with  the  heart — I  may  not,  can  not  be  : 

Nor  can  I  suffer  that  a  man  should  trust  me — 

As  his  friend  trust  me — and  then  lull  my  conscience 

With  such  low  pleas  as  these  : — "  I  ask'd  him  not — 

He  did  it  all  at  his  own  hazard — and 

My  mouth  has  never  lied  to  him." — No,  no ! 

What  a  friend  takes  me  for,  that  I  must  be. 

— I  '11  to  the  Duke  ;  ere  yet  this  day  is  ended, 

Will  I  demand  of  him  that  he  do  save 

His  good  name  from  the  world,  and  with  one  stride 

Break  through  and  rend  this  fine-spun  web  of  yours. 

He  can,  he  will ! — J  still  am  his  believer. 

Yet  I  '11  not  pledge  myself,  but  that  those  letters 

May  furnish  you,  perchance,  with  proofs  against  him. 

How  far  may  not  this  Tertsky  have  proceeded — 

What  may  not  he  himself  too  have  permitted 

Himself  to  do,  to  snare  the  enemy, 

The  laws  of  war  excusing  ?  Nothing,  save 

His  own  mouth,  shall  convict  him — nothing  less! 

And  face  to  face  will  I  go  question  him. 

OCTAVIO. 

Thou  wilt  ? 

MAX. 

I  will,  as  sure  as  this  heart  beats. 

OCTAVIO. 

I  have,  indeed,  miscalculated  on  thee. 
I  calculated  on  a  prudent  son, 
Who  would  have  blest  the  hand  beneficent 
That  pluck*d  him  back  from  the  abyss — and  lo ! 
A  fascinated  being  I  discover. 
Whom  his  two  eyes  befool,  whom  passion  wilders, 
Whom  not  the  broadest  light  of  noon  can  heal. 
Go,  question  him! — Re  mad  enough,  I  pray  thee. 
The  purpose  of  thy  father,  of  thy  Emperor, 
Go,  give  it  up  free  booty  : — Force  me,  drive  me 
To  an  open  breach  before  the  time.     And  now, 
Now  that  a  miracle  of  heaven  had  guarded 
My  secret  purpose  even  to  this  hour, 
And  laid  to  sleep  Suspicion's  piercing  eyes,  i 

Let  me  have  lived  to  see  that  mine  own  son,         I 
P 


With  frantic  enterprise,  annihilates 

My  toilsome  labors  and  stale-policy. 

MAX. 

Ay — this  slate-policy  !  O  how  I  curse  it ! 

You  will,  some  time,  with  your  state-policy 

Compel  him  to  the  measure  :  it  may  happen, 

Because  you  are  determined  that  he  is  guilty, 

Guilty  ye 'II  make  him.     All  retreat  cut  ofF, 

You  close  up  every  outlet,  hem  him  in 

Narrower  and  narrower,  till  at  length  ye  force  him 

Yes,  ye, — ye  force  him,  in  his  desperation, 

To  set  fire  to  his  prison.     Father  !  father  ! 

That  never  can  end  well — it  can  not — will  not ! 

And  let  it  be  decided  as  it  may, 

I  see  with  boding  hcarl  die  near  approach 

Of  an  ill-starr'd.  unblest  catastrophe. 

For  this  great  Monarch-spirit,  if  he  fall, 

Will  drag  a  world  into  the  ruin  with  him. 

And  as  a  ship  (that  midway  on  the  ocean 

Takes  fire)  al  once,  and  with  a  thunder-burst 

Explodes,  and  with  itself  shoots  out  its  crew 

In  smoke  and  ruin  betwixt  sea  and  heaven ; 

So  will  he,  falling,  draw  down  in  his  fall 

All  us,  who  're  fix'd  and  mortised  to  his  fortune. 

Deem  of  it  what  thou  wilt ;  but  pardon  me, 

That  I  must  bear  me  on  in  my  own  way. 

All  must  remain  pure  betwixt  him  and  me ; 

And,  ere  the  day-light  dawns,  it  must  be  known 

Which  I  must  lose — my  faiher,  or  my  friend. 

[During  his  exit  the  curtain  drops 


ACT  IV. 
SCENE  I. 

Scene,  a  Room  fitted  up  for  astrological  labors,  and 
provided  with  celestial  Charts,  with  Globes,  Teh- 
scopes,  Quadrants,  and  other  mathematical  Instru- 
ments.— Seven  Colossal  Figures,  representing  tlit 
Planets,  each  with  a  transparent  Star  of  a  different 
Color  on  its  head,  stand  in  a  semicircle  in  the  Back- 
ground, so  that  Mars  and  Saturn  are  nearest  tin 
Eye. — The  Remainder  of  the  Scene,  and  its  Dispo- 
sition, is  gin  ii  in  the  Fourth  Scene  of  the  Second 
Act. — There  must  be  a  Curtain  over  the  Figure?, 
which  may  be  dropped,  and  conceal  them  on  occasions 

[In  the  Fifth  Scene  of  this  Act  it  must  be  dropped;  bw 
in  the  Sevenlii  Scene,  it  must  be  again  drawn  up 
wholly  or  in  part.] 

Wallenstein  at  a  black  Table,  on  which  a  Speadwn 
Astrologicum  is  described  with  Chalk.  Seni  is  taking 
Observations  through  a  Window. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

All  well — and  now  let  it  be  ended.  Seni. — rome, 
The  dawn  commences,  and  Mars  rules  the  hour. 
We  must  give  o'er  the  operation.     Come, 
We  know  enough. 

SENI. 

Your  Highness  must  permit  rae 
Just  to  contemplate  Venus.     She 's  now  rising : 
Like  as  a  sun,  so  shines  she  in  the  east. 

wai.lensteix. 
She  is  at  present  in  her  perigee, 
And  shoots  down  now  her  strongest  influences. 

[Contemplating  the  figure  on  tlie  laiiit- 
1G3 


154 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Auspicious  aspect !  fateful  in  conjunction, 
At  length  the  mighty  three  corradiate  ; 
And  the  two  stars  of  blessing,  Jupiter 
And  Venus,  take  between  thern  the  malignant 
Slyly-malicious  Mars,  and  thus  compel 
Into  mu  service  that  old  mischief-founder: 
For  long  he  view'd  me  hostilely,  and  ever 
With  beam  oblique,  or  perpendicular, 
Now  in  the  Quartile,  now  in  the  Secundan, 
Shot  his  red  lightnings  at  my  stars,  disturbing 
Their  blessed  influences  and  sweet  aspects. 
Now  they  have  conquer'd  the  old  enemy, 
And  bring  him  in  the  heavens  a  prisoner  to  me. 
seni  (who  has  come  down  from  the  window). 
And  in  a  corner  house,  your  Highness — think  of  that! 
That  makes  each  influence  of  double  strength. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  sun  and  moon,  too,  in  the  Sextile  aspect, 
The  soft  light  with  the  vehement — so  I  love  it. 
Sol  is  the  heart,  Luna  the  head  of  heaven, 
Bold  be  the  plan,  fiery  the  execution. 

SENI. 

And  both  the  mighty  Lumina  by  no 
Maleficus  affronted.  Lo  !  Saturnus, 
Innocuous,  powerless,  in  cadente  Domo. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  empire  of  Saturnus  is  gone  by ; 

Lord  of  the  secret  birth  of  things  is  he; 

Within  the  lap  of  earth,  and  in  the  depths 

Of  the  imagination  dominates  ; 

And  his  are  all  things  that  eschew  the  light. 

The  time  is  o'er  of  brooding  and  contrivance, 

For  Jupiter,  the  lustrous,  lordeth  now, 

And  the  dark  work,  complete  of  preparation, 

He  draws  by  force  into  the  realm  of  light. 

Now  must  we  hasten  on  to  action,  ere 

The  scheme,  and  most  auspicious  posture 

Parts  o'er  my  head,  and  takes  once  more  its  flight ; 

For  the  heavens  journey  still,  and  sojourn  not. 

[There  are  knocks  at  the  door. 
There's  some  one  knocking  there.     See  who  it  is. 

tertsky  (from  without). 
Open,  and  let  me  in. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Ay — 'tis  Tertsky. 
What  is  there  of  such  urgence  ?  We  are  busy. 

tertsky  (from  without). 
Lay  all  aside  at  present,  I  entreat  you. 
It  suffers  no  delaying. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Open,  Seni ! 
[While  Seni  opens  the  door  for  Tertsky,  Wallen- 
stein  draws  the  curtain  over  the  figures. 

tertsky  (enters). 
Hast  thou  already  heard  it  ?  He  is  taken. 
Galas  has  given  him  up  to  the  Emperor. 

[Seni  draws  off  the  black  table,  and  exit. 


SCENE  II. 

WALLENSTEIN,    COUNT  TERTSKY. 
WALLENSTEIN  (to  TERTSKY). 

VVhe  has  been  taken  ? — Who  is  given  up  ? 

TERTSKY. 

The  man  who  knows  our  secrets,  who  knows  every 


Negotiation  with  the  Swede  and  Saxon, 

Through  whose  hands  all  and  everything  has  pass'd — 

wallenstein  (drawing  back). 
Nay,  not  Sesina  ? — Say,  No !  I  entreat  thee. 

TERTSKY. 

All  on  his  road  for  Regensburg  to  the  Swede 
He  was  plunged  down  upon  by -Galas'  agent, 
Who  had  been  long  in  ambush  lurking  for  him. 
There  must  have  been  found  on  him  my  whole  packet 
To  Thur,  to  Kinsky,  to  Oxenstiern,  to  Arnheim : 
All  this  is  in  their  hands  ;  they  have  now  an  insight 
Into  the  whole — our  measures,  and  our  motives. 


SCENE  III. 
To  them  enters  Illo. 


Has  he  heard  it  ? 


illo  (to  Tertsky). 

TERTSKY. 

He  has  heard  it. 


illo  (to  Wallenstein). 

Thinkest  thou  still 
To  make  thy  peace  with  the  Emperor,  to  regain 
His  confidence  ? — E'en  were  it  now  thy  wish 
To  abandon  all  thy  plans,  yet  still  they  know 
What  thou  hast  wish'd  ;  then  forwards  thou  must 

press ; 
Retreat  is  now  no  longer  in  thy  power. 

TERTSKY. 

They  have  documents  against  us,  and  in  hands, 
Which  show  beyond  all  power  of  contradiction — 

wallenstein. 
Of  my  handwriting — no  iota.     Thee 
I  punish  for  thy  lies. 

illo. 
And  thou  believest, 
That  what  this  man,  that  what  thy  sister's  husband 
Did  in  thy  name,  will  not  stand  on  thy  reck'ning  > 
His  word  must  pass  for  thy  word  with  the  Swede, 
And  not  with  those  that  hate  thee  at  Vienna. 

tertsky. 
In  writing  thou  gavest  nothing — But  bethink  thee. 
How  far  thou  ventured 'st  by  word  of  mouth 
With  this  Sesina  !  And  will  he  be  silent  ? 
If  he  can  save  himself  by  yielding  up 
Thy  secret  purposes,  will  he  retain  them  ? 

ILLO. 

Thyself  dost  not  conceive  it  possible  ; 
And  since  they  now  have  evidence  authentic 
How  far  thou  hast  already  gone,  speak ! — tell  us, 
What  art  thou  waiting  for  ?  thou  canst  no  longer 
Keep  thy  command ;  and  beyond  hope  of  rescue 
Thou'rt  lost,  if  thou  resign'st  it. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

In  the  army 
Lies  my  security.     The  army  will  not 
Abandon  me.     Whatever  they  may  know, 
The  power  is  mine,  and  they  must  gulp  it  down — 
And  substitute  I  caution  for  my  fealty, 
They  must  be  satisfied,  at  least  appear  so. 

ILLO. 

The  army,  Duke,  is  thine  now — for  this  moment — 
'Tis  thine  :  but  think  with  terror  on  the  slow. 
The  quiet  power  of  time.     From  open  violence 
The  attachment  of  thy  soldiery  secures  thee 
To-day — to-morrow ;  but  grant'st  thou  them  a  respite 

ItU 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


155 


Unheard,  unseen,  they  '11  undermine  that  love 
On  which  thou  now  dost  feel  so  firm  a  footing, 
With  wily  theft  will  draw  away  from  thee 
One  after  the  other 

WALLENSTEIN. 

'Tis  a  cursed  accident ! 

ILLO. 

Oh !  I  will  call  it  a  most  blessed  one, 
If  it  work  on  thee  as  it  ought  to  do, 
Hurry  thee  on  to  action — to  decision — 
The  Swedish  General 

WALLENSTEIN. 

He 's  arrived !  Know'st  thou 
What  his  commission  is 

ILLO. 

To  thee  alone 
Will  he  intrust  the  purpose  of  his  coming. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

A  cursed,  cursed  accident !  Yes,  yes, 
Sesina  knows  too  much,  and  won't  be  silent. 

TERTSKY. 

He 's  a  Bohemian  fugitive  and  rebel. 

His  neck  is  forfeit.    Can  he  save  himself 

At  thy  cost,  think  you  he  will  scruple  it  ? 

And  if  they  put  him  to  the  torture,  will  he, 

Will  he,  that  dastardling,  have  strength  enough 

WALLENSTEIN  (lost  in  thought). 
Their  confidence  is  lost — irreparably  ! 
And  I  may  act  what  way  I  will,  I  shall 
Be  and  remain  for  ever  in  their  thought 
A  traitor  to  my  country.    How  sincerely 
Soever  I  return  back  to  my  duty, 
It  will  no  longer  help  me 

ILLO. 

Ruin  thee, 
That  it  will  do !  Not  thy  fidelity, 
Thy  weakness  will  be  deem'd  the  sole  occasion — 
wallenstein  (pacing  up  and  down  in  extreme 
agitation). 
What !  I  must  realize  it  now  in  earnest, 
Because  I  toy'd  too  freely  with  the  thought  ? 
Accursed  he  who  dallies  with  a  devil! 
And  must  I — I  must  realize  it  now — 
Now,  while  I  have  the  power,  it  must  take  place ! 

ILLO. 

Now — now — ere  they  can  ward  and  parry  it ! 

wallenstein  {looking  at  the  paper  of  signatures). 
I  have  the  General's  word — a  written  promise ! 
Max.  Piccolomini  stands  not  here — how 's  that  ? 

TERTSKY 

It  was he  fancied 

ILLO. 

Mere  self-willedness. 
There  needed  no  such  tiling  'twixt  him  and  you. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

He  is  quite  right — there  needeth  no  such  thing. 
The  regiments,  too,  deny  to  march  for  Flanders — 
Have  sent  me  in  a  paper  of  remonstrance, 
And  openly  resist  the  Imperial  orders. 
The  first  step  to  revolt 's  already  taken. 

ILLO. 

Believe  me,  thou  wilt  find  it  far  more  easy 
To  lead  them  over  to  the  enemy 
Than  to  the  Spaniard. 


WALLENSTEIN. 

I  will  hear,  however, 
What  the  Swede  has  to  say  to  me. 

illo  (eagerly  to  Tertsky). 

Go,  call  him  I 
He  stands  without  the  door  in  waiting. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Stay! 
Stay  yet  a  little.    It  hath  taken  me 
All  by  surprise, — it  came  too  quick  upon  me  ; 
'Tis  wholly  novel,  that  an  accident, 
With  its  dark  lordship,  and  blind  agency, 
Should  force  me  on  wdth  it. 


And  after  weigh  it. 


ILLO. 

First  hear  him  only, 
[Exeunt  Tertsky  and  Illo 


SCENE  IV. 


WALLENSTEIN  (in  soliloquy) 
Is  it  possible  ? 
Is 't  so  ?  I  can  no  longer  what  I  would  ? 
No  longer  draw  back  at  my  liking  ?  I 
Must  do  the  deed,  because  I  thought  of  it, 
And  fed  this  heart  here  with  a  dream  ?  Because 
I  did  not  scowl  temptation  from  my  presence, 
Dallied  with  thoughts  of  possible  fulfilment, 
Commenced  no  movement,  left  all  time  uncertain, 
And  only  kept  the  road,  the  access  open  ? 
By  the  great  God  of  Heaven  !  It  was  not 
My  serious  meaning,  it  was  ne'er  resolve. 
I  but  amused  myself  with  thinking  of  it. 
The  free-will  tempted  me,  the  pow:er  to  do 
Or  not  to  do  it. — Was  it  criminal 
To  make  the  fancy  minister  to  hope, 
To  fill  the  air  with  pretty  toys  of  air, 
And  clutch  fantastic  sceptres  moving  t'ward  me  ! 
Was  not  the  world  kept  free  ?  Beheld  I  not 
The  road  of  duty  close  beside  me — but 
One  little  step,  and  once  more  I  was  in  it ! 
Where  am  I  ?  Whither  have  I  been  transported  ? 
No  road,  no  track  behind  me,  but  a  wall, 
Impenetrable,  insurmountable, 
Rises  obedient  to  the  spells  I  mutter'd 
And  meant  not — my  own  doings  tower  behind  me. 

[Pauses  and  remains  in  deep  thought. 
A  punishable  man  I  seem ;  the  guilt, 
Try  what  I  will,  I  cannot  roll  off  from  me ; 
The  equivocal  demeanor  of  my  life 
Bears  witness  on  my  prosecutor's  party. 
And  even  my  purest  acts  from  purest  motives 
Suspicion  poisons  with  malicious  gloss. 
Were  I  that  thing  for  which  I  pass,  that  traitor, 
A  goodly  outside  I  had  sure  reserved, 
Had  drawn  the  coverings  thick  and  double  round  me 
Been  calm  and  chary  of  my  utterance  ; 
But  being  conscious  of  the  innocence 
Of  my  intent,  my  uncorrupted  will, 
I  gave  way  to  my  humors,  to  my  passion  : 
Bold  were  my  words,  because  my  deeds  were  not. 
Now  every  planless  measure,  chance  event, 
The  threat  of  rage,  the  vaunt  of  joy  and  triumph. 
And  all  the  May-games  of  a  heart  o'erflowing, 
Will  they  connect,  and  weave  them  all  together 
Into  one  web  of  treason ;  all  will  be  plan, 
My  eye  ne'er  absent  from  the  far-off  mark, 
165 


156 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Step  tracing  step,  each  step  a  politic  progress  ; 
And  out  of  all  they  '11  fabricate  a  charge 
So  specious,  that  I  must  myself  stand  dumb. 
I  am  caught  in  my  own  net,  and  only  force, 
Naught  but  a  sudden  rent  can  liberate  me. 

[Pauses  again. 
How  else .'  since  that  the  heart 's  unbiass'd  instinct 
[mpell'd  me  to  the  daring  deed,  which  now 
Necessity,  self-preservation,  orders. 
Stern  is  the  On-look  of  Necessity, 
Not  without  shudder  may  a  human  hand 
Grasp  the  mysterious  urn  of  destiny. 
My  deed  was  mine,  remaining  in  my  bosom : 
Once  suifer'd  to  escape  from  its  safe  corner 
Within  the  heart,  its  nursery  and  birth-place, 
Sent  forth  into  the  Foreign,  ft  belongs 
For  ever  to  those  sly  malicious  powers 
Whom  never  art  of  man  conciliated. 

[Paces  in  agitation  through  the  chamber,  then  pauses, 

and,  after  the  pause,  breaks  out  again  into 

audible  soliloquy. 
What  is  thy  enterprise  ?  thy  aim  ?  thy  object  ? 
Hast  honestly  confess'd  it  to  thyself? 
Power  seated  on  a  quiet  throne  thou  'dst  shake, 
Power  on  an  ancient  consecrated  throne, 
Strong  in  possession,  founded  in  old  custom  ; 
Power  by  a  thousand  tough  and  string}'  roots 
Fix'd  to  the  people's  pious  nursery-faith. 
This,  this  will  be  no  strife  of  strength  with  strength. 
That  fear'd  1  not.    I  brave  each  combatant, 
Whom  I  can  look  on,  fixing  eye  to  eye, 
Who,  full  himself  of  courage,  kindles  courage 
In  me  too.    'Tis  a  foe  invisible. 
The  which  I  fear — a  fearful  enemy, 
Which  in  the  human  heart  opposes  me, 
By  its  coward  fear  alone  made  fearful  to  me. 
Not  that,  which  full  of  life,  instinct  with  power, 
Makes  known  its  present  being ;  that  is  not 
The  true,  the  perilously  formidable. 
O  no !  it  is  the  common,  the  quite  common, 
The  thing  of  an  eternal  yesterday, 
What  ever  was,  and  evermore  returns, 
Sterling  to-morrow,  for  to-day  't  was  sterling ! 
For  of  the  wholly  common  is  man  made, 
And  custom  is  his  nurse !  Woe  then  to  them, 
Who  lay  irreverent  hands  upon  his  old 
House  furniture,  the  dear  inheritance 
From  his  forefathers !  For  time  consecrates  ; 
And  what  is  gray  with  age  becomes  religion. 
Be  in  possession,  and  thou  hast  the  right, 
And  sacred  will  the  many  guard  it  for  thee ! 

[7b  the  Page,  who  here  enters. 
The  Swedish  officer  ? — Well,  let  him  enter. 

[The  Page  exit,  WALLENSTEiN./ues  his  eye  in  deep 

thought  on  the  door. 
Yet  is  it  pure — as  yet !  the  crime  has  come 
Not  o'er  this  threshold  yet — so  slender  is 
The  boundary  that  divideth  life's  two  paths. 


SCENE  V. 

Wallenstein  and  Wrangel  . 

wallenstein  (after  having  fxed  a  searching  look  on 

him). 
ifour  name  is  Wrangel  ? 


WRANGEL. 

Guslave  Wrangel,  General 
Of  the  Sudermanian  Blues. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

It  was  a  Wrangel 
Who  injured  me  materially  at  Stralsund, 
And  by  his  brave  resistance  was  the  cause 
Of  the  opposition  which  that  sea-port  made. 

WRANGEL. 

It  was  the  doing  of  the  element 
With  which  you  fought,  my  Lord  !  and  not  my  merit 
The  Baltic  Neptune  did  assert  his  freedom  : 
The  sea  and  land?  it  seem'd,  were  not  to  serve 
One  and  the  same. 

wallenstein  (makes  the  motion  for  him  to  take  a  seat, 

a?id.  seals  himself). 

And  where  are  your  credentials  ? 

Come  you  provided  with  full  powers,  Sir  General  ? 

wrangel. 

There  are  so  many  scruples  yet  to  solve 

wallenstein  {having  rtad  the  credentials). 
An  able  letter ! — Ay — he  is  a  prudent 
Intelligent  master,  whom  you  serve,  Sir  General ! 
The  Chancellor  writes  me,  that  he  but  fulfils 
His  late  departed  Sovereign's  own  idea 
In  helping  me  to  the  Bohemian  crown. 

wrangel. 
He  says  the  truth.    Our  great  King,  now  in  heaven 
Did  ever  deem  most  highly  of  your  Grace's 
Pre-eminent  sense  and  military  genius  ; 
And  ahvavs  the  commanding  Intellect, 
He  said,  should  have  command,  and  be  the  King. 

wallenstein. 
Yes,  he  might  say  it  safely. — General  Wrangel, 

[Taking  his  hand  affectionately 
Come,  fair  and  open. — Trust  me,  I  was  always 
A  Swede  at  heart.    Ey !  that  did  you  experience 
Both  in  Silesia  and  at  Nuremburg ; 
I  had  you  often  in  my  power,  and  let  you 
Always  slip  out  by  some  back-door  or  other. 
'Tis  this  for  which  the  Court  can  ne'er  forgive  me. 
Which  drives  me  to  this  present  step:  and  since 
Our  interests  so  run  in  one  direction, 
E'en  let  us  have  a  thorough  confidence 
Each  in  the  other. 

WRANGEL. 

Confidence  will  come 
Has  each  but  only  first  security. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  Chancellor  still,  I  see,  does  not  quite  trust  me ; 
And,  I  confess — the  game  does  not  lie  wholly 
To  my  advantage — Without  doubt  he  thinks. 
If  I  can  play  false  with  the  Emperor, 
Who  is  my  Sov'reign,  I  can  do  the  like 
With  the  enemy,  and  that  the  one  too  were 
Sooner  to  be  forgiven  me  than  the  other. 
Is  not  this  your  opinion  too,  Sir  General  ? 

WRANGEL. 

I  have  here  an  office  merely,  no  opinion. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  Emperor  hath  urged  me  to  the  uttermost 
I  can  no  longer  honorably  serve  him. 
For  my  security,  in  self-defence, 
I  take  this  hard  step,  which  my  conscience  blame*. 
16ti 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


157 


WRANGEL. 

That  I  believe.     So  far  would  no  one  go 
Who  was  not  forced  to  it.                      [After  a  pause. 
What  may  have  impell'd 
Your  pnncely  Highness  in  this  wise  to  act 
Toward  your  Sovereign  Lord  and  Emperor, 
Beseems  not  us  to  expound  or  criticise. 
The  Swede  is  lighting  for  his  good  old  cause, 
With  his  good  sword  and  conscience.    This  concur- 
rence, 
This  opportunity,  is  in  our  favor, 
And  all  advantages  in  war  are  lawful. 
We  take  what  offers  without  questioning ; 
And  if  all  have  its  due  and  just  proportions 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Of  what  then  are  ye  doubting  ?   Of  my  will  ? 

Or  of  my  power !  I  pledged  me  to  the  Chancellor, 

Would  he  trust  me  with  sixteen  thousand  men, 

That  I  would  instantly  go  over  to  them 

With  eighteen  thousand  of  the  Emperor's  troops. 

WRANGEL. 

Your  Grace  is  known  to  be  a  mighty  war-chief, 
To  be  a  second  Attila  and  Pyrrhus. 
'Tis  talk'd  of  still  with  fresh  astonishment, 
How  some  years  past,  beyond  all  human  faith, 
You  call'd  an  army  forth,  like  a  creation : 
But  yet 

WALLENSTEIN-. 

But  yet  ? 

WRANGEL. 

But  still  the  Chancellor  thinks, 
It  might  yet  be  an  easier  thing  from  nothing 
To  call  forth  sixty  thousand  men  of  battle, 
Than  to  persuade  one  sixtieth  part  of  them — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  now  ?   Out  with  it,  friend  ? 

WRANGEL. 

To  break  their  oaths. 

WALLENSTEIN 

And  he  thinks  sol — lie  judges  like  a  Swede, 
And  like  a  Protestant.     You  Lutherans 
Fight  for  your  Bible.    You  are  interested 
About  the  cause  ;  and  with  your  hearts  you  follow 
Your  banners. — Among  you,  whoe'er  deserts 
To  the  enemy,  hath  broken  covenant 
With  two  Lords  at  one  time. — We  've  no  such  fan- 
cies. 

WRANGEL. 

Great  God  in  Heaven !  Have  then  the  people  here 
No  house  and  home,  no  fire-side,  no  altar  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  will  explain  that  to  you,  how  it  stands : — 
The  Austrian  has  a  country,  ay,  and  loves  it, 
And  has  good  cause  to  love  it — but  this  army, 
That  calls  itself  the  Imperial,  this  that  houses 
Here  in  Bohemia,  this  has  none — no  country  ; 
This  is  an  outcast  of  all  foreign  lands, 
Unclaiin'd  by  town  or  tribe,  to  whom  belongs 
Nothing,  except  the  universal  sun. 

WRANGEL. 

But  then  the  Nobles  and  the  Officers  ? 
Such  a  desertion,  such  a  felony, 
It  is  without  example,  my  Lord  Duke, 
In  the  world's  history. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

They  are  all  mine — 
Mine  unconditionally — mine  on  all  terms. 
P2 


Not  me,  your  own  eyes  you  must  trust. 

[He  gives  him  (he  paper  containing  the  ■uyritten 
oath.  Wrangel  reads  it  through,  and,  having 
read  it,  lays  it  on  the  table,  remaining  silerit. 
So  then  ? 
Now  comprehend  you  f 

WRANGEL. 

Comprehend  who  can ! 
My  Lord  Duke  ;  I  will  let  the  mask  drop — yes ! 
I  've  full  powers  for  a  final  settlement 
The  Rhinegrave  stands  but  four  days'  march  from 

here 
With  fifteen  thousand  men,  and  only  waits 
For  orders  to  proceed  and  join  your  army 
Those  orders  /  give  out,  immediately 
We're  compromised. 

WALLENSTEIN 

What  asks  the  Chancellor  ? 
wrangel  (considerately). 
Twelve  regiments,  every  man  a  Swede — my  head 
The  warranty — and  all  might  prove  at  last 

Only  false  play 

wallenstein  (starting). 

Sir  Swede ! 

wrangel  (calmly  proceeding). 

Am  therefore  forced 
T' insist  thereon,  that  he  do  formally, 
Irrevocably  break  with  the  Emperor, 
Else  not  a  Swede  is  trusted  to  Duke  Friedland. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Come,  brief,  and  open  I  What  is  the  demand  ? 

WRANGEL. 

That  he  forthwith  disarm  the  Spanish  regiments 
Attach'd  to  the  Emperor,  that  he  seize  Prague, 
And  to  the  Swedes  give  up  that  city,  with 
The  strong  pass  Egra. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

That  is  much  indeed  ! 

Prague  ! — Egra 's    granted  —  But — but    Prague ! — 

'T  won't  do. 
I  give  you  every  security 

Which  you  may  ask  of  me  in  common  reason — 
But  Prague — Bohemia — these,  Sir  General, 
I  can  myself  protect. 

WRANGEL. 

We  doubt  it  not. 
But  'tis  not  the  protection  that  is  now 
Our  sole  concern.    We  want  security, 
That  we  shall  not  expend  our  men  and  money 
All  to  no  purpose. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

'Tis  but  reasonable. 

WRANGEL. 

And  till  we  are  indemnified,  so  long 
Stays  Prague  in  pledge. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Then  trust  you  us  so  little  >. 
wrangel  (rising). 
The  Swede,  if  he  would  treat  well  with  the  German, 
Must  keep  a  sharp  look-out.    We  have  been  call'd 
Over  the  Baltic,  we  have  saved  the  empire 
From  ruin — with  our  best  blood  have  we  seal'd 
The  liberty  of  faith,  and  gospel  truth. 
But  now  already  is  the  benefaction 

No  longer  felt,  the  load  alone  is  felt, 

Ye  look  askance  with  evil  eye  upon  us, 
As  foreigners,  intruders  in  the  empire, 
167 


158 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


And  would  fain  send  us,  with  some  paltry  sum 
Of  money,  home  again  to  our  old  forests. 
No,  no !  my  Lord  Duke !  no ! — it  never  was 
For  Judas'  pay,  for  chinking  gold  and  silver, 
That  we  did  leave  our  King  by  the  Great  Stone.* 
No,  not  for  gold  and  silver  have  there  bled 
So  many  of  our  Swedish  Nobles — neither 
Will  we,  with  empty  laurels  for  our  payment, 
Hoist  sail  for  our  own  country.    Citizens 
Will  we  remain  upon  the  soil,  the  which 
Our  Monarch  conquer'd  for  himself,  and  died. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Help  to  keep  down  the  common  enemy, 
And  the  fair  border-land  must  needs  be  yours. 

WRANGEL. 

But  when  the  common  enemy  lies  vanquished, 

Who  knits  together  our  new  friendship  then  ? 

We  know,  Duke  Friedland.  though  perhaps  the  Swede 

Ought  not  t'  have  known  it,  that  you  carry  on 

Secret  negotiations  with  the  Saxons. 

Who  is  our  warranty,  that  we  are  not 

The  sacrifices  in  those  articles 

Which  'tis  thought  needful  to  conceal  from  us? 

WALLENSTEIN  (rises). 

Think  you  of  something  better,  Gustave  Wrangel ! 
Of  Prague  no  more. 

WRANGEL. 

Here  my  commission  ends. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Surrender  up  to  you  my  capital ! 

Far  liever  would  I  face  about,  and  step 

Back  to  my  Emperor. 

WRANGEL. 

If  time  yet  permits 

WALLENSTEIN. 

That  lies  with  me,  even  now,  at  any  hour. 

WRANGEL. 

Some  days  ago,  perhaps.    To-day,  no  longer ; 
No  longer  since  Sesina  's  been  a  prisoner. 

[wallenptein  is  struck,  and  silenced. 
My  Lord  Duke,  hear  me — We  believe  that  you 
At  present  do  mean  honorably  by  us. 
Since  yesterday  we  're  sure  of  that — and  now 
This  paper  warrants  for  the  troops,  there 's  nothing 
Stands  in  the  way  of  our  full  confidence. 
Prague  shall  not  part  us.    Hear !    The  Chancellor 
Contents  himself  with  Albstadt ;  to  your  Grace 
He  gives  up  Ralschin  and  the  narrow  side. 
But  Egra  above  all  must  open  to  us, 
Ere  we  can  think  of  any  junction. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

You, 
You  therefore  must  I  trust,  and  you  not  me  ? 
I  will  consider  of  your  proposition. 

WRANGEL. 

I  must  entreat,  that  your  consideration 
Occupy  not  too  long  a  time.    Already 
Has  this  negotiation,  my  Lord  Duke ! 
Crept  on  into  the  second  year.    If  nothing 
Is  settled  this  time,  will  the  Chancellor 
Consider  it  as  broken  off  for  ever. 


WALLENSTEIN. 

Ye  press  me  hard.    A  measure,  such  as  this, 
Ought  to  be  thouglti  of. 

WRANGEL. 

Ay  !  but  think  of  this  too, 
That  sudden  action  only  can  procure  it 
Success — think  first  of  this,  your  Highness. 

[Exit  Wrangel, 


SCENE  VI. 

Wallenstein,  Tertsky,  and  Illo  (re-enter). 

ILLO. 

Is't  all  right? 

tertsky. 
Are  you  compromised  ? 

ILLO. 

This  Swede 
Went  smiling  from  you.    Yes !  you  're  compromised 

WALLENSTEIN. 

As  yet  is  nothing  settled  :  and  (well  weigh'd) 
I  feel  myself  inclined  to  leave  it  so. 

TERTSKY. 

How  ?  What  was  that  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Come  on  me  what  may  come 
The  doing  evil  to  avoid  an  evil 
Can  not  be  good ! 

TERTSKY. 

Nay,  but  bethink  you,  Duke. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

To  live  upon  the  mercy  of  these  Swedes ! 

Of  these  proud-hearted  Swedes ! — I  could  not  bear  it 

ILLO. 

Goest  thou  as  fugitive,  as  mendicant  ? 

Bringest  thou  not  more  to  them  than  thou  receivest 


*  A  groat  atone  near  Llitzen,  since  called  the  Swede's  Stone, 
the  body  of  their  great  king  having  been  found  at  the  foot  of  it, 
after  the  battle  in  which  he  lost  his  life. 


SCENE  VII. 


To  these  enter  the  Countess  Tertsky. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Who  sent  for  you  ?   There  is  no  business  here 
For  women. 

COUNTESS. 

I  am  come  to  bid  you  joy. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Use  thy  authority,  Tertsky ;  bid  her  go. 

COUNTESS. 

Come  I  perhaps  too  early  ?  I  hope  not. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Set  not  this  tongue  upon  me,  I  entreat  you  : 
You  know  it  is  the  weapon  that  destroys  me. 
I  am  routed,  if  a  woman  but  attack  me : 
I  cannot  traffic  in  the  trade  of  words 
With  that  unreasoning  sex. 

COUNTESS. 

I  had  already 
Given  the  Bohemians  a  king. 

wallenstein  (sarcastically). 

They  have  one, 
In  consequence,  no  doubt. 

countess  (to  the  others). 

Ha !  what  new  scruple  ? 
tertsky. 
The  Duke  will  not. 

1G8 


THE  PICOOLOMINI. 


159 


COUNTESS. 

He  will  not  what  he  must ! 


It  lies  with  you  now.  Try.  For  I  am  silenced, 
When  folks  begin  to  talk  to  me  of  conscience, 
And  of  fidelity. 

COUNTESS. 

How  ?  then,  when  all 
Lay  in  the  far-off  distance,  when  the  road 
Stretch'd  out  before  thine  eyes  interminably, 
Then  hadst  thou  courage  and  resolve ;  and  now, 
Now  that  the  dream  is  being  realized, 
The  purpose  ripe,  the  issue  ascertain'd, 
Dost  thou  begin  to  play  the  dastard  now  ? 
Plann'd  merely,  'tis  a  common  felony; 
Accomplish'd,  an  immortal  undertaking: 
And  with  success  comes  pardon  hand  in  hand  ; 
For  all  event  is  God's  arbitrament. 

servant  (enters). 
The  Colonel  Piccolomini. 

countess  (.hastily). 

— Must  wait 

wallenstein. 
I  cannot  see  him  now.    Another  time. 

servant. 
But  for  two  minutes  he  entreats  an  audience : 
Of  the  most  urgent  nature  is  his  business. 

wallenstein. 
Who  knows  what  he  may  bring  us !  I  will  hear  him 

countess  tlaughs). 
Urgent  for  him,  no  doubt ;  Dut  thou  mayest  wait. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  is  it  ? 

countess. 
Thou  shall  be  inform'd  hereafter. 
First  let  the  Swede  and  thee  be  compromised. 

[Exit  Servant, 
wallenstein. 
It  there  were  yet  a  choice !  if  yet  some  milder 
Way  of  escape  were  possible — I  still 
Will  choose  it,  and  avoid  the  last  extreme. 

COUNTESS. 

Desirest  thou  nothing  further  ?  Such  a  way 

Lies  slill  before  thee.    Send  this  Wrangel  off 

Forget  thou  thy  old  hopes,  cast  far  away 

All  thy  past  life  ;  determine  to  commence 

A  new  one.     Virtue  hath  her  heroes  too, 

As  well  as  Fame  and  Fortune. — To  Vienna — 

Hence — to  the  Emperor — kneel  hefore  the  throne  ; 

Take  a  full  coffer  with  thee — say  aloud, 

Thou  didst  but  wish  to  prove  thy  fealty  ; 

Thy  whole  intention  but  to  dupe  the  Swede. 

ILLO. 

For  that  too  't  is  too  late.    They  know  too  much : 
He  would  but  bear  his  own  head  to  the  block. 

COUNTESS. 

I  fear  not  that.    They  have  not  evidence 

To  attaint  him  legally,  and  they  avoid 

The  avowal  of  an  arbitrary  power. 

They  '11  let  the  Duke  resign  without  disturbance. 

I  see  how  all  will  end.    The  King  of  Hungary 

Makes  his  appearance,  and  'twill  of  itself 

Be  understood,  that  then  the  Duke  retires, 

There  will  not  want  a  formal  declaration: 

The  young  king  will  administer  the  oath 

To  the  whole  army ;  and  so  all  returns 


To  the  old  position.    On  some  morrow  morning 

The  Duke  departs;  and  now  'tis  stir  and  bustle 

Within  his  castles.    He  will  hunt,  and  build  ; 

Superintend  his  horses'  pedigrees, 

Creates  himself  a  court,  gives  golden  keys. 

And  introduceth  strictest  ceremony 

In  fine  proportions,  and  nice  etiquette  ; 

Keeps  open  table  with  high  cheer ;  in  brief, 

Commenceth  mighty  King — in  miniature. 

And  while  he  prudently  demeans  himself, 

And  gives  himself  no  actual  importance, 

He  will  be  let  appear  whate'er  he  likes : 

And  who  dares  doubt,  that  Friedland  will  appear 

A  mighty  Prince  to  his  last  dying  hour  ? 

Well  now,  what  then  ?  Duke  Friedland  is  as  others 

A  fire-new  IVoble,  whom  the  war  hath  raised 

To  price  and  currency,  a  Jonah's  gourd, 

An  over-night  creation  of  court-favor, 

Which  with  an  undistinguishable  ease 

Makes  Baron  or  makes  Prince. 

wallenstein  (in  extreme  agitation). 

Take  her  away. 
Let  in  the  young  Count  Piccolomini. 

countess. 
Art  thou  in  earnest  ?  I  entreat  thee !  Canst  thou 
Consent  to  bear  thyself  to  thy  own  grave 
So  ignominiously  to  be  dried  up  ? 
Thy  life,  that  arrogated  such  a  height, 
To  end  in  such  a  nothing !  To  be  nothing, 
When  one  was  always  nothing,  is  an  evil 
That  asks  no  stretch  of  patience,  a  light  evil  ; 
But  to  become  a  nothing,  having  been 

wallenstein  (starts  up  in  violent  agitation). 
Show  me  a  way  out  of  this  stifling  crowd, 
Ye  Powers  of  Aidance  !  Show  me  such  a  way 
As  /  am  capable  of  going. — I 
Am  no  tongue-hero,  no  fine  virtue-prattler ; 
I  cannot  warm  by  thinking ;  cannot  say 
To  the  good  luck  that  turns  her  back  upon  me, 
Magnanimously  :  "  Go ;  I  need  thee  not." 
Cease  I  to  work,  I  am  annihilated. 
Dangers  nor  sacrifices  will  I  shun, 
If  so  I  may  avoid  the  last  extreme ; 
But  ere  I  sink  down  into  nothingness, 
Leave  off  so  little,  who  began  so  great, 
Ere  that  the  world  confuses  me  with  those 
Poor  wretches,  whom  a  day  creates  and  crumbles, 
This  age  and  after  ages*  speak  my  name 
With  hate  and  dread  ;  and  Friedland  be  redemption 
For  each  accursed  deed ! 

countess. 

What  is  there  here,  then, 
So  against  nature  ?  Help  me  to  perceive  it ! 
O  let  not  Superstition's  nightly  goblins 
Subdue  thy  clear  bright  spirit!  Art  thou  bid 
To  murder  ? — with  abhorr'd  accursed  poniard, 
To  violate  the  breasts  that  nourish 'd  thee  ? 
That  were  against  our  nature,  that  might  aptly 
Make  thy  flesh  shudder,  and  thy  whole  heart  sicken,  t 


*  Could  1  have  hazarded  such  a  Germanism,  as  the  use  of 
the  word  after-world,  for  posterity, — "  Es  spreche  Welt  und 
Nachwelt  meinen  Namen" — might  have  been  rendered  with 
more  literal  fidelity  : — Let  world  and  after-world  speak  out  my 
name,  etc. 

t  I  have  not  ventured  to  affront  the  fastidious  delicacy  of  our 
age  with  the  literal  translation  of  this  line, 

werth 
Die  Eingeweide  schaudernd  aufzuregen. 
169 


100 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Yet  not  a  few,  and  for  a  meaner  object, 
Vave  ventured  even  this,  ay,  and  perform'd  it 
Whal  is  there  in  thy  case  so  black  and  monstrous? 
Thou  art  accused  of  treason — whether  with 
Or  without  justice  is  not  now  the  question — 
Thou  art  lost  if  thou  dost  not  avail  thee  quickly 
Of  the  power  which  thou  possessest — Friedland .'  Duke  ! 
Tell  me,  where  lives  that  thing  so  meek  and  tame, 
That  dolh  not  all  his  living  faculties 
Put  forth  in  preservation  of  his  life ! 
What  deed  so  daring,  which  necessity 
And  desperation  will  not  sanctify  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Once  was  this  Ferdinand  so  gracious  to  me : 

He  loved  me ;  he  esteem'd  me ;  I  was  placed 

The  nearest  to  his  heart.     Full  many  a  time 

We,  like  familiar  friends,  both  at  one  table, 

Have  banqueted  together.    He  and  I — 

And  the  young  kings  themselves  held  me  the  basin 

Wherewith  to  wash  me — and  is't  come  to  this? 

COUNTESS. 

So  faithfully  preservest  thou  each  small  favor, 

And  hast  no  memory  for  contumelies  ? 

Must  I  remind  thee,  how  at  Regensburg 

This  man  repaid  thy  faithful  services  ? 

All  ranks  and  all  conditions  in  the  empire 

Thou   hadst  wrong'd,    to    make   him  great, — hadst 

loaded  on  thee, 
On  thee,  the  hate,  the  curse  of  the  whole  world. 
No  friend  existed  for  thee  in  all  Germany, 
And  why!  because  thou  hadst  existed  only 
For  the  Emperor.    To  the  Emperor  alone 
Clung  Friedland  in  that  storm  which  gather'd  round 

him 
At  Regensburg  in  the  Diet — and  he  dropp'd  thee  ! 
He  let  thee  fall !  He  let  thee  fall  a  victim 
To  the  Bavarian,  to  that  insolent! 
Deposed,  stript  bare  of  all  thy  dignity 
And  power,  amid  the  taunting  of  thy  foes, 
Thou  wert  let  drop  into  obscurity. — 
Say  not,  the  restoration  of  thy  honor 
Has  made  atonement  for  that  first  injustice. 
No  honest  good-will  was  it  that  replaced  thee ; 
The  law  of  hard  necessity  replaced  thee, 
Which  they  had  fain  opposed,  but  that  they  could  not. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Not  to  their  good  wishes,  that  is  certain, 
Nor  yet  to  his  affection,  I  'm  indebted 
For  this  high  office ;  and  if  I  abuse  it, 
I  shall  therein  abuse  no  confidence. 

COUNTESS. 

Affection  !  confidence  ! — They  needed  thee. 

Necessity,  impetuous  remonstrant! 

Who  not  with  empty  names,  or  shows  of  proxy, 

Is  served,  who'll  have  the  thing  and  not  the  symbol, 

Ever  seeks  out  the  greatest  and  the  best, 

And  at  the  rudder  places  him,  e'en  though 

She  had  been  forced  to  take  him  from  the  rabble — 

She,  this  Necessity,  it  was  that  placed  thee 

In  this  high  office ;  it  was  she  that  gave  thee 

Thy  letters-patent  of  inauguration. 

For,  to  the  uttermost  moment  that  they  can, 

This  race  still  help  themselves  at  cheapest  rate 

With  slavish  souls,  with  puppets !  At  the  approach 

Of  extreme  peril,  when  a  hollow  image 

Is  found  a  hollow  image  and  no  more, 

Then  falls  the  power  into  the  mighty  hands 


Of  Nature,  of  the  spirit  giant-born, 
Who  listens  only  to  himself,  knows  nothing 
Of  stipulations,  duties,  reverences, 
And,  like  the  emancipated  force  of  fire, 
Unmaster'd  scorches,  ere  it  reaches  them, 
Their  fine-spun  webs,  their  artificial  policy. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

'Tis  true !  they  saw  me  always  as  I  am — 
Always !  I  did  not  cheat  them  in  the  bargain. 
I  never  held  it  worth  my  pains  to  hide 
The  bold  all-grasping  habit  of  my  soul. 

COUNTESS. 

Nay  rather — thou  hast  ever  shown  thyself 

A  formidable  man,  without  restraint  ; 

Hast  exercised  the  full  prerogatives 

Of  thy  impetuous  nature,  which  had  been 

Once  granted  to  thee.    Therefore,  Duke,  not  thou, 

Who  hast  still  remain'd  consistent  with  thyself, 

But  they  are  in  the  wrong,  who  fearing  thee, 

Intrusted  such  a  power  in  hands  they  fear'd. 

For,  by  the  laws  of  Spirit,  in  the  right 

Is  every  individual  character 

That  acts  in  strict  consistence  with  itself. 

Self-contradiction  is  the  only  wrong. 

Wert  thou  another  being,  then,  when  thou 

Eight  years  ago  pursuedst  thy  march  with  fire 

And  sword,  and  desolation,  through  the  Circles 

Of  Germany,  the  universal  scourge, 

Didst  mock  all  ordinances  of  the  empire, 

The  fearful  rights  of  strength  alone  exertedst, 

Trampledst  to  earth  each  rank,  each  magistracy, 

All  to  extend  thy  Sultan's  domination  ? 

Then  was  the  time  to  break  thee  in,  to  curb 

Thy  haughty  will,  to  teach  thee  ordinance. 

But  no,  the  Emperor  felt  no  touch  of  conscience 

What  served  him  pleased  him,  and  without  a  murmur 

He  stamp'd  his  broad  seal  on  these  lawless  deeds. 

Wnat  at  that  time  was  right,  because  thou  didst  it 

For  him,  to-day  is  all  at  once  become 

Opprobrious,  foul,  because  it  is  directed 

Against  him. — O  most  flimsy  superstition ! 

wallenstein  (rising). 
I  never  saw  it  in  this  light  before. 
'Tis  even  so.    The  Emperor  perpetrated 
Deeds  through  my  arm,  deeds  most  unorderly. 
And  even  this  prince's  mantle,  which  I  wear, 
I  owe  to  what  were  services  to  him, 
But  most  high  misdemeanors  'gainst  the  empire. 

countess. 
Then  betwixt  thee  and  him  (confess  it,  Friedland  :) 
The  point  can  be  no  more  of  right  and  duty, 
Only  of  power  and  the  opportunity. 
That  opportunity,  lo  !  it  comes  yonder 
Approaching  with  swift  steeds ;  then  with  a  swing 
Throw  thyself  up  into  the  chariot-seat, 
Seize  with  firm  hand  the  reins,  ere  thy  opponent 
Anticipate  thee,  and  himself  make  conquest 
Of  the  now  empty  seat.    The  moment  comes ; 
It  is  already  here,  when  thou  must  write 
The  absolute  total  of  thy  life's  vast  sum. 
The  constellations  stand  victorious  o'er  thee. 
The  planets  shoot  good  fortune  in  fair  junctions, 
And  tell  thee,  "  JNow's  the  time!"  The  starry  courses 
Hast  thou  thy  life-long  measured  to  no  purpose  ? 
The  quadrant  and  the  circle,  were  they  playthings? 
[Pointing  to  the  different  objects  in  the  room. 
170 


THE  PICCOLOMINl. 


161 


The  zodiacs,  the  rolling  orbs  of  heaven, 

Hast  pictured  on  these  walls,  and  all  around  thee 

In  dumb,  foreboding  symbols  hast  thou  placed 

These  seven  presiding  Lords  of  Destiny — 

For  toys  ?  Is  all  this  preparation  nothing  ? 

Is  there  no  marrow  in  this  hollow  art, 

That  even  to  thyself  it  doth  avail 

Nothing,  and  has  no  influence  over  thee 

In  the  great  moment  of  decision  ? 

wallenstein  (during  this  last  speech  walks  up  and 
down  with  inward  struggles,  laboring  with  passion  ; 
stojis  suddenly,  stands  still,  then  interrupting  the 
Couiitess). 

Send  Wrangel  to  me — I  will  instantly 

Dispatch  three  couriers 

ILLO  (hurrying  out). 

God  in  heaven  be  praised  ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

It  is  his  evil  genius  and  mine. 

Our  evil  genius.1  It  chastises  him 

Through  me,  the  instrument  of  his  ambition  ,• 

And  I  expect  no  less,  than  that  Revenge 

E'en  now  is  whetting  for  my  breast  the  poniard. 

Who  sous  the  serpent's  teeth,  let  him  not  hope 

To  reap  a  joyous  harvest.    Every  crime 

Has,  in  the  moment  of  its  perpetration, 

Its  own  avenging  angel — dark  misgiving, 

An  ominous  sinking  at  the  inmost  heart. 

He  can  no  longer  trust  me — Then  no  longer 

Can  I  retreat — so  come  that  which  must  come. — 

Still  Destiny  preserves  its  due  relations  : 

The  heart  within  us  is  its  absolute 

Vicegerent. 

[To  Tertsky. 
Go,  conduct  you  Gustave  Wrangel 
To  my  state-cabinet. — Myself  will  speak  to 
The  couriers. — And  dispatch  immediately 
A  servant  for  Octavio  Piccolomini. 

[To  the  Countess,  who  cannot  conceal  her  triumph. 
No  exultation  !  woman,  triumph  not ! 
For  jealous  are  the  Powers  of  Destiny. 
Joy  premature,  and  shouts  ere  victory, 
Encroach  upon  their  rights  and  privileges. 
We  sow  the  seed,  and  they  the  growth  determine. 
[While  he  is  making  his  exit,  the  curtain  drops 


ACT  V. 

SCENE  I. 

Scene,  as  in  the  preceding  Act. 

Wallenstein,  Octavio  Piccolomini. 

wallenstein  (coming  forward  in  conversation). 
He  sends  me  word  from  Linz,  that  he  lies  sick ; 
But  I  have  sure  intelligence,  that  he 
Secretes  himself  at  Frauenberg  with  Galas. 
Secure  them  both,  and  send  them  to  me  hither. 
Remember,  thou  takest  on  thee  the  command 
Of  those  same  Spanish  regiments, — constantly 
Make  preparation,  and  be  never  ready  ; 
And  if  they  urge  thee  to  draw  out  against  me, 
Still  answer  yes,  and  stand  as  thou  wert  fetter'd. 
I  know,  that  it  is  doing  thee  a  service 
To  keep  thee  out  of  action  in  this  business. 
Thou  lovest  to  linger  on  in  fair  appearances ; 
12 


Steps  of  extremity  are  not  thy  province, 
Therefore  have  I  sought  out  this  part  for  thee. 
Thou  wilt  this  time  be  of  most  service  to  me 
By  thy  inertness.    The  mean  time,  if  fortune 
Declare  itself  on  my  side,  thou  wilt  know 
What  is  to  do. 

Enter  Max.  Piccolomini. 
Now  go,  Octavio. 
This  night  must  thou  be  off:  take  my  own  horses  . 
Him  here  I  keep  with  me — make  short  larewell — 
Trust  me,  I  think  we  all  shall  meet  again 
In  joy  and  thriving  fortunes. 

octavio  (to  his  son). 

I  shall  see  you 
Yet  ere  I  go. 


SCENE  II. 


Wallenstein,  Max.  Piccolomini. 

max.  (advances  to  him). 
My  General ! 

wallenstein. 
That  am  I  no  longer,  if 
Thou  stylest  thyself  the  Emperor's  officer 

MAX. 

Then  thou  wilt  leave  the  army,  General  ? 

wallenstein. 
I  have  renounced  the  service  of  the  Emperor. 

MAX. 

And  thou  wilt  leave  the  army  ? 
wallenstein. 

Rather  hope  I 

To  bind  it  nearer  still  and  faster  to  me. 

[He  seats  himself 

Yes,  Max.,  I  have  delay'd  to  open  it  to  thee, 

Even  till  the  hour  of  acting  'gins  to  strike. 

Youth's  fortunate  feeling  doth  seize  easily 

The  absolute  right,  yea,  and  a  joy  it  is 

To  exercise  the  single  apprehension 

Where  the  sums  square  in  proof; 

But  where  it  happens,  that  of  two  sure  evils 

One  must  be  taken,  where  the  heart  not  wholly 

Brings  itself  back  from  out  the  strife  of  duties, 

There  't  is  a  blessing  to  have  no  election, 

And  blank  necessity  is  grace  and  favor. 

— This  is  now  present :  do  not  look  behind  thee, — 

It  can  no  more  avail  thee.    Look  thou  forwards  ! 

Think  not !  judge  not !  prepare  thyself  to  act ! 

The  Court — it  hath  determined  on  my  ruin, 

Therefore  I  will  to  be  beforehand  with  them. 

We'll  join  the  Swedes — right  gallant  fellows  are 
they, 

And  our  good  friends. 

[He  stops  himself,  expecting  Piccolomini's  answer. 

I  have  ta'en  thee  by  surprise.    Answer  me  not 

I  grant  thee  time  to  recollect  thyself. 

[He  rises,  and  retires  to  the  back  of  the  stage 
Max.  remains  for  a  long  time  motionless, 
in  a  trance  of  excessive  anguish.  At  his 
first  motion  Wallenstein  returns,  and 
places  himself  before  him. 

MAX. 

My  General,  this  day  thou  makest  me 
Of  age  to  speak  in  my  own  right  and  person, 
For  till  this  day  I  have  been  spared  the  trouble 
To  find  out  my  own  road.    Thee  have  I  followed 
171 


162 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


With  most  implicit  unconditional  faith, 
Sure  of  the  right  path  if  I  follow'd  thee. 
To-day,  for  the  first  time,  dost  thou  refer 
Me  to  myself,  and  forcest  me  to  make 
Election  between  thee  and  my  own  heart. 

WALLENSTEIN, 

Soft  cradled  thee  thy  Fortune  till  to-day ; 
Thy  duties  thou  couldst  exercise  in  sport, 
Indulge  all  lovely  instincts,  act  for  ever 
With  undivided  heart.    It  can  remain 
No  longer  thus.    Like  enemies,  the  roads 
Start  from  each  other.    Duties  strive  with  duties. 
Thou  must  needs  choose  thy  party  in  the  war 
Which  is  now  kindling  'twixt  thy  friend  and  him 
Who  is  thy  Emperor. 

MAX. 

War  !  is  that  the  name  ? 
War  is  as  frightful  as  heaven's  pestilence. 
Yet  it  is  good,  is  it  heaven's  will  as  that  is. 
Is  that  a  good  war,  which  against  the  Emperor 
Thou  wagest  with  the  Emperor's  own  army  ? 
O  God  of  heaven  !  what  a  change  is  this  ! 
Beseems  it  me  to  offer  such  persuasion 
To  thee,  who  like  the  fix'd  star  of  the  pole 
Wert  all  1  gazed  at  on  life's  trackless  ocean  ? 
O !  what  a  rent  thou  makest  in  my  heart ! 
The  ingrain'd  instinct  of  old  reverence, 
The  holy  habit  of  obediency, 
Must  I  pluck  live  asunder  from  thy  name  ? 
Nay,  do  not  turn  thy  countenance  upon  me — 
It  always  was  as  a  god  looking  at  me  ! 
Duke  Wallenstein,  its  power  is  not  departed : 
The  senses  still  are  in  thy  bonds,  although, 
Bleeding,  the  soul  hath  freed  itself. 


WALLENSTEIN. 


Max.,  hear  me. 


O !  do  it  not,  I  pray  thee,  do  it  not ! 
There  is  a  pure  and  noble  soul  within  thee, 
Knows  not  of  this  unblest,  unlucky  doing. 
Thy  will  is  chaste,  it  is  thy  fancy  only 
Which  hath  polluted  thee — and  innocence, 
It  will  not  let  itself  be  driven  away 
From  that  world-awing  aspect.    Thou  wilt  not, 
Thou  canst  not,  end  in  this.    It  would  reduce 
All  human  creatures  to  disloyalty 
Against  the  nobleness  of  their  own  nature. 
'T  will  justify  the  vulgar  misbelief, 
Which  holdeth  nothing  noble  in  free-will, 
And  trusts  itself  to  impotence  alone, 
Made  powerful  only  in  an  unknown  power. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  world  will  judge  me  sternly,  I  expect  it. 
Already  have  I  said  to  my  own  self 
All  thou  canst  say  to  me.    Who  but  avoids 
The  extreme,  can  he  by  going  round  avoid  it? 
But  here  there  is  no  choice.    Yes — I  must  use 
Or  suffer  violence — so  stands  the  case, 
There  remains  nothing  possible  but  that 

MAX. 

O  that  is  never  possible  for  thee ! 

'T  is  the  last  desperate  resource  of  those 

Cheap  souls,  to  whom  their  honor,  their  good  name 

Is  their  poor  saving,  their  last  worthless  keep, 

Which  having  staked  and  lost,  they  stake  themselves 

In  the  mad  rage  of  gaming.    Thou  art  rich, 


And  glorious  ;  with  an  unpolluted  heart 

Thou   canst   make    conquest  of   whate'er   seems 

highest ! 
But  he,  who  once  hath  acted  infamy, 
Does  nothing  more  in  this  world. 

wallenstein  {grasps  his  hand). 

Calmly,  Max. ! 
Much  that  is  great  and  excellent  will  we 
Perform  together  yet.    And  if  we  only 
.Stand  on  the  height  with  dignity,  't  is  soon 
Forgotten,  Max.,  by  what  road  we  ascended. 
Believe  me,  many  a  crown  shines  spotless  now, 
That  yet  was  deeply  sullied  in  the  winning. 
To  the  evil  spirit  doth  the  earth  belong, 
Not  to  the  good.    All,  that  the  powers  divine 
Send  from  above,  are  universal  blessings : 
Their  light  rejoices  us,  their  air  refreshes, 
But  never  yet  was  man  enrich'd  by  them  : 
In  their  eternal  realm  no  property 
Is  to  be  struggled  for — all  there  is  general. 
The  jewel,  the  all-valued  gold  we  win 
From  the  deceiving  Powers,  depraved  in  nature, 
That  dwell  beneath  the  day  and  blessed  sun-light. 
Not  without  sacrifices  are  they  render'd 
Propitious,  and  there  lives  no  soul  on  earth 
That  e'er  retired  unsullied  from  their  service. 

MAX. 

Whate'er  is  human,  to  the  human  being 

Do  I  allow — and  to  the  vehement 

And  striving  spirit  readily  I  pardon 

The  excess  of  action ;  but  to  thee,  my  General ! 

Above  all  others  make  I  large  concession. 

For  thou  must  move  a  world,  and  be  the  master — 

He  kills  thee,  who  condemns  thee  to  inaction 

So  be  it  then !  maintain  thee  in  thy  post 

By  violence.    Resist  the  Emperor, 

And  if  it  must  be,  force  with  force  repel : 

I  will  not  praise  it,  yet  I  can  forgive  it. 

But  not — not  to  the  traitor — yes ! — the  word 

Is  spoken  out 

Not  to  the  traitor  can  I  yield  a  pardon. 
That  is  no  mere  excess !  that  is  no  error 
Of  human  nature — that  is  wholly  different, 
O  that  is  black,  black  as  the  pit  of  hell! 

[Wallenstein  betrays  a  sudden  agitation 
Thou  canst  not  hear  it  named,  and  wilt  thou  do  it? 

0  turn  back  to  thy  duty.    That  thou  canst, 

1  hold  it  certain.     Send  me  to  Vienna  : 

I  '11  make  thy  peace  for  thee  with  the  Emperor. 
He  knows  thee  not.    But  I  do  know  thee.   He 
Shall  see  thee,  Duke  !  with  my  unclouded  eye, 
And  I  bring  back  his  confidence  to  thee. 

wallenstein. 
It  is  too  late.   Thou  knowest  not  what  has  happen'd 

max. 
Were  it  too  late,  and  were  things  gone  so  far, 
That  a  crime  only  could  prevent  thy  fall, 
Then — fall !  fall  honorably,  even  as  thou  stood'st. 
Lose  the  command.    Go  from  the  stage  of  war. 
Thou  canst  with  splendor  do  it — do  it  too 
With  innocence.    Thou  hast  lived  much  for  others, 
At  length  live  thou  for  thy  own  self.    I  follow  thee 
My  destiny  I  never  part  from  thine. 

wallenstein. 
It  is  too  late  !  Even  now,  while  thou  art  losing 
Thy  words,  one  after  the  other  are  the  mile-stones 
Left  fast  behind  by  my  post  couriers, 

172 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


103 


Who  bear  the  order  on  to  Prague  and  Egra. 

[Max.  staiids  as  convuhtd,   with  a  gesture  and 
countenance  expressing  the  most  intense  an- 
guish. 
Yield  thyself  to  it.    We  act  as  we  are  forced, 
/cannot  give  assent  to  my  own  shame 
And  ruin.    Thou — no — thou  canst  not  forsake  me ! 
So  let  us  do,  what  must  be  done,  with  dignity, 
With  a  firm  step.    What  am  I  doing  worse 
Than  did  famed  Ca?sar  at  the  Rubicon, 
When  he  the  legions  led  against  his  country, 
The  which  his  country  had  deliver'd  to  him  ? 
Had  he  thrown  down  the  sword,  he  had  been  lost, 
As  I  were,  if  I  but  disarm'd  myself 
I  trace  out  something  in  me  of  his  spirit ; 
Give  me  his  luck,  that  other  thing  I'll  bear. 

[Max- quits  him  abruptly.  Wallenstein,  startled 
and  overpowered,  continues  looking  after  him, 
and  is  still  in  this  posture  when  Tertsky 
enters. 


SCENE  III. 

Wallenstein,  Tertsky. 


tertsky. 
Max.  Piccolomini  just  left  you  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Where  is  Wrangel  ? 
tertsky. 
He  is  already  gone. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

In  such  a  hurry  ? 

TERTSKY. 

It  is  as  if  the  earth  had  swallow'd  him. 

He  had  scarce  left  thee,  when  1  went  to  seek  him. 

I  wish'd  some  words  with  him — but  he  was  gone. 

How,  when,  and  where,  could  no  one  tell  me.   Nay, 

I  half  believe  it  was  the  devil  himself; 

A  human  cieaiure  could  not  so  at  once 

Have  vanish'd 

illo  {enters). 
Is  it  true  that  thou  wilt  send 
Octavio  ? 

TERTSKY. 

How,  Octavio !  Whither  send  him  ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

He  goes  to  Frauenberg,  and  will  lead  hither 
The  Spanish  and  Italian  regiments. 

ILLO. 

No! 
Nay,  Heaven  forbid  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  why  should  Heaven  forbid  ? 

ILLO. 

Him! — that  deceiver!  Wouldst  thou  trust  to  him 
The  soldiery  ?  Him  wilt  thou  let  slip  from  thee, 
Now,  in  the  very  instant  that  decides  us 

TERTSKY. 

Thou  wilt  not  do  this  ! — No !  I  pray  thee,  no ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Ye  are  whimsical. 

ILLO. 

O  but  for  this  time,  Duke, 
Yield  to  our  warning!  Let  him  not  depart. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  why  should  I  not  trust  him  only  this  time, 


Who    have    always    trusted   him  '.    What,   then,  lias 

happen'd, 
That  1  should  Lose  my  good  opinion  of  him? 
In  complaisance  to  your  whims,  not  my  own. 
I  must,  forsooth,  give  up  a  rooted  judgment. 
Think  not  I  am  a  woman.    Having  trusted  him 
E'en  till  to-day,  to-day  too  will  I  trust  him. 

TERTSKY. 

Must  it  be  he — he  only  ?  Send  another. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

It  must  be  he,  whom  I  myself  have  chosen ; 
He  is  well  fitted  for  the  business.  Therefore 
I  gave  it  him. 

ILLO. 

Because  he's  an  Italian — 
Therefore  is  he  well  fitted  for  the  business ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  know  you  love  them  not — nor  sire  nor  son — 

Because  that  I  esteem  them,  love  them — visibly 

Esteem  them,  love  them  more  than  you  and  others, 

E'en  as  they  merit.    Therefore  are  they  eye-blights 

Thorns  in  your  foot-path.    But  your  jealousies, 

In  what  affect  they  me  or  my  concerns  ? 

Are  they  the  worse  to  me  because  you  hate  them? 

Love  or  hate  one  another  as  you  will, 

I  leave  to  each  man  his  own  moods  and  likings ; 

Yet  know  the  worth  of  each  of  you  to  me. 

ILLO. 

Von  Questenberg,  while  he  was  here,  was  always 
Lurking  about  with  this  Octavio. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

It  happen'd  with  my  knowledge  and  permission. 

ILLO. 

I  know  that  secret  messengers  came  to  him 
From  Galas 

WALLENSTEIN. 

That's  not  true. 

ILLO. 

O  thou  art  blind. 
With  thy  deep-seeing  eyes ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Thou  wilt  not  shake 
My  faith  for  me — my  faith,  which  founds  itself 
On  the  profoundest  science.    If  'tis  false, 
Then  the  whole  science  of  the  stars  is  false ; 
For  know,  I  have  a  pledge  from  Fate  itself, 
That  he  is  the  most  faithful  of  my  friends. 

ILLO. 

Hast  thou  a  pledge,  that  this  pledge  is  not  false  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

There  exist  moments  in  the  life  of  man, 
When  he  is  nearer  the  great  Soul  of  the  world 
Than  is  man's  custom,  and  possesses  freely 
The  power  of  questioning  his  destiny  : 
And  such  a  moment  'twas,  when  in  the  night 
Before  the  action  in  the  plains  of  Liitzen, 
Leaning  against  a  tree,  thoughts  crowding  thoughts 
I  look'd  out  far  upon  the  ominous  plain. 
My  whole  life,  past  and  future,  in  this  moment 
Before  my  mind's  eye  glided  in  procession, 
And  to  the  destiny  of  the  next  morning 
The  spirit,  fill'd  with  anxious  presentiment, 
Did  knit  the  most  removed  futurity. 
Then  said  I  also  to  myself,  "  So  many 
Dost  thou  command.    They  follow  all  thy  stars 
And  as  on  some  great  number  set  their  All 
Upon  thy  single  head,  and  only  man 
173 


164 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


The  vessel  of  thy  fortune.    Yet  a  day 

Will  come,  when  Destiny  shall  once  more  scatter 

All  these  in  many  a  several  direction: 

Few  be  they  who  will  stand  out  faithful  to  thee." 

I  yearn'd  to  know  which  one  was  faithfullest 

Of  all,  this  camp  included.    Great  Destiny, 

Give  me  a  sign !    And  he  shall  be  the  man, 

Who,  on  the  approaching  morning,  comes  the  first 

To  meet  me  with  a  token  of  his  love  : 

And  thinking  this,  I  fell  into  a  slumber. 

Then  midmost  in  the  battle  was  I  led 

In  spirit.    Great  the  pressure  and  the  tumult ! 

Then  was  my  horse  kill'd  under  me:  I  sank; 

And  over  me  away  all  unconcernedly, 

Drove  horse  and  rider — and  thus  trod  to  pieces 

I  lay,  and  panted  like  a  dying  man  ; 

Then  seized  me  suddenly  a  savior  arm  : 

It  was  Octavio's — I  awoke  at  once, 

'T  was  broad  day,  and  Oclavio  stood  before  me. 

"  My  brother,"  said  he,  "  do  not  ride  to-day 

The  dapple,  as  you  're  wont ;  but  mount  the  horse 

Which  I  have  chosen  for  thee.    Do  it,  brother  ! 

In  love  to  me.     A  strong  dream  warn'd  me  so." 

It  was  the  swiftness  of  this  horse  that  snalch'd  me 

From  the  hot  pursuit  of  Bannier's  dragoons. 

My  cousin  rode  the  dapple  on  that  day, 

And  never  more  saw  I  or  horse  or  rider. 

ILLO. 

That  was  a  chance. 

wallexstein  (significantly). 

There 's  no  such  thing  as  chance. 
In  brief,  'tis  sign'd  and  seal'd  that  this  Octavio 
Is  my  good  angel — and  now  no  word  more. 

[He  is  retiring, 

TEUTSKY. 

This  is  my  comfort — Max.  remains  our  hostage. 

ILLO. 

And  he  shall  never  stir  from  here  alive. 

wallenstein  (stops  and  turns  himself  round). 
Are  ye  not  like  the  women,  who  for  ever 
Only  recur  to  their  first  word,  although 
One  had  been  talking  reason  by  the  hour ! 
Know,  that  the  human  being's  thoughts  and  deeds 
Are  not,  like  ocean  billows,  blindly  moved. 
The  inner  world,  his  microcosmus,  is 
The  deep  shaft,  out  of  which  they  spring  eternally. 
They  grow  by  certain  laws,  like  the  tree's  fruit — 
No  juggling  chance  can  metamorphose  them. 
Have  I  the  human  kernel  first  examined  ? 
Then  I  know,  too,  the  future  will  and  action. 


SCENE  IV. 


Scene — A  chamber  in  Piccolomini's  Dwelling-House, 
Octavio  Piccolomini,  Isolani,  entering. 

ISOLANI. 

Here  am  I — Well !  who  comes  yet  of  the  others  ? 

octavio  (with  an  air  of  mystery). 
But,  first  a  word  with  you,  Count  Isolani. 

isolani  [assuming  the  same  air  of  mystery). 
Will  it  explode,  ha  ? — Is  the  Duke  about 
To  make  the  attempt?  In  me,  friend,  you  may  place 
Full  confidence. — Nay,  put  me  to  the  proof. 

OCTAVIO. 

That  may  happen. 


ISOLANI. 

Noble  brother,  I  am 
Not  one  of  those  men  who  in  words  are  valiant. 
And  when  it  comes  to  action  skulk  away. 
The  Duke  has  acted  towards  me  as  a  friend. 

God  knows  it  is  so;  and  I  owe  him  all 

He  may  rely  on  my  fidelity. 

OCTAVIO. 

That  will  be  seen  hereafter. 

ISOLANI. 

Be  on  your  guard. 
All  think  not  as  I  think ;  and  there  are  many 
Who  still  hold  with  the  Court — yes,  and  they  say 
That  those  stolen  signatures  bind  them  to  nothing 

OCTAVIO. 

I  am  rejoiced  to  hear  it. 

ISOLANI. 

You  rejoice ! 

OCTAVIO. 

That  the  Emperor  has  yet  such  gallant  servants, 
And  loving  friends. 

ISOLANI. 

Nay,  jeer  not,  I  entreat  you. 
They  are  no  such  worthless  fellows,  I  assure  you. 

OCTAVIO. 

I  am  assured  already.    God  forbid 

That  I  should  jest ! — In  very  serious  earnest, 

I  am  rejoiced  to  see  an  honest  cause 

So  strong. 

ISOLANI. 

The  Devil! — what! — why,  what  means  this? 
Are  you  not,  then For  what,  then,  am  I  here  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

That  you  may  make  full  declaration,  whether 
You  will  be  Call'd  the  friend  or  enemy 
Of  the  Emperor. 

isolani  (with  an  air  of  defiance). 
That  declaration,  friend, 
I  '11  make  to  him  in  whom  a  right  is  placed 
To  put  that  question  to  me. 

OCTAVIO. 

Whether,  Count, 
That  right  is  mine,  this  paper  may  instruct  you. 

isolani  {stammering). 
Why — why — what !  this  is  the  Emperor's  hand  and 

seal !  [Reads 

"  Whereas,  the  officers  collectively 
Throughout  our  army  will  obey  the  orders 
Of  the  Lieutenant-general  Piccolomini. 
As  from  ourselves  " Hem ! —  Yes !   so !  —  Yes ' 

yes! — 
I — I  give  you  joy,  lieutenant-general ! 

OCTAVIO. 

And  you  submit  you  to  the  order  ? 

ISOLANI. 

I- 

But  you  have  taken  me  so  by  surprise — 
Time  for  reflection  one  must  have 

OCTAVIO. 

Two  minutes 

ISOLANI. 

My  God !    But  then  the  case  is 

OCTAVIO. 

Plain  and  simple 
You  must  declare  you,  whether  you  determine 
To  act  a  treason  'gainst  your  Lord  and  Sovereign, 
Or  whether  you  will  serve  him  faithfully. 
174 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


165 


ISOLANI. 

Treason  !— 'My  God  ! — But  who  talks  then  of  treason  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

That  is  the  case.    The  Prince-duke  is  a  traitor — 

Means  to  lead  over  to  the  enemy 

The   Emperor's   army.  —  Now,   Count! — brief  and 

full- 
Say,  will  you  break  your  oath  to  the  Emperor  ? 
Sell  yourself  lo  the  enemy  I — Say,  will  you  ? 

ISOLANI. 

What  mean  you  ?  I — I  break  my  oath,  d'ye  say, 

To  his  Imperial  Majesty  ? 

Did  I  say  so  ? — When,  when  have  I  said  that  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

You  have  not  said  it  yet — not  yet.    This  instant 
I  wait  to  hear,  Count,  whether  you  will  say  it. 

ISOLANI. 

Ay !  that  delights  me  now,  that  you  yourself 
Bear  witness  for  me  that  I  never  said  so. 

OCTAVIO. 

And  you  renounce  the  Duke,  then  ? 

ISOLANI. 

If  he 's  planning 
Treason — why,  treason  breaks  all  bonds  asunder. 

OCTAVIO. 

And  are  determined,  too,  to  fight  against  him? 

ISOLANI. 

He  has  done  me  service — but  if  he's  a  villain. 
Perdition  seize  him! — All  scores  are  rubb'd  off 

OCTAVIO. 

I  am  rejoiced  that  you're  so  well-disposed. 
This  night  break  off  in  the  utmost  secrecy 
With  all  the  light-arm'd  troops — it  must  appear 
As  came  the  order  from  the  Duke  himself. 
At  Frauenberg's  the  place  of  rendezvous  ; 
There  will  Count  Galas  give  you  further  orders. 

ISOLANI. 

It  shall  be  done.    But  you'll  remember  me 

With  the  Emperor — how  well-disposed  you  found  me. 

OCTAVIO. 

I  will  not  fail  to  mention  it  honorably. 

[Exit  Isolani.    A  Servant  enters. 
What,  Colonel  Butler ! — Show  him  up. 

ISOLANI  {returning). 
Forgive  me  too  my  bearish  ways,  old  father ! 
Lord  God !  how  should  I  know,  then,  what  a  great 
Person  I  had  before  me  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

No  excuses ! 

ISOLANI. 

[  am  a  merry  lad,  and  if  at  time 
A  rash  word  might  escape  me  'gainst  the  court 
Amidst  my  wine — you  know  no  harm  was  meant. 

[Exit 

OCTAVIO. 

You  need  not  be  uneasy  on  that  score. 
That  has  succeeded.  Fortune  favor  us 
With  all  the  others  only  but  as  much ! 


BUTLER. 

You  do  me  too  much  honor. 

octavio  {after  both  have  seated  themselves). 
You  have  not 
Retum'd  the  advances  which  I  made  you  yesterday — 
Misunderstood  them,  as  mere  empty  forms. 
That  wish  proceeded  from  my  heart — I  was 
In  earnest  with  you — for  'tis  now  a  time 
In  which  the  honest  should  unite  most  closely. 

butler. 
'Tis  only  the  like-minded  can  unite. 

OCTAVIO, 

True  !  and  I  name  all  honest  men  like-minded. 

I  never  charge  a  man  but  with  those  acts 

To  which  his  character  deliberately 

Impels  him ;  for  alas !  the  violence 

Of  blind  misunderstandings  often  thrusts 

The  very  best  of  us  from  the  right  track. 

You  came  through  Frauenberg.  Did  the  Count  Galas 

Say  nothing  to  you  ?   Tell  me.    He 's  my  friend. 

BUTLER. 

His  words  were  lost  on  me. 

OCTAVIO. 

It  grieves  me  sorely, 
To  hear  it :  for  his  counsel  was  most  wise. 
I  had  myself  the  like  to  offer. 

BUTLER. 

Spare 
Yourself  the  trouble — me  th'  embarrassment, 
To  have  deserved  so  ill  your  good  opinion. 

OCTAVIO. 

The  time  is  precious — let  us  talk  openly. 
You  know  how  matters  stand  here.    Wallenstein 
Meditates  treason — I  can  tell  you  further — 
He  has  committed  treason ;  but  few  hours 
Have  past,  since  he  a  covenant  concluded 
With  the  enemy.    The  messengers  are  now 
Full  on  their  way  to  Egra  and  to  Prague. 
To-morrow  he  intends  to  lead  us  over 
To  the  enemy.    But  he  deceives  himself; 
For  Prudence  wakes — the  Emperor  has  still 
Many  and  faithful  friends  here,  and  they  stand 
In  closest  union,  mighty  though  unseen. 
This  manifesto  sentences  the  Duke — 
Recalls  the  obedience  of  the  army  from  him, 
And  summons  all  the  loyal,  all  the  honest, 
To  join  and  recognize  in  me  their  leader. 
Choose — will  you  share  with  us  an  honest  cause  ? 
Or  with  the  evil  share  an  evil  lot. 


SCENE  V. 

OCTAVIO,  PlCCOLO.MINI,  BuTLER. 
BUTLER. 

At  your  command,  Lieutenant-General. 

OCTAVIO. 

Welcome,  as  honor'd  friend  and  visitor. 

a 


His  lot  is  mine. 


It  is. 


butler  {rises). 

OCTAVIO. 

Is  that  your  last  resolve  ? 
butler. 


OCTAVIO. 

Nay,  but  bethink  you,  Colonel  Butler ! 
As  yet  you  have  time.    Within  my  faithful  breast 
That  rashly-utter'd  word  remains  interr'd. 
Recall  it,  Butler !  choose  a  better  party  : 
You  have  not  chosen  the  right  one. 
butler  {going). 

Any  other 
Commands  for  me,  Lieutenant-General  I 

OCTAVIO. 

See  your  white  hairs !    Recall  that  word ! 
175 


ICO 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


BUTLER. 

Farewell ! 

OCTAVIO. 

What  ?  Would  you  draw  this  good  and  gallant  sword 
In  such  a  cause?  Into  a  curse  would  you 
Transform  the  gratitude  which  you  have  earn'd 
By  forty  years'  fidelity  from  Austria  ? 

butler  {laughing  with  bitterness). 
Gratitude  from  the  House  of  Austria !    [He  is  going. 
OCTAVio  (permits  him  to  go  as  far  as  the  door,  then 

calls  after  him). 
Butler! 

BUTLER. 

What  wish  you  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

How  was 't  with  the  Count  ? 

BUTLER. 

Count?  what? 

octavio  (coldly). 
The  title  that  you  wish'd,  I  mean. 
butler  (starts  in  sudden  passion). 
Hell  and  damnation ! 

octavio  (coldly). 

You  petition'd  for  it— 
And  your  petition  was  repell'd — Was  it  so  ? 

BUTLER. 

Your  insolent  scoff  shall  not  go  by  unpunish'd. 
Draw ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Nay!  your  sword  to 'ts  sheath!  and  tell  me  calmly, 
How  all  that  happen'd.    I  will  not  refuse  you 
Your  satisfaction  afterwards. — Calmly,  Butler! 

BUTLER. 

Be  the  whole  world  acquainted  with  the  weakness 

For  which  I  never  can  forgive  myself. 

Lieutenant-General !    Yes — I  have  ambition. 

Ne'er  was  I  able  to  endure  contempt. 

It  stung  me  to  the  quick,  that  birth  and  title 

Should  have  more  weight  than  merit  has  in  the  army. 

I  would  fain  not  be  meaner  than  my  equal. 

So  in  an  evil  hour  I  let  myself 

Be  tempted  to  that  measure — It  was  folly! 

But  yet  so  hard  a  penance  it  deserved  not. 

It  might  have  been  refused  ;  but  wherefore  barb 

And  venom  the  refusal  with  contempt  ? 

Why  dash  to  earth  and  crush  with  heaviest  scorn 

The  gray-hair'd  man,  the  faithful  veteran  ? 

Why  to  the  baseness  of  his  parentage 

Refer  him  with  such  cruel  roughness,  only 

Because  he  had  a  weak  hour  and  forgot  himself? 

But  Nature  gives  a  sting  e'en  to  the  worm 

Which  wanton  Power  treads  on  in  sport  and  insult. 

OCTAVIO. 

You  must  have  been  calumniated.    Guess  you 
The  enemy,  who  did  you  this  ill  service  ? 

BUTLER. 

Be't  who  it  will — a  most  low-hearted  scoundrel, 
Some  vile  court-minion  must  it  be,  some  Spaniard, 
Some  young  squire  of  some  ancient  family, 
In  whose  light  I  may  stand,  some  envious  knave, 
Stung  to  the  soul  by  my  fair  self-earn'd  honors ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Hut  tell  me  !    Did  the  Duke  approve  that  measure  ? 

BUTLER. 

Himself  impell'd  me  to  it,  used  his  interest 

In  my  behalf  with  all  the  warmth  of  friendship. 


OCTAVIO. 

Ay  ?  are  you  sure  of  that  ? 

BUTLER. 

I  read  the  letter 

OCTAVIO. 

And  so  did  I — but  the  contents  were  different. 

[Butler  is  suddenly  struck 
By  chance  I  'm  in  possession  of  that  letter — 
Can  leave  it  to  your  own  eyes  to  convince  you. 

[He  gives  him  the  letter 
butler. 
Ha !  what  is  this  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

I  fear  me,  Colonel  Butler, 
An  infamous  game  have  they  been  playing  with  you 
The  Duke,  you  say,  impell'd  you  to  this  measure  ? 
Now,  in  this  letter  talks  he  in  contempt 
Concerning  you,  counsels  the  minister 
To  give  sound  chastisement  to  your  conceit, 
For  so  he  calls  it. 

[Butler  reads  through  the  letter,  his  knees  tremble, 
he  seizes  a  chair,  and  sinks  down  in  it. 
You  have  no  enemy,  no  persecutor  ; 
There  's  no  one  wishes  ill  to  you.     Ascribe 
The  insult  you  received  to  the  Duke  only. 
His  aim  is  clear  and  palpable.    He  wish'd 
To  tear  you  from  your  Emperor — he  hoped 
To  gain  from  your  revenge  what  he  well  knew 
(What  your  long-tried  fidelity  convinced  him) 
He  ne'er  could  dare  expect  from  your  calm  reason 
A  blind  tool  would  he  make  you,  in  contempt 
Use  you,  as  means  of  most  abandon'd  ends. 
He  has  gain'd  his  point.    Too  well  has  he  succeeded 
In  luring  you  away  from  that  good  path 
On  which  you  had  been  journeying  forty  years ! 

butler  (his  voice  trembling). 
Can  e'er  the  Emperor's  Majesty  forgive  me  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

More  than  forgive  you.    He  would  fain  compensate 
For  that  affront,  and  most  unmerited  grievance 
Sustain'd  by  a  deserving,  gallant  veteran. 
From  his  free  impulse  he  confirms  the  present, 
Which  the  Duke  made  you  for  a  wicked  purpose. 
The  regiment,  which  you  now  command,  is  your's. 
[Butler  attempts  to  rise,  sinks  down  again.    He 
labors  inwardly  with  violent  emotions ;  tries 
to  speak,  and  cannot.    At  length  he  takes  his 
sword  from  the  belt,  and  offers  it  to  Picco- 

LOM1NI. 

OCTAVIO. 

What  wish  you  ?   Recollect  yourself,  friend. 
butler. 

Take  it. 

OCTAVIO. 

But  to  what  purpose  ?   Calm  yourse'f. 


BUTLER. 


O  take  it ! 


I  am  no  longer  worthy  of  this  sword. 

OCTAVIO. 

Receive  it  then  anew  from  my  hands — and 
Wear  it  with  honor  for  the  right  cause  ever. 

BUTLER. 

Perjure  myself  to  such  a  gracious  Sovereign ! 

OCTAVIO. 

You '11  make  amends.  Quick!  break  off  from  the  Duke 
176 


THE  PICCOLOMINI. 


167 


Break  off"  from  him ! 

OCTAVIO. 

What  now  ?  Bethink  thyself. 
butler  (no  longer  governing  his  emotion). 
Only  break  off  from  him  ?  He  dies  !  he  dies  ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Come  after  me  to  Frauenberg,  where  now 
All  who  are  loyal,  are  assembling  under 
Counts  Altringer  and  Galas.    Many  others 
I  've  brought  to  a  remembrance  of  their  duty. 
This  night  be  sure  that  you  escape  from  Pilsen. 

butler  (strides  up  and  down  in  excessive  agitation, 
then  steps  up  to  Octavio  with  resolved  countenance). 
Count  Piccolomini !  Dare  that  man  speak 
Of  honor  to  you,  who  once  broke  his  troth  ? 

OCTAVIO. 

He,  who  repents  so  deeply  of  it,  dares. 

BUTLER. 

Then  leave  me  here,  upon  my  word  of  honor ! 

OCTAVIO. 

What 's  your  design  ? 

BUTLER. 

Leave  me  and  my  regiment 

OCTAVIO. 

I  have  full  confidence  in  you.    But  tell  me 
What  are  you  brooding  ? 

BUTLER. 

That  the  deed  will  tell  you. 
Ask  me  no  more  at  present.    Trust  to  me. 
Ye  may  trust  safely.    By  the  living  God 
Ye  give  him  over,  not  to  his  good  angel ! 
Farewell.  [Exit  Butler, 

servant  (enters  with  a  billet). 
A  stranger  left  it,  and  is  gone. 
The  Prince-duke's  horses  wait  for  you  below. 

[Exit  Servant, 
octavio  (reads). 
"  Be  sure  make  haste  !  Your  faithful  Isolan." 
— 0  that  I  had  but  left  this  town  behind  me, 
To  split  upon  a  rock  so  near  the  haven ! — 
Away !  This  is  no  longer  a  safe  place  for  me ! 
Where  can  my  son  be  tarrying  ? 


SCENE  VI. 


Octavio  and  Max.  Piccolomini. 

Max.  enters  almost  in  a  state  of  derangement  from 
extreme  agitation,  his  eyes  roll  wildly,  his  walk  is 
unsteady,  and  he  appears  not  to  observe  his  father, 
who  stands  at  a  distance,  and  gazes  at  him  with  a 
countenance  expressive  of  compassion.  He  paces 
with  long  strides  through  the  chamber,  then  stands 
still  again,  and  at  last  throws  himself  into  a  chair, 
staring  vacantly  at  the  object  directly  before  him. 
octavio  (advances  to  him). 
I  am  going  off  my  son. 

[Receiving  no  answer,  he  takes  his  Itand. 
My  son,  farewell. 


Farewell. 


octavio. 
Thou  wilt  soon  follow  me  ? 


I  follow  thee  > 
Thy  way  is  crooked — it  is  not  my  way. 

[Octavio  drops  his  hand,  and  status  back. 
O,  hadst  thou  been  but  simple  and  sincere, 
Ne'er  had  it  come  to  this — all  had  stood  otherwise. 
He  had  not  done  that  foul  and  horrible  deed : 
The  virtuous  had  retain'd  their  influence  o'er  him  : 
He  had  not  fallen  into  the  snares  of  villains. 
Wherefore  so  like  a  thief,  and  thief's  accomplice, 
Didst  creep  behind  him — lurking  for  thy  prey  ? 
O,  unblest  falsehood  !   Mother  of  all  evil ! 
Thou  misery-making  demon,  it  is  thou 
That  sink'st  us  in  perdition.    Simple  truth, 
SustaLner  of  the  world,  had  saved  us  all ! 
Father,  I  will  not,  I  can  not  excuse  thee ! 
Wallenstein  has  deceived  me — O,  most  foully ! 
But  thou  hast  acted  not  much  better. 

OCTAVIO. 

Son! 
My  son,  ah !  I  forgive  thy  agony  ! 

max.  (rises,  and  contemplates  his  father  with  looks  of 

suspicion). 

Was 't  possible  ?  hadst  thou  the  heart,  my  father, 
Hadst  thou  the  heart  to  drive  it  to  such  lengths, 
With  cold  premeditated  purpose  ?  Thou — 
Hadst  thou  the  heart,  to  wish  to  see  him  guilty, 
Rather  than  saved  ?  Thou  risest  by  his  fall. 
Octavio,  't  will  not  please  me. 

OCTAVIO. 

God  in  Heaven ! 

MAX. 

O,  woe  is  me !  sure  I  have  changed  my  nature. 
How  comes  suspicion  here — in  the  free  soul  ? 
Hope,  confidence,  belief,  are  gone  ;  for  all 
Lied  to  me,  all  that  I  e'er  loved  or  honor'd. 
No !  no  !  not  all !  She — she  yet  lives  for  me, 
And  she  is  true,  and  open  as  the  heavens ! 
Deceit  is  everywhere,  hypocrisy, 
Murder,  and  poisoning,  treason,  perjury: 
The  single  holy  spot  is  our  love, 
The  only  unprofaned  in  human  nature. 

OCTAVIO. 

Max. ! — we  will  go  together.    'T  will  be  better. 

MAX. 

What  ?  ere  I  've  taken  a  last  parting  leave, 
The  very  last — no,  never ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Spare  thyself 
The  pang  of  necessary  separation. 
Come  with  me  !  Come,  my  son ! 

[Attempts  to  take  him  with  him. 

MAX. 

No!  as  sure  as  God  lives,  no! 

octavio  (more  urgently). 
Come  with  me,  I  command  thee  !  I,  thy  father. 

MAX. 

Command  me  what  is  human.    I  ^tay  here. 

OCTAVIO. 

Max. !  in  the  Emperor's  name  I  bid  thee  come. 

MAX. 

No  Emperor  has  power  to  prescribe 

Laws  to  the  heart;  and  wouldst  thou  wish  to  rob  me 

Of  the  sole  blessing  which  my  fate  has  left  me, 

Her  sympathy  ?  Must  then  a  cruel  deed 

Be  done  with  cruelty  ?  The  unalterable 

177 


168 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Shall  I  perform  ignobly— steal  away, 
With  stealthy  coward  flight  forsake  her  ?  No  ! 
She  shall  behold  my  suffering,  my  sore  anguish, 
Hear  the  complaints  of  the  disparted  soul, 
And  weep  tears  o'er  me.    Oh  !  the  human  race 
Have  steely  souls — but  she  is  as  an  angel. 
From  the  black  deadly  madness  of  despair 
Will  she  redeem  my  soul,  and  in  soft  words 
Of  comfort,  plaining,  loose  this  pang  of  death ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Thou  wilt  not  tear  thyself  away ;  thou  canst  not. 
0,  come,  my  son !  I  bid  thee  save  thy  virtue. 

MAX. 

Squander  not  thou  thy  words  in  vain. 
The  heart  I  follow,  for  I  dare  trust  to  it. 

octavio  (trembling,  and  losing  all  self-command). 
Max. !  Max. !  if  that  most  damned  thing  could  be, 
If  thou — my  son — my  own  blood — (dare  I  think  it?) 
Do  sell  thyself  to  him,  the  infamous, 
Do  stamp  this  brand  upon  our  noble  house, 
Then  shall  the  world  behold  the  horrible  deed, 
And  in  unnatural  combat  shall  the  steel 
Of  the  son  trickle  with  the  father's  blood. 

MAX. 

O  hadst  thou  always  better  thought  of  men, 
Thou  hadst  then  acted  better.    Curst  suspicion ! 
Unholy,  miserable  doubt!  To  him 
Nothing  on  earth  remains  unwrench'd  and  firm, 
Who  has  no  faith. 

OCTAVIO. 

And  if  I  trust  thy  heart, 
Will  it  be  always  in  thy  power  to  follow  it  ? 


The  heart's  voice  thou  hast  not  o'erpowcr'd — as  litt ' 
Will  Wallenstein  be  able  to  o'erpower  it. 

OCTAVIO. 

O,  Max. !  I  see  thee  never  more  again  ! 

MAX. 

Unworthy  of  thee  wilt  thou  never  see  me. 

OCTAVIO. 

I  go  to  Frauenberg — the  Pappenheimers 

I  leave  thee  here,  the  Lothrings  too ;  Toskana 

And  Tiefenbach  remain  here  lo  protect  thee. 

They  love  thee,  and  are  faithful  to  their  oath, 

And  will  far  rather  fall  in  gallant  contest 

Than  leave  their  rightful  leader,  and  their  honor. 

MAX. 

Rely  on  this,  I  either  leave  my  life 

In  the  struggle,  or  conduct  them  out  of  Pilsen. 

OCTAVIO. 

Farewell,  my  son ! 

MAX. 

Farewell ! 

OCTAVIO. 

How !  not  one  look 
Of  filial  love  ?  No  grasp  of  the  hand  at  parting  ? 
It  is  a  bloody  war  to  which  we  are  going, 
And  the  event  uncertain  and  in  darkness. 
So  used  we  not  to  part — it  was  not  so ! 
Is  it  then  true  ?  I  have  a  son  no  longer  ? 

[Max.  falls  into  his  arms,  they  hold  each  other 
for  a  long  time    in  a  speechless    embrace- 
then  go  away  at  different  sides. 
(The  Curtain  drops). 


©fie  Beatti  of  SKtoUen  gteiu ; 

A  TRAGEDY,  IN  FIVE  ACTS. 


PREFACE. 


The  two  Dramas,  Piccolomini,  or  the  first  part  of 
Wallenstein,  and  Wallenstein,  are  introduced  in 
the  original  manuscript  by  a  Prelude  in  one  Act,  en- 
titled  Wallenstein's   Camp.     This  is   written    in 


explanation.    For  these  reasons  it  has  been  thought 
expedient  not  to  translate  it. 

The  admirers  of  Schiller,  who  have  abstracted 
their  idea  of  that  author  from  the  Robbers,  and  the 
Cabal  and  Love,  plays  in  which  the  main  interest  is 
produced  by  the  excitement  of  curiosity,  and  in 
which  the  curiosity  is  excited  by  terrible  and  extra- 


rhyme,  and  in  nine-syllable  verse,  in  the  same  lilting  ordinary  incident,  will    not    have    perused  without 

metre  (if  that  expression  may  be  permitted)  with  the! some  portion  of  disappointment  the  Dramas,  which 

second  Eclogue  of  Spencer's  Shepherd's  Calendar,    it  has    been    my  employment    to   translate.     They 

This  Prelude  possesses  a  sort  of  broad  humor,  and  \  should,  however,  reflect    that  these    are  Historical 


is  not  deficient  in  character ;  but  to  have  translated 
it  into  prose,  or  into  any  other  metre  than  that  of  the 
original,  would  have  given  a  false  idea  both  of  its 
style  and  purport ;  to  have  translated  it  into  the  same 
metre  would  been  incompatible  with  a  faithful  ad- 
herence to  the  sense  of  the  German,  from  the  com- 
parative poverty  of  our  language  in  rhymes  ;  and  it 
would  have  been  unadvisable,  from  the  incongruity 
of  those  lax  verses  with  the  present  taste  of  the 
English  Public.  Schiller's  intention  seems  to  have 
been  merely  to  have  prepared  his  reader  for  the 
Tragedies  by  a  lively  picture  of  the  laxity  of  dis- 
cipline,  and  the   mutinous   dispositions  of  Wallen 


Dramas,  taken  from  a  popular  German  History ;  that 
we  must  therefore  judge  of  them  in  some  measure 
with  the  feelings  of  Germans  ;  or  by  analogy,  with 
the  interest  excited  in  us  by  similar  Dramas  in  our 
own  language.  Few,  I  trust,  would  be  rash  or  ignorant 
enough  to  compare  Schiller  with  Shakspeare ;  yet, 
merely  as  illustration,  I  would  say  that  we  should 
proceed  to  the  perusal  of  Wallenstein,  not  from  Lear 
or  Othello,  but  from  Richard  the  Second,  or  the  three 
parts  of  Henry  the  Sixth.  We  scarcely  expect  rapid- 
ity in  an  Historical  Drama  ;  and  many  prolix  speeches 
are  pardoned  from  characters,  whose  names  and  ac- 
tions have  formed  the  most  amusing  tales  of  our  early 


stein's  soldiery.    It  is  not  necessary  as  a  preliminary  life.    On  the  other  hand,  there  exist  in  these  plays 

178 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


169 


more  individua.  beauties,  more  passages  whose  ex- 
cellence will  bear  reflection,  than  in  the  former  pro- 
ductions of  Schiller.  The  description  of  the  Astro- 
logical Tower,  and  the  reflections  of  the  Young 
Lover,  which  follow  it,  form  in  the  original  a  fine 
poem;  and  my  translation  must  have  been  wretched 
indeed,  if  it  can  have  wholly  overclouded  the  beauties 
of  the  Scene  in  the  first  Act  of  the  first  Play  between 
Questenberg,  Max.,  and  Octavio  Piccolomini.  If  we 
except  the  Scene  of  the  setting  sun  in  the  Robbers, 
I  know  of  no  part  in  Schiller's  Plays  which  equals 
the  whole  of  the  first  Scene  of  the  fifth  Act  of  the 
concluding  Play.  It  would  be  unbecoming  in  me  to 
be  more  diffuse  on  this  subject.  A  translator  stands 
connected  with  the  original  Author  by  a  certain  law 
of  subordination,  which  makes  it  more  decorous  to 
point  out  excellencies  than  defects :  indeed  he  is  not 
likely  to  be  a  fair  judge  of  either.  The  pleasure  or 
disgust  from  his  own  labor  will  mingle  with  the 
feelings  that  arise  from  an  after-view  of  the  original, 
Even  in  the  first  perusal  of  a  work  in  any  foreign 
language  which  we  understand,  we  are  apt  to  at- 
tribute to  it  more  excellence  than  it  really  possesses, 
from  our  own  pleasurable  sense  of  difficulty  over- 
come without  effort.  Translation  of  poetry  into  poetry 
is  difficult,  because  the  translator  must  give  a  bril- 
liancy to  his  language  without  that  warmth  of  original 
conception,  from  which  such  brilliancy  would  follow 
of  its  own  accord.  But  the  Translator  of  a  living 
Author  is  encumbered  with  additional  inconveni- 
ences. If  he  render  his  original  faithfully,  as  to  the 
sense  of  each  passage,  he  must  necessarily  destroy  a 
considerable  portion  of  the  spirit ;  if  he  endeavor  to 
give  a  work  executed  according  to  laws  of  compensa- 
tion, he  subjects  himself  to  imputations  of  vanity,  or 
misrepresentation.  I  have  thought  it  my  duty  to  re- 
main bound  by  the  sense  of  my  original,  with  as  few 
exceptions  as  the  nature  of  the  languages  rendered 
possible. 


DRAMATIS  PERSONS. 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


ACT  I. 


Wallenstein,  Duke  of  Friedla/td,  Generalissimo  of 
(he  Imperial  forces  in  the  Thirty-years'  War. 

Duchess  Of  Friedland,  Wife  of  Wallenstein. 

Thekla,  her  Daughter,  Princess  of  Friedland. 

The  Countess  Tertsky,  Sister  of  the  Duchess. 

Lady  Neubrunn. 

Octavio  Piccolomini,  Lieutenant-General. 

Max.  Piccolomini,  his  Son.  Colonel  of  a  Regiment 
of  Cuirassiers. 

Count  Tertsky,  the  Commander  of  several  Regi- 
ments, and  Brother-in-law  of  Wallenstein. 

Illo,  Field  Marshal.  Wallenstein  s  Confidant. 

Butler,  an  Irishman,  Commander  of  a  Regiment  of 
Dragoons. 

Gordon,  Governor  of  Egra. 

Major  Geraldin. 

Captain  Devereux. 

Macdonald. 

Neumann,  Captain  of  Cavalry,  Aid-de-campto  Tertsky. 

Swedish  Captain. 

Seni. 

Burgomaster  of  Egra. 

A.nspessade  of  the  Cuirassiers. 

Groom  of  the  Chamber,    )  „  7       .  ,     „  , 

A  pAGE>  >  Belonging  to  the  Duke. 

Cuirassiers,  Dragoons,  Servants. 
Q2 


SCENE  I. 

Scene — A  Chamber  in  /he  House  of  the  Duchess  of 

Friedland. 

Countess  Tertsky,  Thekla,  Lady  Neubrunn  {tlte 
two  latter  sit  at  the  same  table  at  work). 

countess  (watching  them  from  the  opposite  side). 
So  you  have  nothing  to  ask  me — nothing  ? 
I  have  been  waiting  for  a  word  from  you. 
And  could  you  then  endure  in  all  this  time 
Not  once  to  speak  his  name  ? 

[Thekla  remaining  silent,  the  Countess  rises 
and  advances  to  her. 

Why,  how-  comes  this  ? 
Perhaps  I  am  already  grown  superfluous, 
And  other  ways  exist,  besides  through  me? 
Confess  it  to  me,  Thekla ;  have  you  seen  him  ? 

THEKLA. 

To-day  and  yesterday  I  have  not  seen  him. 

COUNTESS. 

And  not  heard  from  him,  either?  Come,  be  open. 

THEKLA. 

No  syllable. 

COUNTESS. 

And  still  you  are  so  calm  ? 

THEKLA. 

I  am. 

COUNTESS. 

May't  please  you,  leave  us,  Lady  Neubrunn. 
[Exit  Lady  Neubrunn 


SCENE  II. 
The  Countess,  Thekla. 

COUNTESS. 

It  does  not  please  me,  Princess,  that  he  holds 
Himself  so  still,  exactly  at  this  time. 

THEKLA. 

Exactly  at  this  time  ? 

COUNTESS. 

He  now  knows  all  : 
'Twere  now  the  moment  to  declare  himself. 

THEKLA. 

If  I  'm  to  understand  you,  speak  less  darkly. 

COUNTESS. 

'T  was  for  that  purpose  that  I  bade  her  leave  us. 

Thelka,  you  are  no  more  a  child.    Your  heart 

Is  now  no  more  in  nonage  :  for  you  love, 

And  boldness  dwells  with  love — that  you  have  proved 

Your  nature  moulds  itself  upon  your  father's 

More  than  your  mother's  spirit.    Therefore  may  you 

Hear,  what  were  too  much  for  her  fortitude. 

THEKLA. 

Enough  :  no  further  preface,  I  entreat  you. 
At  once,  out  with  it !  Be  it  what  it  may, 
It  is  not  possible  that  it  should  torture  me 
More  than  this  introduction.    What  have  you 
To  say  to  me  ?  Tell  me  the  whole,  and  briefly ! 

COUNTESS. 

You'll  not  be  frighten'd 

179 


170 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


THEKLA. 

Name  it,  I  entreat  you. 

COUNTESS. 

It  lies  within  your  power  to  do  your  father 
A  weighty  service 

THEKLA. 

Lies  within  my  power  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Max.  Piccolomini  loves  you.    You  can  link  him 
Indissolubly  to  your  father. 

THEKLA. 

I? 

What  need  of  me  for  that  ?    And  is  he  not 
Already  link'd  to  him? 

COUNTESS 

He  was. 

THEKLA. 

And  wherefore 
Should  he  not  be  so  now — not  be  so  always  ? 

COUNTESS. 

He  cleaves  to  the  Emperor  too. 

THEKLA. 

Not  more  than  duty 
And  honor  may  demand  of  him. 

COUNTESS. 

We  ask 
Proofs  of  his  love,  and  not  proofs  of  his  honor. 
Duty  and  honor ! 

Those  are  ambiguous  words  with  many  meanings. 
You  should  interpret  them  for  him  :  his  love 
Should  be  the  sole  definer  of  his  honor. 

THEKLA. 

How? 

COUNTESS. 

The  Emperor  or  you  must  he  renounce. 

THEKLA. 

He  will  accompany  my  father  gladly 

In  his  retirement.    From  himself  you  heard, 

How  much  he  wish'd  to  lay  aside  the  sword. 

COUNTESS. 

He  must  not  lay  the  sword  aside,  we  mean  ; 
He  must  unsheathe  it  in  your  father's  cause. 

THEKLA. 

He'll  spend  with  gladness  and  alacrity 

His  life,  his  heart's-blood  in  my  father's  cause, 

If  shame  or  injury  be  intended  him. 

COUNTESS. 

You  will  not  understand  me     Well,  hear  then : — 
Your  father  has  fallen  off  from  the  Emperor, 
And  is  about  to  join  the  enemy 
With  the  whole  soldiery 

THEKLA. 

Alas,  my  mother! 

COUNTESS. 

There  needs  a  great  example  to  draw  on 
The  army  after  him.    The  Piccolomini 
Possess  the  love  and  reverence  of  the  troops ; 
They  govern  all  opinions,  and  wherever 
They  lead  the  way,  none  hesitate  to  follow. 
The  son  secures  the  father  to  our  interests — 
You  've  much  in  your  hands  at  this  moment. 


Ah, 


My  miserable  mother !  what  a  death-stroke 
Awaits  thee! — No!  she  never  will  survive  it. 


COUNTESS. 

She  will  accommodate  her  soul  to  that 

Which  is  and  must  be.    I  do  know  your  mothe- 

The  far-off  future  weighs  upon  her  heart 

With  torture  of  anxiety ;  but  is  it 

Unalterably,  actually  present, 

She  soon  resigns  herself,  and  bears  it  calmly. 

THEKLA. 

0  my  foreboding  bosom !  Even  now, 

E'en  now  'tis  here,  that  icy  hand  of  horror! 
And  my  young  hope  lies  shuddering  in  its  grasp  ; 

1  knew  it  well — no  sooner  had  I  enter'd, 
A  heavy  ominous  presentiment 

Reveal'd  to  me,  that  spirits  of  death  were  hovering 
Over  my  happy  fortune.    But  why  think  I 
First  of  myself?  My  mother!  O  my  mother! 

COUNTESS. 

Calm  yourself!  Break  not  out  in  vain  lamenting! 
Preserve  you  for  your  father  the  firm  friend, 
And  for  yourself  the  lover,  all  will  yet 
Prove  good  and  fortunate. 

THEKLA. 

Prove  good  !  What  good 
Must  we  not  part  ? — part  ne'er  to  meet  again  ? 

COUNTESS. 

He  parts  not  from  you  !  He  can  not  part  from  you 

THEKLA. 

Alas  for  his  sore  anguish  !  It  will  rend 
His  heart  asunder. 

COUNTESS. 

If  indeed  he  loves  you 
His  resolution  will  be  speedily  taken. 

THEKLA. 

His  resolution  will  be  speedily  taken — 
O  do  not  doubt  of  that !  A  resolution ! 
Does  there  remain  one  to  be  taken  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Hush ! 
Collect  yourself!  I  hear  your  mother  coming. 

THEKLA. 

How  shall  I  bear  to  see  her  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Collect  yourself 


SCENE  III. 


To  Oiem  enter  the  Duchess, 
duchess  (to  the  Countess). 
Who  was  here,  sister  ?  I  heard  some  one  talking, 
And  passionately  too. 

countess. 

Nay !  There  was  no  one. 
duchess. 
I  am  grown  so  timorous,  every  trifling  noise 
Scatters  my  spirits,  and  announces  to  me 
The  footstep  of  some  messenger  of  evil. 
And  you  can  tell  me,  sister,  what  the  event  is  ? 
Will  lie  agree  to  do  the  Emperor's  pleasure, 
And  send  the  horse-regiments  to  the  Cardinal  ? 
Tell  me,  has  he  dismiss'd  Von  Questenberg 
With  a  favorable  answer  ? 

countess. 

No,  he  has  not 

DUCHESS. 

Alas !  then  all  is  lost !  I  see  it  coming, 
The  worst  that  can  come  !  Yes,  they  will  depose  him 
180 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


171 


The  accursed  business  of  the  Rcgensburg  diet 
"Will  all  be  acted  o'er  again  ! 

COUNTESS. 

No!  never! 
Make  your  heart  easy,  sister,  as  to  that. 

[Thekla,  in  extreme  agitation,  throws  herself  upon 
her  mother  and  enfolds  her  in  her  arms,  weeping. 

DUCHESS. 

Yes,  my  poor  child ! 

Thou  too  hast  lost  a  most  affectionate  godmother 

In  the  Empress.    O  that  stern  unbending  man ! 

In  this  unhappy  marriage  what  have  I 

Not  suffer'd,  not  endured  ?  For  even  as  if 

I  had  been  link'd  on  to  some  wheel  of  fire 

That  restless,  ceaseless,  whipls  impetuous  onward, 

I  have  pass'd  a  life  of  frights  and  horrors  with  him, 

And  ever  to  the  brink  of  some  abyss 

With  dizzy  headlong  violence  he  whirls  me. 

Nay,  do  not  weep,  my  child  !  Let  not  my  sufferings 

Presignify  unhappiness  to  thee, 

Nor  blacken  with  their  shade  the  fate  that,  waits  thee. 

There  lives  no  second  Friedland  :  thou,  my  child, 

Hast  not  to  fear  thy  mother's  destiny. 

THEKLA. 

0  let  us  supplicate  him,  dearest  mother ! 
Quick!  quick!  here's  no  abiding-place  for  us. 
Here  every  coming  hour  broods  into  life 
Some  new  affrighti'ul  monster. 

DUCHESS. 

Thou  wilt  share 
An  easier,  calmer  lot,  my  child !  We  loo, 

1  and  thy  lather,  witness'd  happy  days. 

Still  think  I  with  delight  of  those  first  years, 

When  he  was  making  progress  with  glad  effort, 

When  his  ambition  was  a  genial  fire, 

Not  that  consuming  flame  which  now  it  is. 

The  Emperor  loved  him,  trusted  him:  and  all 

He  undertook  could  not  but  be  successful. 

But  since  that  ill-starr'd  day  at  Regensburg, 

Which  plunged  him  headlong  from  his  dignity, 

A  gloomy  uncompanionable  spirit, 

Unsteady  and  suspicious,  has  possess'd  him. 

His  quiet  mind  forsook  him,  and  no  longer 

Did  he  yield  up  himself  in  joy  and  faith 

To  his  old  luck,  and  individual  power  ; 

But  thenceforth  turn'd  his  heart  and  best  affections 

All  to  those  cloudy  sciences,  which  never 

Have  yet  made  happy  him  who  follow'd  them. 

COUNTESS. 

You  see  it,  sister !  as  your  eyes  permit  you. 

But  surely  this  is  not  the  conversation 

To  pass  the  time  in  which  we  are  waiting  for  him. 

You  know  he  will  be  soon  here.    Would  you  have 

him 
Find  her  in  this  condition  ? 

DUCHESS. 

Come,  my  child ! 
Come  wipe  away  thy  tears,  and  show  thy  father 
A  cheerful  countenance.    See,  the  tie-knot  here 
Is  off1— this  hair  must  not  hang  so  dishevell'd. 
Come,  dearest !  dry  thy  tears  up.    They  deform 
Thy  gentle  eye. — Well  now — what  was  I  saying  ? 
Yes,  in  good  truth,  this  Piccolomini 
Is  a  most  noble  and  deserving  gentleman. 

COUNTESS. 

That  is  he,  sister ! 


thekla  {to  the  Countess,  with  7narhs  of  great  oppres- 
sion of  spirits). 
Aunt,  you  will  excuse  me  ?  (Is  going). 

countess. 
But  whither  ?  See,  your  father  comes. 

thekla. 
I  cannot  see  him  now. 

countess. 
Nay,  but  bethink  you. 
thekla. 
Believe  me,  I  cannot  sustain  his  presence. 

COUNTESS. 

But  he  will  miss  you,  will  ask  after  you. 

DUCHESS. 

What  now  ?  Why  is  she  going  ? 

COUNTESS. 

She 's  not  well. 
duchess  (anxiously). 
What  ails  then  my  beloved  child  ? 

[Both  follow  the  Princess,  and  endeavor  to  detain 
her.  During  this  Wallenstein  appears,  engaged 
in  conversation  with  Illo. 


SCENE  IV. 
Wallenstein,  Illo,  Countess,  Duchess,  Thekla. 

wallenstein. 
All  quiet  in  the  camp  ? 

illo. 

It  is  all  quiet. 

wallenstein. 
In  a  few  hours  may  couriers  come  from  Prague 
With  tidings,  that  this  capital  is  ours. 
Then  we  may  drop  the  mask,  and  to  the  troops 
Assembled  in  this  town  make  known  the  measure 
And  its  result  together.    In  such  cases 
Example  does  the  whole.    Whoever  is  foremost 
Still  leads  the  herd.    An  imitative  creature 
Is  man.    The  troops  at  Prague  conceive  no  other, 
Than  that  the  Pilsen  army  has  gone  through 
The  forms  of  homage  to  us ;  and  in  Pilsen 
They  shall  swear  fealty  to  us,  because 
The  example  has  been  given  them  by  Prague. 
Butler,  you  tell  me,  has  declared  himself? 

ILLO, 

At  his  own  bidding,  unsolicited, 

He  came  to  offer  you  himself  and  regiment 

wallenstein. 
I  find  we  must  not  give  implicit  credence 
To  every  warning  voice  that  makes  itself 
Be  listen'd  to  in  the  heart.     To  hold  us  back, 
Oft  does  the  lying  Spirit  counterfeit 
The  voice  of  Truth  and  inward  Revelation, 
Scattering  false  oracles.    And  thus  have  I 
To  entreat  forgiveness,  for  that  secretly 
I  've  wrong'd  this  honorable  gallant  man, 
This  Butler  :  for  a  feeling,  of  the  which 
I  am  not  master  (fear  I  would  not  call  it), 
Creeps  o'er  me  instantly,  with  sense  of  shuddering, 
At  his  approach,  and  stops  love's  joyous  motion. 
And  this  same  man,  against  whom  I  am  warn'd, 
This  honest  man  is  he,  who  reaches  to  me 
The  first  pledge  of  my  fortune. 

ILLO. 

And  doubt  not 
181 


172 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


That  his  example  will  win  over  to  you 
The  best  men  in  the  army. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Go  and  send 
Isolani  hither.    Send  him  immediately. 
He  is  under  recent  obligations  to  me : 
With  him  will  I  commence  the  trial.    Go. 

[Exit  Illo. 

wallenstein  {turns  himself  round  to  the  females). 
Lo,  there  the  mother  with  the  darling  daughter : 
For  once  we  '11  have  an  interval  of  rest — 
Come !  my  heart  yearns  to  live  a  cloudless  hour 
In  the  beloved  circle  of  my  family. 

COUNTESS. 

'Tis  long  since  we've  been  thus  together,  brother. 

wallenstein  {to  the  Countess  aside). 
Can  she  sustain  the  news  ?  Is  she  prepared  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Not  yet. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Come  here,  my  sweet  girl!  Seat  thee  by  me, 
For  there  is  a  good  spirit  on  thy  lips. 
Thy  mother  praised  to  me  thy  ready  skill : 
She  says  a  voice  of  melody  dwells  in  thee, 
Which  doth  enchant  the  soul.  Now  such  a  voice 
Will  drive  away  from  me  the  evil  demon 
That  beats  his  black  wings  close  above  my  head. 

DUCHESS. 

Where  is  thy  lute,  my  daughter  ?  Let  thy  father 
Hear  some  small  trial  of  thy  skill. 

THEKLA. 

My  mother ! 
I— 

DUCHESS. 

Trembling  ?  come,  collect  thyself    Go,  cheer 
Thy  father. 

THEKLA. 

O  my  mother !  I — I  cannot. 

COUNTESS. 

How,  what  is  that,  niece  ? 

thekla  {to  the  Countess). 
O  spare  me — sing — now — in  this  sore  anxiety 
Of  the  o'erburthen'd  soul — to  sing  to  him, 
Who  is  thrusting,  even  now,  my  mother  headlong 
Into  her  grave. 

DUCHESS. 

How,  Thekla !  Humorsome  ? 
What !  shall  thy  father  have  express'd  a  wish 
In  vain  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Here  is  the  lute. 

THEKLA. 

My  God  !  how  can  I — 
[The  orchestra  plays.  During  the  ritornelloTHEKL  a 
expresses  in  her  gestures  and  countenance  the 
struggle  of  her  feelings :  and  at  the  moment 
that  she  should  begin  to  sing,  contracts  her- 
self together,  as  one  shuddering,  throws  the 
instrument  down,  and  retires  abruptly. 

DUCHESS. 

My  child !  O  she  is  ill— 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  ails  the  maiden  ? 
Say,  is  she  often  so  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Since  then  herself 


Has  now  betray'd  it,  I  too  must  no  longer 
Conceal  it. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What? 

COUNTESS. 

She  loves  him! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Loves  him !  Whonv  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Max.  does  she  love  !  Max.  Piccolomini. 

Hast  thou  ne'er  noticed  it  ?  Nor  yet  my  sister  ? 

DUCHESS. 

Was  it  this  that  lay  so  heavy  on  her  heart  ? 

God's  blessing  on  thee,  my  sweet  child  thou  need's?; 

Never  take  shame  upon  thee  for  thy  choice. 

COUNTESS. 

This  journey,  if  'twere  not  thy  aim,  ascribe  it 

To  thine  own  self.    Thou  shouldst  have  chosen  aru 

other 
To  have  attended  her. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  does  he  know  it  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Yes,  and  he  hopes  to  win  her. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Hopes  to  win  her ! 
Is  the  boy  mad  ? 

COUNTESS. 

Well,  hear  it  from  themselves. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

He  thinks  to  carry  off  Duke  Friedland's  daughter! 

Ay  ?  the  thought  pleases  me. 

The  young  man  has  no  grovelling  spirit. 

COUNTESS 

Since 
Such  and  such  constant  favor  you  have  shown  him. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

He  chooses  finally  to  be  my  heir. 

And  true  it  is,  I  love  the  youth ;  yea,  honor  him. 

But  must  he  therefore  be  my  daughter's  husband  ? 

Is  it  daughters  only  ?  Is  it  only  children 

That  we  must  show  our  favor  by  ? 

DUCHESS. 

His  noble  disposition  and  his  manners — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Win  him  my  heart,  but  not  my  daughter. 

DUCHESS. 

Then 
His  rank,  his  ancestors — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Ancestors !  What  ? 
He  is  a  subject,  and  my  son-in-law 
I  will  seek  out  upon  the  thrones  of  Europe. 

DUCHESS. 

O  dearest  Albrecht !  Climb  we  not  too  high, 
Lest  we  should  fall  too  low. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  ?  have  I  paid 
A  price  so  heavy  to  ascend  this  eminence, 
And  jut  out  high  above  the. common  herd, 
Only  to  close  the  mighty  part  I  play- 
In  Life's  great  drama,  with  a  common  kinsman  ? 
Have  I  for  this — 

[Stops  suddenly,  repressing  himself 
She  is  the  only  thing 
That  will  remain  behind  of  me  on  earth ; 
And  I  will  see  a  crown  around  her  head, 

182 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


173 


Or  die  in  the  attempt  to  place  it  there. 
I  hazard  all — all !  and  for  this  alone, 
To  lift  her  into  greatness — 

Yea,  in  this  moment,  in  the  which  we  are  speaking — 
[He  recollects  himself. 
And  I  must  now,  like  a  soft-hearted  father. 
Couple  together  in  good  peasant-fashion 
The  pair,  that  chance  to  suit  each  other's  liking — 
And  1  must  do  it  now,  even  now,  when  I 
Am  stretching  out  the  wreath  that  is  to  twine 
My  fill]  accomplish'd  work — no!  she  is  the  jewel, 
Which  I  have  treasured  long,  my  last,  my  noblest, 
And  'tis  my  purpose  not  to  let  her  from  me 
For  less  than  a  king's  sceptre. 

DUCHESS. 

O  my  husband ! 
You're  ever  building,  building  to  the  clouds, 
Still  building  higher,  and  still  higher  building, 
And  ne'er  reflect,  that  the  poor  narrow  basis 
Cannot  sustain  the  giddy  tottering  column. 

WALLEXSTEIX  (10  the  CoUXTESS.) 

Have  you  announced  the  place  of  residence 
Which  I  have  destined  for  her  ? 

COUNTESS. 

No !  not  yet. 
Twere  better  you  yourself  disclosed  it  to  her, 

DUCHESS. 

How  ?    Do  we  not  return  to  Karn  then  ? 


No. 


SCENE  V. 
To  them  enter  Count  Tertsky. 

COUNTESS. 

— Tertsky ! 
What  ails  him  ?    What  an  image  of  affright ! 
He  looks  as  he  had  seen  a  ghost. 

tertsky  {leading  Wallexstein  aside). 
Is  it  thy  command  that  all  the  Croats — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Mine ! 

TERTSKY. 

We  are  betray'd. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  ? 

TERTSKY. 

They  are  off!  This  night 
The  Jagers  likewise1 — all  the  villages 
In  the  whole  round  are  empty. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Isolani  ? 

TERTSKY. 

Him  thou  hast  sent  away.    Yes,  surely. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I? 

TERTSKY. 

No  !  Hast  thou  not  sent  him  off?   Nor  Deodate  ? 
They  are  vanish'd  both  of  them. 


WALLENSTEIN. 
DUCHESS. 

And  to  no  other  of  your  lands  or  seats  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

You  would  not  be  secure  there. 

DUCHESS. 

Not  secure 
In  the  Emperor's  realms,  beneath  the  Emperor's 
Protection  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Friedland's  wife  may  be  permitted 
No  longer  to  hope  that. 

DUCHESS. 

O  God  in  Heaven ! 
And  have  you  brought  it  even  to  this ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

In  Holland 
You'll  find  protection. 

DUCHESS. 

In  a  Lutheran  country  ? 
What  ?   And  you  send  us  into  Lutheran  countries  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Duke  Franz  of  Lauenburg  conducts  you  thither. 

DUCHESS. 

Duke  Franz  of  Lauenburg  ? 

The  ally  of  Sweden,  the  Emperor's  enemy. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  Emperor's  enemies  are  mine  no  longer. 
duchess  (casting  a  look  of  terror  on  the  Duke  and  the 

Countess.) 
Is  it  then  true  ?   It  is.    You  are  degraded  ? 
Deposed  from  the  command  ?   O  God  in  Heaven ! 

countess  (aside  to  the  Duke). 
Leave  her  in  this  belief.    Thou  seest  she  can  not 
Support  the  real  truth. 


SCENE  VI. 
To  them  enter  Illo. 
illo. 
Has  Tertsky  told  thee  ? 

tertsky. 

He  knows  all. 
illo. 

And  likewise 
That  Esterhatzy,  Goetz,  Maradas,  Kaunitz, 
Kolatto,  Palfi,  have  forsaken  thee. 

tertsky. 
Damnation ! 

wallexstein  (winks  at  them). 
Hush! 
countess  (who  has  been  watching  them  anxiously  from 

the  distance,  and  now  advances  to  them). 
Tertsky  !  Heaven !  What  is  it  ?  What  has  happen'd  ? 

wallexsteix  (scarcely  suppressing  his  emotion). 
Nothing !  let  us  be  gone ! 

tertsky  (following  him). 

Theresa,  it  is  nothing. 
countess  (holding  him  back). 
Nothing?   Do  I  not  see,  that   all  the  life-blood 
Has  left  your  cheeks — look  you  not  like  a  ghost  ? 
That  even  my  brother  but  affects  a  calmness  ? 

page  (enters). 
An  Aid-de-Camp  inquires  for  the  Count  Tertsky. 
[Tertsky  follows  the  Page. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Go,  hear  his  business. 

(To  Illo). 
This  could  not  have  happen'd 
So  unsuspected  without  mutiny. 
Who  was  on  guard  at  the  gates  ? 
illo. 

T  was  Tiefenbach. 
183 


174 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


WALLENSTEIN. 

Let  Tiefenbach  leave  guard  without  delay, 
And  Tertsky's  grenadiers  relieve  him. 
(Illo  is  going). 

Stop! 
Hast  thou  heard  aught  of  Butler  ? 

ILLO. 

Him  I  met': 
He  will  be  here  himself  immediately. 
Butler  remains  unshaken. 

[Illo  exit.    Wallenstein  is  following  him. 

COUNTESS. 

Let  him  not  leave  thee,  sister !  go,  detain  him ! 
There 's  some  misfortune. 

duchess  (clinging  to  him). 

Gracious  Heaven !  what  is  it  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Be  tranquil'  leave  me,  sister! ■•dearest  wife! 
We  are  in  camp,  and  this  is  naught  unusual  ; 
Here  storm  and  sunshine  follow  one  another 
With  rapid  interchanges.    These  fierce  spirits 
Champ  the  curb  angrily,  and  never  yet 
Did  quiet  bless  the  temples  of  the  leader. 
If  I  am  to  stay,  go  you.    The  plaints  of  women 
HI  suit  the  scenes  where  men  must  act. 

[He  is  going .-  Tertsky  returns. 

TERTSKY. 

Remain  here.    From  this  window  must  we  see  it. 

WALLENSTEIN  (to  the  COUNTESS). 

Sister,  retire ! 

COUNTESS. 

No — never. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

'Tis  my  will. 
tertsky  (leads  the  Countess  aside,  and  drawing  her 

attention  to  the  Duchess). 
Theresa ! 

DUCHESS. 

Sister,  come !  since  he  commands  it. 


SCENE  VII. 


It  should  have  been  kept  secret  from  the  army, 
Till  fortune  had  decided  for  us  at  Prague. 
tertsky. 

0  that  thou  hadst  believed  me !   Yester-evening 
Did  we  conjure  thee  not  to  let  that  skulker, 
That  fox,  Octavio,  pass  the  gates  of  Pilsen. 

Thou  gavest  him  thy  own  horses  to  flee  from  thee- 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  old  tune  still !    Now,  once  for  all,  no  more 
Of  this  suspicion — it  is  doting  folly. 

tertsky. 
Thou  didst  confide  in  Isolani  too  ; 
And  lo !  he  was  the  first  that  did  desert  thee. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

It  was  but  yesterday  I  rescued  him 

From  abject  wretchedness.    Let  that  go  by  ; 

1  never  reckon'd  yet  on  gratitude. 

And  wherein  doth  he  wrong  in  going  from  me  ? 
He  follows  still  the  god  whom  all  his  life 
He  has  worshipp'd  at  the  gaming-table.    With 
My  fortune,  and  my  seeming  destiny, 
He  made  the  bond,  and  broke  it  not  with  me. 
1  am  but  the  ship  in  which  his  hopes  were  stovv'd, 
And  with  the  which  well-pleased  and  confident 
He  traversed  the  open  sea ;  now  he  beholds  it 
In  eminent  jeopardy  among  the  coast-rocks, 
And  hurries  to  preserve  his  wares.    As  light 
As  the  free  bird  from  the  hospitable  twig 
Where  it  had  nested,  he  flies  off  from  me  : 
No  human  tie  is  snapp'd  betwixt  us  two. 
Yea,  he  deserves  to  find  himself  deceived 
Who  seeks  a  heart  in  the  unthinking  man. 
Like  shadows  on  a  stream,  the  forms  of  life 
Impress  their  characters  on  the  smooth  forehead, 
Naught  sinks  into  the  bosom's  silent  depth : 
Quick  sensibility  of  pain  and  pleasure 
Moves  the  light  fluids  lightly ;  but  no  soul 
Warmeth  the  inner  frame. 

TERTSKY. 

Yet,  would  I  rather 
Trust  the  smooth  brow  than  that  deep-furrow'd  one. 


Wallenstein,  Tertsky. 

wallenstein  (stepping  to  the  window). 
What  now,  then? 

tertsky. 
There  are  strange  movements  among  all  the  troops, 
And  no  one  knows  the  cause.    Mysteriously, 
With  gloomy  silence,  the  several  corps 
Marshal  themselves,  each  under  its  own  banners. 
Tiefenbach's  corps  make  threat'ning  movements ;  only 
The  Pappenheimers  still  remain  aloof 
In  their  own  quarters,  and  let  no  one  enter. 

wallenstein. 
Does  Piccolomini  appear  among  them  ? 

tertsky. 
We  are  seeking  him  :  he  is  nowhere  to  be  met  with, 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  did  the  Aid-de-Camp  deliver  to  you  ? 

TERTSKY. 

My  regiments  had  dispatch'd  him ;  yet  once  more 

They  swear  fidelity  to  thee,  and  wait 

The  shout  for  onset,  all  prepared,  and  eager. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

But  whence  arose  this  larum  in  the  camp  ? 


scene  vin. 

Wallenstein,  Tertsky,  Illo. 

illo  (who  enters  agitated  with  rage). 
Treason  and  mutiny ! 

tertsky. 
And  what  further  now  ? 
illo. 
Tiefenbach's  soldiers,  when  I  gave  the  orders 
To  go  off  guard — Mutinous  villains ! 
tertsky. 

Well! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  followed  ? 

ILLO. 

They  refused  obedience  to  them. 

TERTSKY. 

Fire  on  them  instantly !  Give  out  the  order. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Gently !  what  cause  did  they  assign  ? 

ILLO. 

No  other, 
They  said,  had  right  to  issue  orders  but 
Lieutenant-General  Piccolomini. 

184 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


175 


WALLENSTEIN  {in  a  convulsion  of  agony). 
What  ?  How  is  that  ? 

ILLO. 

He  takes  that  office  on  him  by  commission, 
Under  sign-manual  of  the  Emperor. 

TERTSKY. 

From  the  Emperor — hear'st  thou,  Duke  ? 

ILLO. 

At  his  incitement 
The  Generals  made  that  stealthy  flight — 

TERTSKY. 

Duke !  hear'st  thou  ? 

ILLO. 

Caraffa  too,  and  Montecuculi, 

Are  missing,  with  six  other  Generals, 

All  whom  he  had  induced  to  follow  him. 

Tlus  plot  he  has  long  had  in  writing  by  him 

From  the  Emperor;  but  'twas  finally  concluded 

With  all  the  detail  of  the  operation 

Some  days  ago  with  the  Envoy  Questenberg. 

[Wallenstein  sinks  down  into  a  chair,  and  covers 
his  face. 

TERTSKY. 

O  hadst  thou  but  believed  me  ! 


SCENE  IX. 
To  them  enter  the  Countess. 

COUNTESS. 

This  suspense, 
This  horrid  fear — I  can  no  longer  bear  it. 
For  heaven's  sake,  tell  me,  what  has  taken  place  ? 

ILLO. 

The  regiments  are  all  falling  off  from  us. 

TERTSKY. 

Octavio  Piccolomini  is  a  traitor. 


O  my  foreboding 


COUNTESS. 

[Rashes  out  of  the  room. 

TERTSKY. 

Hadst  thou  but  believed  me ! 
Now  seest  thou  how  the  stars  have  lied  to  thee. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  stars  lie  not;  but  we  have  here  a  work 

Wrought  counter  to  the  stars  and  destiny. 

The  science  is  still  honest :  this  false  heart 

Forces  a  lie  on  the  truth-telling  heaven. 

On  a  divine  law  divination  rests  ; 

Where  Nature  deviates  from  that  law,  and  stumbles 

Out  of  her*limits,  there  all  science  errs. 

True,  I  did  not  suspect !  Were  it  superstition 

Never  by  such  suspicion  t'  have  affronted 

The  human  form,  O  may  that  time  ne'er  come 

In  which  I  shame  me  of  the  infirmity. 

The  wildest  savage  drinks  not  with  the  victim, 

Into  whose  breast  he  means  to  plunge  the  sword. 

This,  this,  Octavio,  was  no  hero's  deed  : 

'T  was  not  thy  prudence  that  did  conquer  mine ; 

A  bad  heart  triumph 'd  o'er  an  honest  one. 

No  shield  received  the  assassin  stroke ;  thou  plungest 

Thy  weapon  on  an  unprotected  breast — 

Against  such  weapons  I  am  but  a  child. 


SCENE  X. 
To  these  enter  Butler, 
tertsky  (  meeting  him). 
0  look  there !  Butler !  Here  we  've  still  a  friend ! 


wallenstein  {meets  him  with  outspread  arms,  and 

embraces  him  with  warmth). 
Come  to  my  heart,  old  comrade !  Not  the  sun 
Looks  out  upon  us  more  revivingly 
In  the  earliest  month  of  spring, 
Than  a  friend's  countenance  in  such  an  hour. 

butler. 
My  General :  I  come — 

wallenstein  {leaning  on  Butler's  shoulders). 
Know'st  thou  already  ? 
That  old  man  has  betray 'd  me  to  the  Emperor. 
What  say'st  thou  ?  Thirty  years  have  we  together 
Lived  out,  and  held  out,  sharing  joy  and  hardship. 
We  have  slept  in  one  camp-bed,  drunk  from  one  glass, 
One  morsel  shared !  I  lean'd  myself  on  him, 
As  now  I  lean  me  on  thy  faithful  shoulder. 
And  now  in  the  very  moment,  when,  all  love, 
All  confidence,  my  bosom  beat  to  his, 
He  sees  and  takes  the  advantage,  slabs  the  knife 
Slowly  into  my  heart. 

[He  hides  his  face  on  Butler's  breast 

butler. 

Forget  the  false  one. 
What  is  your  present  purpose  ? 

wallenstein. 

Well  remember'd ! 
Courage,  my  soul !  I  am  still  rich  in  friends, 
Still  loved  by  Destiny ;  for  in  the  moment, 
That  it  unmasks  the  plotting  hypocrite, 
It  sends  and  proves  to  me  one  faithful  heart. 
Of  the  hypocrite  no  more !  Think  not,  his  loss 
Was  that  which  struck  the  pang :  O  no !  his  treason 
Is  that  which  strikes  this  pang !  No  more  of  him ! 
Dear  to  my  heart,  and  honor'd  were  they  both, 
And  the  young  man — yes — he  did  truly  love  me, 
He — he — has  not  deceived  me.    But  enough, 
Enough  of  this — Swift  counsel  now  beseems  us, 
The  courier,  whom  Count  Kinsky  sent  from  Prague, 
I  expect  him  every  moment :  and  whatever 
He  may  bring  with  him,  we  must  take  good  care 
To  keep  it  from  the  mutineers.    Quick,  then ! 
Dispatch  some  messenger  you  can  rely  on 
To  meet  him,  and  conduct  him  to  me. 

[Illo  is  going 

butler  {detaining  him). 
My  General,  whom  expect  you  then  1 

wallenstein. 

The  courier 
Who  brings  me  word  of  the  event  at  Prague. 

butler  {hesitating). 


Hem! 


WALLENSTEIN. 

And  what  now  ? 


BUTLER. 

You  do  not  know  it  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 


Well  ? 


BUTLER. 

From  what  that  larum  in  the  camp  arose  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

From  what  ? 

BUTLER. 

That  courier 

WALLENSTEIN  {with  eager  expectation). 


Well ' 


185 


176 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


BUTLER. 

Is  already  here. 
tertsky  and  illo  (at  the  same  time). 
Already  here  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

My  courier? 

BUTLER. 

For  some  hours. 


WALLENSTEIN. 


And  I  not  know  it  ? 


BUTLER 

The  sentinels  detain  him 


In  custody. 


illo  (stamping  with  his  foot). 
Damnation ! 

BUTLER. 

And  his  letter 
Was  broken  open,  and  is  circulated 
Through  the  whole  camp. 


WALLENSTEIN. 

You  know  what  it  contains  ? 


Question  me  not ! 

TERTSKY. 

Illo !  alas  for  us. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Hide  nothing  from  me — I  can  hear  the  worst. 
Prague  then  is  lost.    It  is.    Confess  it  freely. 

BUTLER. 

Yes!  Prague  is  lost.    And  all  the  several  regiments 

At  Budweiss,  Tabor,  Brannau,  Konigingratz, 

At  Brun  and  Znaym,  have  forsaken  you, 

And  ta'en  the  oaths  of  fealty  anew 

To  the  Emperor.    Yourself,  with  Kinsky,  Tertsky, 

\nd  Illo  have  been  sentenced. 

[Tertsky  and  Illo  express  alarm  and  fury. 
Wallenstein  remains frni  and  collected. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

'T  is  decided ! 
'T  is  well !  I  have  received  a  sudden  cure 
From  all  the  pangs  of  doubt :  with  steady  stream 
Once  more  my  life-blood  flows !  My  soul 's  secure ! 
In  the  night  only  Friedland's  stars  can  beam. 
Lingering  irresolute,  with  fitful  fears 
I  drew  the  sword — 'twas  with  an  inward  strife, 
While  yet  the  choice  was  mine.  The  murderous  knife 
Is  lifted  for  my  heart!  Doubt  disappears! 
I  fight  now  for  my  head  and  for  my  life. 

[Exit  Wallenstein;  the  others  follow  him. 


SCENE  XI. 


countess  tertsky  (enters  from  a  side-room). 
I  can  endure  no  longer.  No  ! 

[Looks  around  her. 
Where  are  they  ? 
No  one  is  here.    They  leave  me  all  alone, 
Alone  in  this  sore  anguish  of  suspense. 
\nd  I  must  wear  the  outward  show  of  calmness 
Before  my  sister,  and  shut  in  within  me 
The  pangs  and  agonies  of  my  crowded  bosom. 
It  is  not  to  be  borne. — If  all  should  fail ; 
If— if  he  must  go  over  to  the  Swedes, 
An  empty-handed  fugitive,  and  not 
As  an  ally,  a  covenanted  equal, 


A  proud  commander  with  his  army  following ; 
If  we  must  wander  on  from  land  to  land. 
Like  the  Count  Palatine,  of  fallen  greatness 
An  ignominious  monument — But  no! 
That  day  I  will  not  see !  And  could  himself 
Endure  to  sink  so  low,  I  would  not  bear 
To  see  him  so  low  sunken. 


SCENE  XII. 
Countess,  Duchess,  Thekla. 
thekla  (endeavoring  to  hold  back  the  Duchess; 
Dear  mother,  do  stay  here ! 

duchess. 

No!  Here  is  yet 
Some  frightful  mystery  that  is  hidden  from  me. 
Why  does  my  sister  shun  me  ?  Don't  I  see  her 
Full  of  suspense  and  anguish  roam  about 
From  room  to  room? — Art  thou  not  full  of  terror? 
And  what  import  these  silent  nods  and  gestures 
Which  stealthwise  thou  exchangest  with  her  ? 

thekla. 

Nothing . 
Nothing,  dear  mother! 

duchess  (to  the  Countess). 

Sister,  I  will  know. 

countess. 
What  boots  it  now  to  hide  it  from  her  ?  Sooner 
Or  later  she  must  learn  to  hear  and  bear  it. 
'Tis  not  the  time  now  to  indulge  infirmity ; 
Courage  beseems  us  now,  a  heart  collect, 
And  exercise  and  previous  discipline 
Of  fortitude.    One  word,  and  over  with  it ! 
Sister,  you  are  deluded.    You  believe, 
The  Duke  has  been  deposed — The  Duke  is  not 
Deposed — he  is 

thekla  [going  to  the  Countess) 

What  ?  do  you  wish  to  kill  her  ? 

countess. 

The  Duke  is 

thekla  (throwing  her  arms  around  her  mother). 

O  stand  firm !  stand  firm,  my  mother ! 

countess. 
Revolted  is  the  Duke ;  he  is  preparing 
To  join  the  enemy ;  the  army  leave  him, 
And  all  has  fail'd. 


ACT  II. 

SCENE  I. 

Scene — A  spacious  room  in  the  Duke  of  Friedland's 
Palace. 

(wallenstein  in  armor). 
Thou  hast  gain'd  thy  point,  Octavio !  Once  more  am  I 
Almost  as  friendless  as  at  Regeasburg. 
There  I  had  nothing  left  me,  but  myself— 
But  what  one  man  can  do,  you  have  now  experience 
The  twigs  have  you  hew'd  off,  and  here  I  stand 
A  leafless  trunk.     But  in  the  sap  within 
Lives  the  creating  power,  and  a  new  world 
May  sprout  forth  from  it.    Once  already  have  I 
Proved  myself  worth  an  army  to  you — I  alone ! 
Before  the  Swedish  strength  your  troops  had  melted , 
Beside  the  Lech  sunk  Tillv.  your  last  hope  : 

186 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


177 


Into  Bavaria,  like  a  winter  torrent, 

Did  that  Gustavus  pour,  and  at  Vienna 

In  his  own  palace  did  the  Emperor  tremble. 

Soldiers  were  scarce,  lor  still  the  multitude 

Follow  the  luck :  all  eyes  were  turn'd  on  me, 

Their  helper  in  distress:  the  Emperor's  pride 

Bow'd  itself  down  before  the  man  he  had  injured. 

'Twos  I  must  rise,  and  with  creative  word 

Assemble  forces  in  the  desolate  camps. 

I  did  it.    Like  a  god  of  war,  my  name 

Went  through  the  world.  The  drum  was  beat — and.lo! 

The  plow,  the  work-shop  is  forsaken,  all 

Swarm  to  the  old  familiar  long-loved  banners; 

And  as  the  wood-choir  rich  in  melody 

Assemble  quick  around  the  bird  of  wonder, 

When  first  his  throat  swells  with  his  magic  song, 

So  did  the  warlike  youth  of  Germany 

Crowd  in  around  the  image  of  my  eagle. 

I  feel  myself  the  being  that  I  was. 

It  is  the  soul  that  builds  itself  a  body, 

And  Friedland's  camp  will  not  remain  unfill'd. 

Lead  then  your  thousands  out  to  meet  me — true ! 

They  are  accustom'd  under  me  to  conquer, 

But  not  against  me.    If  the  head  and  limbs 

Separate  from  each  other,  'twill  be  soon 

Made  manifest,  in  which  the  soul  abode. 

(Illo  and  Tertsky  enter). 
Courage, friends !  Courage  !  We  are  still  un vanquished ; 
I  feel  my  footing  firm ;  five  regiments,  Tertsky, 
Are  still  our  own,  and  Butler's  gallant  troops ; 
And  a  host  of  sixteen  thousand  Swedes  to-morrow. 
1  wras  not  stronger,  when  nine  years  ago 
I  march'd  forth,  with  glad  heart  and  high  of  hope, 
To  conquer  Germany  for  the  Emperor. 


SCENE  II 

Wallenstein,  Illo,  Tertskv.  (To  them  enter  Neu- 
mann, who  leads  Tertsky  aside,  and  talks  with 
him). 

tertsky. 

What  do  they  want  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  now  ? 

tertsky. 

Ten  Cuirassiers 
From  Pappenheim  request  leave  to  address  you 
In  the  name  of  the  regiment. 

wallenstein  (hastily  to  Neumann). 
Let  them  enter. 

[Exit  Neumann. 
This 
May  end  in  something.    Mark  you.    They  are  still 
Doubtful,  and  may  be  won. 


SCENE  III. 
Wallenstein,  Tertsky,  Illo,  Ten  Cuirassiers 
(led  by  an  Anspessade,*  march  up  and  arrange 
themselves,  offer  the  word  of  command,  in  one 
front  before  the  Duke,  and  make  their  obeisance. 
He  takes  his  hat  off,  and  immediately  covers  him- 
self again). 

ANSPESSADE. 

Halt!  Front!  Present! 


*  Anspessade,  in  German,  Gefreiler,  a  soldier  inferior  to  a 
corporal,  but  above  the  sentinels.    The  German  name  implies 
that  he  is  exempt  from  mounting  guard. 
13  K 


wallenstein  (after  he  has  run  through  them  with  his 
eye,  to  the  Anspessade). 
I  know  thee  well.  Thou  art  out  of  Briiggin  in  Flan- 
ders :  thy  name  is  Mercy. 

ANSPESSADE. 

Henry  Mercy. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Thou  wert  cut  off'  on  the  march,  surrounded  by 
the  Hessians,  and  didst  fight  thy  way  with  a  hun 
dred  and  eighty  men  through  their  thousand. 

ANSPESSADE. 

'T  was  even  so,  General ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  reward  hadst  thou  for  this  gallant  exploit  ? 

ANSPESSADE. 

That  which  I  asked  for :  the  honor  to  serve  in  this 
corps. 

wallenstein  (turning  to  a  second). 

Thou  wert  among  the  volunteers  that  seized  and 
made  booty  of  the  Swedish  battery  at  Altenburg. 

SECOND  CUIRASSIER. 

Yes,  General ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  forget  no  one  with  whom  I  have  exchanged  words 
(A  pause).    Who  sends  you  ? 

ANSPESSADE. 

Your  noble  regiment,  the  Cuirassiers  of  Piccolomini. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Why  does  not  your  colonel  deliver  in  your  request 
according  to  the  custom  of  service  ? 

ANSPESSADE. 

Because  we  would  first  know  whom  we  serve. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Begin  your  address. 

anspessade  (giving  the  word  of  command). 
Shoulder  your  arms ! 

wallenstein  (turning  to  a  third). 
Thy  name  is  Risbeck ;  Cologne  is  thy  birth-place 

third  cuirassier. 
Risbeck  of  Cologne. 

wallenstein. 
It  was  thou  that  broughtest  in  the  Swedish  colonel 
Diebald,  prisoner,  in  the  camp  at  Nuremberg. 

third  cuirassier. 
It  was  not  I,  General ! 

wallenstein. 
Perfectly  right!  It  was  thy  elder  brother:  thou  hadst 
a  younger  brother  too :  where  did  he  stay  ? 

THIRD  CUIRASSIER. 

He  is  stationed  at  Olmiitz  with  the  Imperial  army 

wallenstein  (to  the  Anspessade). 
Now  then — begin. 

anspessade. 
There  came  to  hand  a  letter  from  the  Emperor, 
Commanding  us 

wallenstein  (interrupting  him). 
Who  chose  you  I 

anspessade. 

Every  company 
Drew  its  own  man  by  lot. 

wallenstein. 

Now!  to  the  business. 
anspessade. 
There  came  to  hand  a  letter  from  the  Emperor, 
Commanding  us  collectively,  from  thee 

167 


178 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


All  duties  of  obedience  to  withdraw, 
Because  thou  wert  an  enemy  and  traitor. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  what  did  you  determine? 

ANSPESSADE. 

All  our  comrades 
At  Braunnau,  Budweiss,  Prague  and  Olmiitz,  have 
Obey'd  already ;  and  the  regiments  here, 
Tiefenbach  and  Toscano,  instantly 
Did  follow  their  example.    But — but  we 
Do  not  believe  that  thou  art  an  enemy 
And  traitor  to  thy  country,  hold  it  merely 
For  lie  and  trick,  and  a  trump'd-up  Spanish  story  ? 

[  With  warmth. 
Thyself  shalt  tell  us  what  thy  purpose  is, 
For  we  have  found  thee  still  sincere  and  true : 
No  mouth  shall  interpose  itself  betwixt 
The  gallant  General  and  the  gallant  troops. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Therein  I  recognize  my  Pappenheimers. 

ANSPESSADE. 

And  this  proposal  makes  thy  regiment  to  thee  : 

Is  it  thy  purpose  merely  to  preserve 

In  thy  own  hands  this  military  sceptre, 

Which  so  becomes  thee,  which  the  Emperor 

Made  over  to  thee  by  a  covenant? 

Is  it  thy  purpose  merely  to  remain 

Supreme  commander  of  the  Austrian  armies  ? — 

We  will  stand  by  thee,  General !  and  guaranty 

Thy  honest  rights  against  all  opposition. 

And  should  it  chance,  that  all  the  other  regiments 

Turn  from  thee,  by  ourselves  will  we  stand  forth 

Thy  faithful  soldiers,  and,  as  is  our  duty, 

Far  rather  let  ourselves  be  cut  to  pieces, 

Than  suffer  thee  to  fall.    But  if  it  be 

As  the  Emperor's  letter  says,  if  it  be  true, 

That  thou  in  traitorous  wise  will  lead  us  over 

To  the  enemy,  which  God  in  heaven  forbid  ! 

Then  we  too  will  forsake  thee,  and  obey 

That  letter 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Hear  me,  children ! 


ANSPESSADE. 


Yes,  or  no ! 


There  needs  no  other  answer. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Yield  attention. 
You  're  men  of  sense,  examine  for  yourselves  ; 
Ye  think,  and  do  not  follow  with  the  herd  : 
And  therefore  have  I  always  shown  you  honor 
Above  all  others,  suffer'd  you  to  reason ; 
Have  treated  you  as  free  men,  and  my  orders 
Were  but  the  echoes  of  your  prior  suffrage. — 

ANSPESSADE. 

Most  fair  and  noble  has  thy  conduct  been 

To  us,  my  General !  With  thy  confidence 

Thou  hast  honor'd  us,  and  shown  us  grace  and  favor 

Beyond  all  other  regiments ;  and  thou  see'st 

We  follow  not  the  common  herd.    We  will 

Stand  by  thee  faithfully.    Speak  but  one  word — 

Thy  word  shall  satisfy  us,  that  it  is  not 

A  treason  which  thou  meditatest — that 

Thou  meanest  not  to  lead  the  army  over 

To  the  enemy ;  nor  e'er  betray  thy  country. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Me,  me  are  they  betraying.    The  Emperor 


Hath  sacrificed  me  to  my  enemies, 

And  I  must  fall,  unless  my  gallant  troops 

Will  rescue  me.    See  !  1  confide  in  you. 

And  be  your  hearts  my  strong-hold !    At  this  breast 

The  aim  is  taken,  at  this  hoary  head. 

This  is  your  Spanish  gratitude,  this  is  our 

Requital  for  that  murderous  fight  at  Lutzen! 

For  this  we  threw  the  naked  breast  against 

The  halbert,  made  for  this  the  frozen  earth 

Our  bed,  and  the  hard  stone  our  pillow !  never  stream 

Too  rapid  for  us,  nor  wood  too  impervious  : 

With  cheerful  spirit  we  pursued  that  Mansfield 

Through  all  the  turns  and  windings  of  his  flight ; 

Yea,  our  whole  life  was  but  one  restless  march ; 

And  homeless  as  the  stirring  wind,  we  travell'd 

O'er  the  war-wasted  earth.  And  now,  even  now, 

That  we  have  well-nigh  finish'd  the  hard  toil, 

The  unthankful,  the  curse-laden  toil  of  weapons, 

With  faithful  indefatigable  arm 

Have  roll'd  the  heavy  war-load  up  the  hill, 

Behold  !  this  boy  of  the  Emperor's  bears  away 

The  honors  of  the  peace,  an  easy  prize ! 

He  '11  weave,  forsooth,  into  his  flaxen  locks 

The  olive-branch,  the  hard-earn'd  ornament 

Of  this  gray  head,  grown  gray  beneath  the  helmet. 

ANSPESSADE. 

That  shall  he  not,  while  we  can  hinder  it ! 

No  one,  but  thou,  who  hast  conducted  it 

With  fame,  shall  end  this  war,  this  frightful  war. 

Thou  ledd'st  us  out  into  the  bloody  field 

Of  death  ;  thou  and  no  other  shall  conduct  us  home, 

Rejoicing  to  the  lovely  plains  of  peace — 

Shalt  share  with  us  the  fruits  of  the  long  toil — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  ?  Think  you  then  at  length  in  late  old  age 
To  enjoy  the  fruits  of  toil  ?  Believe  it  not. 
Never,  no  never,  will  you  see  the  end 
Of  the  contest !  you  and  me,  and  all  of  us, 
This  war  will  swallow  up !  War,  war,  not  peace, 
Is  Austria's  wish  ;  and  therefore,  because  I 
Endeavor'd  after  peace,  therefore  I  fall. 
For  what  cares  Austria,  how  long  the  war 
Wears  out  the  armies  and  lays  waste  the  world  ? 
She  will  but  wax  and  grow  amid  the  ruin, 
And  still  win  new  domains. 
[The  Cuirassiers  express  agitation  by  their  gestures 
Ye 're  moved — I  see 
A  noble  rage  flash  from  your  eyes,  ye  warriors ! 
Oh  that  my  spirit  might  possess  you  now 
Daring  as  once  it  led  you  to  the  battle ! 
Ye  would  stand  by  me  with  your  veteran  arms, 
Protect  me  in  my  rights  ;  and  this  is  noble  ! 
But  think  not  that  you  can  accomplish  it, 
Your  scanty  number !  to  no  purpose  will  you 
Have  sacrificed  you  for  your  General. 

[Confidentially 
No !  let  us  tread  securely,  seek  for  friends ! 
The  Swedes  have  proffer'd  us  assistance,  let  us 
Wear  for  a  while  the  appearance  of  good-will. 
And  use  them  for  your  profit,  till  we  both 
Carry  the  fate  of  Europe  in  our  hands, 
And  from  our  camp  to  the  glad  jubilant  world 
Lead  Peace  forth  with  the  garland  on  her  head  ! 

ANSPESSADE. 

'Tis  then  but  mere  appearances  which  thou 
Dost  put  on  with  the  Swede?    Thou 'It  not  betray 

188 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


179 


The  Emperor  ?    Wilt  not  turn  us  into  Swedes? 
This  is  the  only  thing  which  we  desire 
To  learn  from  thee. 

«  W.LENSTEIN. 

What  care  I  for  the  Swedes  ? 
I  hate  them  as  I  hate  the  pit  of  hell, 
And  under  Providence  I  trust  right  soon 
To  chase  them  to  their  homes  across  the  Baltic. 
My  cares  are  only  for  the  whole :  I  have 
A  heart — it  bleeds  within  me  for  the  miseries 
And  piteous  groaning  of  my  fellow  Germans. 
Ye  are  but  common  men,  but  yet  ye  think 
With  minds  not  common ;  ye  appear  to  me 
Worthy  before  all  others,  that  I  whisper  ye 
A  little  word  or  two  in  confidence ! 
See  now  !  already  for  full  fifteen  years 
The  war-torch  has  continued  burning,  yet 
No  rest,  no  pause  of  conflict.    Swede  and  German, 
Papist  and  Lutheran !  neither  will  give  way 
To  the  other,  every  hand's  against  the  other. 
Each  one  is  party,  and  no  one  a  judge. 
Where  shall  this  end  ?  Where's  he  that  will  unravel 
This  tangle,  ever  tangling  more  and  more. 
It  must  be  cut  asunder. 
I  feel  that  I  am  the  man  of  destiny, 
And  trust,  with  your  assistance,  to  accomplish  it. 


SCENE  IV. 


To  these  enter  Butler, 
butler  {passionately). 
General !  this  is  not  right .' 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  is  not  right  ? 

BUTLER. 

It  must  needs  injure  us  with  all  honest  men. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

But  what  ? 

BUTLER. 

It  is  an  open  proclamation 
Of  insurrection. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Well,  well — but  what  is  it  ? 

BUTLER, 

Count  Tertsky's  regiments  tear  the  Imperial  Eagle 
From  off  the  banners,  and  instead  of  it, 
Have  rear'd  aloft  thy  arms. 

anspessade  (abruptly  to  the  Cuirassiers). 

Right  about !  March ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Cursed  be  this  counsel,  and  accursed  who  gave  it! 

[To  the  Cuirassiers,  who  are  retiring. 
Halt,  children,  halt !    There 's  some  mistake  in  this ; 
Hark ! — I  will  punish  it  severely.    Stop ! 
They  do  not  hear.  (To  Illo).  Go  after  them,  assure 

them, 
And  bring  them  back  to  me,  cost  what  it  may. 

[Illo  hurries  out 
This  hurls  us  headlong.    Butler!    Butler! 
You  are  my  evil  genius :  wherefore  must  you 
Announce  it  in  their  presence  ?  It  was  all 
In  a  fair  way.    They  were  half  won,  those  madmen 
With  their  improvident  over-readiness — 
A  cruel  game  is  Fortune  playing  with  me. 
The  zeal  of  friends  it  is  that  razes  me, 
And  not  the  hate  of  enemies. 


SCENE  V. 

To  these  enter  the  Duchess,  who  rushes  into  the  Cham- 
ber.    Thekla  and  the  Countess  follow  her. 

DUCHESS. 

O  Albrecht ! 
What  hast  thou  done  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  now  comes  this  beside. 
countess. 
Forgive  me,  brother!    It  was  not  in  my  power. 
They  know  all. 

duchess. 
What  hast  thou  done  ? 

COUNTESS  (to  TERTSKY). 

Is  there  no  hope  ?  Is  all  lost  utterly  ? 

TERTSKY. 

All  lost.    No  hope.    Prague  in  the  Emperor's  hands. 
The  soldiery  have  ta'en  their  oaths  anew. 

COUNTESS. 

That  lurking  hypocrite,  Octavio ! 
Count  Max.  is  off  too  ? 

TERTSKY. 

Where  can  he  be  ?    He 's 
Gone  over  to  the  Emperor  with  his  father. 

[Thekla  rushes  out  into  the  arms  of  her  mother, 
hiding  her  face  in  her  bosom. 

duchess  (mfolding  her  in  her  arms). 
Unhappy  child !  and  more  unhappy  mother ! 

WALLENSTEIN  (aside  to  Tertsky). 
Quick  !    Let  a  carriage  stand  in  readiness 
In  the  court  behind  the  palace.    Scherfenberg 
Be  their  attendant ;  he  is  faithful  to  us  ; 
To  Egra  he  '11  conduct  them,  and  we  follow. 

[To  Illo,  who  returns. 
Thou  hast  not  brought  them  back  ? 

illo. 

Hear'st  thou  the  uproar  ? 
The  whole  corps  of  the  Pappenheimers  is 
Drawn  out :  the  younger  Piccolomini, 
Their  colonel,  they  require :  for  they  affirm, 
That  he  is  in  the  palace  here,  a  prisoner ; 
And  if  thou  dost  not  instantly  deliver  him, 
They  will  find  means  to  free  him  with  the  sword. 

[AU  stand  amazed. 

TERTSKY. 

What  shall  we  make  of  this  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Said  I  not  so  ? 

0  my  prophetic  heart !  he  is  still  here. 

He  has  not  betray'd  me — he  could  not  betray  me. 

1  never  doubted  of  it. 

COUNTESS. 

If  he  be 
Still  here,  then  all  goes  well ;  for  I  know  what 

[Embracing  Thekla. 
Will  keep  him  here  for  ever. 

TERTSKY. 

It  can't  be. 
His  father  has  hetray'd  us,  is  gone  over 
To  the  Emperor — the  son  could  not  have  ventured 
To  stay  behind. 

thekla  (her  eye  fxed  on  the  door). 
There  he  is ! 

189 


180 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


SCENE  VI. 
To  these  enter  Max.  Piccolomini. 

max. 
Yes!  here  he  is!  I  can  endure  no  longer 
To  creep  on  tiptoe  round  this  house,  and  lurk 
In  ambush  for  a  favorable  moment: 
This  loitering,  this  suspense  exceeds  my  powers. 

[Advancing  to  Thekla,  who  has  thrown  herself 
into  her  mother's  arms. 
Turn  not  thine  eyes  away.    O  look  upon  me  ! 
Confess  it  freely  before  all.    Fear  no  one. 
Let  who  will  hear  that  we  both  love  each  other. 
Wherefore  continue  to  conceal  it  ?  Secrecy 
Is  for  the  happy — misery,  hopeless  misery, 
Needeth  no  evil !    Beneath  a  thousand  suns 
It  dares  act  openly. 

[He  observes  the  Countess  looking  on  Thekla 
with  expressions  of  triumph. 
No,  Lady!    No! 
Expect  not,  hope  it  not.     I  am  not  come 
To  stay  :  to  bid  farewell,  farewell  for  ever, 
For  this  I  come  !  'T  is  over !  I  must  leave  thee ! 
Thekla,  I  must — must  leave  thee !    Yet  thy  hatred 
Let  me  not  take  with  me.    I  pray  thee,  grant  me 
One  look  of  sympathy,  oidy  one  look. 
Say  that  thou  dost  not  hate  me.  Say  it  to  me,  Thekla ! 
[Grasps  her  hand. 

0  God !  I  cannot  leave  this  spot — I  cannot ! 
Cannot  let  go  this  hand.    O  tell  me,  Thekla  ! 
That  thou  dost  suffer  with  me,  art  convinced 
That  I  can  not  act  otherwise. 

[Thekla,  avoiding  his  look,  points  with  her  hand 
to  her  father.  Max.  turns  round  to  the  Duke, 
whom  he  had  not  till  then  perceived. 
Thou  here  ?    It  was  not  thou,  whom  here  I  sought. 

1  trusted  never  more  to  have  beheld  thee. 
My  business  is  with  her  alone.    Here  will  I 
Receive  a  full  actpiiittal  from  this  heart — 
For  any  other  I  am  no  more  concern'd. 

wallenstein. 
Think'st  thou,  that,  fool-like,  I  shall  let  thee  go, 
And  act  the  mock-magnanimous  with  thee  ? 
Thy  father  is  become  a  villain  to  me ; 
I  hold  thee  for  his  son,  and  nothing  more : 
Nor  to  no  purpose  shalt  thou  have  been  given 
Into  my  power.    Think  not,  that  I  will  honor 
That  ancient  love,  which  so  remorselessly 
He  mangled.    They  are  now  past  by,  those  hours 
Of  friendship  and  forgiveness.    Hate  and  vengeance 
Succeed — 'tis  now  their  turn — I  too  can  throw 
All  feelings  of  the  man  aside — can  prove 
Myself  as  much  a  monster  as  thy  father ! 

max.  {calmly). 
Thou  wilt  proceed  with  me,  as  thou  hast  power. 
Thou  know'st,  I  neither  brave  nor  fear  thy  rage. 
What  has  detain'd  me  here,  that  too  thou  know'st. 

[Taking  Thekla  by  the  hand- 
le, Duke !  All — all  would  I  have  owed  to  thee, 
Would  have  received  from  thy  paternal  hand 
The  lot  of  blessed  spirits.     This  hast  thou 
Laid  waste  for  ever — that  concerns  not  thee. 
Indifferent  thou  tramples!,  in  tlio  dust 
Their  happiness,  who  most  are  thine.    The  god 
Whom  thou  dost  serve,  is  no  benignant  deity. 


Like  as  the  blind  irreconcilable 

Fierce  element,  incapable  of  compact, 

Thy  heart's  wild  impulse  only  dost  thou  follow.* 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Thou  art  describing  thy  own  father's  heart. 

The  adder !  O,  the  charms  of  hell  o'erpower'd  me 

He  dwelt  within  me,  to  my  inmost  soul 

Still  to  and  fro  he  pass'd,  suspected  never ! 

On  the  wide  ocean,  in  the  starry  heaven 

Did  mine  eyes  seek  the  enemy,  whom  I 

In  my  heart's  heart  had  folded !    Had  I  been 

To  Ferdinand  what  Octavio  was  to  me, 

War  had  I  ne'er  denounced  against  him.     No, 

I  never  could  have  done  it.    The  Emperor  was 

My  austere  master  only,  not  my  friend. 

There  was  already  war  'twixt  him  and  me 

When  he  deliver'd  the  Commander's  Staff 

Into  my  hands  ;  for  there's  a  natural 

Unceasing  war  'twixt  cunning  and  suspicion  ; 

Peace  exists  only  betwixt  confidence 

And  faith.     Who  poisons  confidence,  he  murders 

The  future  generations. 

MAX. 

I  will  not 
Defend  my  father.    Woe  is  me,  I  cannot ! 
Hard  deeds  and  luckless  have  ta'en  place ;  one  crime 
Draars  after  it  the  other  in  close  link. 


*  I  have  here  ventured  to  omit  a  considerable  number  of 
lines.  I  fear  that  I  should  not  have  done  amiss,  had  I  taken 
this  liberty  more  frequently.  It  is,  however,  incumbent  on  me 
to  give  the  original  with  a  literal  translation. 

Weh  denen,  dieauf  Dich  vertraun,  an  Dich 
Die  sichre  Hutte  ihres  Gluckes  lehnen, 
Gelockt  von  Deiner  geistlichen  Gestalt, 
Schnell  unverhofft,  bei  naBchtlich  stdler  Weile 
Ga-hrts  in  dem  tiickschen  Feuerschlunde,  ladet 
Sich  aus  mit  tobender  Gewalt,  und  weg 
Treibt  Uber  alle  Pflanzungen  der  Menschen 
Der  wilde  Strom  in  grausender  Zerstcarung. 

WALLENSTEIN. 
Du  schilderst  Deines  Vaters  Herz.    Wie  Du's 
Beschreibst,  so  ist's  in  seinem  Eingeweide, 
In  dieser  schwarzen  Heuchlers  Brust  gestaltet. 
O,  mich  hat  Hoellenkunst  getaeuscht !    Mir  sandte 
Der  Abgrund  den  verflecktesten  der  Geister, 
Den  Liigenkundigsten  herauf,  und  stellt'  ihn 
Als  Freund  an  meine  Seite.    Wer  vermag 
Der  Hcelle  Macht  zu  widerstehn  !    Ich  zog 
Den  Basilisken  auf  an  meinem  Busen, 
Mit  meinem  Herzblut  nfflhrt  ich  ihn,  er  sog 
Sich  schwelgend  voll  an  meiner  Liebe  Briisten, 
Ich  hatte  nimmer  Arges  gegen  ihn, 
Weit  often  Mess  ich  des  Gedankens  Thore, 
Und  warf  die  Schlussel  weiser  Vorsicht  weg, 
Am  Sternenhimmel,  etc. 

LITERAL  TRANSLATION. 
Alas !  for  those  who  place  their  confidence  on  thee,  against 
thee  lean  the  secure  hut  of  their  fortune,  allured  by  thy  hos- 
pitable form.  Suddenly,  unexpectedly,  in  a  moment  still  as 
night,  there  is  a  fermentation  in  the  treacherous  gulf  of  fire;  it 
discharges  itself  with  raging  force,  and  away  over  all  the  plan 
tations  of  men  drives  the  wild  stream  in  frightful  devastation. 
Wallenstein.  Thou  art  portraying  thy  father's  heart;  as  thou 
describest,  even  so  is  it  shaped  in  his  entrails,  in  this  black  hypo- 
crite's breast.  O,  the  art  of  hell  has  deceived  me!  The  Abyss 
sent  up  to  me  the  most  spotted  of  the  spirits,  the  most  skilful  iu 
lies,  and  placed  him  as  a  friend  by  my  side.  Who  may  with 
stand  the  power  of  hell  t  1  took  the  basilisk  to  my  bosom,  with 
my  heart's  blood  1  nourish'd  him  ;  he  sucked  himself  glutl'ul  at 
the  breasts  of  my  love.  I  never  harbored  evil  towards  him  ; 
wide  open  did  I  leave  the  door"  of  my  thoughts  ;  I  threw  away 
the  key  of  wise  foresight.  In  the  starry  heaven,  etc. — We  find 
a  difficulty  in  believing  this  to  have  been  written  by  Schiller 
190 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


181 


But  we  are  innocent:  how  have  we  fallen 

Into  this  circle  of  mishap  and  guilt  ? 

To  whom  have  we  been  faithless  ?  Wherefore  must 

The  evil  deeds  and  guilt  reciprocal 

Of  our  two  fathers  twine  like  serpents  round  us  ? 

Why  must  our  fathers' 
Unconquerable  hate  rend  us  asunder 
Who  love  each  other  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Max.,  remain  with  me. 
Go  you  not  from  me,  Max.!  Hark!  I  will  tell  thee — 
How  when  at  Prague,  our  winter-quarters,  thou 
Wert  brought  into  my  tent  a  tender  boy, 
Not  yet  accustom'd  to  the  German  winters; 
Thy  hand  was  frozen  to  the  heavy  colors ; 
Thou  wouldst  not  let  them  go. — 
At  that  time  did  I  take  thee  in  my  arms, 
And  with  my  mantle  did  1  cover  thee; 
I  was  thy  nurse,  no  woman  could  have  been 
A  kinder  to  thee ;  I  was  not  ashamed 
To  do  for  thee  all  little  offices, 
However  strange  to  me  ;  1  tended  thee 
Till  life  return'd ;  and  when  thine  eyes  first  open'd, 
1  had  thee  in  my  arms.    Since  then,  when  have  I 
Alter'd  my  feelings  towards  thee?  Many  thousands 
Have  I  made  rich,  presented  them  with  lands ; 
Rewarded  them  with  dignities  and  honors  ; 
Thee  have  I  loved :  my  heart,  myself,  I  gave 
To  thee!  They  all  were  aliens:  thou  wert 
Our  child  and  inmate.*  Max. !  Thou  canst  not  leave 

me; 
It  can  not  be ;  I  mfly  not,  will  not  think 
That  Max.  can  leave  me. 

MAX. 

O  my  God  ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  have 
Held  and  sustain'd  thee  from  thy  tottering  childhood. 
What  holy  bond  is  there  of  natural  love? 
What  human  tie,  that  does  not  knit  thee  to  me  ? 
I  love  thee,  Max. !  What  did  thy  father  for  thee, 
Which  I  too  have  not  done,  to  the  height  of  duty  ? 
Go  hence,  forsake  me,  serve  thy  Emperor  ; 
He  will  reward  thee  with  a  pretty  chain 
Of  gold ;  with  his  ram's  fleece  will  he  reward  thee  ; 
For  that  the  friend,  the  father  of  thy  youth, 
For  that  the  holiest  feeling  of  humanity, 
Was  nothing  worth  to  thee. 

MAX. 

O  God  !  how  can  I 
Do  otherwise  ?  Am  I  not  forced  to  do  it, 
My  oath — my  duty — honor — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

How  ?  Thy  duty  ? 
Duty  to  whom  ?  Who  art  thou  ?  Max. !  bethink  thee 
What  duties  mayst  thou  have?  If  I  am  acting 
A  criminal  part  toward  the  Emperor, 
It  is  my  crime,  not  thine.    Dost  thou  belong 
To  thine  own  self?  Art  thou  thine  own  commander? 
Stand'st  thou,  like  me,  a  freeman  in  the  world, 
Ttia   in  thy  actions  thou  shouldst  plead  free  agency? 


On  me  thou'rt  planted,  1  am  thy  Emperor; 

To  obey  me,  to  belong  to  me.  this  is 

Thy  honor,  this  a  law  of  Datura  to  thee! 

And  if  ihe  planet,  on  the  which  thou  livest 

And  hast  thy  dwelling,  from  its  orbit  starts, 

It  is  not  in  thy  choice,  whether  or  no 

Thou 'It  follow  it,    Unfelt  it  whirls  thee  onward 

Together  with  his  ring  and  all  his  moons. 

With  little  guilt  Btepp'sl  thou  into  this  contest, 

Thee  will  the  world  not  censure,  it  will  praise  thee 

For  that  thou  held'st  thy  friend  more  worth  to  thee 

Than  names  and  influences  more  removed. 

For  justice  is  the  virtue  of  the  ruler, 

Affection  and  fidelity  the  subject's. 

Not  every  one  doth  it  beseem  to  question 

The  far-off"  high  Arcturus.  Most  securely 

Wilt  thou  pursue  the  nearest  duty — let 

The  pilot  fix  his  eye  upon  the  pole-star. 


*  !'  lis  is  a  poor  and  inadequate  translation  of  the  affectionate 
simD  ,<;ity  of  the  original — 

Sie  alle  waren  Fremdlinge,  Du  warst 
Das  Kind  des  Hause9. 
Indeed  the  whole  speech  is  in  the  best  style  of  Massinger.  O 
•i  sic  omnia '. 

R2 


SCENE  VII. 
To  these  enter  Newmann. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  now  ? 

newmann. 
The  Pappenheimers  are  dismounted, 
And  are  advancing  now  on  foot,  determined 
With  sword  in  hand  to  storm  the  house,  and  free 
The  Count,  their  colonel. 

WALLENSTEIN  (to  TERTSKV). 

Have  the  cannon  planted. 
I  will  receive  them  with  chain-shot. 

[Exit  Tertsky 
Prescribe  to  me  with  sword  in  hand !  Go,  Neumann ! 
'T  is  my  command  that  they  retreat  this  moment, 
And  in  their  ranks  in  silence  wait  my  pleasure. 

[Neumann  exit.   Illo  steps  to  the  window 

COUNTESS. 

Let  him  go,  I  entreat  thee,  let  him  go. 

illo  (at  the  window). 
Hell  and  perdition! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  is  it  ? 

ILLO. 

They  scale  the  council-house,  the  roof's  uncover'd  : 
They  level  at  this  house  the  cannon 

MAX. 

Madmen ' 

ILLO. 

They  are  making  preparations  now  to  fire  on  us. 

DUCHESS  AND  COUNTESS. 

Merciful  Heaven ! 

MAX  (to  WALLENSTEIN). 

Let  me  go  to  them ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Not  a  step ! 
max.  (pointing  to  Thekla  and  the  Duchess). 
But  their  life !  Thine ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  tidings  bring'st  thou,  Tertsky  ? 


SCENE  VIII. 

To  these  Tertsky  (returning). 

tertsky. 
Message  and  greeting  from  our  faithful  regiments 
Their  ardor  may  no  longer  be  curb'd  in. 

191 


182 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


They  entreat  permission  to  commence  the  attack, 
And  if  thou  wouldst  but  give  the  word  of  onset, 
They  could  now  charge  the  enemy  in  rear, 
into  the  city  wedge  them,  and  with  ease 
O'erpower  them  in  the  narrow  streets. 

ILLO. 

O  come ! 
Let  not  their  ardor  cool.    The  soldiery 
Of  Butler's  corps  stand  by  us  faithfully  ; 
We  are  the  greater  number.    Let  us  charge  them, 
\nd  finish  here  in  Pilsen  the  revolt. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  ?  shall  this  town  become  a  field  of  slaughter, 

And  brother-killing  Discord,  fire-eyed, 

Be  let  loose  through  its  streets  to  roam  and  rage  ? 

Shall  the  decision  be  deliver'd  over 

To  deaf  remorseless  Rage,  that  hears  no  leader  ? 

Here  is  not  room  for  battle,  only  for  butchery. 

Well,  let  it  be !  I  have  long  thought  of  it, 

So  let  it  burst  then ! 

[Tunis  to  Max. 
Well,  how  is  it  with  thee  ? 
Wilt  thou  attempt  a  heat  with  me.    Away ! 
Thou  art  free  to  go.    Oppose  thyself  to  me, 
Front  against  front,  and  lead  them  to  the  battle ; 
Thou  'rt  skilled  in  war,  thou  hast  learn'd  somewhat 

under  me, 
I  need  not  be  ashamed  of  my  opponent, 
And  never  hadst  thou  fairer  opportunity 
To  pay  me  for  thy  schooling. 

COUNTESS. 

Is  it  then, 
Can  it  have  come  to  this? — What!  Cousin,  cousin! 
Have  you  the  heart  ? 

MAX. 

The  regiments  that  are  trusted  to  my  care 

I  have  pledged  my  troth  to  bring  away  from  Pilsen 

True  to  the  Emperor,  and  this  promise  will  I 

Make  good,  or  perish.    More  than  this  no  duty 

Requires  of  me.    I  will  not  fight  against  thee, 

Unless  compell'd ;  for  though  an  enemy, 

Thy  head  is  holy  to  me  still. 

[Two  reports  of  cannon.  Illo  and  Tertsky  hurry 
to  the  window. 


What's  that? 


WALLENSTEIN. 
TERTSKY. 

He  falls. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Falls!  who? 


Discharged  the  ordnance. 


Tiefenbach's  corps 


WALLENSTEIN. 

Upon  whom? 

ILLO. 

On  Neumann, 


Your  messenger. 


wallenstein  (starting  up). 

Ha!  Death  and  Hell!  I  will- 

TERTSKY. 

Expose  thyself  to  their  blind  frenzy? 
duchess  and  countess. 


For  God's  sake,  no ! 


No! 


ILLO. 

Not  yet,  my  General ! 
countess. 
0,  hold  him !  hold  him ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Leave  me 


MAX. 

Do  it  not  ; 

Nor  yet!  This  rash  and  bloody  deed  has  thrown  them 
Into  a  frenzy-fit — allow  them  time 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Away!  too  long  already  have  I  loiter'd. 
They  are  embolden'd  to  these  outrages, 
Beholding  not  my  face.    They  shall  behold 

My  countenance,  shall  hear  my  voice 

Are  they  not  my  troops  ?  Am  I  not  their  General, 
And  their  long-fear'd  commander!  Let  me  see, 
Whether  indeed  they  do  no  longer  know 
That  countenance,  which  was  their  sun  in  battle! 
From  the  balcony  (mark !;  I  show  myself 
To  these  rebellious  forces,  and  at  once 
Revolt  is  mounded,  and  the  high-swoln  current 
Shrinks  back  into  the  old  bed  of  obedience. 
[Exit  Wallenstein  :  Illo,  Tertsky,  and  Butler 
follow. 


SCENE  IX. 


Countess,  Duchess,  Max.  and  Thekla. 

COUNTESS  (to  the  DufHESS). 

Let  them  but  see  him — there  is  hope  still,  sister. 

DUCHESS. 

Hope !  I  have  none  ! 

max.  (who  during  the  last  scene  has  been  standing  at  a 
distance  in  a  visible  struggle  of  feelings,  advances). 
This  can  I  not  endure. 
With  most  determined  soul  did  I  come  hither. 
My  purposed  action  seem'd  unblamable 
To  my  own  conscience — and  I  must  stand  here 
Like  one  abhorr'd,  a  hard  inhuman  being ; 
Yea,  loaded  with  the  curse  of  all  I  love ! 
Must  see  all  whom  I  love  in  this  sore  anguish, 
Whom  I  with  one  word  can  make  happy — O! 
My  heart  revolts  within  me,  and  two  voices 
Make  themselves  audible  within  my  bosom. 
My  soul 's  benighted  ;  I  no  longer  can 
Distinguish  the  right  track.     O,  well  and  truly 
Didst  thou  say,  father.  I  relied  too  much 
On  my  own  heart.    My  mind  moves  to  and  fro — 
I  know  not  what  to  do. 

COUNTESS. 

What !  you  know  not  ? 
Does  not  your  own  heart  tell  you  ?  O !  then  I 
Will  tell  it  you.    Your  father  is  a  traitor, 
A  frightful  traitor  to  us — he  has  plotted 
Against  our  General's  life,  has  plunged  us  all 
In  misery — and  you're  his  son!  'Tis  your's 
To  make  the  amends — Make  you  the  son's  fidelity 
Outweigh  the  father's  treason,  that  the  name 
Of  Piccolomini  be  not  a  proverb 
Of  infamy,  a  common  form  of  cursing 
To  the  posterity  of  Wallenstein. 

MAX. 

Where  is  that  voice  of  truth  which  I  dare  follow? 
It  speaks  no  longer  in  my  heart.    We  all 
But  utter  what  our  passionate  wishes  dictate  • 

192 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


183 


O  that  an  angel  would  descend  from  Heaven, 
And  scoop  for  me  the  right,  the  uncorrnpted, 
With  a  pure  hand  from  the  pure  Fount  of  Light, 

[His  eyes  glance  on  Thekla. 
What  other  angel  seek  1 '.    To  this  heart, 
To  this  unerring  heart,  will  1  submit  it ; 
Will  ask  thy  love,  which  has  the  power  to  bless 
The  happy  man  alone,  averted  ever 
From  the  disquieted  and  guilty — canst  thou 
Still  love  me,  if  I  stay  ?  Say  that  thou  canst, 
And  I  am  the  Duke's 

COUNTESS. 

Think,  niece 


Speak  what  thoufeelest. 


Think  nothing,  Thekla ! 


COUNTESS. 

Think  upon  your  father. 

MAX. 

I  did  not  question  thee,  as  Friedland's  daughter. 

Thee,  the  beloved  and  the  unerring  god 

Within  thy  heart,  I  question.    What 's  at  stake  ? 

Not  whether  diadem  of  royalty 

Be  to  be  won  or  not — that  might'st  thou  think  on. 

Thy  friend,  and  his  soul's  quiet,  are  at  stake; 

The  fortune  of  a  thousand  gallant  men, 

Who  will  all  follow  me ;  shall  I  forswear 

My  oath  and  duty  to  the  Emperor  ? 

Say,  shall  I  send  into  Octavio's  camp 

The  parricidal  ball  ?  For  when  the  ball 

Has  left  its  cannon,  and  is  on  its  flight, 

It  is  no  longer  a  dead  instrument! 

It  lives,  a  spirit  passes  into  it, 

The  avenging  furies  seize  possession  of  it, 

And  with  sure  malice  guide  it  the  worst  way. 

THEKLA. 

O!  Max. 

max.  (interrupting  her). 

Nay,  not  precipitately  either,  Thekla. 
I  understand  thee.    To  thy  noble  heart 
The  hardest  duty  might  appear  the  highest 
The  human,  not  the  great  part,  would  I  act 
Even  from  my  childhood  to  this  present  hour, 
Think  what  the  Duke  has  done  for  me,  how  loved  me, 
And  think  too,  how  my  father  has  repaid  him. 
O  likewise  the  free  lovely  impulses 
Of .  hospitality,  the  pious  friend's 
Faithful  attachment,  these  too  are  a  holy 
Religion  to  the  heart ;  and  heavily 
The  shudderings  of  nature  do  avenge 
Themselves  on  the  barbarian  that  insults  them. 
Lay  all  upon  the  balance,  all — then  speak, 
And  let  thy  heart  decide  it. 

THEKLA. 

O,  thy  own 
Hath  long  ago  decided.    Follow  thou 
Thy  heart's  first  feeling 

COUNTESS. 

Oh !  ill-fated  woman ! 

THEKLA. 

Is  it  possible,  that  that  can  be  the  right, 
The  which  thy  tender  heart  did  not  at  first 
Detect  and  seize  with  instant  impulse  ?  Go, 
Fulfil  thy  duty !   I  should  ever  love  thee. 
Whate'er  thou  hadst  chosen,  thou  vvouldst  still  have 
acted 


Nobly  ami  worthy  of  thee — but  repentance 
Shall  ne'er  disturb  thy  soul's  fair  peace. 

MAX. 

Then  I 
Must  leave  thee,  must  part  from  thee ! 

THEKLA. 

Being  faithful 
To  thine  own  self,  thou  art  faithful  too  to  me : 
If  our  fates  part,  our  hearts  remain  united. 
A  bloody  hatred  will  divide  for  ever 
The  houses  Piccolomini  and  Friedland  ; 
But  we  belong  not  to  our  houses — Go ! 
Quick  !  quick  !  and  separate  thy  righteous  cause 
From  our  unholy  and  unblessed  one ! 
The  curse  of  Heaven  lies  upon  our  head: 
'Tis  dedicate  to  ruin.    Even  me 
My  father's  guilt  drags  with  it  to  perdition. 
Mourn  not  for  me  : 
My  destiny  will  quickly  be  decided. 

[Max.  clasps  her  in  his  arms  in  extreme  emotion. 
There  is  heard  from  behind  the  Scene  a  loud, 
wild,  long-continued  cry,  Vivat  Ferdinan- 
dus,  accompanied  by  warlike  Instruments. 
Max  and  Thekla  remain  without  motion 
in  each  other's  embraces. 


SCENE  X. 
To  these  enter  Tertsky. 
countess  (meeting  him). 
What  meant  that  cry  ?  What  was  it ! 

TERTSKY. 

All  is  lost! 

COUNTESS. 

What !  they  regarded  not  his  countenance  1 

TERTSKY. 

'Twas  all  in  vain. 

DUCHESS. 

They  shouted  Vivat ! 

TERTSKY. 

To  the  Emperor 

COUNTESS. 

The  traitors ! 

TERTSKY. 

Nay !  he  was  not  once  permitted 
Even  to  address  them.    Soon  as  he  began, 
With  deafening  noise  of  warlike  instruments 
They  drown'd  his  words.     But  here  he  comes. 


SCENE  XL 


To  these  enter  Wallenstein,  accompanied  by  Illo 
and  Butler. 

wallenstein  (as  he  enters). 

Tertsky ! 

TERTSKY. 

My  General  ? 

wallenstein. 
Let  our  regiments  hold  themselves 
In  readiness  to  march ;  for  we  shall  leave 
Pilsen  ere  evening.  [Exit  Tertsky. 

Butler! 


BUTLER. 


Yes,  mv  General. 
193 


184 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


WALLENSTEIN. 

The  Governor  at  Egra  is  your  friend 
And  countryman.    Write  to  him  instantly 
By  a  post-courier.    He  must  be  advised, 
That  we  are  with  him  early  on  the  morrow. 
You  follow  us  yourself,  your  regiment  \vith  you. 

BUTLER. 

It  shall  be  done,  my  General ! 

Wallenstein  (steps  between  Max.  and  Thekla,  who 

have  remained  during  this  time  in  each  other's 

arms). 

Part! 

MAX. 

OGod! 
[Cuirassiers  enter  with  drawn  swords,  and  assemble  in 
the  back-ground.  At  the  same  time  there  are  heard 
from  below  some  spirited  passages  out  of  the  Pap- 
penheim  March,  which  seem  to  address  Max. 
wallenstein  (to  the  Cuirassiers). 
Here  he  is,  he  is  at  liberty :  I  keep  him 
No  longer. 

[He  turns  away,  and  stands  so  that  Max.  cannot 
pass  by  him  nor  approach  the  Princess. 

max. 
Thou  know'st  that  I  have  not  yet  learnt  to  live 
Without  thee  !  I  go  forth  into  a  desert, 
Leaving  my  all  behind  me.    O  do  not  turn 
Thine  eyes  away  from  me !  O  once  more  show  me 
Thy  ever  dear  and  honor'd  countenance. 

[Max.  attempts  to  take  his  hand,  but  is  repelled ; 
he  turns  to  the  Countess. 
Is  there  no  eye  that  has  a  look  of  pity  for  me  ? 

[The  Countess  turns  away  from  him ;  he  turns 
to  the  Duchess. 
My  mother1 

DUCHESS. 

Go  where  duty  calls  you.     Haply 
The  time  may  come,  when  you  may  prove  to  us 
A  true  friend,  a  good  angel  at  the  throne 
Of  the  Emperor. 

MAX. 

You  give  me  hope  ;  you  would  not 
Suffer  me  wholly  to  despair.    No !  no ! 
Mine  is  a  certain  misery — Thanks  to  Heaven 
That  offers  me  a  means  of  ending  it. 

[The  military  music  begins  again.   The  stage flls 

more  and  more  with  armed  men.    Max.  sees 

Butler,  and  addresses  him. 
And  you  here,  Colonel  Butler — and  will  you 
Not  follow  me  ?    Well,  then  !  remain  more  faithful 
To  your  new  lord,  than  you  have  proved  yourself 
To  the  Emperor.    Come,  Butler !  promise  me, 
Give  me  your  hand  upon  it,  that  you'll  be 
The  guardian  of  his  life,  its  shield,  its  watchman. 
He  is  attainted,  and  his  princely  head 
I  air  booty  for  each  slave  that  trades  in  murder. 
Now  he  doth  need  the  faithful  eye  of  friendship, 
And  those  whom  here  I  see — 

[Casting  suspicious  looks  on  Illo  and  Butler. 

ILLO. 

Go — seek  for  traitors 
In  Galas',  in  your  father's  quarters.    Here 
Is  only  one.    Away  !  away  !  and  free  us 
From  his  detested  sight !  Away ! 

[Max.  attempts  once  more  to  approach  Thekla. 
wallenstein  prevents  him.     Max.  Stand*  | 


irresolute,  and  in  apparent  anguish.  In  the 
mean  time  the  stage  flls  more  and  more;  and 
the  horns  sound  from  below  louder  and 
louder,  and  each  time  after  a  shorter  inter- 
val. 

MAX. 

Blow,  blow !  O  were  it  but  the  Swedish  trumpets, 
And  all  the  naked  swords,  which  I  see  here, 
Were  plunged  into  my  breast !   What  purpose  you  ? 
You  come  to  tear  me  from  this  place !   Beware, 
Ye  drive  me  not  to  desperation. — Do  it  not ! 
Ye  may  repent  it ! 

[The  stage  is  entirely  filed  with  armed  men. 
Yet  more !  weight  upon  weight  to  drag  me  down ! 
Think  what  ye're  doing.    It  is  not  well  done 
To  choose  a  man  despairing  for  your  leader; 
You  tear  me  from  my  happiness.    Well,  then, 
I  dedicate  your  souls  to  vengeance.    Mark ! 
For  your  own  ruin  you  have  chosen  me : 
Who  goes  with  me,  must  be  prepared  to  perish. 

[He  turns  to  the  back-ground,  there  ensues  a  sud 
den  and  violent,  movement  among  the  Cuiras 
siers;  they  surround  him,  and  carry  him  of 
in  wild  tumult.  Wallenstein  remains  im- 
movable. Thekla  sinks  into  her  mother's 
arms.  The  curtain  falls.  The  music  be- 
comes loud  and  overpowering,  and  jjasses 
into  a  complete  war-march — the  orchestra 
joins  it — and  continues  during  the  interval 
between  the  second  and  third  Acts. 


ACT  HI. 

SCENE  I.      v 
Scene — The  Burgomaster's  House  at  Egra. 
butler  {just  arrived). 
Here  then  he  is,  by  his  destiny  conducted. 
Here,  Friedland  !  and  no  farther !  From  Bohemia 
Thy  meteor  rose,  traversed  the  sky  awhile, 
And  here  upon  the  borders  of  Bohemia 
Must  sink. 

Thou  hast  forsworn  the  ancient  colors, 
Blind  man !  yet  trustest  to  thy  ancient  fortunes. 
Profaner  of  the  altar  and  the  hearth, 
Against  thy  Emperor  and  fellow-citizens 
Thou  mean'st  to  wage  the  war.  Friedland,  beware- 
The  evil  spirit  of  revenge  impels  thee — 
Beware  thou,  that  revenge  destroy  thee  not ! 


SCENE  II. 
Butler  and  Gordon. 


GORDON. 

Is  it  you  ? 

How  my  heart  sinks !  The  Duke  a  fugitive  traitor ! 
His  princely  head  attainted  !  O  my  God ! 

BUTLER. 

You  have  received  the  letter  which  I  sent  you 
By  a  post-courier? 

GORDON. 

Yes  :  and  in  obedience  to  it 
Open'd  the  strong-hold  to  him  without  scruple, 
For  an  imperial  letter  orders  me 
To  follow  your  commands  implicitly. 
But  yet  forgive  me ;  when  even  now  I  saw 
194 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


185 


The  Duke  himself,  my  scruples  recommenced. 
For  truly,  not  like  an  attainted  man, 
Into  this  town  did  Friedland  make  his  entrance; 
His  wonted  majesty  beam'd  from  his  brow. 
And  calm,  as  in  the  days  when  all  was  right, 
Did  he  receive  from  me  the  accounts  of  office. 
Tis  said,  that  fallen  pride  learns  condescension: 
But  sparing  and  with  dignity  the  Duke 
Weigh'd  every  syllable  of  approbation, 
As  masters  praise  a  servant  who  has  done 
His  duty,  and  no  more. 

BUTLER. 

'Tis  all  precisely 
As  I  related  in  my  letter.    Friedland 
Has  sold  the  army  to  the  enemy, 
And  pledged  himself  to  give  up  Prague  and  Egra. 
On  this  report  the  regiments  all  forsook  him, 
The  five  excepted  that  belong  to  Tertsky, 
And  which  have  follow'd  him,  as  thou  hast  seen. 
The  sentence  of  attainder  is  pass'd  on  him, 
And  every  loyal  subject  is  required 
To  give  him  in  to  justice,  dead  or  living. 

GORDON-. 

A  traitor  to  the  Emperor — Such  a  noble ! 

Of  such  high  talents  !  What  is  human  greatness  ? 

I  often  said,  this  can't  end  happily. 

His  might,  his  greatness,  and  this  obscure  power 

Are  but  a  cover'd  pit-fall.   The  human  being 

May  not  be  trusted  to  self-government. 

The  clear  and  written  law,  the  deep-trod  foot-marks 

Of  ancient  custom,  are  all  necessary 

To  keep  him  in  the  road  of  faith  and  duty. 

The  authority  intrusted  to  this  man 

Was  unexampled  and  unnatural. 

It  placed  him  on  a  level  with  his  Emperor, 

Till  the  proud  soul  unlearn'd  submission.  Woe  is  me  ; 

I  mourn  for  him !  for  where  he  fell,  I  deem 

Might  none  stand  firm.    Alas  !  dear  General, 

We  in  our  lucky  mediocrity 

Have  ne'er  experienced,  cannot  calculate, 

What  dangerous  wishes  such  a  height  may  breed 

In  the  heart  of  such  a  man. 

BUTLER. 

Spare  your  laments 
Till  he  need  sympathy ;  for  at  this  present 
He  is  still  mighty,  and  still  formidable. 
The  Swedes  advance  to  Egra  by  forced  marches, 
And  quickly  will  the  junction  be  accomplish'd. 
This  milst  not  be !  The  Duke  must  never  leave 
This  strong-hold  on  free  footing ;  for  I  have 
Pledged  life  and  honor  here  to  hold  him  prisoner, 
And  your  assistance  't  is  on  which  I  calculate. 

GORDON. 

O  that  I  had  not  lived  to  see  this  day ! 
From  his  hand  I  received  this  dignity, 
He  did  himself  intrust  this  strong-hold  to  me, 
Which  I  am  now  required  to  make  his  dungeon. 
We  subalterns  have  no  will  of  our  own  : 
The  free,  the  mighty  man  alone  may  listen 
To  the  fair  impulse  of  his  human  nature. 
Ah !  we  are  but  the  poor  tools  of  the  law, 
Obedience  the  sole  virtue  we  dare  aim  at ! 


Nay !  let  it  not  afflict  you,  that  your  power 
Is  circumscribed.    Much  liberty,  much  error ! 
The  narrow  path  of  duty  is  securest 


GORDON. 

And  all  then  have  deserted  him,  you  say  ? 
lie  has  limit  up  the  luck  of  many  thousands; 
For  kingly  was  his  spirit :  his  full  hand 
Was  ever  open  !  Many  a  one  from  dust 

[  With  a  sly  glance  on  Butler. 
Hath  he  selected,  from  the  very  dust 
Hath  raised  him  into  dignity  and  honor. 
And  yet  no  friend,  not  one  friend  hath  he  purchased 
Whose  heart  beats  true  to  him  in  the  evil  hour 

BUTLER. 

Here  's  one,  I  see. 

GORDON. 

I  have  enjoy'd  from  him 
No  grace  or  favor.    I  could  almost  doubt, 
If  ever  in  his  greatness  he  once  thought  mi 
An  old  friend  of  his  youth.    For  still  my  ollice 
Kept  me  at  distance  from  him  ;  and  when  first 
He  to  this  citadel  appointed  me, 
He  was  sincere  and  serious  in  his  duty. 
1  do  not  then  abuse  his  confidence, 
If  I  preserve  my  fealty  in  that 
Which  to  my  fealty  was  first  deliver'd 

BUTLER. 

Say,  then,  will  you  fulfil  the  attainder  on  him  ? 

Gordon  (pauses  reflecting — then  as  in  deep  dejection) 

If  it  be  so — if  all  be  as  you  say — 

If  he  've  betray'd  the  Emperor,  his  master, 

Have  sold  the  troops,  have  purposed  to  deliver 

The  strong-holds  of  the  country  to  the  enemy — 

Yea,  truly ! — there  is  no  redemption  for  him ! 

Yet  it  is  hard,  that  me  the  lot  should  destine 

To  be  the  instrument  of  his  perdition  ; 

For  we  were  pages  at  the  court  of  Bergau 

At  the  same  period  ;  but  I  was  the  senior. 

BUTLER. 

I  have  heard  so— — 

GORDON. 

'Tis  full  thirty  years  since  then 
A  youth  w7ho  scarce  had  seen  his  twentieth  year 
Was  Wallenstein,  when  he  and  I  were  friends : 
Yet  even  then  he  had  a  daring  soul : 
His  frame  of  mind  was  serious  and  severe 
Beyond  his  years :  his  dreams  were  of  great  objects 
He  walk'd  amidst  us  of  a  silent  spirit, 
Communing  with  himself;  yet  I  have  known  him 
Transported  on  a  sudden  into  utterance 
Of  strange  conceptions ;  kindling  into  splendor 
His  soul  reveal'd  itself,  and  he  spake  so 
That  we  look'd  round  perplex'd  upon  each  other, 
Not  knowing  whether  it  were  craziness, 
Or  whether  it  were  a  god  that  spoke  in  him. 

BUTLER. 

But  was  it  where  he  fell  two  story  high 

From  a  window-ledge,  on  which  he  had  fallen  asleep 

And  rose  up  free  from  injury  ?  From  this  day 

(It  is  reported)  he  betray'd  clear  marks 

Of  a  distemper'd  fancy. 

GORDON. 

He  became 
Doubtless  more  self-enwrapt  and  melancholy ; 
He  made  himself  a  Catholic.    Marvellously 
His  marvellous  preservation  had  transform'd  him 
Thenceforth  he  held  himself  for  an  exempted 
And  privileged  being,  and,  as  if  he  were 
Incapable  of  dizziness  or  fall, 

195 


186 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


He  ran  alone  the  unsteady  rope  of  life. 

But  now  our  destinies  drove  us  asunder; 

He  paced  with  rapid  step  the  way  of  greatness, 

Was  Count,  and  Prince,  Duke-regent,  and  Dictator. 

And  now  is  all,  all  this  too  little  for  him ; 

He  stretches  forth  his  hands  for  a  king's  crown, 

And  plunges  in  unfathomable  ruin. 

BUTLER. 

No  more,  he  comes". 


SCENE  III. 


To  these  enter  Wallenstein,  in  conversation  with  the 
Burgomaster  of  Egra. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

You  were  at  one  time  a  free  town.  I  see, 
Ye  bear  the  half  eagle  in  your  city  arms. 
Why  the  half  eagle  only  ? 

BURGOMASTER. 

We  were  free, 
But  for  these  last  two  hundred  years  has  Egra 
Remain'd  in  pledge  to  the  Bohemian  crown  ; 
Therefore  we  bear  the  half  eagle,  the  other  half 
Being  cancell'd  till  the  empire  ransom  us, 
If  ever  that  should  be. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Ye  merit  freedom. 
Only  be  firm  and  dauntless.    Lend  your  ears 
To  no  designing  whispering  court-minions. 
What  may  your  imposts  be  ? 

BURGOMASTER. 

So  heavy  that 
We  totter  under  them.  The  garrison 
Lives  at  our  costs. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  will  relieve  you.    Tell  me, 

There  are  some  Protestants  among  you  still  ? 

[The  Burgomaster  hesitates. 
Yes,  yes ;  I  know  it.    Many  lie  conceal'd 
Within  these  walls — Confess  now — you  yourself — 

[Fixes  his  eye  on  him.  The  Burgomaster  alarmed. 
Be  not  alarm'd.    I  hate  the  Jesuits. 
Could  my  will  have  determined  it,  they  had 
Been  long  ago  expell'd  the  empire.    Trust  me — 
Mass-book  or  Bible — 'tis  all  one  to  me. 
Of  that  the  world  has  had  sufficient  proof. 
I  built  a  church  for  the  reform'd  in  Glogau 
At  my  own  instance.    Harkye,  Burgomaster ! 
What  is  your  name  ? 

burgomaster. 
Pachhalbel,  may  it  please  you. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Harkye  ! 

But  let  it  go  no  further,  what  I  now 
Disclose  to  you  in  confidence. 

[Laying  his  hand  on  the  Burgomaster's  shoulder 
with  a  certain  solemnity. 

The  times 
Draw  near  to  their  fulfilment,  Burgomaster ! 
The  high  will  fall,  the  low  will  be  exalted. 
Harkye  !  But  keep  it  to  yourself!  The  end 
Approaches  of  the  Spanish  double  monarchy — 
A  new  arrangement  is  at  hand.  You  saw 
The  three  moons  that  appear'd  at  once  in  the  Heaven. 


burgomaster. 
With  wonder  and  affright ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Whereof  did  two 
Strangely  transform  themselves  to  bloody  daggers, 
And  only  one,  the  middle  moon,  remain'd 
Steady  and  clear. 

burgomaster. 
We  applied  it  to  the  Turks. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  Turks  !  That  all'? — I  tell  you,  that  two  empires 
Will  set  in  blood,  in  the  East  and  in  the  West, 
And  Luth'ranism  alone  remain. 

[Observing  Gordon  and  Butler. 
I'  faith, 
'Twas  a  smart  cannonading  that  we  heard 
This  evening,  as  we  journey 'd  hitherward  ; 
'Twas  on  our  left  hand.    Did  you  hear  it  here  ? 

GORDON. 

Distinctly.  The  wind  brought  it  from  the  South. 

butler. 
It  seem'd  to  come  from  Weiden  or  from  NeustadL 

WALLENSTEIN. 

'T  is  likely.  That 's  the  route  the  Swedes  are  taking. 
How  strong  is  the  garrison  ? 

GORDON. 

Not  quite  two  hundred 
Competent  men,  the  rest  are  invalids. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Good !  And  how  many  in  the  vale  of  Jochim. 

GORDON. 

Two  hundred  arquebusiers  have  I  sent  thither. 
To  fortify  the  posts  against  the  Swedes. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Good  !  I  commend  your  foresight.  At  the  works  too 
You  have  done  somewhat  ? 

GORDON. 

Two  additional  batteries 
I  caused  to  be  run  up.    They  were  needed. 
The  Rhinegrave  presses  hard  upon  us,  General ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

You  have  been  watchful  in  your  Emperor's  service 
I  am  content  with  you,  Lieutenant-Colonel. 

[To  Butler. 
Release  the  outposts  in  the  vale  of  Jochim 
With  all  the  stations  in  the  enemy's  route. 

[To  Gordon 
Governor,  in  your  faithful  hands  I  leave 
My  wife,  my  daughter,  and  my  sister.    I 
Shall  make  no  stay  here,  and  wait  but  the  arrival 
Of  letters  to  take  leave  of  you,  together 
With  all  the  regiments. 


SCENE  IV. 
To  these  enter  Count  Tertsky. 

TERTSKY. 

Joy,  General ;  joy  !  I  bring  you  welcome  tidings. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

And  what  may  they  be  ? 

TERTSKY. 

There  has  been  an  engagement 
At  Neustadt ;  the  Swedes  gain'd  the  victory. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

From  whence  did  you  receive  the  intelligence  ? 

196 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


187 


TERTSKY. 

A  countryman  from  Tirschenseil  convey'd  it. 
Soon  after  sunrise  did  the  fight  begin ! 
A  troop  of  the  Imperialists  from  Fachau 
Had  forced  their  way  into  the  Swedish  camp; 
The  cannonade  continued  full  two  hours  ; 
There  were  left  dead  upon  the  field  a  thousand 
Imperialists,  together  with  their  Colonel ; 
Further  than  this  he  did  not  know. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

How  came 
Imperial  troops  at  Neustadt  ?  Altringer, 
But  yesterday,  stood  sixty  miles  from  there. 
Count  Galas'  force  collects  at  Frauenberg, 
And  have  not  the  full  complement.    Is  it  possible, 
That  Suys  perchance  had  ventured  so  far  onward  ? 
It  cannot  be. 

TERTSKY. 

We  shall  soon  know  the  whole, 
For  here  comes  Illo,  full  of  haste,  and  joyous. 


SCENE  V. 
To  these  enter  Illo. 


illo  (to  Wallenstein). 
A  courier,  Duke !  he  wishes  to  speak  with  thee. 

tertsky  {eagerly). 
Does  he  bring  confirmation  of  the  victory  I 
wallenstein  {at  the  same  time). 
What  does  he  bring  ?  Whence  comes  he  ? 

ILLO. 

From  the  Rhinegrave 
And  what  he  brings  I  can  announce  to  you 
Beforehand.    Seven  leagues  distant  are  the  Swedes; 
At  Neustadt  did  Max.  Piccolomini 
Throw  himself  on  them  with  the  cavalry ; 
A  murderous  fight  took  place !  o'erpower'd  by  numbers 
The  Pappenheimers  all,  with  Max.  their  leader, 

[Wallenstein  shudders  and  turns  pale 
Were  left  dead  on  the  field. 

wallenstein  {after  a  pause,  in  a  low  voice). 
Where  is  the  messenger  ?  Conduct  me  to  him. 

[Wallenstein  is  going,  when  Lady  Neubrunn 
rushes  into  the  room.  Some  Servants  follow 
her,  and  run  across  the  stage. 

NEUBRUNN. 

Help!  Help! 

illo  and  tertsky  (at  the  same  time). 
What  now  ? 

NEUBRUNN. 

The  Princess! 

WALLENSTEIN  and  TERTSKY. 

Does  she  know  it  ? 
neubrunn  (at  the  same  time  with  them). 
She  is  dying!     [Hurries  off  the  stage,  when  Wallen- 
stein and  Tertsky  follow  her. 


SCENE  VI. 
Butler  and  Gordon. 

GORDON. 

What's  this? 

BUTLER. 

She  has  lost  the  man  she  loved— 
Young  Piccolomini,  who  fell  in  the  battle. 


GORDON. 

Unfortunate  Lady ! 

BUTLER. 

You  have  heard  what  Illo 
Reporteth,  that  the  Swedes  are  conquerors, 
And  marching  hitherward. 

GORDON. 

Too  well  I  heard  it. 

BUTLER. 

They  are  twelve  regiments  strong,  and  there  are  five 
Close  by  us  to  protect  the  Duke.    We  have 
Only  my  single  regiment ;  and  the  garrison 
Is  not  two  hundred  strong. 

GORDON. 

'Tis  even  so. 

BUTLER. 

It  is  not  possible  with  such  small  force 
To  hold  in  custody  a  man  like  him. 

GORDON. 

I  grant  it. 

BUTLER. 

Soon  the  numbers  would  disarm  us, 
And  liberate  him. 

GORDON. 

■  It  were  to  be  fear'd. 
butler  (after  a  pause). 
Know,  I  am  warranty  for  the  event  ; 
With  my  head  have  I  pledged  myself  for  his, 
Must  make  my  word  good,  cost  it  what  it  will, 
And  if  alive  we  cannot  hold  him  prisoner, 
Why — death  makes  all  things  certain ! 

GORDON. 

Butler!  What? 
Do  I  understand  you  ?  Gracious  God !   Fow  could — 

BUTLER. 

He  must  not  live. 

GORDON. 

And  you  can  do  the  deed ! 

BUTLER. 

Either  you  or  I.    This  morning  was  his  last 

GORDON. 

You  would  assassinate  him. 

BUTLER. 

'Tis  my  purpose 

GORDON. 

Who  leans  with  his  whole  confidence  upon  you ! 

BUTLER. 

Such  is  his  evil  destiny ! 

GORDON. 

Your  General ! 
The  sacred  person  of  your  General ! 

BUTLER. 

My  General  he  has  been. 

GORDON, 

That  'tis  only 
An  "  has  been  "  washes  out  no  villany. 
And  without  judgment  pass'd  ? 

BUTLER. 

The  execution 
Is  here  instead  of  judgment 

GORDON. 

This  were  murder. 
Not  justice.    The  most  guilty  should  be  heard 

BUTLER. 

His  guilt  is  clear,  the  Emperor  has  pass'd  judgment 
And  we  but  execute  his  will. 

197 


188 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


GORDON. 

We  should  not 
Hurry  to  realize  a  bloody  sentence. 
A  word  may  be  recall'd,  a  life  can  never  be. 

. BUTLER. 

Dispatch  in  service  pleases  sovereigns. 

GORDON. 

No  honest  man 's  ambitious  to  press  forward 
To  the  hangman's  service. 

BUTLER. 

And  no  brave  man  loses 
His  color  at  a  daring  enterprise. 

GORDON. 

A  brave  man  hazards  life,  but  not  his  conscience. 

BUTLER.. 

What  then  ?  Shall  he  go  forth,  anew  to  kindle 
The  unextinguishable  flame  of  war? 

GORDON. 

Seize  him,  and  hold  him  prisoner — do  not  kill  him ! 

BUTLER. 

Had  not  the  Emperor's  army  been  defeated, 
I  might  have  done  so  — But  'tis  now  past  by. 

GORDON. 

O,  wherefore  open'd  I  the  strong-hold  to  him  ? 

BUTLER. 

His  destiny  and  not  the  place  destroys  him. 

GORDON. 

Upon  these  ramparts,  as  beseem'd  a  soldier, 
I  had  fallen,  defending  the  Emperor's  citadel! 

BUTLER. 

Yes !  and  a  thousand  gallant  men  have  perish'd ! 

GORDON. 

Doing  their  duty — that  adorns  the  man  ! 

But  murder's  a  black  deed,  and  nature  curses  it. 

butler  {brings  out  a  paper). 
Here  is  the  manifesto  which  commands  us 
To  gain  possession  of  his  person.    See — 
It  is  address 'd  to  you  as  well  as  me. 
Are  you  content  to  take  the  consequences, 
If  through  our  fault  he  escape  to  the  enemy? 

GORDON. 

I  ?  Gracious  God  ! 

BUTLER. 

Take  it  on  yourself. 
Come  of  it  what  it  may,  on  you  I  lay  it. 

GORDON. 

0  God  in  heaven  ! 

BUTLER. 

Can  you  advise  aught  else 
Wherewith  to  execute  the  Emperor's  purpose  ? 
Say  if  you  can.    For  I  desire  his  fall, 
Not  his  destruction. 

GORDON. 

Merciful  heaven !  what  must  be 

1  see  as  clear  as  you.    Yet  still  the  heart 
Within  my  bosom  beats  with  other  feelings ! 

BUTLER. 

Mine  is  of  harder  stuff!  Necessity 

In  her  rough  school  hath  steel'd  me.    And  this  Illo 

And  Tertsky  likewise,  they  must  not  survive  him. 

GORDON. 

I  feel  no  pang  for  these.    Their  own  bad  hearts 
Impell'd  them,  not  the  influence  of  the  stars, 
'Twas  they  who  strew'd  the  seeds  of  evil  passions 
In  his  calm  breast,  and  with  officious  villany 


Water'd  and  nurs'd  the  pois'nous  plants.    May  they 
Receive  their  earnests  to  the  uttermost  mite ! 

BUTLER. 

And  their  death  shall  precede  his! 

We  meant  to  have  taken  them  alive  this  evening 

Amid  the  merry-making  of  a  feast, 

And  keep  them  prisoners  in  the  citadels 

But  this  makes  shorter  work.    I  go  this  instant 

To  give  the  necessary  orders. 


SCENE  VLT. 


To  these  enter  Illo  and  Tertsky. 

tertsky. 
Our  luck  is  on  the  turn.    To-morrow  come 
The  Swedes — twelve  thousand  gallant  warriors,  Illo 
Then  straightways  for  Vienna.    Cheerily,  friend  ! 
What !  meet  such  news  with  such  a  moody  face  ? 

ILLO. 

It  lies  with  us  at  present  to  prescribe 

Laws,  and  take  vengeance  on  those  worthless  traitors 

Those  skulking  cowards  that  deserted  us ; 

One  has  already  done  his  bitter  penance, 

The  Piccolomini :   be  his  the  fate 

Of  all  who  wish  us  evil !  This  flies  sure 

To  the  old  man's  heart ;  he  has  his  whole  life  long 

Fretted  and  toil'd  to  raise  his  ancient  house 

From  a  Count's  title  to  the  name  of  Prince  ; 

And  now  must  seek  a  grave  for  his  only  son. 

BUTLER. 

'Twas  pity,  though  !  A  youth  of  such  heroic 
And  gentle  temperament !  The  Duke  himself, 
'Twas  easily  seen,  how  near  it  went  to  his  heart 

ILLO. 

Hark  ye,  old  friend !  That  is  the  very  point 
That  never  pleased  me  in  our  General — 
He  ever  gave  the  preference  to  the  Italians. 
Yea,  at  this  very  moment,  by  my  soul ! 
He'd  gladly  see  us  all  dead  ten  times  over, 
Could  he  thereby  recall  his  friend  to  life. 

TERTSKY. 

Hush,  hush!    Let  the  dead  rest!    This  evening's 

business 
Is,  who  can  fairly  drink  the  other  down — 
Your  regiment,  Illo !  gives  the  entertainment, 
Come !  we  will  keep  a  meny  carnival — 
The  night  for  once  be  day,  and  'mid  full  glasses 
Will  we  expect  the  Swedish  avant-garde. 

ILLO. 

Yes,  let  us  be  of  good  cheer  for  to-day, 
For  there 's  hot  work  before  us,  friends  !  This  sword 
Shall  have  no  rest,  till  it  be  bathed  to  the  hilt 
In  Austrian  blood. 

GORDON. 

Shame,  shame!  what  talk  is  this, 
My  Lord  Field  Marshal  ?  Wherefore  foam  you  so 
Against  your  Emperor  ? 

BUTLER. 

Hope  not  too  much 
From  this  first  victor)'.    Bethink  you,  sirs ! 
How  rapidly  the  wheel  of  Fortune  turns; 
The  Emperor  still  is  formidably  strong. 

ILLO. 

The  Emperor  has  soldiers,  no  commander 
For  this  King  Ferdinand  of  Hungary 
Is  but  a  tyro.    Galas  ?  He 's  no  luck, 

198 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


180 


And  was  of  old  the  miner  of  armies. 

And  then  this  viper,  this  Octavio, 

Is  excellent  at  stabbing  in  the  back, 

But  ne'er  meets  Friedland  in  the  open  field. 

TERTSKY. 

Trust  me,  my  friends,  it  cannot  but  succeed  ; 
Fortune,  we  know,  can  ne'er  forsake  the  Duke ! 
And  only  under  Wallenstein  can  Austria 
Be  conqueror. 

ILLO. 

The  Duke  will  soon  assemble 
A  mighty  army :  all  comes  crowding,  streaming 
To  banners,  dedicate  by  destiny, 
To  fame,  and  prosperous  fortune.    I  behold 
Old  times  come  back  again !  he  will  become 
Once  more  the  mighty  Lord  which  he  has  been. 
How  will  the  fools,  who've  now  deserted  him, 
Look  then !  I  can't  but  laugh  lo  think  of  them, 
For  lands  will  he  present  to  all  his  friends, 
And  like  a  King  and  Emperor  reward 
True  services  ;  but  we  've  the  nearest  claims. 

[To  Gordon 
You  will  not  be  forgotten,  Governor! 
He'll  take  you  from  this  nest,  and  bid  you  shine 
In  higher  station  :  your  fidelity 
Well  merits  it. 

GORDON. 

I  am  content  already, 
And  wish  to  climb  no  higher ;  where  great  height  is, 
The  fall  must  needs  be  great.    "  Great  height,  great 
depth." 

ILLO. 

Here  you  have  no  more  business,  for  to-morrow 
The  Swedes  will  take  possession  of  the  citadel. 
Come,  Tertsky,  it  is  supper-time.    What  think  you  ? 
Nay,  shall  we  have  the  State  illuminated 
In  honor  of  the  Swede  ?  And  who  refuses 
To  do  it  is  a  Spaniard  and  a  traitor. 

TERTSKY. 

Nay !  Nay  !  not  that,  it  will  not  please  the  Duke — 

ILLO. 

What!  we  are  masters  here;  no  soul  shall  dare 
Avow  himself  imperial  where  we've  the  rule. 
Gordon!  good  night,  and  for  ihe  last  time,  take 
A  fair  leave  of  the  place.    Send  out  patrols 
To  make  secure,  the  watch-word  may  be  alter'd 
At  the  stroke  of  ten;  deliver  in  the  keys 
To  the  Duke  himself,  and  then  you've  quit  for  ever 
Your  wardship  of  the  gates,  for  on  to-morrow 
The  Swedes  will  take  possession  of  the  citadel. 

tertsky  (as  he  is  going,  lo  Butler). 
You  come,  though,  to  the  castle  ? 

BUTLER. 

At  the  right  time. 
[Exeunt  Tertsky  and  Illo. 


SCENE  VI 11. 
Gorho.v  and  Butler. 
Gordon  (looking  after  them). 
Unhappy  men  !    How  free  from  all  foreboding  ! 
They  rush  into  the  outspread  net  of  murder, 
In  the  blind  drunkenness  of  viclory ; 
I  have  no  pity  for  their  fate.    This  Illo, 
This  overflowing  and  foolhardy  villain, 
That  would   fain    bathe   himself  in   lus   Emperor's 
blood. — 

S 


BUTLER. 

Do  as  he  order'd  you.    Send  round  patrols, 
Take  measures  for  the  citadel's  security ; 
When  they  are  within,  1  close  the  castle-gate 
That  nothing  may  transpire. 

Gordon  {with  earnest  anxiety). 

Oh !  haste  not  so ! 
Nay,  stop;  first  tell  me 

BUTLER. 

You  have  heard  already 
To-morrow  to  the  Swedes  belongs.    This  night 
Alone  is  ours.    They  make  good  expedition. 
But  we  will  make  still  greater.    Fare  you  well. 

GORDON. 

Ah !  your  looks  tell  me  nothing  good.    Nay,  Butler 
I  pray  you,  promise  me ! 

BUTLER. 

The  sun  has  set ; 
A  fateful  evening  doth  descend  upon  us, 
And  brings  on  their  long  night!  Their  evil  stars 
Deliver  them  unarm'd  into  our  hands, 
And  from  their  drunken  dream  of  golden  fortunes 
The  dagger  at  their  heart  shall  rouse  them.    Well, 
The  Duke  was  ever  a  great  calculatoi  , 
His  fellow-men  were  figures  on  his  chess-board, 
To  move  and  station,  as  his  game  required. 
Other  men's  honor,  dignity,  good  name, 
Did  he  shift  like  pawns,  and  made  no  conscience  of  it 
Still  calculating,  calculating  still  ; 
And  yet  at  last  his  calculation  proves 
Erroneous ;  the  whole  game  is  lost ;  and  lo ! 
His  own  life  will  be  found  among  the  forfeits. 

GORDON. 

0  think  not  of  his  errors  now ;  remember 
His  greatness,  his  munificence,  think  on  all 
The  lovely  features  of  his  character, 
On  all  the  noble  exploits  of  his  life, 
And  let  them,  like  an  angel's  arm,  unseen 
Arrest  the  lifted  sword. 

BUTLER. 

It  is  too  late. 

1  suffer  not  myself  to  feel  compassion, 
Dark  thoughts  and  bloody  are  my  duty  now  : 

[Grasping  Gordon's  hand 
Gordon!  'tis  not  my  hatred  (I  pretend  not 
To  love  the  Duke,  and  have  no  cause  to  love  him), 
Yet  'tis  not  now  my  hatred  that  impels  me 
To  be  his  murderer.    'Tis  his  evil  fate. 
Hostile  concurrences  of  many  events 
Control  and  subjugate  me  to  the  office. 
In  vain  the  human  bein<r  meditates 
Free  action.    He  is  but  the  wire-work'd*  puppet 
Of  the  blind  Power,  wliich  out  of  his  own  choice 
Creates  for  him  a  dread  necessity. 
What  too  would  it  avail  him,  if  there  were 
A  something  pleading  for  him  in  my  heart — 
Still  I  must  kill  him. 

GORDON. 

If  your  heart  speak  to  you 
Follow  its  impulse.    'Tis  the  voice  of  God. 
Think  you  your  fortunes  will  grow  prosperous 
Bedew'd  with  blood — his  blood  ?    Believe  it  not ! 


*  We  doubt  the  propriety  of  putting  so  blasphemous  a  seuti 
merit  in  the  mouth  of  any  character.    T. 

199 


190 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


BUTLER. 

You  know  not.  Ask  not !  Wherefore  should  it  happen. 
That  the  Swedes  gain'd  the  victory,  and  hasten 
With  such  forced  marches  hitherward  I  Fain  would  I 
Have  given  him  to  the  Emperor's  mercy. — Gordon ! 
I  do  not  wish  his  blood — But  1  must  ransom 
The  honor  of  my  word, — it  lies  in  pledge — 

And  he  must  die,  or 

[Passionately  grasping  Gordon's  hand. 
Listen  then,  and  know ! 
I  am  dishonored  if  the  Duke  escape  us. 

GORDON. 

O !  to  save  such  a  man 

BUTLER. 

What ! 

GORDON. 

It  is  worth 
A  sacrifice. — Come,  friend  !    Be  noble-minded  ! 
Our  own  heart,  and  not  other  men's  opinions, 
Forms  our  true  honor. 

butler  (with  a  cold  and  haughty  ah). 
He  is  a  great  Lord, 
This  Duke — and  I  am  but  of  mean  importance. 
This  is  what  you  would  say  ?    Wherein  concerns  it 
The  world  at  large,  you  mean  to  hint  to  me, 
Whether  the  man  of  low  extraction  keeps 
Or  blemishes  his  honor — 
So  that  the  man  of  princely  rank  be  saved  ? 
We  all  do  stamp  our  value  on  ourselves. 
The  price  we  challenge  for  ourselves  is  given  us. 
There  does  not  live  on  earlh  the  man  so  station'd, 
That  I  despise  myself  compared  with  him. 
Man  is  made  great  or  little  by  his  own  will  ; 
Because  I  am  true  to  mine,  therefore  he  dies. 

GORDON. 

I  am  endeavoring  to  move  a  rock. 

Thou  hadst  a  mother,  yet  no  human  feelings. 

I  cannot  hinder  you,  but  may  some  God 

Rescue  him  from  you !  [Exit  Gordon. 


SCENE  IX. 


butler  {alone). 
I  treasured  my  good  name  all  my  life  long; 
The  Duke  has  cheated  me  of  life's  best  jewel, 
So  that  I  blush  before  this  poor  weak  Gordon  ' 
He  prizes  above  all  his  feally ; 
His  conscious  soul  accuses  him  of  nothing ; 
In  opposition  to  his  own  soft  heart 
He  subjugates  himself  to  an  iron  duty. 
Me  in  a  weaker  moment  passion  warp'd  ; 
I  stand  beside  him,  and  must  feel  myself 
The  worse  man  of  the  two.    What,  though  the  world 
Is  ignorant  of  my  purposed  treason,  yet 
One  man  does  know  it,  and  can  prove  it  too — 
High-minded  Piccolomini ! 
There  lives  the  man  who  can  dishonor  me! 
This  ignominy  blood  alone  can  cleanse ! 
Duke  Fried  land,  thou  or  I — Into  my  own  hands 
Fortune  delivers  me — The  dearest  thing  a  man  has 
is  himself. 

(The  curtain  drops.) 


ACT  IV. 

SCENE  I. 

Scene — Butler's  Chamber. 

Butler,  Major,  and  Geraldin. 

butler. 
Find  me  twelve  strong  Dragoons,  arm  them   with 

pikes, 
For  there  must  be  no  firing — 
Conceal  them  somewhere  near  the  banquet-room, 
And  soon  as  the  dessert  is  served  up,  rush  all  in 
And  cry — Who  is  loyal  to  the  Emperor  ? 
I  will  overturn  the  table — while  you  attack 
Illo  and  Tertsky,  and  dispatch  them  both. 
The  castle-palace  is  well  barr'd  and  guarded, 
That  no  intelligence  of  this  proceeding 
May  make  its  way  to  the  Duke. — Go  instantly ; 
Have  you  yet  sent  for  Captain  Devereux 
And  the  Macdonald  ? 

GERALDIN. 

They'll  be  here  anon. 

[Exit  Geraldin. 

BUTLER. 

Here's  no  room  for  delay.    The  citizens 
Declare  for  him,  a  dizzy  drunken  spirit 
Possesses  the  whole  town.    They  see  in  the  Duke 
A  Prince  of  peace,  a  founder  of  new  ages 
And  golden  times.    Arms  too  have  been  given  out 
By  the  town-council,  and  a  hundred  citizens 
Have  volunteer'd  themselves  to  stand  on  guard. 
Dispatch  then  be  the  word.    For  enemies 
Threaten  us  front  without  and  from  within. 


SCENE  II. 
Butler,  Captain  Devereux,  and  Macdonald. 

MACDONALD. 

Here  we  are,  General. 

DEVEREUX. 

What 's  to  be  the  watch- word  ? 

BUTLER. 

Long  live  the  Emperor  ! 

both  (recoiling). 
How  ? 

BUTLER. 

Live  the  House  of  Austria! 

DEVEREUX. 

Have  we  not  sworn  fidelity  to  Friedland? 

MACDONALD. 

Have  we  not  march'd  to  this  place  to  protect  him  ? 

BUTLEK. 

Protect  a  traitor,  and  his  country's  enemy  ! 

DEVEREUX. 

Why,  yes !  in  his  name  you  administer'd 
Our  oath. 

MACDONALD. 

And  followed  him  yourself  to  Egra. 

BUTLER. 

I  did  it  the  more  surely  to  destroy  him. 

DEVEREUX. 

So  then ! 


MACDONALD. 

An  alter'd  case ! 


200 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTE1N. 


191 


BUTLER  (to  DEVEREUX). 

Thou  wretched  man ! 
So  easily  leavest  thou  thy  oath  and  colors  ? 

DEVEREUX. 

The  devil ! — I  but  foliow'd  your  example. 
If  you  could  prove  a  villain,  why  not  we  ? 

MACDONALD. 

We've  nought  to  do  with  thinking — that's   your 

business. 
You  are  our  General,  and  give  out  the  orders ; 
We  follow  you,  though  the  track  lead  to  hell. 

butler  (.appeased). 
Good  then !  we  know  each  other. 

MACDONALD. 

I  should  hope  so. 

DEVEREUX. 

Soldiers  of  fortune  are  we — who  bids  most, 
He  has  us 

MACDONALD. 

'Tis  e'en  so! 

BUTLER. 

Well,  for  the  present 
Ye  must  remain  honest  and  faithful  soldiers. 


We  wish  no  other. 


DEVEREUX. 
BUTLER. 

Ay,  and  make  your  fortunes. 

MACDONALD. 

That  is  still  better. 

BUTLER. 

Listen! 

BOTH. 

We  attend. 

BUTLER. 

It  is  the  Emperor's  will  and  ordinance 

To  seize  the  person  of  the  Prince-duke  Friedland, 

Alive  or  dead. 

DEVEREUX. 

It  runs  so  in  the  letter. 

MACDONALD. 

Alive  or  dead — these  were  the  very  words. 

BUTLER. 

And  he  shall  be  rewarded  from  the  State 
In  land  and  gold,  who  proffers  aid  thereto. 

DEVEREUX. 

Ay !  that  sounds  well.  The  words  sound  always  well 
That  travel  hither  from  the  Court.    Yes !  yes ! 
We  know  already  what  Court-words  import. 
A  golden  chain  perhaps  in  sign  of  favor, 
Or  an  old  charger,  or  a  parchment  patent, 
And  such  like. — The  Prince-duke  pays  better. 

MACDONALD. 


Yes, 


The  Duke's  a  splendid  paymaster. 

BUTLER. 

All  over 
With  that,  my  friends !  His  lucky  stars  are  set. 

MACDONALD. 

And  is  that  certain? 

BUTLER. 

You  have  my  word  for  it. 

DEVEREUX. 

His  lucky  fortunes  all  past  by  ? 

BUTLER. 

For  ever. 
He  is  as  poor  as  we. 


MACDONALD. 

As  poor  as  we  ? 

DEVEREUX. 

Macdonald,  we'll  desert  him. 

BUTLER. 

We'll  desert  him? 
Full  twenty  thousand  have  done  that  already ; 
We  must  do  more,  my  countrymen  !  In  short — 
We — we  must  kill  him. 

BOTH  (slarlmg  back). 
Kill  him ! 

BUTLER. 

Yes  !  must  kill  him ; 
And  for  that  purpose  have  I  chosen  you. 

BOTH. 

Us' 

BUTLER. 

You,  Captain  Devereux,  and  thee,  Macdonald 

devereux  (after  a  pause). 
Choose  you  some  other. 

butler. 

What  ?  art  dastardly  ? 
Thou,  with  full  thirty  lives  to  answer  for — 
Thou  conscientious  of  a  sudden  ? 
devereux. 

Nay, 
To  assassinate  our  Lord  and  General — 

macdonald. 
To  whom  we've  sworn  a  soldier's  oath — 
butler. 

The  oath 
Is  null,  for  Friedland  is  a  traitor. 

devereux. 
No,  no !  it  is  too  bad  ! 

macdonald. 

Yes,  by  my  soul ! 
It  is  too  bad.    One  has  a  conscience  too — 

devereux. 
If  it  were  not  our  Chieftain,  who  so  long 
Has  issued  the  commands,  and  claim'd  our  duty. 

butler. 
Is  that  the  objection  ? 

devereux. 

Were  it  my  own  father, 
And  the  Emperor's  service  should  demand  it  of  me, 
It  might  be  done,  perhaps — But  we  are  soldiers, 
And  to  assassinate  our  Chief  Commander, 
That  is  a  sin,  a  foul  abomination, 
From  which  no  Monk  or  Confessor  absolves  us 

butler. 
I  am  your  Pope,  and  give  you  absolution. 
Determine  quickly! 

devereux. 
'Twill  not  do. 
macdonald. 

'T  wont  do . 
butler. 
Well,  off  then !  and — send  Pestalutz  to  me. 

devereux  (hesitates). 
The  Pestalutz— 

macdonald. 
What  may  you  want  with  him  ? 
butler. 
If  you  reject  it,  we  can  find  enough — 

devereux. 
Nay,  if  he  must  fall,  we  may  earn  the  bounty 
201 


192 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


As  well  as  any  other.    What  think  you, 
Brother  Macdonald  ? 

MACDONALD. 

Why,  if  he  must  fall, 
And  will  fall,  and  it  can't  be  otherwise, 
One  would  not  give  place  to  this  Pestalutz. 
DEVereux  (after  some  reflection). 
When  do  you  purpose  he  should  fall  ? 

BUTLER. 

This  night. 
To-morrow  will  the  Swedes  be  at  our  gates. 

DEVEREUX. 

You  take  upon  you  all  the  consequences ' 

BUTLER. 

I  take  the  whole  upon  me. 

DEVEREUX. 

And  it  is 
The  Emperor's  will,  his  express  absolute  will? 
For  we  have  instances,  that  folks  may  like 
The  murder,  and  yet  hang  the  murderer. 

BUTLER. 

The  manifesto  says — alive  or  dead. 

Alive — 't  is  not  possible — you  see  it  is  not. 

DEVEREUX. 

Well,  dead  then !  dead !  But  how  can  we  come  at  him  ? 
The  town  is  fill'd  with  Tertsky's  soldiery. 

MACDONALD. 

Ay!  and  then  Tertsky  still  remains,  and  Illo — 

BUTLER. 

With  these  you  shall  begin — you  understand  me  ? 

DEVEREUX. 

How  ?  And  must  they  too  perish  ? 

BUTLER. 

They  the  first 

MACDONALD. 

Hear,  Devereux!  A  bloody  evening  this. 

DEVEREUX. 

Have  you  a  man  for  that  ?  Commission  me — 

BUTLER. 

'Tis  given  in  trust  to  Major  Geraldin; 
This  is  a  carnival  night,  and  there's  a  feast 
Given  at  the  castle — there  we  shall  surprise  them, 
And  hew  them  down.    The  Pestalutz,  and  Lesley 
Have  that  commission — soon  as  that  is  finish'd — 

DEVEREUX. 

Hear,  General !  It  will  be  all  one  to  you — 
Harkye,  let  me  exchange  with  Geraldin. 

BUTLER. 

'T  will  be  the  lesser  danger  with  the  Duke. 

DEVEREUX. 

Danger!  the  devil!  What  do  you  think  me,  General? 
'Tis  the  Duke's  eye,  and  not  his  sword,  I  fear. 

BUTLER. 

Vhat  can  his  eye  do  to  thee  ? 

DEVEREUX. 

Death  and  hell ! 
Thou  know'st  that  I'm  no  milk-sop,  General ! 
But  'tis  not  eight  days  since  the  Duke  did  send  me 
Twenty  gold  pieces  for  this  good  warm  coat 
Which  I  have  on !  and  then  for  him  to  see  me 
Standing  before  him  with  the  pike,  his  murderer, 
That  eye  of  his  looking  upon  this  coat — 
Why — why — the  devil  fetch  me!  I'm  no  milk-sop! 

BUTLER. 

The  Duke  presented  thee  this  good  warm  coat, 
And  thou,  a  needy  wight,  hast  pangs  of  conscience 


To  run  him  through  the  body  in  return. 

A  coat  that  is  far  better  and  far  warmer 

Did  the  Emperor  give  to  him,  the  Prince's  mantle 

How  doth  he  thank  the  Emperor  ?  With  revolt, 

And  treason. 

DEVEREUX. 

That  is  true.    The  devil  take 
Such  thankers !  I  '11  dispatch  him. 

BUTLER. 

And  wouldst  quiet 
Thy  conscience,  thou  hast  naught  to  do  but  simply 
Pull  off  the  coat ;  so  canst  thou  do  the  deed 
With  light  heart  and  good  spirits. 

DEVEREUX. 

You  are  right 
That  did  not  strike  me.  I  '11  pull  off  the  coat — 
So  there 's  an  end  of  it. 

MACDONALD. 

Yes,  but  there's  another 
Point  to  be  thought  of. 

BUTLER. 

And  what's  that,  Macdonald,? 

MACDONALD. 

What  avails  sword  or  dagger  against  him  ? 
He  is  not  to  be  wounded — he  is — 

butler  (slartiiig  up). 

What? 

MACDONALD. 

Safe  against  shot,  and  stab  and  flash !  Hard  frozen, 
Secured,  and  warranted  by  the  black  art! 
His  body  is  impenetrable,  I  tell  you. 

DEVEREUX. 

In  Inglestadt  there  was  just  such  another: 

His  whole  skin  was  the  same  as  steel ;  at  last 

We  were  obliged  to  beat  him  down  with  gunstocks 

MACDONALD. 

Hear  what  I  '11  do. 

DEVEREUX. 

Well  ? 

MACDONALD. 

In  the  cloister  here 
There  's  a  Dominican,  my  countryman. 
I  '11  make  him  dip  my  sword  and  pike  for  me 
In  holy  water,  and  say  over  them 
One  of  his  strongest  blessings.  That 's  probatum. 
Nothing  can  stand  'gainst  that. 

BUTLER. 

So  do,  Macdonald 
But  now  go  and  select  from  out  the  regiment 
Twenty  or  thirty  able-bodied  fellows, 
And  let  them  take  the  oaths  to  the  Emperor. 
Then  when  it  strikes  eleven,  when  the  first  rounds 
Are  pass'd,  conduct  them  silently  as  may  be 
To  the  house — I  will  myself  be  not  far  off 

DEVEREUX. 

But  how  do  we  get  through  Hartschier  and  Gordon 
That  stand  on  guard  there  in  the  inner  chamber  ? 

butler.  * 
I  have  made  myself  acquainted  with  the  place. 
I  lead  you  through  a  back-door  that's  defended 
By  one  man  only.    Me  my  rank  and  office 
Give  access  to  the  Duke  at  every  hour, 
I  '11  go  before  you — with  one  poniard-stroke 
Cut  Hartschier's  windpipe,  and  make  way  for  you 

DEVEREUX. 

And  when  we  are  there,  by  what  means  shall  we  gam 

902 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


193 


The  Duke*s  bed-chamber,  without  his  alarming 
The  servants  of  the  Court ;  for  he  has  here 
A  numerous  company  of  followers? 

BUTLER. 

The  attendants  fill  the  right  wing ;  he  hates  bustle, 
And  lodges  in  the  left  wing  quite  alone. 

DEVEREUX. 

Were  it  well  over — hey,  Macdonald  ?  I 
Feel  queerly  on  the  occasion,  devil  knows ! 

MACDONALD. 

And  I  too.   'T  is  too  great  a  personage. 
People  will  hold  us  lbr  a  brace  of  villains. 

BUTLER. 

In  plenty,  honor,  splendor — You  may  safely 
Laugh  at  the  people's  babble. 

DEVEREUX. 

If  the  business 
Squares  with  one's  honor — if  that  be  quite  certain — 

BUTLER. 

Set  your  hearts  quite  at  ease.  Ye  save  for  Ferdinand 
His  Crown  and  Empire.    The  reward  can  be 
No  small  one. 

DEVEREUX. 

And  'tis  his  purpose  to  dethrone  the  Emperor? 

BUTLER. 

Yes  ! — Yes ! — to  rob  him  of  his  Crown  and  life. 

DEVEREUX. 

And  he  must  fall  by  the  executioner's  hands, 
Should  we  deliver  him  up  to  the  Emperor 
Alive  ? 

BUTLER. 

It  were  his  certain  destiny. 

DEVEREUX. 

Well !  Well !  Come  then,  Macdonald,  he  shall  not 
Lie  long  in  pain. 

[Exeunt  Butler  through  one  door,  Macdonald  and 
Devereux  through  the  other. 


SCENE  III. 


Scene — A  Gothic  and  gloomy  Apartment  at  the  Duchess 
Friedland's.  Thekla  on  a  seat, pale,  her  eyes 
closed.  The  Duchess  and  Lady  Neubrunn 
busied  about  her.  Wallenstein  and  the  Countess 
in  conversation. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

How  knew  she  it  so  soon  ? 

COUNTESS. 

She  seems  to  have 
Foreboded  some  misfortune.     The  report 
Of  an  engagement,  in  the  which  had  fallen 
A  colonel  of  the  Imperial  army,  frighten'd  her. 
I  saw  it  instantly.    She  flew  to  meet 
The  Swedish  courier,  and  with  sudden  questioning, 
Soon  wrested  from  him  the  disastrous  secret. 
Too  late  we  miss'd  her,  has'.en'd  after  her, 
We  found  her  lying  in  his  arms,  all  pale 
And  in  a  swoon. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

A  heavy,  heavy  blow  ! 
And  she  so  unprepared !  Poor  child !  How  is  it  ? 

[Turning  to  the  Duchess. 
Is  she  coming  to  herself? 

duchess. 

Her  eyes  are  opening. 
countess. 
She  lives. 

14  S2 


thekla  [looking  around  her). 
Where  am  I  ? 
wallenstein  (steps  to  her,  raising  her  up  in  his  arms). 
Come,  eheerly,  Thekla!  be  my  own  brave  girl ! 
See,  there's  thy  loving  mother.    Thou  art  in 
Thy  father's  arms. 

thekla  (standing  up). 

Where  is  he  ?  Is  he  gone  ? 
duchess. 
Who  gone,  my  daughter  ? 

thekla. 

He — the  man  who  utter'd 
That  word  of  misery. 

duchess. 
O !  think  not  of  it, 
My  Thekla ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Give  her  sorrow  leave  to  talk ! 
Let  her  complain — mingle  your  tears  with  hers. 
For  she  hath  sufTer'd  a  deep  anguish  ;  but 
She'll  rise  superior  to  it,  for  my  Thekla 
Hath  all  her  father's  unsubdued  heart. 

thekla. 
I  am  not  ill.  See,  I  have  power  to  stand. 
Why  does  my  mother  weep  ?    Have  I  alarm'd  her  ? 
It  is  gone  by — I  recollect  myself— 

[She  casts  her  eyes  round  the  room,  as  seeking  some 
me. 
Where  is  he  ?  Please  you,  do  not  hide  him  from  me 
You  see  I  have  strength  enough :  now  I  will  hear  him. 

DUCHESS. 

No,  never  shall  this  messenger  of  evil 
Enter  again  into  thy  presence,  Thekla ! 

thekla. 
My  father — 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Dearest  daughter ! 

THEKLA. 

I  'm  not  weak — 
Shortly  I  shall  be  quite  myself  again. 
You'll  grant  me  one  request? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Name  it,  my  daughter 

THEKLA. 

Permit  the  stranger  to  be  call'd  to  me, 
And  grant  me  leave,  that  by  myself  I  may 
Hear  his  report  and  question  him. 

DUCHESS. 

No,  never ! 

COUNTESS. 

'Tis  not  advisable — assent  not  to  it. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Hush !  Wherefore  wouldst  thou  speak  with  him,  my 
daughter? 

THEKLA, 

Knowing  the  whole,  I  shall  be  more  collected  : 
I  will  not  be  deceived.    My  mother  wishes 
Only  to  spare  me.    1  will  not  be  spared, 
The  worst  is  said  already :  I  can  hear 
Nothing  of  deeper  anguish  ! 

duchess  and  countess. 
Do  it  not. 

THEKLA. 

The  horror  overpower'd  me  by  surprise. 
My  heart  betray'd  me  in  the  stranger's  presence ; 
He  was  a  witness  of  my  weakness,  yea, 
203 


194 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


I  sank  into  his  arms ;  and  that  has  shamed  me. 
[  must  replace  myself  in  his  esteem, 
And  I  must  speak  with  him,  perforce,  that  he, 
ITie  stranger,  may  not  think  ungently  of  me. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

I  see  she  is  in  the  right,  and  am  inclined 

To  grant  her  this  request  of  hers.    Go,  call  him. 

(Lady  Neubrunn  goes  to  call  him). 

DUCHESS. 

But  I,  thy  mother,  will  be  present — 

THEKLA. 

'T  were 

More  pleasing  to  me,  if  alone  I  saw  him : 
Trust  me,  I  shall  behave  myself  the  more 
Collectedly. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Permit  her  her  own  will. 
Leave  her  alone  with  him  :  for  there  are  sorrows, 
Where  of  necessity  the  soul  must  be 
Its  own  support.    A  strong  heart  will  rely 
On  its  own  strength  alone.    In  her  own  bosom, 
Not  in  her  mother's  arms,  must  she  collect 
>The  strength  to  rise  superior  to  this  blow. 
It  is  mine  own  brave  girl.    I  '11  have  her  treated 
Not  as  the  woman,  but  the  heroine.  (Uoi?ig. 

countess  (detaining  him). 
Where  art  thou  going  ?  I  heard  Tertsky  say 
That  'tis  thy  purpose  to  depart  from  hence 
To-morrow  early,  but  to  leave  us  here. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Yes,  ye  stay  here,  placed  under  the  protection 
Of  gallant  men. 

COUNTESS. 

O  take  us  with  you,  brother ! 
Leave  us  not  in  this  gloomy  solitude 
To  brood  o'er  anxious  thoughts.    The  mists  of  doubt 
Magnify  evils  to  a  shape  of  horror. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Who  speaks  of  evil  ?  I  entreat  you,  sister, 
Use  words  of  belter  omen. 

COUNTESS. 

Then  take  us  with  you. 

0  leave  us  not  behind  you  in  a  place 
That  forces  us  to  such  sad  omens.    Heavy 
And  sick  within  me  is  my  heart 

These  walls  breathe  on  me,  like  a  church-yard  vault. 

1  cannot  tell  you,  brother,  how  this  place 
Doth  go  against  my  nature.    Take  us  with  you. 
Come,  sister,  join  you  your  entreaty  ! — Niece, 
Yours  too.  We  all  entreat  you,  take  us  with  you ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  place's  evil  omens  will  I  change, 

Making  it  that  which  shields  and  shelters  for  me 

My  best  beloved. 

lady  neubrunn  (returning). 
The  Swedish  officer. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Leave  her  alone  with  me.  [Exit. 

duchess  (to  Thekla,  who  starts  and  shivers). 
There — pale  as  death! — Child,  'tis  impossible 
That  thou  shouldst  speak  with  him.  Follow  thy  mother. 

thekla. 
The  Lady  Neubrunn  then  may  stay  with  me. 

[Exeunt  Duchess  and  Countess. 


SCENE  IV. 
Thekla,  the  Swedish  Captain,  Lady  Neubrunn. 

captain  (respectfully  approaching  her). 
Princess — I  must  entreaf  your  gentle  pardon — 
My  inconsiderate  rash  speech — How  could  I — 

thekla  (with  dignity). 
You  have  beheld  me  in  my  agony. 
A  most  distressful  accident  occasion'd 
You  from  a  stranger  to  become  at  once 
My  confidant. 

CAPTAIN. 

I  fear  you  hate  my  presence, 
For  my  tongue  spake  a  melancholy  word. 

thekla. 
The  fault  is  mine.    Myself  did  wrest  it  from  you. 
The  horror  which  came  o'er  me  interrupted 
Your  tale  at  its  commencement.  May  it  please  you, 
Continue  it  to  the  end. 

captain. 
Princess,  'twill 
Renew  your  anguish. 

thekla. 

I  am  firm. 

I  will  be  firm.  Well — how  began  the  engagement  ? 

captain. 
We,  lay,  expecting  no  attack,  at  Neustadt, 
Intrench'd  but  insecurely  in  our  camp, 
When  towards  evening  rose  a  cloud  of  dust 
From  the  wood  thitherward  ;  our  vanguard  fled 
Into  the  camp,  and  sounded  the  alarm. 
Scarce  had  we  mounted,  ere  the  Pappenheimers, 
Their  horses  at  full  speed,  broke  through  the  lines, 
And  leapt  the  trenches  ;  but  their  heedless  courage 
Had  borne  them  onward  far  before  the  others — 
The  infantry  were  still  at  distance  only. 
The  Pappenheimers  follow'd  daringly 
Their  daring  leader 

[Thekla  betrays  agitation  in  her  gestures.  The 
Officer  pauses  till  she  makes  a  sign  to  him  to 
proceed. 

CAPTAIN. 

Both  in  van  and  flanks 
With  our  whole  cavalry  we  now  received  them  ; 
Back  to  the  trenches  drove  them,  where  the  foot 
Stretch'd  out  a  solid  ridge  of  pikes  to  meet  them. 
They  neither  could  advance,  nor  yet  retreat  • 
And  as  they  stood  on  every  side  wedged  in, 
The  Rhinegrave  to  their  leader  call'd  aloud, 
Inviting  a  surrender  ;  but  their  leader, 

Young  Piccolomini 

[Thekla,  as  giddy,  grasps  a  chair 
Known  by  his  plume, 
And  his  long  hair,  gave  signal  for  the  trenches  ; 
Himself  leapt  first,  the  regiment  all  plunged  after 
His  charger,  by  a  halbert  gored,  rear'd  up, 
Flung  him  with  violence  off,  and  over  him 

The  horses,  now  no  longer  to  be  curb'd, 

[Thekla  who  has  accompanied  the  last  speech  with 
all  the  marks  of  increasing  agony,  trembles 
through  her  whole  frame,  and  is  falling.  The 
Lady  Neubrunn  runt  to  her,  and  receives  her 
in  her  arms. 


My  dearest  lady- 


204 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


195 


CAPTAIN. 

I  retire. 


'T  is  over. 


Proceed  to  the  conclusion. 


CAPTAIN. 

Wild  despair 
Inspired  the  troops  with  frenzy  when  they  saw 
Their  leader  perish ;  every  thought  of  rescue 
Was  spurn'd  ;  they  fought  like  wounded  tigers ;  their 
Frantic  resistance  roused  our  soldiery  ; 
A  murderous  tight  took  place,  nor  was  the  contest 
Finish'd  before  their  last  man  fell. 

thekla  (faltering). 

And  where 

Where  is — You  have  not  told  me  all. 

captain  {after  a  pause). 

This  morning 
We  buried  him.    Twelve  youths  of  noblest  birth 
Did  bear  him  to  interment ;  the  whole  army 
Follow'd  the  bier.    A  laurel  deck'd  his  coffin ; 
The  sword  of  the  deceased  was  placed  upon  it, 
In  mark  of  honor,  by  the  Rhinegrave's  self. 
Nor  tears  were  wanting ;  for  there  are  among  us 
Many,  who  had  themselves  experienced 
The  greatness  of  his  mind,  and  gentle  manners; 
All  were  affected  at  his  fate.    The  Rhinegrave 
Would  willingly  have  saved  him ;  but  himself 
Made  vain  the  attempt — 'tis  said  he  wish'd  to  die. 

NEUbrunn  (to  Thekla,  who  has  hidden  her  coun- 
tenance). 
Look  up,  my  dearest  lady 

thekla. 

Where  is  his  grave  ? 

captain. 
At  Neustadt,  lady ;  in  a  cloister  church 
Are  his  remains  deposited,  until 
We  can  receive  directions  from  his  father. 

thekla. 
What  is  the  cloister's  name  ? 

captain. 

Saint  Catherine's. 
thekla. 
And  how  far  is  it  thither  ? 

captain. 

Near  twelve  leagues. 
thekla. 
And  which  the  way  ? 

captain. 

You  go  by  Tirschenreit 
And  Falkenberg,  through  our  advanced  posts. 


captain  (confused) 

Princess 

[Thekla  silently  makes  signs  to  him  to  go,  and 
turns  from  him.  The  Captain  lingers,  and 
is  about  to  speak.  Lady  Neubrunn  repeals 
the  signal,  and  he  retires. 


Who 


Is  their  commander  ? 


captain. 
Colonel  Seckendorf. 

[thekla  steps  to  the  table,  and  takes  a  ring  from 
a  casket. 

thekla. 
You  have  beheld  me  in  my  agony, 
And  shown  a  feeling  heart.    Please  you,  accept 

[Giving  him  the  ring. 
A  small  memorial  of  this  hour.    Now  go ! 


SCENE  V. 

Thekla,  Lady  Neubrunn. 

thekla  (falls  on  Lady  Neubrunn's  neck). 
Now,  gentle  Neubrunn,  show  me  the  affection 
Which  thou  hast  ever  promised — prove  thyself 
My  own  true  friend  and  faithful  fellow-pilgrim. 
This  night  we  must  away ! 

NEUBRUNN. 

Away!  and  whither? 
thekla. 

Whither !   There  is  but  one  place  in  the  world. 
Thither  where  he  lies  buried  !   To  his  coffin ! 

NEUBRUNN. 

What  would  you  do  there  ? 

thekla. 

What  do  there  ? 
That  wouldst  thou  not  have  ask'd,  hadst  thou  e'er 

loved. 
There,  there  is  all  that  still  remains  of  him. 
That  single  spot  is  the  whole  earth  to  me. 

NEUBRUNN. 

That  place  of  death 

thekla. 

Is  now  the  only  place, 
Where  life  yet  dwells  for  me :  detain  me  not ! 
Come  and  make  preparations :  let  us  think 
Of  means  to  fly  from  hence. 

NEUBRUNN. 

Your  father's  rage 

THEKLA. 

That  time  is  past 

And  now  I  fear  no  human  being's  rage. 

NEUBRUNN. 

The  sentence  of  the  world  !  The  tongue  of  calumny ! 

THEKLA. 

Whom  am  I  seeking  ?   Him  who  is  no  more. 

Am  I  then  hastening  to  the  arms O  God ! 

I  haste  but  to  the  grave  of  the  beloved. 

NEUBRUNN. 

And  we  alone,  two  helpless  feeble  women  ? 

THEKLA. 

We  will  take  weapons :  my  arm  shall  protect  thee. 

NEUBRUNN. 

In  the  dark  night-time  ? 

THEKLA. 

Darkness  will  conceal  us. 

NEUBRUNN. 

This  rough  tempestuous  night 

THEKLA. 

Had  he  a  soft  bed 
Under  the  hoofs  of  his  war-horses  ? 

NEUBRUNN. 

Heaven ! 

And  then  the  many  posts  of  the  enemy ! 

THEKLA. 

They  are  human  beings.    Misery  travels  free 
Through  the  whole  earth. 

205 


196 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


NEUBRUNN. 

The  journey's  weary  length — 

THEKLA. 

ITie  pilgrim,  travelling  to  a  distant  shrine 

Of  hope  and  healing,  doth  not  count  the  leagues. 

NEUBRUNN. 

How  can  we  pass  the  gates  ? 

THEKLA. 

Gold  opens  them. 
Go,  do  but  go. 

NEUBRUNN. 

Should  we  be  recognized — 

THEKLA. 

In  a  despairing  woman,  a  poor  fugitive, 

Will  no  one  seek  the  daughter  of  Duke  Friedland. 

NEUBRUNN. 

And  where  procure  we  horses  for  our  flight  ? 

THEKLA. 

My  equerry  procures  them.    Go  and  fetch  him. 

NEUBRUNN. 

Dares  he,  without  the  knowledge  of  his  lord  ? 

THEKLA. 

He  will.    Go,  only  go.    Delay  no  longer. 

NEUBRUNN. 

Dear  lady !  and  your  mother  ? 

THEKLA. 

Oh !  my  mother ! 

NEUBRUNN. 

So  much  as  she  has  suffer'd  too  already ; 
Your  tender  mother — Ah  !  how  ill  prepared 
For  this  last  anguish ! 

THEKLA. 

Woe  is  me !  my  mother  ! 

[Pauses. 
Go  instantly. 

NEUBRUNN. 

But  think  what  you  are  doing ! 

THEKLA. 

What  can  be  thought,  already  has  been  thought. 

NEUBRUNN. 

And  being  there,  what  purpose  you  to  do  ? 

THEKLA. 

There  a  Divinity  will  prompt  my  soul. 

NEUBRUNN. 

Your  heart,  dear  lady,  is  disquieted ! 

And  this  is  not  the  way  that  leads  to  quiet. 

THEKLA. 

To  a  deep  quiet,  such  as  he  has  found, 

It  draws  me  on,  I  know  not  what  to  name  it, 

Resistless  does  it  draw  me  to  his  grave. 

There  will  my  heart  be  eased,  my  tears  will  flow. 

0  hasten,  make  no  further  questioning ! 
There  is  no  rest  for  me  till  I  have  left 

These  walls — they  fall  in  on  me — a  dim  power 
Drives  me  from  hence — O  mercy  !  What  a  feeling ! 
What  pale  and  hollow  forms  are  those !  They  fill, 
They  crowd  the  place  !  I  have  no  longer  room  here  ! 
Mercy .'  Still  more  !  More  still !  The  hideous  swarm ! 
They  press  on  me  ;  they  chase  me  from  these  walls — 
Those  hollow,  bodiless  forms  of  living  men ! 

NEUBRUNN. 

You  frighten  me  so,  lady,  that  no  longer 

1  dare  slay  here  myself.     I  go  and  call 
Rosenberg  instantly.  [Exit  Lady  Neubuunn 


SCENE  VI. 

THEKLA. 

His  spirit  'tis  that  calls  me  :  'tis  the  troop 

Of  his  true  followers,  who  offer'd  up 

Themselves  to  avenge  his  death :  and  they  accuse  me 

Of  an  ignoble  loitering — they  would  not 

Forsake  their  leader  even  in  his  death — they  died  fori 

him! 
And  shall  /  live  ? — 

For  me  too  was  that  laurel-garland  twined 
That  decks  his  bier.    Life  is  an  empty  casket : 
I  throw  it  from  me.    O  !  my  only  hope ; — 
To  die  beneath  the  hoofs  of  trampling  steeds — 
That  is  the  lot  of  heroes  upon  earth !  [Exit  Thekla. 
(The  curtain  drops). 


ACT  V. 

SCENE  I. 

Scene — A  Saloon,  terminated  by  a  Gallery  which  ex- 
tends far  into  the  back-ground. 

Wallenstein  (silting  at  a  table). 

The  Swedish  Captain  (standi?ig  before  him). 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Commend  me  to  your  lord.    I  sympathize 

In  his  good  fortune  ;  and  if  you  have  seen  me 

Deficient  in  the  expressions  of  that  joy, 

Which  such  a  victory  might  well  demand, 

Attribute  it  to  no  lack  of  good-will, 

For  henceforth  are  our  fortunes  one.     Farewell, 

And  for  your  trouble  take  my  thanks.     To-morrow 

The  citadel  shall  be  surrender'd  to  you 

On  your  arrival. 

[The  Swedish  Captain  retires.  Wallenstein  sits 
lost  in  thought,  his  eyes  fxed  vacantly,  and  his 
head  sustamed  by  his  hand.  The  Countess 
Tertsky  enters,  stands  before  him  awhile,  un- 
observed by  him  ;  at  length  he  starts,  sees  her 
and  recollects  himself. 

wallenstein. 
Comest  thou  from  her  ?  Is  she  restored  ?  How  is  she  ? 

countess. 
My  sister  tells  me,  she  was  more  collected 
After  her  conversation  with  the  Swede. 
She  has  now  retired  to  rest. 

wallenstein. 

The  pang  will  soften. 
She  will  shed  tears. 

countess. 

I  find  thee  alter'd  too, 
My  brother !  After  such  a  victory 
I  had  expected  to  have  found  in  thee 
A  cheerful  spirit.    O  remain  thou  firm ! 
Sustain,  uphold  us !    For  our  light  thou  art, 
Our  sun. 

wallenstein. 
Be  quiet.    I  ail  nothing.    Where 's 
Thy  husband  ? 


*  The  soliloquy  of  Thekla  consists  in  the  original  of  six-and- 
twenty  lines,  twenty  of  which  are  in  rhymes  of  irregular  recur- 
rence. I  thought  it  prudent  to  abridge  it.  Indeed  the  whole  scene 
between  Thekla  and  Lady  Neubrunn  might,  perhaps,  have  been 
omitted  without  injury  to  the  play. 

20G 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


197 


COUNTESS. 

At  a  banquet — he  and  Illo. 

WALLENSTEIN  [rises  and  strides  across  the  saloon). 

The  night's  Car  spent.     Betake  thee  to  thy  chamber. 

COUNTESS. 

Bid  me  not  go,  O  let  me  stay  with  thee ! 

WALLENSTEIN  (moirs  to  the  window). 
There  is  a  busy  motion  in  the  Heaven, 
The  wind  doth  chase  the  flag  upon  the  tower, 
Fast  sweep  the  clouds,  the  sickle*  of  the  moon, 
Struggling,  darts  snatches  of  uncertain  light. 
]Vo  form  of  star  is  visible  !    That  one 
White  stain  of  liuht,  that  single  glimmering  yonder, 
Is  from  Cassiopeia,  and  therein 
Is  Jupiter.    (A  pause).    But  now 
The  blackness  of  the  troubled  element  hides  him! 
[He  sinks  into  profound   melancholy,  and  looks 
vacantly  into  the  distance. 
COUNTESS  (looks  on  him  mournfully,  then  grasps  his 

hand). 
What  art  thou  brooding  on  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Methinks, 
If  I  but  saw  him,  't  would  be  well  with  me. 
He  is  the  star  of  my  nativity, 
And  often  marvellously  hath  his  aspect 
Shot  strength  into  my  heart. 

COUNTESS. 

Thou 'It  see  him  again. 
wallenstein'  (remains  for  a  while  with  absent  mind, 

then  assumes  a  livelier  manner,  and  turns  suddenly 

to  the  Countess). 
See  him  again  ?  O  never,  never  again ! 

COUNTESS. 

How? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

He  is  gone — is  dust. 

COUNTESS. 

Whom  meanest  thou  then? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

He,  the  more  fortunate !  yea,  he  hath  finish 'd ! 

For  him  there  is  no  longer  any  future, 

His  life  is  bright — bright  without  spot  it  was, 

And  cannot  cease  to  be.    No  ominous  hour 

Knocks  at  his  door  with  tidings  of  mishap. 

Far  off  is  he,  above  desire  and  fear ; 

No  more  submitted  to  the  change  and  chance 

Of  the  unsteady  planets.    O  'tis  well 

With  him!  but  who  knows  what  the  coming  hour 

Veil'd  in  thick  darkness  brings  for  us  ? 

*  These  four  lines  are  expressed  in  the  original  with  exquisite 
felicity. 

Am  Himmel  ist  geschsftige  Bewegung, 
Des  Thunnes  Fahne  jaet  der  Wind,  schnell  geht 
Der  Wolken  Zuc,  die  jMondcs-Sichel  wankt, 
Und  durch  die  Nacht  zuckt  ungewisse  Helle. 

The  word  "  moon-sickle,"  reminds  me  of  a  passage  in  Har- 
ris, as  quoted  by  Johnson,  under  the  word  "  falcated."  "  The 
enlightened  part  of  the  moon  appears  in  the  form  of  a  sickle  or 
reaping-hook,  which  is  while  she  is  moving  from  the  conjunc 
tion  to  the  opposition,  or  from  the  new-moon  to  the  full:  but 
from  full  to  a  new  again,  the  enlightened  part  appears  gibbous, 
and  the  dark  falcated." 

The  words  "  wanken"  and  "  schweben"  are  not  easily  trans- 
lated. The  English  words,  by  which  we  attempt  to  render 
them,  are  either  vulgar  or  pedantic,  or  not  of  sufficiently  gene- 
ral application.  So  "der  Wolken  Zug" — The  Draft,  the  Pro- 
cession of  clouds. — The  Masses  of  the  Clouds  sweep  onward 
in  swift  stream. 


COUNTESS. 

Thou  speakest 
Of  Piccolomini.    What  was  his  death  ? 
The  courier  bad  just  left  thee  as  I  came. 

[Wallenstein  by  a  motion  of  his  hand  mdke$ 

signs  to  her  Id  be  sihnt. 
Turn  not  thine  eyes  upon  the  backward  view, 
Let  us  look  forward  into  sunny  days. 
Welcome  with  joyous  heart  the  victory, 
Forget  what  it  has  cost  thee.    Not  to-day. 
For  the  first  time,  thy  friend  was  to  thee  dead; 
To  thee  he  died,  when  first  he  parted  from  thee. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

This  anguish  will  be  wearied  down,*  I  know  ; 
What  pang  is  permanent  with  man  ]  From  the  highest 
As  from  the  vilest  thing  of  every  day 
lie  learns  to  wean  himself:  for  the  strong  hours 
Conquer  him.    Yet  I  feel  what  I  have  lost 
In  him.    The  bloom  is  vanish'd  from  my  life. 
For  O !  he  stood  beside  me,  like  my  youth, 
Transform'd  for  me  the  real  to  a  dream, 
Clothing  the  palpable  and  the  familiar 
With  golden  exhalations  of  the  dawn. 
Whatever  fortunes  wait  my  future  toils, 
The  beautiful  is  vanish'd — and  returns  not. 

COUNTESS. 

O  be  not  treacherous  to  thy  own  power. 
Thy  heart  is  rich  enough  to  vivify 
Itself.    Thou  lovest  and  prizest  virtues  in  him, 
The  which  thyself  didst  plant,  thyself  unfold. 

wallenstein  (stepping  to  the  door). 
Who  interrupts  us  now  at  this  late  hour  ? 
It  is  the  Governor.    He  brings  the  keys 
Of  the  Citadel.    'Tis  midnight.    Leave  me,  sister 

COUNTESS. 

0  'tis  so  hard  to  me  this  night  to  leave  thee — 
A  boding  fear  possesses  me  ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Fear?  Wherefore? 

COUNTESS. 

Shouldst  thou  depart  this  night,  and  we  at  waking 
Never  more  find  thee  ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Fancies ! 

COUNTESS. 

O  my  soul 
Has  long  been  vveigh'd  down  by  these  dark  forebodings. 
And  if  I  combat  and  repel  them  waking, 
They  still  rush  down  upon  my  heart  in  dreams. 

1  saw  thee  yester-night  with  thy  first  wife 
Sit  at  a  banquet  gorgeously  attired. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

This  was  a  dream  of  favorable  omen, 

That  marriage  being  the  founder  of  my  fortunes. 

COUNTESS. 

To-day  I  dreamt  that  I  was  seeking  thee 

In  thy  own  chamber.    As  I  enter'd,  lo! 

It  was  no  more  a  chamber :  the  Chartreuse 

At  Gitschin  'twas,  which  thou  thyself  hast  founded 


»  A  very  inadequate  translation  of  the  original. 

Verschmerzen  werd'  ich  diesen  Schlag,  das  weise  icb, 
Denn  waB  verschmerzte  nicht  der  Mensch ! 

LITERALLY. 
I  shall  grieve  down  this  blow,  of  that  I'm  conscious: 
What  does  not  man  grieve  down  ? 

207 


198 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


And  where  it  is  thy  will  that  thou  shouldst  be 
Interr'd. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Thy  soul  is  busy  with  these  thoughts. 

COUNTESS. 

What!  dost  thou  not  believe  that  oft  in  dreams 
A  voice  of  warning  speaks  prophetic  to  us  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  there  exist  such  voices. 

Yet  I  would  not  call  litem 

Voices  of  warning  that  announce  to  us 

Only  the  inevitable.    As  the  sun, 

Ere  it  is  risen,  sometimes  paints  its  image 

In  the  atmosphere!  so  often  do  the  spirits 

Of  great  events  stride  on  before  the  events, 

And  in  to-day  already  walks  to-morrow. 

That  which  we  read  of  the  fourth  Henry's  death 

Did  ever  vex  and  haunt  me  like  a  tale 

Of  my  own  future  destiny.    The  king 

Felt  in  his  breast  the  phantom  of  the  knife, 

Long  ere  Ravaillac  arm'd  himself  therewith. 

His  quiet  mind  forsook  him :  the  phantasma 

Started  him  in  his  Louvre,  chased  him  forth 

Into  the  open  air:  like  funeral  knells 

Sounded  that  coronation  festival ; 

And  still  with  boding  sense  he  heard  the  tread 

Of  those  feet  that  even  then  were  seeking  him 

Throughout  the  streets  of  Paris. 

COUNTESS. 

And  to  thee 
The  voice  within  thy  soul  bodes  nothing  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Nothing. 
Be  wholly  tranquil. 

COUNTESS. 

And  another  time 
I  hasten'd  after  thee,  and  thou  rann'st  from  me 
Through  a  long  suite,  through  many  a  spacious  hall, 
There  seem'd  no  end  of  it :  doors  creak'd  and  clapp'd ; 
I  follow'd  panting,  but  could  not  o'ertake  thee  ; 
When  on  a  sudden  did  I  feel  myself 
Grasp'd    from    behind — the   hand    was    cold,    that 

grasp'd  me — 
'Twas  thou,  and  thou  didst  kiss  me,  and  there  seem'd 
A  crimson  covering  to  envelop  us. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

That  is  the  crimson  tapestry  of  my  chamber. 

countess  {gazing  on  him), 
If  it  should  come  to  that — if  I  should  see  thee, 
Who  standest  now  before  me  in  the  fullness 
Of  life —  [She  falls  on  his  breast  and  weeps. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

The  Emperor's  proclamation  weighs  upon  thee — 
Alphabets  wound  not — and  he  finds  no  hands. 

COUNTESS. 

If  he  should  find  them,  my  resolve  is  taken — 
I  bear  about  me  my  support  and  refuge. 

[Exit  Countess. 


SCENE  II. 

WALLENSTEIN,  GORDON. 
WALLENSTEIN. 

All  quiet  in  the  town  ? 

GORDON. 

The  town  is  quiet 


WALLENSTEIN. 

I  hear  a  boisterous  music !  and  the  Castle 
Is  lighted  up.    Who  are  the  revellers  ? 

GORDON. 

There  is  a  banquet  given  at  the  Castle 

To  the  Count  Tertsky,  and  Field  Marshal  Illo. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

In  honor  of  the  victory — This  tribe 

Can  show  their  joy  in  nothing  else  but  feasting. 

[Rings.     The  Groom  of  the  Chamber  enters. 
Unrobe  me.    I  will  lay  me  down  to  sleep. 

[Wallenstein  takes  the  keys  from  Gordon 
So  we  are  guarded  from  all  enemies, 
And-  shut  in  with  sure  friends. 
For  all  must  cheat  me,  or  a  face  like  this 

[Fixing  his  eye  on  Gordon. 
Was  ne'er  a  hypocrite's  mask. 

[The  Groom  of  the  Chamber  takes  off  his  man- 
tle, collar,  and  scarf. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Take  care — what  is  that  1 

GROOM    OF    THE    CHAMBER. 

The  golden  chain  is  snapped  in  two. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Well,  it  has  lasted  long  enough.    Here — give  it 

[He  takes  and  looks  at  the  chain. 
'Twas  the  first  present  of  the  Emperor. 
He  hung  it  round  me  in  the  war  of  Friule, 
He  being  then  Archduke;  and  I  have  worn  it 

Till  now  from  habit 

From  superstition,  if  you  will.    Belike, 

It  was  to  be  a  Talisman  to  me ; 

And  while  I  wore  it  on  my  neck  in  faith, 

It  was  to  chain  to  me  all  my  life  long 

The  volatile  fortune,  whose  first  pledge  it  was. 

Well,  be  it  so !  Henceforward  a  new  fortune 

Must  spring  up  for  me ;  for  the  potency 

Of  this  charm  is  dissolved. 

Groom  of  the  Chamber  retires  with  the  vest- 
7nents.     Wallenstein  rises,  takes  a  stride 
across  the  room,  and  stands  at  last  before 
Gordon  in  a  posture  of  meditation. 
How  the  old  time  returns  upon  me !  I 
Behold  myself  once  more  at  Burgau,  where 
We  two  were  Pages  of  the  Court  together. 
We  oftentimes  disputed  :  thy  intention 
Was  ever  good ;  but  thou  wert  wont  to  play 
The  Moralist  and  Preacher,  and  wouldst  rail  at  me— 
That  I  strove  after  things  too  high  for  me, 
Giving  my  faith  to  bold  unlawful  dreams, 
And  still  extol  to  me  the  golden  mean. 
— Thy  wisdom  hath  been  proved  a  thriftless  friend 
To  thy  own  self.    See,  it  has  made  thee  early 
A  superannuated  man,  and  (but 
That  my  munificent  stars  will  intervene) 
Would  let  thee  in  some  miserable  corner 
Go  out  like  an  untended  lamp. 

GORDON. 

My  Prince ! 
With  light  heart  the  poor  fisher  moors  his  boat, 
And  watches  from  the  shore  the  lofty  ship 
Stranded  amid  the  storm. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Art  thou  already 
208 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


199 


Tn  harbor  then,  old  man  ?  Well !  I  am  not. 
The  unconquer'd  spirit  drives  me  o'er  life's  billows ; 
My  planks  still  linn,  my  canvas  swelling  proudly. 
Hope  is  my  goddess  still,  and  Youth  my  inmate ; 
And  while  we  Stand  thus  front  to  front  almost, 
I  might  presume  to  say,  that  the  swift  years 
Have  pass'd  by  powerless  o'er  my  unblanch'd  hair. 
[He  moves  with  long  strides  across  the  Saloon,  and 

remains  on  the  opposite  side    ocer-against 

Gordon. 
Who  now  persists  in  calling  Fortune  false  ? 
To  me  she  has  proved  faithful,  with  fond  love 
Took  me  from  out  the  common  ranks  of  men, 
And  like  a  mother  goddess,  with  strong  arm 
Carried  me  swiftly  up  the  slops  of  lite. 
Nothing  is  common  in  my  destiny. 
Nor  in  the  furrows  of  my  hand.    Who  dares 
Interpret  then  my  life  for  me  as  't  were 
One  of  the  undistinguishable  many? 
True,  in  this  present  moment  I  appear 
Fallen  low  indeed  ;  but  I  shall  rise  again. 
The  high  flood  will  soon  follow  on  this  ebb ; 
The  fountain  of  my  fortune,  which  now  stops 
Repress'd  and  bound  by  some  malicious  star, 
Will  soon  in  joy  play  forth  from  all  its  pipes. 

GORDON. 

And  yet  remember  I  the  good  old  proverb, 
"  Let  the  night  come  before  we  praise  the  day." 
I  would  be  slow  from  long-continued  fortune 
To  gather  hope  :  for  Hope  is  the  companion 
Given  to  the  unfortunate  by  pitying  Heaven ; 
Fear  hovers  round  the  head  of  prosperous  men : 
For  still  unsteady  are  the  scales  of  fate. 

WALLENSTEIN  (fmilillg). 

I  hear  the  very  Gordon  that  of  old 

Was  wont  to  preach  to  me,  now  once  more  preaching ; 

I  know  well,  that  all  sublunary  things 

Are  still  the  vassals  of  vicissitude. 

The  unpropitious  gods  demand  their  tribute. 

This  long  ago  the  ancient  Pagans  knew  : 

And  therefore  of  their  own  accord  tfiey  offer'd 

To  themselves  injuries,  so  to  atone 

The  jealousy  of  their  divinities  : 

And  human  sacrifices  bled  to  Typhon. 

[After  a  pause,  serious,  and  in  a  more  subdued 
manner. 
I  too  have  sacrificed  to  him — For  me 
There  fell  the  dearest  friend,  and  through  my  fault 
He  fell !    No  joy  from  favorable  fortune 
Can  overweigh  the  anguish  of  this  stroke. 
The  envy  of  my  destiny  is  glutted : 
Life  pays  for  life.    On  his  pure  head  the  lightning 
Was  drawn  off  which  would  else  have  shatter'd  me. 


SCENE  III. 
To  these  enter  Seni. 


WALLENSTEIN. 

Is  not  that  Seni  ?  and  beside  himself, 

If  one  may  trust  his  looks  ?   What  brings  thee  hither 

At  this  late  hour,  Baptista  ? 

SENI. 

Terror,  Duke ! 
On  thy  account. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  now  ? 


Flee  ere  the  day-break  ! 
Trust  not  thy  person  to  the  Swedes ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  now 
Is  in  thy  thoughts  ? 

seni  (with  louder  voice). 
Trust  not  thy  person  to  these  Swedes. 

WALLENSTEIN. 

What  is  it  then  ? 
seni  (still  more  urgently). 

0  wTait  not  the  arrival  of  these  Swedes ! 
An  evil  near  at  hand  is  threatening  thee 

From  false  friends.    All  the  signs  stand  full  of  horror ' 
Near,  near  at  hand  the  net-work  of  perdition — 
Yea,  even  now  'tis  being  cast  around  thee! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Baptista,  thou  art  dreaming ! — Fear  befools  then 

SENI. 

Believe  not  that  an  empty  fear  deludes  me. 
Come,  read  it  in  the  planetary  aspects  ; 
Read  it  thyself,  that  ruin  threatens  thee 
From  false  friends ! 

WALLENSTEIN. 

From  the  falseness  of  my  friends 
Has  risen  the  whole  of  my  unprosperous  fortunes. 
The  warning  should  have  come  before.   At  present 

1  need  no  revelation  from  the  stars 
To  know  that. 

SENI. 

Come  and  see !  trust  thine  own  eyes ' 
A  fearful  sign  stands  in  ihe  house  of  life — 
An  enemy ;  a  fiend  lurks  close  behind 
The  radiance  of  thy  planet. — O  be  warn'd  ! 
Deliver  not  thyself  up  to  these  heathens, 
To  wage  a  war  against  our  holy  church. 

wallenstein  (laughing  gently). 
The  oracle  rails  that  way  !    Yes,  yes !    Now 
I  recollect.    This  junction  with  the  Swedes 
Did  never  please  thee — lay  thyself  to  sleep, 
Baptista !    Signs  like  these  I  do  not  fear. 

Gordon  (who  during  the  whole  of  this  dialogue  has 
shown  marks  of  extreme  agitation,  and  now  turns  to 

WALLENSTEIN). 

My  Duke  and  General !    May  I  dare  presume  ? 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Speak  freely. 

GORDON. 

What  if  'twere  no  mere  creation 
Of  fear,  if  God's  high  providence  vouchsafed 
To  interpose  its  aid  for  your  deliverance, 
And  made  that  mouth  its  organ  I 

WALLENSTEIN. 

Ye 're  both  feverish! 
How  can  mishap  come  to  me  from  these  Swedes  ? 
They  sought  this  junction  with  me — 'tis  their  in- 
terest. 
GORDON  (with  difficulty  suppressing  his  emotion). 
But  what  if  the  arrival  of  these  Swedes — 
What  if  this  were  the  very  thing  that  wing'd 
The  ruin  that  is  flying  to  your  temples  ? 

[Flings  himself  at  his  feet. 
There  is  yet  time,  my  Prince. 

SENI. 

O  hear  him  !  hear  him  ' 
209 


200 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Gordon  (rises). 
The  Rhinegrave's  still  far  off    Give  but  the  orders, 
This  citadel  shall  close  its  gates  upon  him. 
If  then  he  will  besiege  us,  let  him  try  it. 
But  this  I  say  ;  he'll  find  his  own  destruction 
With  his  whole  force  before  these  ramparts,  sooner 
Than  weary  down  the  valor  of  our  spirit. 
He  shall  experience  what  a  band  of  heroes, 
Inspirited  by  an  heroic  leader, 
Is  able  to  perform.    And  if  indeed 
It  be  thy  serious  wish  to  make  amend 
For  that  which  thou  hast  done  amiss, — this,  this 
Will  touch  and  reconcile  the  Emperor 
Who  gladly  turns  his  heart  to  thoughts  of  mercy, 
And  Friedland,  who  returns  repentant  to  him, 
Will  stand  yet  higher  in  his  Emperor's  favor, 
Than  e'er  he  stood  when  he  had  never  fallen. 

WALLENstein  (contemplates  him  with  surprise,  remains 

silent  awhile,  betraying  strong  emotion). 
Gordon — your  zeal  and  fervor  lead  you  far. 
Well,  weK — an  old  friend  has  a  privilege. 
Blood,  Gordon,  has  been  flowing.     Never,  never 
Can  the  Emperor  pardon  me  :  and  if  he  could, 
Yet  I — I  ne'er  could  let  myself  be  pardon'd. 
Had  I  foreknown  what  now  has  taken  place, 
That  he,  my  dearest  friend,  would  fall  for  me, 
My  first  death-offering ;  and  had  the  heart 
Spoken  to  me,  as  now  it  has  done — Gordon, 
It  may  be,  I  might  have  bethought  myself. 
It  may  be  too,  I  might  not.     Might  or  might  not, 
Is  now  an  idle  question.    All  too  seriously 
Has  it  begun,  to  end  in  nothing,  Gordon ! 
Let  it  then  have  its  course. 

[Stepping  to  the  window 
All  dark  and  silent — at  the  Castle  too 
All  is  now  hush'd — Light  me,  Chamberlain ! 

[The  Groom  of  the  Chamber,  who  had  entered 
during  the  last  dialogue,  and  had  been  stand- 
ing at  a  distance  and  listening  to  it  with 
visible  expressions  of  the  deepest  interest,  ad- 
vances in  extreme  agitation,  and  Uirows  him- 
self at  the  Duke's  feet. 
And  thou  too !    But  I  know  why  thou  dost  wish 
My  reconcilement  with  the  Emperor. 
Poor  man !  he  hath  a  small  estate  in  Caernthen, 
And  fears  it  will  be  forfeited  because 
He 's  in  my  service.     Am  I  then  so  poor, 
That  I  no  longer  can  indemnify 
My  servants  ?    Well !  to  no  one  I  employ 
Means  of  compulsion.     If  'tis  thy  belief 
That  Fortune  has  fled  from  me,  go !  forsake  me. 
This  night  for  the  last  time  mayst  thou  unrobe  me, 
And  then  go  over  to  thy  Emperor. 
Gordon,  good  night !  I  think  to  make  a  long 
Sleep  of  it :  for  the  struggle  and  the  turmoil 
Of  this  last  day  or  two  was  great.  May 't  please  you ! 
Take  care  that  they  awake  me  not  too  early. 

[ Exit  XV allevstew,  the  Groom  of  the  Chamber 
lighting  him.  Sexi  follows,  Gordon  remains 
on  the  darkened  stage,  following  the  Duke 
with  his  eye,  till  he  disappears  at  the  farther 
end  of  the  gallery :  then  by  his  gestures  the  old 
man  expresses  the  depth  of  his  anguish,  and 
stands  leaning  against  a  pillar. 


SCENE  IV. 
Gordon,  Butler  (at  first  behind  the  Scenes). 
Butler  (not  yet  come  into  view  of  the  stage). 
Here  stand  in  silence  till  I  give  the  signal. 

Gordon  (starts  up). 
Tis  he,  he  has  already  brought  the  murderers. 

BUTLER. 

The  lights  are  out.    All  lies  in  profound  sleep. 

GORDON. 

What  shall  I  do  ?  Shall  I  attempt  to  save  him  ? 
Shall  I  call  up  the  house  ?   Alarm  the  guards  ? 
butler  (appears,  but  scarcely  on  the  stage). 
A  light  gleams  hither  from  the  corridor. 
It  leads  directly  to  the  Duke's  bed-chamber. 

GORDON. 

But  then  I  break  my  oath  to  the  Emperor ; 
If  he  escape  and  strengthen  the  enemy, 
Do  I  not  hereby  call  down  upon  my  head 
All  the  dread  consequences  ? 

butler  (stepping  forward). 

Hark !  Who  speaks  there  ? 

GORDON. 

'Tis  better,  I  resign  it  to  the  hands 
Of  Providence.    For  what  am  I,  that  I 
Should  take  upon  myself  so  great  a  deed  ? 
/  have  not  murder'd  him,  if  he  be  murder'd  ; 
But  all  his  rescue  were  my  act  and  deed  ; 
Mine — and  whatever  be  the  consequences, 
I  must  sustain  them. 

butler  (advances). 

I  should  know  that  voice. 

GORDON. 

Butler ! 

butler. 
'Tis  Gordon.     What  do  you  want  here  ? 
Was  it  so  late  then,  when  the  Duke  dismiss'd  you  ? 

GORDON. 

Your  hand  bound  up  and  in  a  scarf? 
butler. 

'Tis  wounded. 
That  Mo  fought  as  he  were  frantic,  till 
At  last  we  threw  him  on  the  ground. 
GORDON  (shuddering). 

Both  dead  ? 
butler. 
Is  he  in  bed  ? 

GORDON. 

Ah,  Butler ! 

butler. 

Is  he  ?  Speak. 

GORDON. 

He  shall  not  perish  !  Not  through  you '  The  Heaven 
Refuses  your  arm.    See — 'tis  wounded! — 

butler. 
There  is  no  need  of  my  arm. 

GORDON. 

The  most  guilty 
Have  perish'd,  and  enough  is  given  to  justice. 

[The  Groom  of  the  Chamber  advances  from 
the  gallery  with  hisfnger  on  his  mouth,  com- 
manding  silence. 

GORDON. 

He  sleeps !  O  murder  not  the  holy  sleep ! 

butler. 
No !  he  shall  die  awake.  [Is  going 

210 


THE  DEATH  OF  WALLENSTEIN. 


201 


GORDON. 

His  heart  still  cleaves 
To  earthly  things :  he 's  not  prepared  to  step 
Into  the  presence  of  his  God  ! 

butler  (going). 

God 's  merciful ! 
Gordon  (holds  him). 
Grant  him  but  this  night's  respite. 

butler  (hurrying  off). 

The  next  moment 
May  ruin  all. 

Gordon  (holds  him  still). 
One  hour ! 

BUTLER. 

Unhold  me !  What 
Can  that  short  respite  profit  him  ? 

GORDON. 

O— Time 
Works  miracles.    In  one  hour  many  thousands 
Of  grains  of  sand  run  out ;  and  quick  as  they, 
Thought  follows  thought  within  the  human  soul. 
Only  one  hour !    Your  heart  may  change  its  purpose, 
His  heart  may  change  its  purpose — some  new  tidings 
May  come ;  some  fortunate  event,  decisive, 
May  fall  from  Heaven  and  rescue  him.    O  what 
May  not  one  hour  achieve ! 

BUTLER. 

You  but  remind  me, 
How  precious  every  minute  is ! 

[He  stamps  on  the  floor. 


SCENE  V. 


To  these  enter  Macdonald,  and  Devereux,  with  the 

Halberdiers. 
Gordon  (throwing  himself  between  him  and  them). 
]\To,  monster! 
First  over  my  dead  body  thou  shalt  tread. 
I  will  not  live  to  see  the  accursed  deed ! 

butler  (forcing  him  out  of  the  way). 
Weak-hearted  dotard ! 

[Trumpets  are  heard  in  the  distance, 
devereux  and  macdonald. 

Hark  !  The  Swedish  trumpets  ! 
The  Swedes  before  the  ramparts  !  Let  us  hasten ! 

Gordon  (rushes  out). 
O,  God  of  Mercy ! 

butler  (calling  after  him). 

Governor,  to  your  post ! 
groom  of  the  chamber  (hurries  in). 
Who  dares  make  larum  here  ?  Hush !  The  Duke  sleeps. 

devereux  (with  a  loud  harsh  voice). 
Friend,  it  is  time  now  to  make  larum. 

GROOM  OF  THE  CHAMBER. 

Help ! 
Murder ! 

BUTLER. 

Down  with  him ! 
groom  OF  the  chamber   (run  through  the  body  by 
Devereux,  falls  at  the  entrance  of  the  gallery). 
Jesus  Maria ! 

BUTLER. 

Burst  the  doors  open. 

[Tliey  rush  over  the  body  into  the  gallery — two 
doors  are  heard  to  crash  one  after  the  other — 
Voices  deadened  by  the  distance — Clash  of 
ar/ns — then  all  at  once  a  profound  silence 


SCENE  VI. 

COUNTESS  TERTSKY  (with  a  light). 

Her  bed-chamber  is  empty ;  she  herself 
Is  nowhere  to  be  found  !  The  Neubrunn  too, 
Who  watch'd  by  her,  is  missing.     If  she  should 

Be  flown But  whither  Sown  '  We  must  call  up 

Every  soul  in  the  house.    How  will  the  Duke 
Bear  up  against  these  worst  bad  tidings?  O 
If  that  my  husband  now  were  but  retum'd 
Home  from  the  banquet! — Hark!  1  wonder  whether 
The  Duke  is  still  awake!  I  though)  I  heard 
Voices  and  tread  of  feet  here !  I  will  go 
And  listen  at  the  door.    Hark!  what  is  that? 
'Tis  hastening  up  the  steps! 


SCENE  VII. 

Countess,  Gordon. 

Gordon  (rushes  in  out  of  breath). 
'Tis  a  mistake ! 
'Tis  not  the  Swedes — Ye  must  proceed  no  further — 
Butler ! — O  God !  where  is  he  ? 

Gordon  (observing  the  Countess). 

Countess !  Say —  - 
countess. 
You  are  come  then  from  the  castle  ?    Where 's  my 
husband  ? 
Gordon  (in  an  agony  of  affright). 

Your  husband ! — Ask  not ! — To  the  Duke 

countess. 

Not  till 
You  have  discover'd  to  me 

GORDON. 

On  this  moment 
Does  the  world  hang.    For  God's  sake !  to  the  Duke. 

While  we  are  speaking 

[Calling  loudlu. 
Butler!  Butler!  God! 
countess. 
Why,  he  is  at  the  castle  with  my  husband. 

[Butler  comes  from  the  Gallery. 

GORDON. 

'Twas  a  mistake — 'Tis  not  the  Swedes — it  is 
The  Imperialist's  Lieutenant-Gene  ral 
Has  sent  me  hither — will  be  here  himself 
Instantly. — You  must  not  proceed. 

BUTLER. 

He  comes 
Too  late.       [Gordon  dashes  himself  against  the  wall 

GORDON. 

O  God  of  mercy  ! 

countess. 

What  too  late  ? 
Who  will  be  here  himself?  Octavio 
In  Egra  ?  Treason  !  Treason  ! — Where's  the  Duke  ? 
[She  rushes  to  the  Gallery 


SCENE  VIII. 


(Servajits  run  across  the  Stage  full  of  terror.  The  whoh 
Scene  must  be  spoken  entirely  without  pauses). 

seni  (from  the  Gallery). 
O  bloody  frightful  deed  ! 

211 


'202 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


COUNTESS. 

What  is  it,  Seni  ? 
page  {from  the  Gallery). 
O  piteous  sight ! 

[Other  Servants  hasten  in  with  torches. 

COUNTESS. 

What  is  it  ?  For  God's  sake ! 

SENI. 

And  do  you  ask  ? 
Within  the  Duke  lies  murder'd — and  your  husband 
Assassinated  at  the  Castle. 

[Tfie  Countess  stands  motionless. 
female  servant  {rushing  across  the  stage). 
Help!  Help!  the  Duchess! 

burgomaster  (enters). 

What  mean  these  confused 
Loud  cries,  that  wake  the  sleepers  of  this  house  ? 

GORDON. 

Your  house  is  cursed  to  all  eternity. 
In  your  house  doth  the  Duke  lie  murder'd ! 
burgomaster  {rushing  out). 

Heaven  forbid! 
first  servant. 
Fly !  fly  !  they  murder  us  all ! 

second  servant  (carrying  silver  plate). 

That  way  !  the  lower 
Passages  are  block 'd  up. 

voice  (from  behind  the  Scene). 
Make  room  for  the  Lieutenant-General ! 

[At  these  words  the  Countess  starts  from  her  stupor, 
collects  herself,  and  retires  suddenly. 
voice  (from  behind  the  Scene). 
Keep  back  the  people !  Guard  the  door ! 


SCENE  IX. 


To  these  enters  Octavio  Piccolomini  with  all  his 
Train.  At  the  same  time  Devereux  and  Macdon- 
Ald  enter  from  the  Corridor  with  the  Halberdiers. 
— Wallenstein's  dead  body  is  carried  over  the 
back  part  of  the  Stage,  wrapped  in  a  piece  of  crim- 
son tapestry. 

octavio  (entering  abruptly). 
It  must  not  be !  It  is  not  possible ! 
Butler !  Gordon ! 
I'll  not  believe  it.    Say,  No! 

[Gordon,  without  answering,  points  with  his  hand  to 
the  Body  of  Wallenstein  as  it  is  carried  over 
the  back  of  the  Stage.    Octavio  looks  that  way, 
and  sta?ids  overpowered  with  horror. 
devereux  (to  Butler). 
Here  is  the  golden  fleece — the  Duke's  sword — 

macdonald. 
Is  it  your  order — 

butler  (pointing  to  Octavio). 

Here  stands  he  who  now 
Hath  the  sole  power  to  issue  orders. 

[Devereux  and  Macdonald  retire  with  marks  of 
obeisance.     One  drops  away  after  the  other, 
till  only  Butler,  Octavio,  and  Gordon 
remain  on  the  Stage. 
octavio  (turning  to  Butler). 
Was  that  my  purpose,  Butler,  when  we  parted  ? 
vy  God  of  Justice  ! 

To  thee  I  lift  my  hand !  I  am  not  guilty 
Of  this  foul  deed. 


butler. 
Your  hand  is  pure.    You  have 
Avail'd  yourself  of  mine. 

octavio. 

Merciless  man ! 
Thus  to  abuse  the  orders  of  thy  Lord — 
And  stain  thy  Emperor's  holy  name  with  murder, 
With  bloody,  most  accursed  assassination ! 

butler  (calmly). 
I've  but  fulfill'd  the  Emperor's  own  sentence. 

octavio. 

0  curse  of  kings, 

Infusing  a  dread  life  into  their  words, 
And  linking  to  the  sudden  transient  thought 
The  unchangeable  irrevocable  deed. 
Was  there  necessity  for  such  an  eager 
Dispatch  ?  Couldst  thou  not  grant  the  merciful 
A  time  for  mercy  ?  Time  is  man's  good  Angel. 
To  leave  no  interval  between  the  sentence, 
And  the  fulfilment  of  it,  doth  beseem 
God  only,  the  immutable  ! 

butler. 

For  what 
Rail  you  against  me  ?  What  is  my  offence  ? 
The  Empire  from  a  fearful  enemy 
Have  I  deliver'd,  and  expect  reward. 
The  single  difference  betwixt  you  and  me 
Is  this :  you  placed  the  arrow  in  the  bow ; 

1  pull'd  the  string.    You  sow'd  blood,  and  yet  stand 
Astonish'd  that  blood  is  come  up.    I  always 
Knew  what  I  did,  and  therefore  no  result 

Hath  power  to  frighten  or  surprise  my  spirit. 

Have  you  aught  else  to  order  ?  for  this  instant 

I  make  my  best  speed  to  Vienna ;  place 

My  bleeding  sword  before  my  Emperor's  Throne, 

And  hope  to  gain  the  applause  which  undelaying 

And  punctual  obedience  may  demand 

From  a  just  judge,  [Exit  Butler 


SCENE  X. 


To  these  enter  the  Countess  Tertsky,  pale  and  dis 
ordered.  Her  utterance  is  slow  and  feeble,  and  un- 
impassioned. 

octavio  (meeting  her). 
O  Countess  Tertsky  !  These  are  the  results 
Of  luckless  unblest  deeds. 

COUNTESS. 

They  are  the  fruits 
Of  your  contrivances.    The  duke  is  dead, 
My  husband  too  is  dead,  the  Duchess  struggles 
In  the  pangs  of  death,  my  niece  has  disappear'd. 
This  house  of  splendor,  and  of  princely  glory. 
Doth  now  stand  desolated :  the  affrighted  servant 
Rush  forth  through  all  ils  doors.     I  am  the  last 
Therein ;  I  shut  it  up,  and  here  deliver 
The  keys. 

octavio  (with  a  deep  anguish). 
O  Countess !  my  house  too  is  desolate 

countess. 
Who  next  is  to  be  murder'd  ?    Who  is  next 
To  bo  maltreated  ?  Lo  !  the  Duke  is  dead. 
The  Emperor's  vengeance  may  be  pacified ! 
Spare  the  old  servants ;  let  not  their  fidelity 
Be  imputed  to  the  faithful  as  a  crime — 

212 


THE  FALL  OF  ROBESPIERRE. 


203 


The  evil  destiny  surprised  my  brother 
Too  suddenly  :  he  could  not  think  on  them. 

OCTAVIO. 

Speak  not  of  vengeance !  Speak  not  of  maltreatment ! 

The  Emperor  is  appeased  ;  the  heavy  fault 

Hath  heavily  been  expiated — nothing 

Descended  from  the  father  to  the  daughter, 

Except  his  glory  and  his  services. 

The  Empress  honors  your  adversity, 

Takes  part  in  your  afflictions,  opens  to  you 

Her  motherly  arms  !   Therefore  no  farther  fears ; 

Yield  yourself  up  in  hope  and  confidence 

To  the  Imperial  Grace ! 

countess  {with  her  eye  raised  to  heaven) 
To  the  grace  and  mercy  of  a  greater  Master 
Do  I  yield  up  myself.    Where  shall  the  body 
Of  the  Duke  have  its  place  of  final  rest  ? 
In  the  Chartreuse,  which  he  himself  did  found 
At  Gitschin,  rest  the  Countess  Wallenstein ; 
And  by  her  side,  to  whom  he  was  indebted 
For  his  first  fortunes,  gratefully  he  wish'd 
He  might  sometime  repose  in  death  !  0  let  him 
Be  buried  there.  And  likewise,  for  my  husband's 
Remains,  I  ask  the  like  grace.    The  Emperor 
Is  now  proprietor  of  all  our  Castles. 
This  sure  may  well  be  granted  us — one  sepulchre 
Beside  the  sepulchres  of  our  forefathers ! 

OCTAVIO. 

Countess,  you  tremble,  you  turn  pale ! 
COUNTESS  {reassembles  all  her  powers,  and  speaks  with 
energy  and  dignity). 

You  think 


More  worthily  of  me,  than  to  believe 
I  would  survive  the  downfall  of  my  house. 
We  did  not  hold  ourselves  too  mean  to  grasp 
After  a  monarch's  crown — the  crown  did  Fate 
Deny,  but  not  the  feeling  and  the  spirit 
That  to  the  crown  belong !   We  deem  a 
Courageous  death  more  worthy  of  our  free  station 
Than  a  dishonor'd  life. — I  have  taken  poison. 

OCTAVIO. 

Help !  Help !  Support  her ! 

COUNTESS. 

Nay,  it  is  too  late. 
In  a  few  moments  is  my  fate  accomplish'd. 

[Exit  Countess 

GORDON. 

O  house  of  death  and  horrors ! 

[An  Officer  enters,  and  brings  a  letter  with  the 
great  seal. 
Gordon  (steps  forward  and  meets  him). 
What  is  this? 
It  is  the  Imperial  Seal. 

[He  reads  the  address,  and  delivers  the  letter  to 
Octavio  with  a  look  of  reproach,  and  with 
an  emphasis  on  the  word. 
To  the  Prince  Piccolomini. 

[Octavio,  with  his  whole  frame  expressive  of  sud- 
den anguish,  raises  his  eyes  to  heaven. 

( The  Curtain  drops.) 


AN  HISTORIC  DRAMA. 


DEDICATION. 


TO  H.  MARTIN,  ESQ. 

OF  JESUS  COLLEGE,  CAMBRIDGE. 

Dear  Sir, 
Accept,  as  a  small  testimony  of  my  grateful  attach- 
ment, the  following  Dramatic  Poem,  in  which  I  have 
endeavored  to  detail,  in  an  interesting  form,  the  fall 
of  a  man,  whose  great  bad  actions  have  cast  a  dis- 
astrous lustre  on  his  name.  In  the  execution  of  the 
work,  as  intricacy  of  plot  could  not  have  been  at- 
tempted without  a  gross  violation  of  recent  facts,  it 
has  been  my  sole  aim  to  imitate  the  impassioned  and 
highly  figurative  language  of  the  French  Orators, 
and  to  develop  the  characters  of  the  chief  actors  on 
a  vast  stage  of  horrors. 


Yours  fraternally, 


S.  T.  Coleridge. 


Jesus  College,  September  22,  1794. 


THE  FALL  OF  ROBESPIERRE. 


ACT  I. 

SCENE,  The  Tuilleries 


The  tempest  gathers — be  it  mine  to  seek 
A  friendly  shelter,  ere  it  bursts  upon  him. 
But  where  ?  and  how  ?  I  fear  the  Tyrant's  soul- 
Sudden  in  action,  fertile  in  resource, 
And  rising  awful  'mid  impending  ruins ; 
In  splendor  gloomy,  as  the  midnight  meteor, 
That  fearless  thwarts  the  elemental  war. 
When  last  in  secret  conference  we  met. 
He  scowl'd  upon  me  with  suspicious  rage, 
Making  his  eye  the  inmate  of  my  bosom. 
I  know  he  scorns  me — and  I  feel,  I  hate  him — 
Yet  there  is  in  him  that  which  makes  me  tremble ! 

[Exit 
213 


204 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Enter  Tallien  and  Legendre. 

TALLIEN. 

It  was  Barrere,  Legendre !  didst  thou  mark  him  ? 

Abrupt  he  turn'd,  yet  linger'd  as  he  went, 

And  towards  us  cast  a  look  of  doubtful  meaning. 

LEGENDRE. 

I  mark'd  him  well.    I  met  his  eye's  last  glance; 

It  menaced  not  so  proudly  as  of  yore. 

Methought  he  would  have  spoke — but  that  he  dared 

not — 
Such  agitalion  darken'd  on  his  brow. 

TALLIEN. 

'Twas  all-distrusting  guilt  that  kept  from  bursting 
Th'  imprison'd  secret  struggling  in  the  face  : 
E'en  as  the  sudden  breeze  upstarting  onwards 
Hurries  the  thunder-cloud,  that  poised  awhile 
Hung  in  mid  air,  red  with  its  mutinous  burthen. 

LEGENDRE. 

Perfidious  Traitor! — still  afraid  to  bask 
In  the  full  blaze  of  power,  the  rustling  serpent 
Lurks  in  the  thicket  of  the  Tyrant's  greatness, 
Ever  prepared  to  sting  who  shelters  him. 
Each  thought,  each  action  in  himself  converges ; 
And  love  and  friendship  on  his  coward  heart 
Shine  like  the  powerless  sun  on  polar  ice: 
To  all  attach'd,  by  turns  deserting  all, 
Cunning  and  dark — a  necessary  villain! 

TALLIEN. 

Yet  much  depends  upon  him — well  you  know 
With  plausible  harangue  'tis  his  to  paint 
Defeat  like  victory — and  blind  the  mob 
With  truth-mix'd  falsehood.    They,  led  on  by  him, 
And  wild  of  head  to  work  their  own  destruction, 
Support  with  uproar  what  he  plans  in  darkness. 

LEGENDRE. 

O  what  a  precious  name  is  Liberty 

To  scare  or  cheat  the  simple  into  slaves ! 

Yes — we  must  gain  him  over :  by  dark  hints 

We'll  show  enough  to  rouse  his  watchful  fears, 

Till  the  cold  coward  blaze  a  patriot. 

O  Danton !  murder'd  friend  !  assist  my  counsels — 

Hover  around  me  on  sad  memory's  wings, 

And  pour  thy  daring  vengeance  in  my  heart. 

Tallien !  if  but  to-morrow's  fateful  sun 

Beholds  the  Tyrant  living — we  are  dead ! 

TALLIEN. 

Yet  his  keen  eye  that  flashes  mighty  meanings — 

LEGENDRE. 

Fear  not — or  rather  fear  th' alternative, 

And  seek  for  courage  e'en  in  cowardice. 

But  see — hither  he  comes — let  us  away  ! 

His  brother  with  him,  and  the  bloody  Couthon, 

And  high  of  haughty  spirit,  young  St-Just. 

[Exeunt. 

Enter  Robespierre,  Couthon,  St-Just,  and 
Robespierre  Junior. 

robespierre. 
What!  did  La  Fayette  fall  before  my  power? 
And  did  I  conquer  Roland's  spotless  virtues  ? 
The  fervent  eloquence  of  Vergniaud's  tongue? 
And  Brissot's  thoughtful  soul  unbribed  and  bold? 
Did  zealot  armies  haste  in  vain  to  save  them  ? 
What!  did  th' assassin's  dagger  aim  its  point 
Vain,  as  a  dream  of  murder,  at  my  bosom  ? 


And  shall  I  dread  the  soft  luxurious  Tallien  ? 
Th' Adonis  Tallien?  banquet-hunting  Tallien? 
Him,  whose  heart  flutters  at  the  dice-box  ?  Him, 
Who  ever  on  the  harlots'  downy  pillow 
Resigns  his  head  impure  to  feverish  slumbers ! 

ST-JUST. 

I  cannot  fear  him — yet  we  must  not  scorn  him. 
Was  it  not  Antony  that  conquer'd  Brutus, 
Th' Adonis,  banquet-hunting  Antony? 
The  state  is  not  yet  purified  :  and  though 
The  stream  runs  clear,  yet  at  the  bottom  lies 
The  thick  black  sediment  of  all  the  factions — 
It  needs  no  magic  hand  to  stir  it  up  ! 

COUTHON. 

0  we  did  wrong  to  spare  them — fatal  error ! 
Why  lived  Legendre,  when  that  Danton  died  ? 
And  Collot  d'Herbois  dangerous  in  crimes? 
I've  fcar'd  him,  since  his  iron  heart  endured 
To  make  of  Lyons  one  vast  human  shambles, 
Compared  with  which  the  sun-scorch'd  wilderness 
Of  Zara  were  a  smiling  paradise. 

ST-JUST. 

Rightly  thou  judgest,  Couthon  !  He  is  one, 

Who  flies  from  silent  solitary  anguish, 

Seeking  forgetful  peace  amid  the  jar 

Of  elements.    The  how!  of  maniac  uproar 

Lulls  to  sad  sleep  the  memory  of  himself. 

A  calm  is  fatal  to  him — then  he  feels 

The  dire  upboilings  of  the  storm  within  him. 

A  tiger  mad  with  inward  wounds. 1  dread 

The  fierce  and  restless  turbulence  of  guilt. 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Is  not  the  commune  ours?    The  stern  tribunal? 
Dumas?  and  Vivier?    Fleuriot  ?  and  Louvet? 
And  Henriot?  We'll  denounce  a  hundred,  nor 
Shall  they  behold  to-morrow's  sun  roll  westward. 

ROBESPIERRE  JUNIOR. 

Nay — I  am  sick  of  blood ;  my  aching  heart 
Reviews  the  long,  long  train  of  hideous  horrors 
That  still  have  gloom'd  the  rise  of  the  republic. 

1  should  have  died  before  Toulon,  when  war 
Became  the  patriot! 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Most  unworthy  wish ! 
He,  whose  heart  sickens  at  the  blood  of  traitors, 
Would  be  himself  a  traitor,  were  he  not 
A  coward !  'T  is  congenial  souls  alone 
Shed  tears  of  sorrow  for  each  other's  fate. 
O  thou  art  brave,  my  brother !  and  thine  eye 
Full  firmly  shines  amid  the  groaning  battle — 
Yet  in  thine  heart  the  woman-form  of  pity 
Asserts  too  large  a  share,  an  ill-timed  guest! 
There  is  unsoundness  in  the  state — To-morrow 
Shall  see  it  cleansed  by  wholesome  massacre! 

ROBESPIERRE  JUNIOR. 

Beware !  already  do  the  sections  murmur— 
"  O  the  great  glorious  patriot,  Robespierre — 
The  tyrant  guardian  of  the  country's  freedom  !" 

COUTHON. 

'Twere  folly  sure  to  work  great  deeds  by  halves .' 
Much  I  suspect  the  darksome  fickle  heart 
Of  cold  Barrere ! 

ROBESPIERRE. 

I  see  the  villain  in  him ! 

ROBESPIERRE  JUNIOR. 

If  he — if  all  forsake  thee — what  remains  ? 
214 


THE  FALL  OF  ROBESPIERRE. 


205 


ROBESPIERRE. 

Myself!  the  steel-strong  Rectitude  of  soul 
And  Poverty  sublime  'mid  circling  virtues! 
The  giant  Victories,  my  counsels  form'd, 
Shall  stalk  around  me  with  sun-glittering  plumes, 
Bidding  the  darts  of  calumny  fall  pointless. 

[Exeunt  cceteri.  Manet  Couthon. 

COUTHON  (.SOlus). 

So  we  deceive  ourselves !   What  goodly  virtues 
Bloom  on  the  poisonous  branches  of  ambition ! 
Still,  Robespierre  !  thou 'It  guard  thy  country's  freedom 
To  des[M>tize  in  all  the  patriot's  pomp. 
While  Conscience, 'mid  the  mob's  applauding  clamors, 
Sleeps  in  thine  ear,  nor  whispers — blood-stain'd  tyrant! 
Yet  what  is  Conscience  ?  Superstition's  dream, 
Making  such  deep  impression  on  our  sleep — 
That  long  th'  awaken'd  breast  retains  its  horrors ! 
But  he  returns — and  with  him  comes  Barrere. 

[Exit  Couthon. 

Enter  Robespierre  and  Barrere. 

ROBESPIERRE. 

There  is  no  danger  but  in  cowardice. — 
Barrere  !  we  make  the  danger,  when  we  fear  it. 
We  have  such  ibrce  without,  as  will  suspend 
The  cold  and  trembling  treachery  of  these  members. 

BARRERE. 

'T  will  be  a  pause  of  terror. — 

ROBESPIERRE. 

But  to  whom  ? 
Rather  the  short-lived  slumber  of  the  tempest, 
Gathering  its  strength  anew.  The  dastard  traitors ! 
Moles,  that  would  undermine  the  rooted  oak ! 
A  pause  ! — a  moment's  pause  ! — 'T  is  all  their  life. 

BARRERE. 

Yet  much  they  talk — and  plausible  their  speech. 
Couthon's  decree  has  given  such  powers,  that — 


ROBESPIERRE. 


That  what  ? 


BARRERE. 

The  freedom  of  debate — 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Transparent  mask ! 
They  wish  to  clog  the  wheels  of  government, 
Forcing  the  hand  that  guides  the  vast  machine 
To  bribe  them  to  their  duty — English  patriots ! 
Are  not  the  congregated  clouds  of  war 
Black  all  around  us  I  In  our  very  vitals 
Works  not  the  king-bred  poison  of  rebellion  ? 
Say,  what  shall  counteract  the  selfish  plottings 
Of  wretches,  cold  of  heart,  nor  awed  by  fears 
Of  him,  whose  power  directs  th'  eternal  justice  ? 
Terror  >.  or  secret-sapping  gold  ?  The  first 
Heavy,  but  transient  as  the  ills  that  cause  it ; 
And  to  the  virtuous  patriot  render'd  light 
By  the  necessities  that  gave  it  birth : 
The  other  fouls  the  fount  of  the  republic, 
Making  it  flow  polluted  to  all  ages ; 
Inoculates  the  state  with  a  slow  venom, 
That,  once  imbibed,  must  be  continued  ever. 
Myself  incorruptible,  I  ne'er  could  bribe  them — 
Therefore  they  hate  me. 

BARRERE. 

Are  the  sections  friendly  ? 
T2 


ROBESPIERRE. 

There  are  who  wish  my  ruin — but  I  '11  make  them 
Blush  for  the  crime  in  blood ! 

BARRERE. 

Nay,  but  I  tell  theo, 
Thou  art  too  fond  of  slaughter — and  the  right 
(If  right  it  be)  workest  by  most  foul  means ! 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Self-centering  Fear  .'  how  well  thou  canst  ape  Mercy! 
Too  fond  of  slaughter! — matchless  hypocrite! 
Thought  Barrere  so,  when  Brissot,  Danton  died? 
Thought  Barrere  so,   when  through   the  streaming 

streets 
Of  Paris  red-eyed  Massacre  o'er-wearied 
Reel'd  heavily,  intoxicate  with  blood  ? 
And  when  (O  heavens !)  in  Lyons'  death-red  square 
Sick  Fancy  groan'd  o'er  putrid  hills  of  slain, 
Didst  thou  not  fiercely  laugh,  and  bless  the  day  ? 
Why,  thou  hast  been  the  mouth-piece  of  all  horrors, 
And,  like  a  blood-hound,  crouch'd  for  murder!  Now 
Aloof  thou  standest  from  the  tottering  pillar, 
Or,  like  a  frighted  child  behind  its  mother, 
Hidest  thy  pale  face  in  the  skirts  of- — Mercy  ! 

BARRERE. 

0  prodigality  of  eloquent  anger ! 

Why  now  I  see  thou  'rt  weak — thy  case  is  desperate  ! 
The  cool  ferocious  Robespierre  turn'd  scolder ! 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Who  from  a  bad  man's  bosom  wards  the  blow 
Reserves  the  whetted  dagger  for  his  own. 
Denounced  twice— and  twice  I  saved  his  life !  [Exit 

BARRERE. 

The  sections  will  support  them — there's  the  point! 
No  !  he  can  never  weather  out  the  storm — 
Yet  he  is  sudden  in  revenge — No  more  ! 

1  must  away  to  Tallien.  [Fxk. 


SCENE  changes  to  the  house  of  Adelaide. 
Adelaide  enters,  speaking  to  a  Servant. 

ADELAIDE. 

Didst  thou  present  the  letter  that  I  gave  thee  ? 
Did  Tallien  answer,  he  would  soon  return  ? 

SERVANT. 

He  is  in  the  Tuilleries — with  him  Legendre — 
In  deep  discourse  they  seem'd  ;  as  I  approach'd, 
He  waved  his  hand  as  bidding  me  retire : 
I  did  not  interrupt  him.  [Returns  the  letter. 

ADELAIDE. 

Thou  didst  rightly. 

[Exit  Servant. 
O  this  new  freedom !  at  how  dear  a  price 
We've  bought  the  seeming  good !  The  peaceful  virtues, 
And  every  blandishment  of  private  life. 
The  father's  cares,  the  mother's  fond  endearment, 
All  sacrificed  to  Liberty's  wild  riot. 
The  winged  hours,  that  scatter'd  roses  round  me, 
Languid  and  sad  drag  their  slow  course  along, 
And  shake  big  gall-drops  from  their  heavy  wings. 
But  I  will  steal  away  these  anxious  thoughts 
By  the  soft  languishment  of  warbled  airs, 
If  haply  melodies  may  lull  the  sense 
Of  sorrow  for  a  while. 

215 


JOtf 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


(Soft  Music). 
Enter  Tallien. 


Music,  my  love  ?  0  breathe  again  that  air ! 

Soft  nurse  of  pain,  it  soothes  the  weary  soul 

Of  care,  sweet  as  the  whisper'd  breeze  of  evening 

That  plays  around  the  sick  man's  throbbing  temples. 


Tell  me,  on  what  holy  ground 
May  domestic  peace  be  found  ? 
Halcyon  daughter  of  the  skies, 
Far  on  fearful  wing  she  flies, 
From  the  pomp  of  sceptred  state, 
From  the  rebel's  noisy  hate. 

In  a  cottaged  vale  she  dwells, 
List'ning  to  the  Sabbath  bells ! 
Still  around  her  steps  are  seen 
Spotless  Honor's  meeker  mien, 
Love,  the  fire  of  pleasing  fears. 
Sorrow  smiling  through  her  tears  ; 
And,  conscious  of  the  past  employ, 
Memory,  bosom-spring  of  joy. 


I  thank  thee,  Adelaide!  't  was  sweet,  though  mournful. 
But  why  thy  brow  o'ercast,  thy  cheek  so  wan  ? 
Thou  look'st  as  a  lorn  maid  beside  some  stream 
That  sighs  away  the  soul  in  fond  despairing, 
While  Sorrow  sad,  like  the  dank  willow  near  her, 
Hangs  o'er  the  troubled  fountain  of  her  eye. 

ADELAIDE. 

Ah !  rather  let  me  ask  what  mystery  lowers 

On  Tallien's  darken'd  brow.  Thou  dost  me  wrong — 

Thy  soul  distemper'd,  can  my  heart  be  tranquil  ? 

TALLIEN. 

Tell  me,  by  whom  thy  brother's  blood  was  spilt  ? 
Asks  he  not  vengeance  on  these  patriot  murderers  ? 
It  has  been  borne  too  tamely.    Fears  and  curses 
Groan  on  our  midnight  beds,  and  e'en  our  dreams 
Threaten  the  assassin  hand  of  Robespierre. 
He  dies ! — nor  has  the  plot  escaped  his  fears. 

ADELAIDE. 

Yet — yet — be  cautious !  much  I  fear  the  Commune — 
The  tyrant's  creatures,  and  their  fate  with  his 
Fast  link'd  in  close  indissoluble  union. 
The  Pale  Convention — 

TALLIEN. 

Hate  him  as  they  fear  him, 
Impatient  of  the  chain,  resolved  and  ready. 

ADELAIDE. 

Th'  enthusiast  mob,  Confusion's  lawless  sons — 

TALLIEN. 

They  are  aweary  of  his  stern  morality, 
The  fair-mask'd  offspring  of  ferocious  pride. 
The  sections  too  support  the  delegates : 
A.11 — all  is  ours !  e'en  now  the  vital  air 
Of  Liberty,  condensed  awhile,  is  bursting 
'Force  irresistible !)  from  its  compressure — 
To  shatter  the  arch-chemist  in  the  explosion ! 


Enter  Billaud  Varennes  and  Bourdon  l'Oise. 

[Adelaide  retires. 
bourdon  l'oise. 
Tallien !  was  this  a  time  for  amorous  conference  ? 
Henriot,  the  tyrant's  most  devoted  creature, 
Marshals  the  force  of  Paris  :  the  fierce  club, 
With  Vivier  at  their  head,  in  loud  acclaim 
Have  sworn  to  make  the  guillotine  in  blood 
Float  on  the  scaffold. — But  who  comes  here  ? 

Enter  Barrere  abruptly. 

barrere. 
Say,  are  ye  friends  to  Freedom  ?    I  am  her's  ! 
Let  us,  forgetful  of  all  common  feuds, 
Rally  around  her  shrine !  E'en  now  the  tyrant 
Concerts  a  plan  of  instant  massacre  ! 

billaud  varennes. 
Away  to  the  Convention  !  with  that  voice 
So  oft  the  herald  of  glad  victory, 
Rouse  their  fallen  spirits,  thunder  in  their  ears 
The  names  of  tyrant,  plunderer,  assassin! 
The  violent  workings  of  my  soul  within 
Anticipate  the  monster's  blood  ? 

[Cry  from  the  street  of— "No  Tyrant!  Down  with 
the  Tyrant!" 


Hear  ye  that  outcry? — If  the  trembling  members 
Even  for  a  moment  hold  his  fate  suspended, 
I  swear,  by  the  holy  poniard  that  stabb'd  Ccesar, 
This  dagger  probes  his  heart ! 

[Exewit  omnes. 


ACT  II. 

SCENE—  The  Convention. 

Robespierre  (mounts  the  Tribune). 
Once  more  befits  it  that  the  voice  of  Truth, 
Fearless  in  innocence,  though  leaguer'd  round 
By  Envy  and  her  hateful  brood  of  hell, 
Be  heard  amid  this  hall ;  once  more  befits 
The  patriot,  whose  prophetic  eye  so  oft 
Has  pierced  through  faction's  veil,  to  flash  on  crimes 
Of  deadliest  import.    Mouldering  in  the  grave 
Sleeps  Capet's  caitiff  corse  ;  my  daring  hand 
Levell'd  to  earth  his  blood-cemented  throne, 
My  voice  declared  his  guilt,  and  stirr'd  up  France 
To  call  for  vengeance.    I  too  dug  the  grave 
Where  sleep  the  Girondists,  detested  band ! 
Long  with  the  show  of  freedom  they  abused 
Her  ardent  sons.    Long  time  the  vvell-turn'd  phrase. 
The  high-fraught  sentence,  and  the  lofty  tone 
Of  declamation,  thunder'd  in  this  hall, 
Till  reason  'midst  a  labyrinth  of  words 
Perplex'd,  in  silence  seem'd  to  yield  assent. 
I  durst  oppose.    Soul  of  my  honor'd  friend  ! 
Spirit  of  Marat,  upon  thee  I  call — 
Thou  know'st  me  faithful,  know'st  with  what  warm 

zeal 
I  urged  the  cause  of  justice,  stripp'd  the  mask 
From  Faction's  deadly  visage,  and  destroy 'd 
Her  traitor  brood.   Whose  patriot  arm  hurl'd  down 
Hebert  and  Rousin,  and  the  villain  friends 
Of  Danton,  foul  apostate  !  those,  who  long 
Mask'd  Treason's  form  in  Liberty's  fair  garb, 

216 


THE  FALL  OF  ROBESPIERRE. 


207 


Loan  deluged  trance  with  blood,  anil  durst  defy 

Omnipotence!  but  1.  it  seems,  am  false! 

I  am  a  traitor  too  !  1 — Robespierre ! 

I — at  whose  name  the  daslard  despot  brood 

Look  pule  with  tear,  and  call  on  saints  to  help  them! 

Who  dares  accuse  me  I  who  shall  dare  belie 

My  spotless  name  I  Speak,  ye  accomplice  band, 

Of  what  am  1  accused  ?   of  what  strange  crime 

Is  Maximilian  Robespierre  accused, 

That  through  this  hall  the  buzz  of  discontent 

Should  murmur  !.  who  shall  speak  ? 

BILLAUD  VARENNES. 

0  patriot  tongue, 
Belying  the  foul  heart !  Who  was-it  urged, 
Friendly  to  tyrants,  that  accurst  decree 
Whose  influence,  brooding  o'er  this  hallow'd  hall, 
Has  chill'd  each  tongue  to  silence.    Who  destroy'd 
The  freedom  of  debate,  and  carried  through 
The  fatal  law,  that  doom'd  the  delegates, 
Unheard  before  their  equals,  to  the  bar 
Where  cruelty  sat  throned,  and  murder  reign'd 
With  her  Dumas  coequal  I  Say — thou  man 
Of  mighty  eloquence,  whose  law  was  that  ? 

COUTHOX. 

That  law  was  mine.    I  urged  it — I  proposed — 
The  voice  of  France  assembled  in  her  sons 
Assented,  though  the  tame  and  timid  voice 
Of  traitors  murmur'd.    I  advised  that  law — 
I  justify  it.    It  was  wise  and  good. 

BARRERE. 

Oh,  wondrous  wise,  and  most  convenient  too ! 
I  have  long  mark'd  thee,  Robespierre — and  now 
Proclaim  thee  traitor — tyrant ! 

[Loud  applauses. 

ROBESPIERRE. 

It  is  well. 
I  am  a  traitor !  oh,  that  I  had  fallen 
When  Regnault  lifted  high  the  murderous  knife  ; 
Regnault,  the  instrument  belike  of  those 
Who  now  themselves  would  fain  assassinate, 
And  legalize  their  murders.    I  stand  here 
An  isolated  patriot — hemm'd  around 
By  faction's  noisy  pack ;  beset  and  bay'd 
By  the  foul  hell-hounds  who  know  no  escape 
From  Justice'  outstretch'd  arm,  but  by  the  force 
That  pierces  through  her  breast. 

[Mur7nurs,  and  shouts  of — Down  with  the  tyrant ! 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Nay,  but  I  will  be  heard.  There  was  a  time, 
When  Robespierre  began,  the  loud  applauses 
Of  honest  patriots  drown'd  the  honest  sound. 
But  times  are  changed,  and  villany  prevails. 

COLLOT  D'lIERBOIS. 

No — villany  shall  fall.  France  could  not  brook 
A  monarch's  sway — sounds  the  dictator's  name 
More  soothing  to  her  ear  I 

BOURDON   L'OISE. 

Rattle  her  chains 
More  musically  now  than  when  the  hand 
Of  Brissot  forged  her  fetters,  or  the  crew 
Of  Herbert  thundered  out  their  blasphemies, 
And  Danton  talk'd  of  virtue  ? 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Oh,  that  Brissot 
Were  here  again  to  thunder  in  this  hall, 
That  Herbert  lived,  and  Danton's  giant  form 


Scowl'd  once  again  defiance!  so  my  soul 
Might  cope  with  worthy  foes. 

People  of  France, 
Hear  me !  Beneath  the  vengeance  of  the  law, 
Traitors  have  perish'd  countless  ;  more  survive  : 
The  hydra-headed  faction  lifts  anew 
Her  daring  front,  and  fruitful  from  her  wounds, 
Cautious  from  past  defeats,  contrives  new  wiles  . 
Against  the  sons  of  Freedom. 

TALLIEN. 

Freedom  lives! 
Oppression  falls — for  France  has  felt  her  chains, 
Has  burst  them  too.    Who  traitor-like  slept  forth 
Amid  the  hall  of  Jacobins  to  save 
Camille  Desmoulins,  and  the  venal  wretch 
D'Eglantine  ? 

ROBESPIERRE. 

I  did — for  I  thought  them  honest. 
And  Heaven  fore  fend  that  vengeance  ere  should  strike 
Ere  justice  doom'd  the  blow. 

BARRERE. 

Traitor,  thou  didst 
Yes,  the  accomplice  of  their  dark  designs, 
Awhile  didst  thou  defend  them,  when  the  storm 
Lower'd  at  safe  distance.    When  the  clouds  frown'd 

darker, 
Fear'd  for  yourself  and  left  them  to  their  fate. 
Oh,  I  have  mark'd  thee  long,  and  through  the  veil 
Seen  thy  foul  projects.    Yes,  ambitious  man, 
Self-will'd  dictator  o'er  the  realm  of  France, 
The  vengeance  thou  hast  plann'd  for  patriots 
Falls  on  thy  head.    Look  how  thy  brother's  deeds 
Dishonor  thine  !  He  the  firm  patriot, 
Thou  the  foul  parricide  of  Liberty ! 

ROBESPIERRE  JUNIOR. 

Barrere — attempt  not  meanly  to  divide 
Me  from  my  brother.    I  partake  his  guilt, 
For  I  partake  his  virtue. 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Brother,  by  my  soul 
More  dear  I  hold  thee  to  my  heart,  that  thus 
With  me  thou  darest  to  tread  the  dangerous  path 
Of  virtue,  than  that  Nature  twined  her  cords 
Of  kindred  round  us. 

BARRERE. 

Yes,  allied  in  guilt, 
Even  as  in  blood  ye  are.    Oh,  thou  worst  wretch, 
Thou  worse  than  Sylla !  hast  thou  not  proscribed, 
Yea,  in  most  foul  anticipation  slaughter'd, 
Each  patriot  representative  of  France  ? 

BOURDON  L'OISE. 

Was  not  the  younger  Cseeai  too  to  reign 
O'er  all  our  valiant  armies  in  the  south, 
And  still  continue  there  his  merchant  wiles  ? 

ROBESPIERRE  JUNIOR. 

His  merchant  wiles!  Oh,  grant  me  patience,  Heaven  ' 
Was  it  by  merchant  wiles  I  gain'd  you  back 
Toulon,  when  proudly  on  her  captive  towers 
Waved  high  the  English  flag  ?  or  fought  I  then 
With  merchant  wiles,  when  sword  in  hand  I  led 
Your  troops  to  conquest  ?  Fought  I  merchant-like. 
Or  barter'd  I  for  victory,  when  death 
Strode  o'er  the  reeking  streets  with  giant  stride. 
And  shook  his  ebon  plumes,  and  sternly  smiled 
Amid  the  bloody  banquet  ?  when  appall'd, 
The  hireling  sons  of  England  spread  the  sail 
217 


205 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Of  safety,  fought  I  like  a  merchant  then  ? 
Oh,  patience  !  patience ! 

BOURDON  L'OISE. 

How  this  younger  tyrant 
Mouths  out  defiance  to  us !  even  so 
He  had  led  on  the  armies  of  the  south, 
Till  once  again  the  plains  of  France  were  drench'd 
With  her  best  blood. 

COLLOT  D'HERBOIS. 

Till,  once  again  display'd, 
Lyons'  sad  tragedy  had  call'd  me  forth 
The  minister  of  wrath,  whilst  slaughter  by 
Had  bathed  in  human  blood. 

DUBOIS  CRANCE. 

No  wonder,  friend, 
That  we  are  traitors — that  our  heads  must  fall 
Beneath  the  ax  of  death !   When  Caesar-like 
Reigns  Robespierre,  'tis  wisely  done  to  doom 
The  fall  of  Brutus.    Tell  me,  bloody  man, 
Hast  thou  not  parcell'd  out  deluded  France, 
As  it  had  been  some  province  won  in  fight, 
Between  your  curst  triumvirate  ?  You,  Couthon, 
Go  with  my  brother  to  the  southern  plains ; 
St-Just,  be  yours  the  army  of  the  north ; 
Meantime  I  rule  at  Paris. 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Matchless  knave ! 
What — not  one  blush  of  conscience  on  thy  cheek — 
Not  one  poor  blush  of  truth  !  Most  likely  tale ! 
That  I  who  ruin'd  Brissot's  towering  hopes, 
I  who  discover'd  Hebert's  impious  wiles, 
And  sharp'd  for  Danton's  recreant  neck  the  ax, 
Should  now  be  traitor!  had  I  been  so  minded, 
Think  ye  I  had  destroy'd  the  very  men 
Whose  plots  resembled  mine  ?  Bring  forth  your  proofs 
Of  this  deep  treason.    Tell  me  in  whose  breast 
Found  ye  the  fatal  scroll  ?  or  tell  me  rather 
Who  forged  the  shameless  falsehood  ? 

COLLOT  D'HERBOIS. 

Ask  you  proofs  ? 
Robespierre,  what  proofs  were  ask'd  when  Brissoldied? 

LEGENDRE. 

What  proofs  adduced  you  when  the  Danton  died  ? 
When  at  the  imminent  peril  of  my  life 
I  rose,  and  fearless  of  thy  frowning  brow, 
Proclaim'd  him  guiltless  ? 

ROBESPIERRE. 

I  remember  well 
The  fatal  day.    I  do  repent  me  much 
That  I  kill'd  Caesar  and  spared  Antony. 
But  I  have  been  too  lenient.    I  have  spared 
The  stream  of  blood,  and  now  my  own  must  flow 
To  fill  the  current. 

[Loud  applauses. 
Triumph  not  too  soon, 
Justice  may  yet  be  victor. 

Enter  St-Just,  and  mounts  the  Tribune. 

ST-JUST. 

I  come  from  the  committee — charged  to  speak 
Of  matters  of  high  import.     I  omit 
Their  orders.     Representatives  of  France, 
Boldly  in  his  own  person  speaks  St-Just 
What  his  own  heart  shall  dictate. 


Hear  ye  this, 


Insulted  delegates  of  France  ?  St-Just 

From  your  committee  comes — comes  charged  to  speak 

Of  matters  of  high  import — yet  omits 

Their  orders !  Representatives  of  France, 

That  bold  man  I  denounce,  who  disobeys 

The  nation's  orders. — I  denounce  St-Just 

[Loud  applauses. 

ST-JUST. 

Hear  me !  [  Violent  murmurs 

ROBESPIERRE. 

He  shall  be  heard ! 

BOURDON  L'OISE. 

Must  we  contaminate  this  sacred  hall 
With  the  foul  breath  of  treason  ? 


COLLOT  D'HERBOIS. 


Hence  with  him  to  the  bar. 


Drag  him  away ! 


COUTHON. 


Oh,  just  proceedings ! 
Robespierre  prevented  liberty  of  speech — 
And  Robespierre  is  a  tyrant !  Tallien  reigns, 
He  dreads  to  hear  the  voice  of  innocence — 
And  St-Just  must  be  silent ! 

LEGENDRE. 

Heed  we  well 
That  justice  guide  our  actions.    No  light  import 
Attends  this  day.    I  move  St-Just  be  heard. 

FRERON. 

Inviolate  be  the  sacred  right  of  man, 
The  freedom  of  debate. 

[Violent  applause 

ST-JUST. 

I  may  be  heard,  then !  much  the  times  are  changed 

When  St-Just  thanks  this  hall  for  hearing  him. 

Robespierre  is  call'd  a  tyrant.    Men  of  France, 

Judge  not  too  soon.    By  popular  discontent 

Was  Aristides  driven  into  exile, 

Was  Phocion  murder'd  ?  Ere  ye  dare  pronounce 

Robespierre  is  guilty,  it  befits  ye  well, 

Consider  who  accuse  him.    Tallien, 

Bourdon  of  Oise — the  very  men  denounced, 

For  their  dark  intrigues  disturb'd  the  plan 

Of  government.    Legendre,  the  sworn  friend 

Of  Danton,  fall'n  apostate.    Dubois  Crance, 

He  who  at  Lyons  spared  the  royalists — 

Collot  d'Herbois — 

BOURDON  L'OISE. 

What — shall  the  traitor  rear 
His  head  amid  our  tribune — and  blaspheme 
Each  patriot  ?  shall  the  hireling  slave  of  faction— 

ST-JUST. 

I  am  of  no  faction.    I  contend 
Against  all  factions. 

TALLIEN. 

I  espouse  the  cause 
Of  truth.    Robespierre  on  yester-morn  pronounced 
Upon  his  own  authority  a  report. 
To-day  St-Just  comes  down.    St-Just  neglects 
What  the  committee  orders,  and  harangues 
From  his  own  will.    O  citizens  of  France, 
I  weep  for  you — I  weep  for  my  poor  country— 
I  tremble  for  the  cause  of  Liberty, 
When  individuals  shall  assume  the  sway, 
And  with  more  insolence  than  kingly  pride 
Rule  the  republic. 

218 


THE  FALL  OF  ROBESPIERRE. 


209 


BILLAUD  VAUKNNES. 

Shudder,  ye  representatives  of  France, 
Shudder  with  horror.  Henriot  commands 
The  marshalled  force  of  Paris — Henriot, 
Foul  patricide — the  sworn  ally  of  Hebert, 
Denounced  by  all — upheld  by  Robespierre. 
Who  spared  La  Vallette  ?  who  promoted  him, 
Stain'd  with  the  deep  dye  of  nobility  ? 
Who  to  an  ex-peer  nave  the  high  command  ? 
Who  screen'd  from  justice  the  rapacious  thief? 
Who  cast  in  chains  the  friends  of  Liberty  ? 
Robespierre,  the  self-styled  patriot  Robespierre — 
Robespierre,  allied  with  villain  Daubigne — 
Robespierre,  the  foul  arch-tyrant  Robespierre. 

BOURDON  L'OISE. 

He  talks  of  virtue — of  morality — 
Consistent  patriot !  he,  Daubigne's  friend  ! 
Henriot's  supporter  virtuous !  Preach  of  virtue. 
Yet  league  with  villains,  for  with  Robespierre 
Villains  alone  ally.    Thou  art  a  tyrant ! 
I  style  thee  tyrant,  Robespierre  ! 

[Loud  applauses. 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Take  back  the  name,  ye  citizens  of  France — 

[Violent  clamor.   Cries  of — Down  with  the  Tyrant! 


The  arrest  of  the  traitors.    Memorable 
Will  be  this  day  for  France. 

ROBESPIERRE. 

Yes !  memorable 
This  day  will  be  for  France for  villains  triumph. 

LEBAS. 

I  will  not  share  in  this  day's  damning  guilt. 
Condemn  me  too. 

[Great  cry — Down  with  the  Tyrants! 

(T/ie<u;oRoBESPIERRES,  CoUTIION,ST-JuSTa/fdLEBAS 

are  led  off). 


Oppression  falls.    The  traitor  stands  appall'd — 

Guilt's  iron  fangs  engrasp  his  shrinking  soul — 

He  hears  assembled  France  denounce  his  crimes  ! 

He  sees  the  mask  torn  from  his  secret  sins — 

He  trembles  on  the  precipice  of  fate. 

Fall'n  guilty  tyrant !  murder'd  by  thy  rage, 

How  many  an  innocent  victim's  blood  has  stain'd 

Fair  Freedom's  altar !  Sylla-like,  thy  hand 

Mark'd  down  the  virtues,  that,  thy  foes  removed, 

Perpetual  Dictator  thou  mightst  reign, 

And  tyrannize  o'er  France,  and  call  it  freedom ! 

Long  time  in  timid  guilt  the  traitor  plann'd 

His  fearful  wiles — success  embolden'd  sin — 

And  his  stretch'd  arm  had  grasp'd  the  diadem 

Ere  now,  but  that  the  coward's  heart  recoil'd, 

Lest  France  awaked,  should  rouse  her  from  her  dream, 

And  call  aloud  for  vengeance.    He,  like  Caesar, 

With  rapid  step  urged  on  his  bold  career, 

Even  to  the  summit  of  ambitious  power, 

And  deem'd  the  name  of  King  alone  was  wanting. 

Was  it  for  this  we  hurl'd  proud  Capet  down? 

Is  it  for  this  we  wage  eternal  war 

Against  the  tyrant  horde  of  murderers, 

The  erown'd  cockatrices  whose  foul  venom 

Tnfects  all  Europe  ?  was  it  then  for  this 

We  swore  to  guard  our  liberty  with  life, 

That  Robespierre  should  reign  ?  the  spirit  of  freedom 

Is  not  yet  sunk  so  low.    The  glowing  flame 

That  animates  each  honest  Frenchman's  heart 

Not  yet  extinguish'd.    I  invoke  thy  shade, 

Immortal  Brutus  !  I  too  wear  a  dagger ; 

And  if  the  representatives  of  France, 

Through  fear  or  favor,  should  delay  the  sword 

Of  justice,  Tallien  emulates  thy  virtues  ; 

Tallien,  like  Brutus,  lifts  the  avenging  arm  ; 

Tallien  shall  save  his  country. 

[Violent  applauses. 

BILLAUD  VARENNES. 

I  demand 
15 


ACT  III. 

Scene  continues. 

COLLOT    D'HERBOIS. 

Csesar  is  fallen !  The  baneful  tree  of  Java, 

Whose  death-distilling  boughs  dropt  poisonous  dew, 

Is  rooted  from  its  base.    This  worse  than  Cromwell, 

The  austere,  the  self-denying  Robespierre, 

Even  in  this  hall,  where  once  with  terror  mute 

We  listen 'd  to  the  hypocrite's  harangues, 

Has  heard  his  doom. 

BILLAUD  VARENNES. 

Yet  must  we  not  suppose 
The  tyrant  will  fall  tamely.    His  sworn  hireling 
Henriot,  the  daring  desperate  Henriot 
Commands  the  force  of  Paris.    I  denounce  him. 

FRERON. 

I  denounce  Fleuriot  too,  the  mayor  of  Paris. 
Enter  Dubois  Crance. 

DUBOIS    CRANCE. 

Robespierre  is  rescued.    Henriot  at  the  head 
Of  the  arm'd  force  has  rescued  the  fierce  tyrant. 

COLLOT    D'HERBOIS. 

Ring  the  tocsin — call  all  the  citizens 

To  save  their  country — never  yet  has  Paris 

Forsook  the  representatives  of  France. 

TALLIEN. 

It  is  the  hour  of  danger.    I  propose 
This  sitting  be  made  permanent. 

[Loud  applauses 

COLLOT    D'HERBOIS. 

The  National  Convention  shall  remain 
Firm  at  its  post. 

Enter  a  Messenger. 

MESSENGER. 

Robespierre  has  reach'd  the  Commune.  They  espouse 
The  tyrant's  cause.    St-Just  is  up  in  arms  ! 
St-Just — the  young  ambitious  bold  St-Just 
Harangues  the  mob.    The  sanguinary  Couthon 
Thirsts  for  your  blood. 

[Tocsin  rings. 

TALLIEN. 

These  tyrants  are  in  arms  against  the  law : 
Outlaw  the  rebels. 

Enter  Merlin  of  Douay. 

merlin. 
Health  to  the  representatives  of  France  t 
I  past  this  moment  through  the  armed  force — 
They  ask'd  my  name — and  when  they  heard  a  delegate, 
Swore  I  was  not  the  friend  of  France. 
219 


210 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


COLLOT    D'HERBOIS. 

The  tyrants  threaten  us,  as  when  they  turn'd 
The  cannon's  mouth  on  Brissot. 

Enter  another  Messenger. 

SECOND  MESSENGER. 

Vivier  harangues  the  Jacobins — the  club 
Espouse  the  cause  of  Robespierre. 

Enter  another  Messenger. 

THIRD  MESSENGER. 

All's  lost — the  tyrant  triumphs.    Henriot  leads 

The  soldiers  to  his  aid. Already  I  hear 

The  rattling  cannon  destined  to  surround 
This  sacred  hall. 

TALLIEN. 

Why,  we  will  die  like  men  then  ; 
The  representatives  of  France  dare  death, 
When  duty  steels  their  bosoms. 

[Lotid  applauses. 

tallien  (addressing  the  galleries). 
Citizens ! 
France  is  insulted  in  her  delegates — 
The  majesty  of  the  republic  is  insulted — 
Tyrants  are  up  in  arms.    An  armed  force 
Threats  the  Convention.    The  Convention  swears 
To  die,  or  save  the  country ! 

[  Violent  applauses  from  the  galleries. 

citizen  (from  above). 

We  too  swear 
To  die,  or  save  the  country.    Follow  me. 

[All  the  men  quit  the  galleries. 

Enter  another  Messenger. 

FOURTH  MESSENGER. 

Henriot  is  taken ! — 

[Loud  applauses. 
Henriot  is  taken.    Three  of  your  brave  soldiers 
Swore  they  would  seize  the  rebel  slave  of  tyrants, 
Or  perish  in  the  attempt.    As  he  patroll'd 
The  streets  of  Paris,  stirring  up  the  mob, 
They  seized  him. 

[Applauses. 

BILLAUD   VARENNES. 

Let  the  names  of  these  brave  men 
Live  to  the  future  day. 

Enter  Bourdon  l'Oise,  sword  in  hand. 

BOURDON  L'OISE. 

I  have  clear'd  the  Commune. 

[Applauses. 
Through  the  throng  I  rush'd, 
Brandishing  my  good  sword  to  drench  its  blade 
Deep  in  the  tyrant's  heart.    The  timid  rebels 
Gave  way.    I  met  the  soldiery — I  spake 
Of  the  dictator's  crimes — of  patriots  chain'd 
In  dark  deep  dungeons  by  his  lawless,  rage — 
Of  knaves  secure  beneath  his  fostering  power. 
I  spake  of  Liberty.    Their  honest  hearts 
Caught  the  warm  (lame.  The  general  shout  burst  forth, 
"  Live  the  Convention — Down  with  Robespierre !" 

[Applauses. 
[Shouts  from  without — Down  with  the  Tyrant ! 

TALLIEN. 

I  hear,  I  hear  the  soul-inspiring  sounds, 

France  shall  be  saved !  her  generous  sons,  attached 


To  principles,  not  persons,  spurn  the  idol 

They  worshipp'd  once.    Yes,  Robespierre  shall  fall 

As  Capet  fell !    Oh  !    never  let  us  deem 

That  France  shall  crouch  beneath  a  tyrant's  throne. 

That  the  almighty  people  who  have  broke 

On  their  oppressors'  heads  the  oppressive  chain. 

Will  court  again  their  fetters !  easier  were  it 

To  hurl  the  cloud-capt  mountain  from  its  base, 

Than  force  the  bonds  of  slavery  upon  men 

Determined  to  be  free ! 

[Applauses. 

Enter  Legendre,  a  pistol  in  one  hand,  keys  in  the 
other. 

legendre  (flinging  down  the  keys). 
So — let  the  mutinous  Jacobins  meet  now 
In  the  open  air. 

[Loud  applauses 
A  factious  turbulent  party 
Lording  it  o'er  the  state  since  Danton  died, 
And  with  him  the  Cordeliers. — A  hireling  band 
Of  loud-tongued  orators  controll'd  the  club, 
And  bade  them  bow  the  knee  to  Robespierre. 
Vivier  has  'scaped  me.    Curse  his  coward  heart — 
This  fate-fraught  tube  of  Justice  in  my  hand, 
I  rush'd  into  the  hall.    He  mark'd  mine  eye 
That  beam'd  its  patriot  anger,  and  flash'd  full 
With  death-denouncing  meaning.    'Mid  the  throng 
He  mingled.    I  pursued — but  staid  my  hand, 
Lest  haply  I  might  shed  the  innocent  blood. 

[Applauses. 

FRF.RON. 

They  took  from  me  my  ticket  of  admission — 
Expell'd  me  from  their  sittings. — Now,  forsooth, 
Humbled  and  trembling  re-insert  my  name  ; 
But  Freron  enters  not  the  club  again 
Till  it  be  purged  of  guilt — till,  purified 
Of  tyrants  and  of  traitors,  honest  men 
May  breathe  the  air  in  safety. 

[Shouts  from  without. 

BARRERE. 

What  means  this  uproar  ?  if  the  tyrant  band 
Should  gain  the  people  once  again  to  rise — 
We  are  as  dead ! 

TALLIEN. 

And  wherefore  fear  we  death? 
Did  Brutus  fear  it  ?  or  the  Grecian  friends 
Who  buried  in  Hipparchus'  breast  the  sword, 
And  died  triumphant?   Caesar  should  fear  death: 
Brutus  must  scorn  the  bugbear. 

Shouts  from  without.  Live  the  Convention — Down 
with  the  Tyrants! 

TALLIEN. 

Hark!  again 
The  sounds  of  honest  Freedom ! 

Enter  Deputies  from  the  Sections. 

CITIZEN. 

Citizens !  representatives  of  France ! 
Hold  on  your  steady  course.    The  men  of  Paris 
Espouse  your  cause.    The  men  of  Paris  swear 
They  will  defend  the  delegates  of  Freedom. 

TALLIEN. 

Hear  ye  this,  Colleagues  ?  hear  ye  this,  my  brethren . 
And  does  no  thrill  of  joy  pervade  your  breasts? 
My  bosom  bounds  to  rapture.    I  have  seen 

220 


THE  FALL  OF  ROBESPIERRE. 


211 


The  sons  of  France  shake  off  the  tyrant  yoke  ; 
I  have,  as  much  as  lies  in  mine  ovvn  arm, 
Hurl'd  down  the  usurper. — Come  death  when  it  will, 
I  have  lived  long  enough. 

[Shouts  without. 

BARRERE. 

Hark !  how  the  noise  increases !  through  the  gloom 
Of  the  still  evening — harbinger  of  death, 
Rings  the  tocsin !  the  dreadful  generate 
Thunders  through  Paris — 

[Cry  without — Down  with  the  Tyrant ! 
Enter  Lecointre. 

LECOINTRE. 

So  may  eternal  justice  blast  the  foes 
Of  France !  so  perish  all  the  tyrant  brood, 
As  Robespierre  has  perish'd  !    Citizens, 
Ceesar  is  taken. 

[Loud  and  repealed  applauses. 
I  marvel  not,  that  with  such  fearless  front, 
He  braved  our  vengeance,  and  with  angry  eye 
Scowl'd  round  the  hall  defiance.    He  relied 
On  Henriot's  aid — the  Commune's  villain  friendship, 
And  Henriot's  boughten  succors.    Ye  have  heard 
How  Henriot  rescued  him — how7  with  open  arms 
The  Commune  welcomed  in  the  rebel  tyrant — 
How  Fleuriot  aided,  and  seditious  Vivier 
Stirr'd  up  the  Jacobins.    All  had  been  lost — 
The  representatives  of  France  had  perish'd — 
Freedom  had  sunk  beneath  the  tyrant  arm 
Of  this  foul  parricide,  but  that  her  spirit 
Inspired  the  men  of  Paris.    Henriot  call'd 
"  To  arms"  in  vain,  whilst  Bourdon's  patriot  voice 
Breathed  eloquence,  and  o'er  the  Jacobins 
Legendre  frown'd  dismay.    The  tyrants  fled — 
They  reach'd  the  Hotel.     We  gather'd  round — we 

call'd 
For  vengeance !    Long  time,  obstinate  in  despair, 
With  knives  they  hack'd  around  them.  Till  foreboding 
The  sentence  of  the  law,  the  clamorous  cry 
Of  joyful  thousands  hailing  their  destruction, 
Each  sought  by  suicide  to  escape  the  dread 
Of  death.    Lebas  succeeded.    From  the  window 
Leapt  the  younger  Robespierre,  but  his  fractured  limb 
Forbade  to  escape.    The  self-will'd  dictator 
Plunged  often  the  keen  knife  in  his  dark  breast, 
Yet  impotent  to  die.    He  lives  all  mangled 
By  his  own  tremulous  hand !    All  gash'd  and  gored, 
He  lives  to  taste  the  bitterness  of  Death. 
Even  now  they  meet  their  doom.  The  bloody  Couthon, 
The  fierce  St-Just,  even  now  attend  their  tyrant 
To  fall  beneath  the  ax.    I  saw  the  torches 
Flash  on  their  visages  a  dreadful  light — 
I  saw  them  whilst  the  black  blood  roll'd  adown 
Each  stern  face,  even  then  with  dauntless  eye 
Scowl  round  contemptuous,  dying  as  they  lived, 
Fearless  of  fate ! 

[Loud  and  repealed  applauses. 


barrere  {mounts  the  Tribune). 
For  ever  hallow'd  be  this  glorious  day, 
When  Freedom,  bursting  her  oppressive  chain, 
Tramples  on  the  oppressor.    When  the  tyrant, 
Hurl'd  from  his  blood-cemented  throne  by  the  arm 
Of  the  almighty  people,  meets  the  death 
He  plann'd  for  thousands.    Oil !  my  sickening  heart 
Has  sunk  within  me,  when  the  various  woes 
Of  my  brave  country  crowded  o'er  my  brain 
In  ghastly  numbers — when  assembled  hordes, 
Dragg'd  from  their  hovels  by  despotic  power, 
Rush'd  o'er  her  frontiers,  plunder'd  her  fair  hamlets, 
And  sack'd  her  populous  towns,  and  drench'd  with 

blood 
The  reeking  fields  of  Flanders. — When  within, 
Upon  her  vitals  prey'd  the  rankling  tooth 
Of  treason ;  and  oppression,  giant  form, 
Trampling  on  freedom,  left  the  alternative 
Of  slavery,  or  of  death.    Even  from  that  day, 
When,  on  the  guilty  Capet,  I  pronounced 
The  docvm  of  injured  France,  has  Faction  rear'd 
Her  hated  head  amongst  us.    Roland  preach'd 
Of  mercy — the  uxorious  dotard  Roland, 
The  woman-govern'd  Roland  durst  aspire 
To  govern  France  ;  and  Petion  talk'd  of  virtue, 
And  Vergniaud's  eloquence,  like  the  honey 'd  tongue 
Of  some  soft  Syren,  wooed  us  to  destruction. 
We  triumph'd  over  these.    On  the  same  scaffold 
Where  the  last  Louis  pour'd  his  guilty  blood, 
Fell  Brissot's  head,  the  womb  of  darksome  treasons, 
And  Orleans,  villain  kinsman  of  the  Capet, 
And  Hebert's  atheist  crew,  whose  maddening  hand 
Hurl'd  down  the  altars  of  the  living  God, 
With  all  the  infidel's  intolerance. 
The  last  worst  traitor  triumph'd — triumph'd  long, 
Secured  by  matchless  villany.    By  turns 
Defending  and  deserting  each  accomplice, 
As  interest  prompted.    In  the  goodly  soil 
Of  Freedom,  the  foul  tree  of  treason  struck 
Its  deep-fix'd  roots,  and  dropt  the  dews  of  death 
On  all  who  slumber'd  in  its  specious  shade. 
He  wove  the  web  of  treachery.    He  caught 
The  listening  crowd  by  his  wild  eloquence, 
His  cool  ferocity,  that  persuaded  murder, 
Even  whilst  it  spake  of  mercy ! — Never,  never 
Shall  this  regenerated  country  wear 
The  despot  yoke.    Though  myriads  round  assail, 
And  with  worse  fury  urge  this  new  crusade 
Than  savages  have  known ;    though  the  leagued 

despots 
Depopulate  all  Europe,  so  to  pour 
The  accumulated  mass  upon  our  coasts, 
Sublime  amid  the  storm  shall  France  arise, 
And  like  the  rock  amid  surrounding  waves 
Repel  the  rushing  ocean. — She  shall  wield 
The  thunderbolt  of  vengeance — she  shall  blast 
The  despot's  pride,  and  liberate  the  world ! 

221 


212 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


iWtecellaneotte  IJoems* 


PROSE  IN  RHYME:  OR  EPIGRAMS,  MORALITIES,  AND  THINGS  WITHOUT  A  NAME 


"Epcof  iiti  \d\ri&pos  traipos. 


In  many  ways  does  the  full  heart  reveal 

The  presence  of  the  love  it  would  conceal ; 

But  in  far  more  th'  estranged  heart  lets  know 

The  absence  of  the  love,  which  yet  it  fain  would  Bhow. 


LOVE.* 

All  thoughts,  all  passions,  all  delights, 
Whatever  stirs  this  mortal  frame, 
All  are  but  ministers  of  Love, 
And  feed  his  sacred  flame. 

Oft  in  my  waking  dreams  do  I 
Live  o'er  again  that  happy  hour, 
When  midway  on  the  mount  I  lay 
Beside  the  ruin'd  tower. 

The  moonshine,  stealing  o'er  the  scene, 
Had  blended  with  the  lights  of  eve  ; 
And  she  was  there,  my  hope,  my  joy, 
My  own  dear  Genevieve ! 

She  leant  against  the  armed  man, 
The  statue  of  the  armed  knight  ; 
She  stood  and  listen'd  to  my  lay, 
Amid  the  lingering  light. 

Few  sorrows  hath  she  of  her  own, 
My  hope  !  my  joy !  my  Genevieve  ! 
She  loves  me  best,  whene'er  I  sing 
The  songs  that  make  her  grieve. 

I  play'd  a  soft  and  doleful  air, 
I  sang  an  old  and  moving  story — 
An  old  rude  song,  that  suited  well 
That  ruin  wild  and  hoary. 

She  listen'd  with  a  flitting  blush, 
With  downcast  eyes  and  modest  grace  ; 
For  well  she  knew,  I  could  not  choose 
But  gaze  upon  her  face. 

I  told  her  of  the  Knight  that  wore 
Upon  his  shield  a  burning  brand  ; 
And  that  for  ten  long  years  he  wooed 
The  Lady  of  the  Land. 

I  told  her  how  he  pined  :  and  ah  ! 
The  deep,  the  low,  the  pleading  tone 
With  which  I  sang  another's  love, 
Interpreted  my  own. 


i  his  piece  may  be  found,  as  originally  published,  under  an- 
other title,  at  page  28. 


She  listen'd  with  a  flitting  blush, 
With  downcast  eyes,  and  modest  grace  ; 
And  she  forgave  me,  that  I  gazed 
Too  fondly  on  her  face. 

But  when  I  told  the  cruel  scorn 
That  crazed  that  bold  and  lovely  Knighi, 
And  that  he  cross'd  the  mountain-woods, 
Nor  rested  day  nor  night ; 

That  sometimes  from  the  savage  den, 
And  sometimes  from  the  darksome  shade. 
And  sometimes  starting  up  at  once 
In  green  and  sunny  glade, 

There  came  and  look'd  him  in  the  face 
An  angel  beautiful  and  bright ; 
And  that  he  knew  it  was  a  Fiend, 
This  miserable  Knight ! 

And  that,  unknowing  what  he  did, 
He  leap'd  amid  a  murderous  band, 
And  saved  from  outrage  worse  than  death 
The  Lady  of  the  Land ! 

And  how  she  wept,  and  clasp'd  his  knees, 
And  how  site  tended  him  in  vain — 
And  ever  strove  to  expiate 

The  scorn  that  crazed  his  brain. 

And  that  she  nursed  him  in  a  cave ; 
And  how  his  madness  went  away, 
When  on  the  yellow  forest-leaves 
A  dying  man  he  lay. 

His  dying  words — but  when  I  reach'd 
That  tenderest  strain  of  all  the  ditty, 
My  faltering  voice  and  pausing  harp 
Disturbed  her  soul  with  pity ! 

All  impulses  of  soul  and  sense 
Had  thrill'd  my  guiltless  Genevieve ; 
The  music  and  the  doleful  tale, 
The  rich  and  balmy  eve  ; 

And  hopes,  and  fears  that  kindle  hope, 
An  undistinguishable  throng, 
And  gentle  wishes  long  subdued, 
Subdued  and  cherish'd  long ! 
222 


MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 


213 


She  wept  with  pity  ami  delight. 
She  blush'd  with  love,  and  virgin  shame; 
And  like  the  murmur  of  a  dream, 
I  heard  her  breathe  my  name. 

Her  bosom  heaved — she  slept  aside, 
As  conscious  of  my  look  she  stepp'd — 
Then  suddenly,  \Min  timorous  eye 
She  lied  10  me  and  wept. 

She  half  inclosed  me  with  her  arms, 
She  press'd  me  with  a  meek  embrace  ; 
And  bending  back  her  head,  look'd  up, 
And  gazed  upon  my  face. 

'Twas  partly  Love,  and  partly  Fear, 
And  partly  'twas  a  bashful  art, 
That  1  might  ralher  feel,  than  see, 
The  swelling  of  her  heart. 

I  calm'd  her  fears,  and  she  was  calm, 
And  told  her  love  with  virgin  pride ; 
And  so  I  won  my  Genevieve, 

My  brighi  and  beauteous  Bride. 


DUTY  SURVIVING  SELF-LOVE, 

THE  ONLY  SURE  FRIEND  OF  DECLINING  LIFE. 

A  SOLILOQUY. 

Unchanged  within  to  see  all  changed  without, 

Is  a  blank  lot  and  hard  to  bear,  no  doubt. 

Yet  why  at  others'  warnings  shouldst  thou  fret  ? 

Then  only  mightst  thou  feel  a  just  regret, 

Hadst  thou  withheld  thy  love  or  hid  thy  light 

In  selfish  forethought  of  neglect  and  slight. 

O  wiselier  then,  from  feeble  yearnings  freed, 

While,  and  on  whom,  thou  mayest — shine  on!  nor  heed 

Whether  the  object  by  reflected  light 

Return  thy  radiance  or  absorb  it  quite ; 

And  though  thou  notest  from  thy  safe  recess 

Old  Friends  burn  dim,  like  lamps  in  noisome  air, 

Love  them  lor  \\  hat  they  are :  nor  love  them  less, 

Because  to  l/tce  they  are  not  what  they  were. 


PHANTOM  OR  FACT? 

A  DIALOGUE  IX  VERSE. 
AUTHOR. 

A  lovely  form  there  sate  beside  my  bed, 
And  such  a  feeding  calm  its  presence  shed, 
A  tender  love  so  pure  from  earthly  leaven 
That  I  unnethe  the  fancy  might  control, 
'T  was  my  own  spirit  newly  come  from  heaven 
Wooing  its  gentle  way  into  my  soul ! 
But  ah !  the  change — It  had  not  stirr'd,  and  yet- 
Alas !  that  change  how  fain  would  I  forget ! 
That  shrinking  back,  like  one  that  had  mistook ! 
That  weary,  wandering,  disavowing  Look! 
'Twas  all  another,  feature,  look,  and  frame, 
And  still,  methought,  I  knew  it  was  the  same ! 

FRIEND. 

This  riddling  tale,  to  what  does  it  belong  ? 
Is 't  history  ?  vision  ?  or  an  idle  song  I 

U 


Or  ralher  say  at  once,  within  what  space 

Of  time  this  wild  disastrous  change  took  place  ? 

AUTHOR. 

Call  it  a  moment's  work  (and  such  it  seems), 
This  tale's  a  fragment  from  the  life  of  dreams; 
But  say,  that  years  matured  the  silent  strife, 
And  'tis  a  record  from  the  dream  of  Life. 


WORK  WITHOUT  HOPE. 

LINES  COMPOSED  21ST  FEBRUARY,  1827. 

All  Nature  seems  at  work.    Stags  leave  their  lair — 

The  bees  are  stirring — Birds  are  on  the  wing — 

And  Winter,  slumbering  in  the  open  air, 

Wears  on  his  smiling  face  a  dream  of  Spring! 

And  1,  the  while,  the  sole  unbusy  tiling, 

Nor  honey  make,  nor  pair,  nor  build,  nor  sing. 

Yet  well  I  ken  the  banks  where  amaranths  blow, 
Have  traced  the  fount  whence  streams  of  nectar  flow. 
Bloom,  O  ye  amaranths !  bloom  for  whom  ye  may. 
For  me  ye  bloom  not !  Glide,  rich  streams,  away  ! 
With  lips  unbrighten'd,  wreathless  brow,  I  stroll: 
And  would  you  learn  the  spells  that  drowse  my  sou'  ? 
Work  without  hope  draws  nectar  in  a  sieve, 
And  hope  without  an  object  cannot  live. 


YOUTH  AND  AGE. 

Verse,  a  breeze  'mid  blossoms  straying, 
Where  Hope  clung  feeding,  like  a  bee — 
Both  were  mine !  Life  went  a-maying 
With  Nature,  Hope,  and  Poesy, 
When  I  was  young! 
When  I  was  young  ? — Ah,  woful  when ! 
Ah  for  the  change  'twixt  now  and  then! 
This  breathing  house  not  built  with  hands, 
This  body  that  does  me  grievous  wrong, 
O'er  airy  cliffs  and  glittering  sands, 
How  lightly  then  it  flash'd  along: — 
Like  those  trim  skiffs,  unknown  of  yore, 
On  winding  lakes  and  rivers  wide, 
That  ask  no  aid  of  sail  or  oar, 
That  fear  no  spite  of  wind  or  tide  ! 
Nought  cared  this  body  for  wind  or  weather, 
When  Youth  and  I  lived  in 't  togethei 

Flowers  are  lovely;  Love  is  flower-like  , 
Friendship  is  a  sheltering  tree ; 
O  the  joys,  that  came  down  shower-like, 
Of  Friendship,  Love,  and  Liberty, 

Ere  I  was  old  ! 
Ere  I  was  old  ?  Ah  woful  Ere, 
Which  tells  me,  Youth's  no  longer  here! 

0  Youth !  for  years  so  many  and  sweet, 
'Tis  known,  ihat  thou  and  I  were  one, 
I'll  think  it  but  a  fond  conceit — 

It  cannot  be,  that  thou  art  gone ! 
Thy  vesper-bell  hath  not  yet  toll'd  :- 
And  thou  wert  aye  a  masker  bold  ! 
What  strange  disguise  hast  now  put  on. 
To  make  believe  thai  thou  art  gone  I 

1  see  these  locks  in  silvery  slips. 
This  drooping  gait,  this  alter'd  size : 

223 


214 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


But  springtide  blossoms  on  thy  lips, 
And  tears  take  sunshine  from  thine  eyes ! 
Life  is  but  thought :  so  think  I  will 
That  youth  and  I  are  house-mates  still. 


A  DAY  DREAM. 

My  eyes  make  pictures,  when  they  are  shut : — 

I  see  a  fountain,  large  and  fair, 
A  willow  and  a  ruin'd  hut, 

And  thee,  and  me,  and  Mary  there. 

0  Mary !  make  thy  gentle  lap  our  pillow ! 

Bend  o'er  us,  like  a  bower,  my  beautiful  green  willow! 

A  wild-rose  roofs  the  ruin'd  shed, 

And  that  and  summer  well  agree : 
And  lo !  where  Mary  leans  her  head, 
Two  dear  names  carved  upon  the  tree ! 
And  Mary's  tears,  they  are  not  tears  of  sorrow: 
Our  sister  and  our  friend  will  both  be  here  to-morrow. 

'Twas  day!  But  now  few,  large,  and  bright, 

The  stars  are  round  the  crescent  moon ! 
And  now  it  is  a  dark  warm  night, 
The  balmiest  of  the  month  of  June  ! 
A  glow-worm  fallen,  and  on  the  marge  remounting 
Shines,  and  its  shadow  shines,  fit  stars  for  our  sweet 
fountain. 

O  ever — ever  be  thou  blest ! 

For  dearly,  Asra !  love  I  thee  ! 
This  brooding  warmth  across  my  breast, 
This  depth  of  tranquil  bliss — ah  me  ! 
Fount,  tree  and  shed  are  gone,  I  know  not  whither, 
But  in  one  quiet  room  we  three  are  still  together. 

The  shadows  dance  upon  the  wall, 
By  the  still  dancing  fire-flames  made; 

And  now  they  slumber,  moveless  all ! 
And  now  they  melt  to  one  deep  shade ! 
But  not  from  me  shall  this  mild  darkness  steal  thee : 

1  dream  thee  with  mine  eyes,  and  at  my  heart  I  feel 

thee ! 

Thine  eyelash  on  my  cheek  doth  play — 

'Tis  Mary's  hand  upon  my  brow! 
But  let  me  check  this  tender  lay, 

Which  none  may  hear  but  she  and  thou ! 
Like  the  still  hive  at  quiet  midnight  humming, 
Murmur  it  to  yourselves,  ye  two  beloved  women ! 


TO  A  LADY, 

OFFENDED  BY  A  SPORTIVE  OBSERVATION  THAT  WOMEN 
HAVE  NO  SOULS. 

Nay,  dearest  Anna  !  why  so  grave  ? 

I  said,  you  had  no  soul,  'tis  true! 
For  what  you  ore  you  cannot  have: 

'T  is  I,  that  have  one  since  I  first  had  you ! 


I  have  heard  of  reasons  manifold 
Why  Love  must  needs  be  blind, 

But  this  the  best  of  all  I  hold — 
His  eyes  are  in  his  mind 


What  outward  form  and  feature  are 
He  guesseth  but  in  part ; 

But  what  within  is  good  and  fair 
He  seeth  with  the  heart 


LINES  SUGGESTED  BY  THE  LAST  WORDS 
OF  BERENGARIUS. 

OB.  ANNO  DOM.  1088. 

No  more  'twixt  conscience  staggering  and  the  Pope, 
Soon  shall  I  now  before  my  God  appear, 
By  him  to  be  acquitted,  as  I  hope ; 
By  him  to  be  condemned,  as  I  fear, 

reflections  on  the  above. 
Lynx  amid  moles !  had  I  stood  by  thy  bed, 
Be  of  good  cheer,  meek  soul !  I  would  have  said  . 
I  see  a  hope  spring  from  that  humble  fear. 
All  are  not  strong  alike  through  storms  to  steer 
Right  onward.    What  though  dread  of  threaten'd 

death 
And  dungeon  torture  made  thy  hand  and  breath 
Inconstant  to  the  truth  within  thy  heart  ? 
That  truth,  from  which,  through  fear,  thou  twice 

didst  start, 
Fear  haply  told  thee,  was  a  learned  strife, 
Or  not  so  vital  as  to  claim  thy  life  : 
And  myriads  had  reach'd  Heaven,  who  never  knew 
Where  lay  the  difference  'twixt  the  false  and  true ! 

Ye  who,  secure  'mid  trophies  not  your  own, 
Judge  him  who  won  them  when  he  stood  alone, 
And  proudly  talk  of  recreant  Berengare — 
0  first  the  age,  and  then  the  man  compare ! 
That  age  how  dark  !  congenial  minds  how  rare ! 
No  host  of  friends  with  kindred  zeal  did  burn ! 
No  throbbing  hearts  awaited  his  return  ! 
Prostrate  alike  when  prince  and  peasant  fell, 
He  only  disenchanted  from  the  spell, 
Like  the  weak  worm  that  gems  the  starless  night, 
Moved  in  the  scanty  circlet  of  his  light : 
And  was  it  strange  if  he  withdrew  the  ray 
That  did  but  guide  the  night-birds  to  their  prey  ? 

The  ascending  Day-star  with  a  bolder  eye 
Hath  lit  each  dew-drop  on  our  trimmer  lawn ! 
Yet  not  for  this,  if  wise,  will  we  decry 
The  spots  and  struggles  of  the  timid  Dawn  ! 
Lest  so  we  tempt  th'  approaching  Noon  to  scorn 
The  mists  and  painted  vapors  of  our  Morn. 


THE  DEVIL'S  THOUGHTS 

From  his  brimstone  bed  at  break  of  day 

A-vvalking  the  Devil  is  gone, 
To  visit  his  little  snug  farm  of  the  earth, 

And  see  how  his  stock  went  on. 

Over  the  hill  and  over  the  dale, 

And  he  went  over  the  plain, 
And  backwards  and  fin-wards  he  swish'd  his  long  tail 

As  a  gentleman  swishes  his  cane. 

And  how  then  was  the  Devil  drest  ? 

Oh  !  he  was  in  his  Sunday's  best : 
His  jacket  was  red  and  his  breeches  were  blue. 

And  there  was  a  hole  where  the  tail  came  through 

224 


MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 


215 


He  saw  a  Lawyer  killing  a  Viper 
On  a  dung-heap  beside  his  stable, 

And  the  Devil  smiled,  for  it  put  him  in  mind 
Of  Cain  and  his  brother,  Abel. 

A  Pothecary  on  a  white  horse 

Rode  by  on  his  vocations, 
And  the  Devil  thought  of  his  old  Friend 

Death  in  the  Revelations. 


He  saw  a  cottage  with  a  double  coach-house, 

A  cottage  of  gentility! 
And  the  Devil  did  grin,  for  his  darling  sin 

Is  pride  that  apes  humility. 

He  went  into  a  rich  bookseller's  shop, 
Quoth  he  !  we  are  both  of  one  college  ; 

For  I  myself  sate  like  a  cormorant  once 
Fast  by  the  tree  of  knowledge.* 

Down  the  river  there  plied  with  wind  and  tide, 

A'pig,  with  vast  celerity; 
And  the  Devil  look'd  wise  as  he  saw  how  the  while, 
It  cut  its  own  throat.   There .'  quoth  he,  with  a  smile, 

Goes  "  England's  commercial  prosperity." 

As  he  went  through  Cold-Bath  Fields,  he  saw 

A  solitary  cell, 
And  the  Devil  was  pleased,  for  it  gave  him  a  hint 

For  improving  his  prisons  in  Hell. 


General 


-'s  burning  face 


He  saw  with  consternation, 
And  back  to  Hell  his  way  did  he  take, 
For  the  Devil  thought,  by  a  slight  mistake, 

It  was  general  conflagration. 


*  And  all  amid  them  stood  the  Tree  of  Life 
High  eminent,  blooming  ambrosial  fruit 
Of  vegetable  gold  (query  paper  money?) ;  and  next  to  Life 
Our  Death,  the  Tree  of  Knowledge,  grew  fast  by. — 


So  clomb  this  first  grand  thief 

Thence  up  he  flew,  and  on  the  tree  of  life 
Sat  like  a  cormorant. — Par.  Lost,  IV. 

The  allegory  here  is  so  apt,  that  in  a  catalogue  of  various 
readings  obtained  from  collating  the  MSS.  one  might  expect  to 
find  it  noted,  that  for  "Life"  Cod.  quid  habent,  "  Trade." 
Though  indeed  the  trade,  i.  e.  the  bibliopolic,  so  called, 
tear'  c^d^nv,  may  be  regarded  as  Life  sansu  eminentiori :  a 
suggestion,  which  I  owe  to  a  young  retailer  in  the  hosiery  line, 
who  on  hearing  a  description  of  the  net  profits,  dinner  parties, 
country  houses,  etc.  of  the  trade,  exclaimed,  "Ay!  that's 
what  I  call  Life  now!"— This  "Life,  our  Death,"  is  thus 
happily  contrasted  with  the  fruits  of  Authorship. — Sic  nos  non 
nobis  mellificamus  Apes. 

Of  this  poem,  with  which  the  Fire,  Famine  and  Slaughter 
first  appeared  in  the  Morning  Post,  the  three  first  stanzas,  which 
are  worth  all  the  rest,  and  the  ninth,  were  dictated  by  Mr. 
Southey.  Between  the  ninth  and  the  concluding  stanza,  two  or 
three  are  omitted  as  grounded  on  subjects  that  have  lost  their 
interest — and  for  better  reasons. 

If  any  one  should  ask,  who  General meant,  the  Author 

begs  leave  to  inform  him,  that  he  did  once  see  a  red-faced  per- 
•on  in  a  dream  whom  by  the  dress  he  took  for  a  General ;  but 


CONSTANCY  TO  AN  IDEAL  OBJECT. 

Since  all,  that  beat  about  in  Nature's  range, 
Or  veer  or  vanish,  why  shouldst  thou  remain 
The  only  constant  in  a  world  of  change — 

0  yearning  THOl  <;iit,  that  livest  hut  in  the  brain? 
Call  to  the  hours,  that  in  the  distance  play, 
The  fairy  people  of  the  future  day 

Fond  thought!  not  one  of  all  that  shining  swarm 
YA^ll  breathe  on  thee  with  life-enkindling  breath, 
Till  when,  like  strangers  shelt'ring  from  a  storm, 
Hope  and  Despair  meet  in  the  porch  of  Death! 
Yet  still  thou  haunt'st  me;  and  though  well  I  see, 
She  is  not  thou,  and  only  thou  art  she, 
Still,  still  as  though  some  dear  embodied  good, 
Some  living  love  before  my  eyes  there  stood, 
With  answering  look  a  ready  ear  to  lend, 

1  mourn  to  thee  and  say — "Ah!  loveliest  friend! 
That  this  the  meed  of  all  my  toils  might  be, 

To  have  a  home,  an  English  home  and  thee  ! 
Vain  repetition !    Home  and  thou  art  one. 
The  peacefull'st  cot  the  moon  shall  shine  upon, 
Ltill'd  by  the  thrush  and  waken'd  by  the  lark, 
Without  thee  were  but  a  becalmed  Bark, 
Whose  helmsman  on  an  ocean  waste  and  wide 
Sits  mute  and  pale  his  mouldering  helm  beside. 

And  art  thou  nothing  ?    Such  thou  art,  as  when 
The  woodman  winding  westward  up  the  glen 
At  wintry  dawn,  where  o'er  the  sheep-track's  maze 
The  viewless  snow-mist  weaves  a  glist'ning  haze, 
Sees  full  before  him,  gliding  without  tread, 
An  imaget  with  a  glory  round  its  head ; 
The  enamour'd  rustic  worships  its  fair  hues, 
Nor  knows,  he  makes  the  shadow  he  pursues ! 


THE  SUICIDE'S  ARGUMENT. 

Ere  the  birth  of  my  life,  if  I  wish'd  it  or  no 
No  question  was  ask'd  me — it  could  not  be  so ! 
If  the  life  was  the  question,  a  thing  sent  to  try. 
And  to  live  on  be  Yes  ;  what  can  No  be  ?  to  die. 

nature's  answer. 
Is't  return'd  as  'twas  sent?  Is't  no  worse  for  the  wear? 
Think  first,  what  you  are  !    Call  to  mind  what  you 

were  ! 
I  gave  you  innocence,  I  gave  you  hope, 
Gave  health,  and  genius,  and  an  ample  scope. 
Return  you  me  guilt,  lethargy,  despair? 
Make  out  the  Invent'ry  ;  inspect,  compare ! 
Then  die — if  die  you  dare  ! 


ho  might  have  been  mistaken,  and  most  certainly  he  did  not 
hear  any  names  mentioned.  In  simple  .verity,  the  Author  never 
meant  any  one,  or  indeed  any  thing  but  to  put  a  concluding 
stanza  to  his  doggerel. 

t  This  phenomenon,  which  the  Author  has  himself  expe- 
rienced, and  of  which  the  reader  may  find  a  description  in  one 
of  the  earlier  volumes  of  the  Manchester  Philosophical  Trans- 
actions, is  applied  figuratively  in  the  following  passage  of  the 
Aids  to  Reflection: 

"Pindar's  fine  remark  respecting  the  different  effects  of  music 
on  different  characters,  holds  equally  true  of  Genius :  as  many 
as  are  not  delighted  by  it  are  disturbed,  perplexed,  irritated. 
The  beholder  either  recognizes  it  as  a  projected  form  of  his  oan 
Being,  that  moves  before  him  with  a  Glory  round  its  head,  or 
recoils  from  it  as  a  spectre." — Aids  to  lifflection,  p.  220. 
225 


216 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


THE  BLOSSOMING  OF  THE  SOLITARY 
DATE-TREE. 


A  LAMENT. 


I  seem  to  have  an  indistinct  recollection  of  having  lead  either 
in  one  of  the  ponderous  tomes  of  George  of  Venice,  or  in  some 
other  compilation  from  the  uninspired  Hebrew  Writers,  an 
Apologue  or  Rabbinical  Tradition  lei  the  following  purpose: 

While  our  first  parents  Blood  before  their  offended  Mal#er, 
and  the  last  words  of  the  sentence  were  yet  sounding  in  Adam's 
ear,  the  guileful  false  serpent,  a  counterfeit  and  h  usurper  from 
the  beginning,  presumptuously  took  on  himself  the  character 
nf  advocate  or  mediator,  and  pretending  to  intercede  for  Adam, 
exclaimed:  "Nay,  Lord,  in  thy  justice,  not  so!  for  the  Man 
was  the  least  in  fault.  Rather  let  the  Woman  return  at  once 
to  the  dust,  and  let  Adam  remain  in  this  thy  Paradise."  And 
the  word  of  the  Most  High  answered  Satan:  "The  tender 
mercies  of  the  wicked  are  cruel.  Treacherous  Fiend  !  if  with 
uuilt  like  thine,  it  had  been  possible  for  thee  to  have  the  heart 
of  a  Man,  and  to  feel  the  yearning  of  a  human  soul  for  its 
counterpart,  the  sentence,  which  thou  now  counsellest,  should 
have  been  inflicted  on  thyself." 


[The  title  of  the  following  poem  was  suggested  by  a  fact  men- 
tioned by  Linnaeus,  of  a  Date- tree  in  a  nobleman's  garden, 
which  year  afler  year  had  put  forth  a  full  show  of  blossoms, 
but  never  produced  fruit,  till  a  branch  from  a  Date-tree  had 
been  conveyed  from  a  distance  of  some  hundred  leagues. 
The  first  leaf  of  the  MS.  from  which  the  poem  has  been 
transcribed,  and  which  contained  the  two  or  three  introduc- 
tory stanzas,  is  wanting  :  and  the  author  has  in  vain  taxed 
his  memory  to  repair  the  loss.  But  a  rude  draught  of  the 
poem  contains  the  substance  of  the  stanzas,  and  the  reader 
is  requested  to  receive  it  as  the  substitute.  It  is  not  impossi- 
ble, that  some  congenial  spirit,  whose  years  do  not  exceed 
those  of  the  author  at  the  time  the  poem  was  written,  may 
find  a  pleasure  in  restoring  the  Lament  to  its  original  integ- 
rity by  a  reduction  of  the  thoughts  to  the  requisite  Metre. — 

S.  T.C. 


Beneath  the  blaze  of  a  tropical  sun  the  moun- 
tain peaks  are  the  Thrones  of  Frost,  through  the 
absence  of  objects  to  reflect  the  rays.  "  What  no 
one  'with  us  shares,  seems  scarce  our  own."  The 
presence  of  a  one, 

The  best  beloved,  who  loveth  me  the  best, 
is  for  the  heart,  what  the  supporting  air  from  within 
is  for  the  hollow  globe  with  its  suspended  car.  De- 
prive it  of  this,  and  all  without,  that  would  have 
buoyed  it  aloft  even  to  the  seat  of  the  gods,  becomes 
a  burthen,  and  crushes  it  into  flatness. 

2. 
The  finer  the  sense  for  the  heautiful  and  the  lovely, 
and  the  fairer  and  lovelier  the  object  presented  to  the 
sense;  the  more  exquisite  the  individual's  capacity 
of  joy,  and  the  more  ample  his  means  and  opportu- 
nities of  enjoyment,  the  more  heavily  will  he  feel 
the  ache  of  solitariness,  the  more  unsubstantial  be- 
comes the  feast  spread  around  him.  What  matters 
it,  whether  in  fact  the  viands  and  the  ministering 
graces  are  shadowy  or  real,  to  him  who  has  not 
hand  to  grasp  nor  arms  to  embrace  them  1 

3. 
Imagination;  honorable  Aims; 
Free  Commune  with  the  choir  that  cannot  die; 
Science  and  Sonar;  Delight  in  little  things, 
The  buoyant  child  surviving  in  the  man; 
Fields,  forests,  ancient  mountains,  ocean,  sky, 
With  all  their  voices — O  dare  I  accuse 
My  earthly  lot  as  guilty  of  my  spleen, 


Or  call  my  destiny  niggard  ?  O  no!  no  ! 
It  is  her  largeness,  and  her  overflow, 
Which  being  incomplete,  disquieteth  me  so ' 

4. 
For  never  touch  of  gladness  stirs  my  heart, 
But  tim'rously  beginning  to  rejoice 
Like  a  blind  Arab,  that  from  sleep  doth  start 
In  lonesome  tent,  I  listen  for  thy  voice. 
Beloved  !  'lis  not  thine;  thou  art  not  there! 
Then  melts  the  bubble  into  idle  air, 
And  wishing  without  hope  I  restlessly  despair. 


The  mother  with  anticipated  glee 
Smiles  o'er  the  child,  that  standing  by  her  chair, 
And  llatt'ning  its  round  cheek  upon  her  knee, 
Looks  up,  and  doth  its  rosy  lips  prepare 
To  mock  the  coming  sounds.    At  that  sweet  sight 
She  hears  her  own  voice  with  a  new  delight ; 
And  if  the   babe  perchance  should   lisp  the  notes 
aright, 


Then  is  she  tenfold  gladder  than  before ! 

But  should  disease  or  chance  the  darling  take, 

What  then  avail  those  songs,  which  sweet  of  yore 

Were  only  sweet  for  their  sweet  echo's  sake  ? 

Dear  maid!  no  prattler  at  a  mother's  knee 

Was  e'er  so  dearly  prized  as  I  prize  thee: 

Why  was  I  made  for  love,  and  love  denied  to  me  ? 


FANCY  IN  NUBIBUS, 

OR    THE    POET    IN    THE    CLOUDS. 

O!  it  is  pleasant,  with  a  heart  at  ease, 

Just  afler  sunset,  or  by  moonlight  skies, 
To  make  the  shifting  clouds  be  what  you  please, 

Or  let  the  easily  persuaded  eyes 
Own  each  quaint  likeness  issuing  from  the  mould 

Of  a  friend's  fancy ;  or  with  head  bent  low 
And  cheek  aslant,  see  rivers  flow  of  gold 

'Twixt  crimson  banks ;  and  then,  a  traveller,  go 
From    mount  to  mount   through  Cloudland,   gor- 
geous land ! 

Or  list'ning  to  the  tide,  with  closed  sight, 
Be  that  blind  bard,  who  on  the  Chian  strand 

By  those  deep  sounds  possess'd,  with  inward  light 
Beheld  the  Iliad  and  the  Odyssey 

Rise  to  the  swelling  of  the  voiceful  sea. 


THE  TWO  FOUNTS. 

stanzas  addressed  to  a  lady  on  her  recovery 
with  unblemished  looks,  from  a  severe  at- 
tack of  pain. 

'T  was  my  last  waking  thought,  how  it  could  be 
That  thou,  sweet  friend,  such  anguish  shouldst  endure 
When  straight  from  Dreamland  came  a  Dwarf,  and  he 
Could  tell  the  cause,  forsooth,  and  knew  the  cure. 

Metbought  he  fronted  me,  with  peering  look 
Fix'd  on  my  heart;  and  read  aloud  in  game 
The  loves  and  griefs  therein,  as  from  a  book : 
And  utter'd  praise  like  one  who  wish'd  to  blame. 
226 


MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 


217 


In  every  heart  (quoth  he)  since  Adam's  sin, 
Two  Founts  there  are,  of  suffering  and  of  cheer ! 
Thai  to  let  Ibrth,  and  this  to  keep  within! 
But  she,  whose  aspect  1  find  imaged  here, 

Of  Pleasure  only  will  to  all  dispense, 
That  Fount  alone  unlock'd,  by  no  distress 
Choked  or  turn'd  inward,  but  still  issue  thence 
Unconquer'd  cheer,  persistent  loveliness. 

As  on  the  driving  cloud  the  shiny  Bow, 
That  gracious  thing  made  up  of  tears  and  light, 
'Mid  the  wild  rack  and  rain  that  slants  below 
Stands  smiling  lorih,  unmoved  and  freshly  bright : 

As  though  the  spirits  of  all  lovely  flowers, 
Inweaving  each  its  wreath  and  dewy  crown, 
Or  ere  they  sank  to  earth  in  vernal  showers, 
Had  built  a  bridge  to  tempt  the  angels  down. 

Even  so,  Eliza !  on  that  face  of  thine, 

On  that  benignant  face,  whose  look  alone 

(The  soul's  translucence  through  her  crystal  shrine  !) 

Has  power  to  soothe  all  anguish  but  thine  own. 

\  beauty  hovers  still,  and  ne'er  takes  wing, 
But  with  a  silent  charm  compels  the  stern 
And  tort'ring  Genius  of  the  bitter  spring 
To  shrink  aback,  and  cower  upon  his  urn. 

Who  then  needs  wonder,  if  (no  outlet  found 
In  passion,  spleen,  or  stnle)  the  fount  of  pain 
O'erflowing  beats  against  its  lovely  mound, 
And  in  wild  flashes  shoots  from  heart  to  brain  ? 

Sleep,  and  the  Dwarf  with  that  unsteady  gleam 
On  his  raised  lip,  that  aped  a  critic  smile, 
Had  pass'd  :  yet  I,  my  sad  thoughts  to  beguile, 
Lay  weaving  on  the  tissue  of  my  dream : 

Till  audibly  at  length  I  cried,  as  though 
Thou  hadst  indeed  been  present  to  my  eyes, 

0  sweet,  sweet  sufferer !  if  the  case  be  so, 

1  pray  thee,  be  less  good,  less  sweet,  less  wise ! 

In  every  look  a  barbed  arrow  send, 
On  these  soft  lips  let  scorn  and  anger  live! 
Do  any  thing,  rather  than  thus,  sweet  friend ! 
Hoard  for  thyself  the  pain  thou  wilt  not  give ! 


WHAT  IS  LIFE? 

Resembles  life  what  once  was  held  of  light, 
Too  ample  in  itself  for  human  sight  ? 
An  absolute  self?  an  element  ungrounded  ? 
All  that  we  see,  all  colors  of  all  shade 

By  encroach  of  darkness  made  ? 
Is  very  life  by  consciousness  unbounded? 
And  all  the  thoughts,  pains,  joys  of  mortal  breath, 
A  war-embrace  of  wrestling  life  and  death  ? 


THE  EXCHANGE. 

We  pledged  our  hearts,  my  love  and  I, — 
I  in  my  arms  the  maiden  clasping ; 

I  could  not  tell  the  reason  why, 
But,  oh !  I  trembled  like  an  aspen. 

U2 


Her  father's  love  she  bade  me  gain  ; 

I  went  and  shook  like  any  reed ! 
I  strove  to  act  the  man — in  vain ! 

We  had  exchanged  our  hearts  indeed. 


SONNET, 

.   COMPOSED  BY  THE  SEASIDE,  OCTOBER  1817. 

Oh  !  it  is  pleasant,  with  a  heart  at  ease, 

Just  after  sunset,  or  by  moonlight  skies, 

To  make  the  shifting  clouds  be  what  you  please; 

Or  yield  the  easily  persuaded  eyes 

To  each  quaint  image  issuing  from  the  mould 
Of  a  friend's  fancy  ;  or  with  head  bent  low, 
And  cheek  aslant,  see  rivers  flow  of  gold 
'Twixt  crimson  banks ;  and  then,  a  traveller,  go 

From  mount  to  mount,  through  Cloudland,  gorgeous 

land ! 
Or  listening  to  the  tide,  with  closed  sight, 
Be  that  blind  bard,  who  on  the  Chian  strand, 
By  those  deep  sounds  possess'd,  with  inward  light 
Beheld  the  Iliad  and  the  Odyssey 
Rise  to  the  swelling  of  the  voiceful  sea ! 


EPIGRAMS. 

I. 
I  ask'd  my  fair,  one  happy  day, 
What  I  should  call  her  in  my  lay, 
By  what  sweet  name  from  Rome,  or  Greece, 
Nesera,  Laura,  Daphne,  Chloris, 
Carina,  Lalage,  or  Doris, 
Dorimene,  or  Lucrece  ? 

II. 
"  Ah,"  replied  my  gentle  fair  ; 
"  Dear  one,  what  are  names  but  air  ? — 
Choose  thou  whatever  suits  the  line  ; 
Call  me  Laura,  call  me  Chloris, 
Call  me  Lalage,  or  Doris, 
Only — only — call  me  thine!" 


Sly  Belzebub  took  all  occasions 

To  try  Job's  constancy,  and  patience. 

He  took  his  honor,  took  his  health ; 

He  took  his  children,  took  his  wealth, 

His  servants,  oxen,  horses,  cows, — 

But  cunning  Satan  did  not  lake  his  spouse. 

But  Heaven,  that  brings  out  good  from  evil, 

And  loves  to  disappoint  the  devil, 

Had  predetermined  to  restore 

Twofold  all  he  had  before  ; 

His  servants,  horses,  oxen,  cows — 

Short-sighted  devil,  not  to  take  his  spouse ! 


Hoarse  Maevius  reads  his  hobbling  verse 
To  all,  and  at  all  times ; 
And  finds  them  both  divinely  smooth, 
His  voice  as  well  as  rhymes. 

227 


218 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


But  folks  say  Msevius  is  no  ass  ; 
But  Macvius  makes  it  clear 
That  lie 's  a  monster  of  an  ass — 
An  ass  without  an  ear! 


There  comes  from  old  Avaro's  grave 
A  deadly  stench — why,  sure,  they  have 
Immured  his  soul  within  his  Grave ! 


Last  Monday  all  the  papers  said, 

That  Mr. was  dead  ; 

Why,  then,  what  said  the  city  ? 
The  tenth  part  sadly  shook  their  head, 
And  shaking  sigh'd,  and  sighing  said, 
"  Pity,  indeed,  'tis  pity  !"        •  . 

But  when  the  said  report  was  found 
A  rumor  wholly  without  ground, 
Why,  then,  what  said  the  city  ? 
The  other  nine  parts  shook  their  head, 
Repeating  what  the  tenth  had  said, 
"  Pity,  indeed,  't  is  pity ! " 


Your  poem  must  eternal  be, 
Dear  Sir! — it  cannot  fail — 
For  'tis  incomprehensible, 
And  wants  both  head  and  tail. 


Swans  sing  before  they  die — 'twere  no  bad  thing 
Did  certain  persons  die  before  they  sing. 


the  "Fortunate  Isles"  of  the  Muses:  and  then  other  and  mora 
momentous  interests  prompted  a  different  voyage,  to  firmer  an- 
chorage and  a  securer  port.  I  have  in  vain  tried  to  recover  the 
lines  from  the  Palimpsest  tablet  of  my  memory :  and  1  can  only 
offer  the  introductory  stanza,  which  had  been  committed  to 
writing  for  the  purpose  of  procuring  a  friend's  judgment  on 
the  metre,  as  a  specimen. 

Encinctured  with  a  twine  of  leaves, 

That  leafy  twine  his  only  dress  ! 

A  lovely  Boy  was  plucking  fruits, 

By  moonlight,  in  a  wilderness. 

The  moon  was  bright,  the  air  was  free. 

And  fruits  and  flowers  together  grew 

On  many  a  shrub  and  many  a  tree: 

And  all  put  on  a  gentle  hue, 

Hanging  in  the  shadowy  air 

Like  a  picture  rich  and  rare. 

It  was  a  climale  where,  they  say, 

The  night  is  more  beloved  than  day. 

But  who  that  beauteous  Boy  beguiled, 

That  beauteous  Boy,  to  linger  here  ? 

Alone,  by  night,  a  little  child. 

In  place  so  silent  and  so  wild — 

Has  he  no  friend,  no  loving  Mother  near  1 

I  have  heregiven  the  birth,  parentage,  and  premature  decease 
of  the  "  Wanderings  of  Cain,  a  poem,"— entreating,  however, 
my  Readers  not  to  think  so  meanly  of  my  judgment,  as  to  sup- 
pose that  I  either  regard  or  offer  it  as  any  excuse  for  the  pub- 
lication of  the  following  fragment  (and  I  may  add,  of  one  or 
two  others  in  its  neighborhood),  or  its  primitive  crudity.  But 
I  should  find  still  greater  difficulty  in  forgiving  myself,  were  I 
to  record  pro  tosdio  publico  a  set  of  petty  mishaps  an'!  annoy- 
ances which  I  myself  wish  to  forget.  I  must  be  content  therefore 
with  assuring  the  friendly  Reader,  that  the  less  he  attributes  its 
appearance  to  the  Author's  will,  choice,  or  judgment,  the 
nearer  to  the  truth  he  will  be.  S.  T.  C. 


THE  WANDERINGS  OF  CAIN. 


PREFATORY    NOTE. 


A  prose  composition,  one  not  in  metre  at  least,  seems  prima 
facie  to  require  explanation  or  apology.  It  was  written  in  the 
year  lT'.IH,  near  Nether  Stowey  in  Somersetshire,  at  which  place 
(sanctum  tt  amabilc  nomen  ■'  rich  by  so  many  associations  and 
recollections)  the  Author  had  taken  up  his  residence  in  order 
to  enjoy  the  society  and  close  neighborhood  of  a  dear  and  hon- 
ored friend,  T.  Poole.  Esq.  The  work  was  to  have  been  written 
in  concert  with  another,  whose  name  is  too  venerable  within 
the  precincts  of  genius  to  be  unnecessarily  brought  into  connex- 
ion with  such  a  trifle,  and  who  was  then  residing  at  a  small 
distance  from  Nether  Stowey.  The  title  and  subject  were  sug- 
gested by  myself,  who  likewise  drew  out  the  scheme  and  the 
contents  for  each  of  the  three  books  or  cantoes,  of  which  the 
work  was  to  consist,  and  which,  the  reader  is  to  be  informed, 
was  to  have  been  finished  in  one  night !  My  partner  undertook 
the  first  canto  :  I  the  second  :  and  whichever  had  done  first,  was 
to  set  about  the  third.  Almost  thirty  years  have  passed  by  ;  yet 
at  this  moment  I  cannot  without  something  more  than  a  smile 
moot  the  question  which  of  the  two  things  was  the  more  im- 
practicable, for  a  mind  so  eminently  original  to  compose  another 
man's  thoughts  and  fancies,  or  for  a  taste  so  austerely  pure  and 
simple  to  imitate  the  Death  of  Abel  ?  Methinks  I  see  his  grand 
and  noble  countenance  as  at  the  moment  when  having  dispatch- 
ed my  own  portion  of  the  task  at  full  finger-speed,  I  hastened 
to  him  with  my  manuscript — that  look  of  humorous  despond- 
ency fixed  on  his  almost  blank  sheet  of  paper,  and  then  its 
silent  mock  piteous  admission  of  failure  struggling  with  the 
sense  of  the  exceeding  ridiculousness  of  the  whole  scheme — 
which  broke  up  in  a  laugh  :  and  the  Ancient  Mariner  was  writ- 
ten instead. 

Years  afterward,  however,  the  draft  of  the  Plan  and  propo- 
sed Incidents,  and  the  portion  executed,  obtained  favor  in  the 
eyes  of  more  than  one  person,  whose  judgment  on  a  poetic 
work  could  not  but  have  weighed  with  me,  even  though  no  pa- 
rental partiality  had  been  thrown  into  the  same  scale,  as  a 
make-weigh' :  and  I  determined  on  commencing  anew,  and 
composing  the  whole  in  stanzas,  and  made  some  progress  in 
real.zuig  this  intention,  when  adverse  gales  drove  my  bark  off, 


CANTO  II. 


"  A  little  further,  O  my  father,  yet  a  little  further, 
and  we  shall  come  into  the  open  moonlight."  Their 
road  was  through  a  forest  of  fir-trees ;  at  its  entrance 
the  trees  stood  at  distances  from  each  other,  and  the 
path  was  broad,  and  the  moonlight,  and  the  moonlight 
shadows  reposed  upon  it,  and  appeared  quietly  to  in- 
habit that  solitude.  But  soon  the  path  winded  and 
became  narrow ;  the  sun  at  high  noon  sometimes 
speckled,  but  never  illumined  it,  and  now  it  was 
dark  as  a  cavern. 

"  It  is  dark,  0  my  father !"  said  Enos ;  "  but  the 
path  under  our  feet  is  smooth  and  soft,  and  we  shall 
soon  come  out  into  the  open  moonlight." 

"Lead  on,  my  child!"  said  Cain:  "guide  me, 
little  child  !"  And  the  innocent  little  child  clasped  a 
finder  of  the  hand  which  had  murdered  the  righteous 
Abel,  and  he  guided  his  father.  "  The  fir  branches 
drip  upon  thee,  my  son."  "  Yea,  pleasantly,  father 
for  I  ran  fast  and  eagerly  to  bring  thee  the  pitcher 
and  the  cake,  and  my  body  is  not  yet  cool,  How 
happy  the  squirrels  are  that  feed  on  these  fir-trees! 
they  leap  from  bough  to  bough,  and  the  old  squirrels 
play  round  their  young  ones  in  the  nest.  I  clomb  a  tree 
yesterday  at  noon,  O  my  father,  that  I  might  play 
with  them ;  hut  they  leapt  away  from  the  branches, 
even  to  the  slender  twigs  did  ihey  leap,  and  in  a 
moment  I  beheld  them  on  another  tree.  Why,  O  my 
father,  would  they  not  play  with  me  ?  I  would  be 
good  to  them  as  thou  art  good  to  me :  and  I  groaned 
to  them  even  as  thou  groanest  when  thou  givest  me 
to  eat,  and  when  thou  coverst  me  at  evening,  and  as 
often  as  I  stand  at  thy  knee  and  thine  eyes  look  at 
me."  Then  Cain  stopped,  and  stifling  his  siroans  he 
sank  to  the  earth,  and  the  child  Enos  stood  in  the 
darkness  beside  him. 

228 


MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 


219 


And  Cain  lifted  up  his  voice  and  cried  bitterly, 
and  said,  "  The  Mighty  One  that  persecuteth  me  is 
on  this  side  and  on  that ;  he  pursueth  my  soul  like 
the  wind,  like  the  sand-blast  he  passeth  through  me ; 
he  is  around  me  even  as  the  air!  O  that  I  might  be 
utterly  no  more !  I  desire  to  die — yea,  the  things 
that  never  had  life,  neither  move  they  upon  the 
earth — behold !  they  seem  precious  to  mine  eyes.  O 
that  a  man  might  live  without  the  breath  of  his  nos- 
trils! So  1  might  abide  in  darkness,  and  blackness, 
and  an  empty  space  !  Yea,  I  would  lie  down,  I  would 
not  rise,  neither  would  1  stir  my  limbs  till  I  became 
as  the  rock  in  the  den  of  the  lion,  on  which  the 
young  lion  resteth  his  head  whilst  he  sleepelh.  For 
the  torrent  that  roareth  far  off  hath  a  voice,  and  the 
clouds  in  heaven  look  terribly  on  me  ;  the  Mighty 
One  who  is  against  me  speaketh  in  the  wind  of  the 
cedar  grove;  and  in  silence  am  I  dried  up."  Then 
Enos  spake  to  his  father:    "  Arise,  my  father,  arise. 


ed  from  its  point,  and  between  its  point  and  the 
sands  a  tall  man  might  stand  upright.  It  was  here 
that  Enos  had  found  the  pitcher  and  cake,  and  to 
this  place  he  led  his  father.  But  ere  they  had  reach- 
ed the  rock  they  beheld  a  human  shape :  his  back 
was  towards  them,  and  they  were  advancing  unper- 
eeivcd,  when  they  heard  him  smile  his  breast  and 
cry  aloud,  "Woe  is  me!  woe  is  me!  I  must  never  die 
again,  and  yet  I  am  perishing  with  thirst  und  hun- 
ger." 

Pallid,  as  the  reflection  of  the  sheeted  lightning  on 
the  heavy-sailing  night-cloud,  became  the  face  of 
Cain ;  but  the  child  Enos  took  hold  of  the  shaggy 
skin,  his  father's  robe,  and  raised  his  eyes  to  his 
father,  and  listening  whispered,  "  Ere  yet  I  could 
speak,  1  am  sure,  O  my  father !  that  I  heard  that 
voice.  Have  not  I  often  said  that  1  remembered  a 
sweet  voice?  O  my  father!  this  is  it:"  and  Cain 
trembled  exceedingly.  The  voice  was  sweet  indeed, 


we  are  but  a  little  way  from  the  place  where  I  found    but  it  was  thin  and  querulous  like   that  of  a  feeble 


the  cake  and  the  pitcher."  And  Cain  said,  "  How 
knowest  thou  ?"  and  the  child  answered — "Behold, 
the  bare  rocks  are  a  few  of  thy  strides  distant  from 
the  forest ;  and  while  even  now  thou  wert  lifting  up 
thy  voice,  I  heard  the  echo."  Then  the  child  took 
hold  of  his  father,  as  if  he  would  raise  him :  and 
Cain  being  faint  and  feeble,  rose  slowly  on  his  knees 
and  pressed  himself  against  the  trunk  of  a  fir,  and 
stood  upright,  and  followed  the  child. 

The  path  was  dark  till  within  three  strides'  length 
of  its  termination,  when  it  turned  suddenly  ;  the 
thick  black  trees  formed  a  low  arch,  and  the  moon- 
light appeared  for  a  moment  like  a  dazzling  portal. 
Enos  ran  before  and  stood  in  the  open  air  ;  and  when 
Cain,  his  father,  emerged  from  the  darkness,  the 
child  was  affrighted.  For  the  mighty  limbs  of  Cain 
were  wasted  as  by  fire ;  his  hair  was  as  the  matted 
curls  on  the  Bison's  forehead,  and  so  glared  his  fierce 
and  sullen  eye  beneath :  and  the  black  abundant 
locks  on  either  side,  a  rank  and  tangled  mass,  were 
stained  and  scorched,  as  though  the  grasp  of  a 
burning  iron  hand  had  striven  to  rend  them ;  and  his 
countenance  told  in  a  strange  and  terrible  language 
of  agonies  that  had  been,  and  were,  and  were  still 
to  continue  to  be. 

The  scene  around  was  desolate ;  as  far  as  the  eye 
could  reach  it  was  desolate  :  the  bare  rocks  faced 
each  other,  and  left  a  long  and  wide  interval  of  thin 
white  sand.  You  might  wander  on  and  look  round 
and  round,  and  peep  into  the  crevices  of  the  rocks, 
and  discover  nothing  that  acknowledged  the  influ- 
ence of  the  seasons.  There  was  no  spring,  no  sum- 
mer, no  autumn:  and  the  winter's  snow,  that  would 
have  been  lovely,  fell  not  on  these  hot  rocks  and 
scorching  sands.  Never  morning  lark  had  poised 
himself  over  this  desert ;  but  the  huge  serpent  often 


slave  in  misery,  who  despairs  altogether,  yet  cannot 
refrain  himself  from  weeping  and  lamentation.  And, 
behold  !  Enos  glided  forward,  and  creeping  softly 
round  the  base  of  the  rock,  stood  before  the  stranger, 
and  looked  up  into  his  face.  And  the  Shape  shriek- 
ed, and  turned  round,  and  Cain  beheld  him,  that  his 
limbs  and  his  face  were  those  of  his  brother  Abel 
whom  he  had  killed!  And  Cain  stood  like  one  who 
struggles  in  his  sleep  because  of  the  exceeding  ter- 
ribleness  of  a  dream. 

Thus  as  he  stood  in  silence  and  darkness  of  soul, 
the  Shape  fell  at  his  feet,  and  embraced  his  knees, 
and  cried  out  with  a  bitter  outcry,  "  Thou  eldest- 
born  of  Adam,  whom  Eve,  my  mother,  brought  forth, 
cease  to  torment  me!  I  was  feeding  my  flocks  in 
green  pastures  by  the  side  of  quiet  rivers,  and  thou 
killedst  me ;  and  now  I  am  in  misery."  Then  Cain 
closed  his  eyes,  and  hid  them  with  his  hands  ;  and 
again  he  opened  his  eyes,  and  looked  around  him, 
and  said  to  Enos, "  What  beholdest  thou?  Didst  thou 
hear  a  voice,  my  son  ?"  "  Yes,  my  father,  I  beheld 
a  man  in  unclean  garments,  and  he  uttered  a  sweet 
voice,  full  of  lamentation."  Then  Cain  raised  up 
the  Shape  that  was  like  Abel,  and  said  : — "  The 
Creator  of  our  father,  who  had  respect  unto  thee, 
and  unto  thy  offering,  wherefore  hath  he  forsaken 
thee  ?"  Then  the  Shape  shrieked  a  second  time,  and 
rent  his  garment,  and  his  naked  skin  was  like  the 
white  sands  beneath  their  feet ;  and  he  shrieked  yet 
a  third  time,  and  threw  himself  on  his  face  upon  the 
sand  that  was  black  with  the  shadow  of  the  rock, 
and  Cain  and  Enos  sate  beside  him;  the  child  by  his 
right  hand,  and  Cain  by  his  left.  They  were  all 
three  under  the  rock,  and  within  the  shadow.  The 
Shape  that  was  like  Abel  raised  himself  up,  and 
spake  to  the  child :  "  I  know  where  the  cold  waters 


hissed  there  beneath  the  talons  of  the  vulture,  and  i  are,  but  I  may  not  drink;  wherefore  didst  ihou  then 
the  vulture  screamed,  his  wings  imprisoned  within  take  away  my  pitcher  I"  But  Cain  said,  "Didst  thou 
the  coils  of  the  serpent.  The  pointed  and  shattered  not  find  favor  in  the  sight  of  the  Lord  thy  God?" 
summits  of  the  ridges  of  the  rocks  made  a  rude  The  Shape  answered,  "The  Lord  is  God  of  the 
mimicry  of  human  concerns,  and  seemed  to  proph-  living  only,  the  dead  have  another  God."  Then 
esy  mutely  of  things  that  then  were  not;  steeples,  i  the  child  Enos  lifted  up  his  eyes  and  prayed;  but 
and  battlements,  and  ships  with  naked  masts.  As  far !  Cain  rejoiced  secretly  in  his  heart.  "  Wretched  shall 
from  the  wood  as  a  boy  might  sling  a  pebble  of  the'  they  be  all  the  days  of  their  mortal  life,"  exclaimed 
brook,  there  was  one  rock  by  itself  at  a  small  dis- ,  the  Shape,  "  who  sacrifice  worthy  and  acceptable 
tance  from  the  main  ridge.  It  had  been  precipitated  j  sacrifices  to  the  God  of  the  dead ;  but  after  death 
there  perhaps  by  the  groan  which  the  Earth  uttered  j  their  toil  ceaseth.  Woe  is  me,  for  I  was  well  beloved 
when  our  first  father  fell.  Before  you  approached,  it  by  the  God  of  the  living,  and  cruel  wert  thou,  O 
appeared  to  lie  flat  on  the  ground,  but  its  base  slant-   my  brother,  who  didst  snatch  me  away  from  his 

229 


220 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


power  and  his  dominion."  Having  uttered  these 
words,  he  rose  suddenly,  and  fled  over  the  sands ; 
and  Cain  said  in  his  heart,  "  The  curse  of  the  Lord 
is  on  me ;  but  who  is  the  God  of  the  dead  ?"  and  he 
ran  after  the  Shape,  and  the  Shape  fled  shrieking 
over  the  sands,  and  the  sands  rose  like  white  mists 
behind  the  steps  of  Cain,  but  the  feet  of  him  that 
was  like  Abel  disturbed  not  the  sands.  He  greatly 
outran  Cain,  and  turning  short,  he  wheeled  round, 
and  came  again  to  the  rock  where  they  had  been 
sitting,  and  where  Enos  still  stood ;  and  the  child 
caught  hold  of  his  garment  as  he  passed  by,  and  he 
fell  upon  the  ground.  And  Cain  stopped,  and  be- 
holding him  not,  said,  "  he  has  passed  into  the  dark 
woods,"  and  he  walked  slowly  back  to  the  rocks ; 
and  when  he  reached  it  the  child  told  him  that  he 
had  caught  hold  of  his  garment  as  he  passed  by,  and 
that  the  man  had  fallen  upon  the  ground :  and  Cain 
once  more  sate  beside  him,  and  said,  "  Abel,  my  bro- 
ther, I  would  lament  for  thee,  but  that  the  spirit 
within  me  is  withered,  and  burnt  up  with  extreme 
agony.  Now,  I  pray  thee,  by  thy  flocks,  and  by  thy 
pastures,  and  by  the  quiet  rivers  which  thou  lovedst, 
that  thou  tell  me  all  that  thou  knowest.  Who  is  the 
God  of  the  dead  ?  where  doth  he  make  his  dwelling  ? 
what  sacrifices  are  acceptable  unto  him  ?  for  I  have 
offered,  but  have  not  been  received  ;  I  have  prayed, 
and  have  not  been  heard ;  and  how  can  I  be  afflicted 
more  than  I  already  am?"  The  Shape  arose  and 
answered,  "  O  that  thou  hadst  had  pity  on  me  as  I 
will  have  pity  on  thee.  Follow  me,  Son  of  Adam ! 
and  bring  thy  child  with  thee ! " 

And  they  three  passed  over  the  white  sands  be- 
tween the  rocks,  silent  as  the  shadows. 


ALLEGORIC  VISION. 

A  feeling  of  sadness,  a  peculiar  melancholy,  is 
wont  to  take  possession  of  me  alike  in  Spring  and  in 
Autumn.  But  in  Spring  it  is  the  melancholy  of 
Hope :  in  Autumn  it  is  the  melancholy  of  Resigna- 
tion. As  I  was  journeying  on  foot  through  the  Apen- 
nine,  I  fell  in  with  a  pilgrim  in  whom  the  Spring  and 
the  Autumn  and  the  Melancholy  of  both  seemed  to 
have  combined.  In  his  discourse  there  were  the 
freshness  and  the  colors  of  April: 

Qual  ramicel  a  ramo, 

Tal  da  perkier  pensiero 

In  lui  germogliava. 

But  as  I  gazed  on  his  whole  form  and  figure,  I  be- 
thought me  of  the  not  unlovely  decays,  both  of  age 
and  of  the  late  season,  in  the  stately  elm,  after  the 
clusters  have  been  plucked  from  its  entwining  vines, 
and  the  vines  are  as  bands  of  dried  withies  around 
its  trunk  and  branches.  Even  so  there  was  a  memo- 
ry on  his  smooth  and  ample  forehead,  which  blended 
with  the  dedication  of  his  steady  eyes,  that  still 
looked — I  know  not,  whether  upward,  or  far  onward, 
or  rather  to  the  line  of  meeting  where  the  sky  rests 
upon  the  distance.  But  how  may  I  express  that 
dimness  of  abstraction  which  lay  on  the  lustre  of  the 
pilgrim's  eyes,  like  the  flitting  tarnish  from  the  breath 
of  a  sigh  on  a  silver  mirror!  and  which  accorded 
with  their  slow  and  reluctant  movement,  whenever 
he  turned  them  to  any  object  on  the  right  hand  or  on 
the  left?  It  seemed,  methought,  as  if  there  lay  upon 
the  brightness  a  shadowy  presence  of  disappointments 


now  unfelt,  but  never  forgotten.    It  was  at  once  the 
melancholy  of  hope  and  of  resignation. 

We  had  not  long  been  fellow-travellers,  ere  a  sud- 
den tempest  of  wind  and  rain  forced  us  to  seek  pro- 
tection in  the  vaulted  door-way  of  a  lone  chapelry  : 
and  we  sate  face  to  face  each  on  the  stone  bench 
along-side  the  low,  w'eather-stained  wall,  and  as  close 
as  possible  to  the  massy  door. 

After  a  pause  of  silence  :  Even  thus,  said  he,  like 
two  strangers  that  have  fled  to  the  same  shelter  from 
the  same  storm,  not  seldom  do  Despair  and  Hope 
meet  lor  the  first  time  in  the  porch  of  Death !  All 
extremes  meet,  I  answered ;  but  yours  was  a  strange 
and  visionary  thought.  The  better  then  doth  it  be- 
seem both  the  place  and  me,  he  replied.  From  a 
Visionary  wilt  thou  hear  a  Vision  ?  Mark  that  vivid 
flash  through  this  torrent  of  rain !  Fire  and  water. 
Even  here  thy  adage  holds  true,  and  its  truth  is  the 
moral  of  my  Vision.  I  entreated  him  to  proceed. 
Sloping  his  face  towards  the  arch  and  yet  averting 
his  eye  from  it,  he  seemed  to  seek  and  prepare  his 
words :  till  listening  to  the  wind  that  echoed  within 
the  hollow  edifice,  and  to  the  rain  without, 

Which  stole  on  his  thoughts  with  its  two-fold  sound, 
The  clash  hard  by  and  the  murmur  all  round, 
he  gradually  sunk  away,  alike  from  me  and  from  his 
own  purpose,  and  amid  the  gloom  of  the  storm,  and 
in  the  duskiness  of  that  place,  he  sate  like  an  em- 
blem on  a  rich  man's  sepulchre,  or  like  a  mourner 
on  the  sodded  grave  of  an  only  one — an  aged  mourner, 
who  is  watching  the  waned  moon  and  sorroweth  not. 
Starting  at  length  from  his  brief  trance  of  abstrac- 
tion, with  courtesy  and  an  atoning  smile  he  renewed 
his  discourse,  and  commenced  his  parable. 

During  one  of  those  short  furloughs  from  the  service 
of  the  Body,  which  the  Soul  may  sometimes  obtain 
even  in  this,  its  militant  state,  I  found  myself  in  a 
vast  plain,  which  I  immediately  knew  to  be  the  Val- 
ley of  Life.  It  possessed  an  astonishing  diversity  of 
soils :  and  here  was  a  sunny  spot,  and  there  a  dark 
one,  forming  just  such  a  mixture  of  sunshine  and 
shade,  as  we  may  have  observed  on  the  mountains' 
side  in  an  April  day,  when  the  thin  broken  clouds 
are  scattered  over  heaven.  Almost  in  the  very  en- 
trance of  the  valley  stood  a  large  and  gloomy  pile, 
into  which  I  seemed  constrained  to  enter.  Every 
part  of  the  building  was  crowded  with  tawdry  orna- 
ments and  fantastic  deformity.  On  every  window 
was  portrayed,  in  glaring  and  inelegant  colors,  some 
horrible  tale,  or  preternatural  incident,  so  that  not  a 
ray  of  light  could  enter,  untinged  by  the  medium 
through  which  it  passed.  The  body  of  the  building 
was  full  of  people,  some  of  them  dancing,  in  and 
out,  in  unintelligible  figures,  with  strange  ceremonies 
and  antic  merriment,  while  others  seemed  convulsed 
with  horror,  or  pining  in  mad  melancholy.  Inter- 
mingled with  these,  I  observed  a  number  of  men, 
clothed  in  ceremonial  robes,  who  appeared,  now  to 
marshal  the  various  groups  and  to  direct  their  move- 
ments, and  now,  with  menacing  countenances,  to 
drag  some  reluctant  victim  to  a  vast  idol,  framed  of 
iron  bars  intercrossed,  which  formed  at  the  same 
time  an  immense  cage,  and  the  shape  of  a  human 
Colossus. 

I  stood  for  a  while  lost  in  wonder  what  these  things 
might  mean;  when  lo!  one  of  the  directors  came  up 
to  me,  and  with  a  stern  and  reproachful  look  bade 
me  uncover  my  head,  for  that  the  place  into  which  I 
had  entered  was  the  temple  of  the  only  true  Rch- 
230 


MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 


221 


gion,  in  the  holier  recess  of  which  the  great  Goddess 
personally  resided.  Himself  too  he  bade  me  reverence, 
as  the  consecrated  minister  of  her  rites.  Awe-struck 
by  the  name  of  Religion,  I  bowed  before  the  priest, 
and  humbly  and  earnestly  entreated  him  to  conduct 
me  into  her  presence.  He  assented.  Offerings  he  took 
from  me,  with  mystic  sprinklings  of  water  and  with 
salt  he  purified',  and  with  strange  Bufflationa  he  ex- 
orcised me ;  and  then  led  me  through  many  a  dark 
and  winding  alley,  the  dew-damps  of  which  chilled 
my  flesh,  and  the  hollow  echoes  under  my  feet, 
mingled,  methought,  with  moanmg*,  affrighted  me. 
At  length  we  entered  a  large  hall,  without  window, 
or  spiracle,  or  lamp.  The  asylum  and  dormitory  it 
seemed  of  perennial  night — only  that  the  walls  were 
brought  to  the  eye  by  a  number  of  sell-luminous 
inscriptions  in  letters  of  a  pale  puhhral  light,  that 
held  strange  neutrality  with  the  darkness,  on  the 
verge  of  which  it  kept  its  rayless  vigil.  I  could  read 
them,  methought;  but  though  each  one  of  the  words 
taken  separately  I  seemed  to  understand,  yet  when  I 
took  them  in  sentences,  they  were  riddles  and  in- 
comprehensible. As  1  stood  meditating  on  these  hard 
sayings,  my  guide  thus  addressed  me — Read  and  be- 
lieve :  these  are  mysteries ! — At  the  extremity  of  the 
vast  hall  the  Goddess  was  placed.  Her  features,  blend- 
ed with  darkness,  rose  out  to  my  view,  terrible,  yet 
vacant.  I  prostrated  myself  before  her,  and  then 
retired  with  my  guide,  soul-withered,  and  wondering, 
and  dissatisfied. 

As  I  re-entered  the  body  of  the  temple,  I  heard  a 
deep  buzz  as  of  discontent.  A  few  whose  eyes  were 
bright,  and  either  piercing  or  steady,  and  whose 
ample  foreheads,  with  the  weighty  bar,  ridge-like, 
above  the  eyebrows,  bespoke  observation  followed 
by  meditative  thought;  and  a  much  larger  number, 
who  were  enraged  by  the  severity  and  insolence  of 
the  priests  in  exacting  their  offerings,  had  collected 
in  one  tumultuous  group,  and  with  a  confused  outcry 
of  "  this  is  the  Temple  of  Superstition !"  after  much 
contumely,  and  turmoil,  and  cruel  maltreatment  on 
all  sides,  rushed  out  of  the  pile :  and  I,  methought, 
joined  them. 

We  speeded  from  the  Temple  with  hasty  steps, 
and  had  now-  nearly  gone  round  half  the  valley, 
when  we  were  addressed  by  a  woman,  tall  beyond 
the  stature  of  mortals,  and  with  a  something  more 
than  human  in  her  countenance  and  mien,  which  yet 
could  by  mortals  be  only  felt,  not  conveyed  by  words 
or  intelligibly  distinguished.  Deep  rellection,  ani- 
mated by  ardent  feelings,  was  displayed  in  them : 
and  hope,  without  its  uncertainly,  and  a  something 
more  than  all  these,  which  I  understood  not,  but 
which  yet  seemed  to  blend  all  these  into  a  divine 
unity  of  expression.  Her  garments  were  white  and 
matronly,  and  of  the  simplest  texture.  We  inquired 
her  name.  My  name,  she  replied,  is  Religion. 

The  more  numerous  part  of  our  company,  affright- 
ed by  the  very  sound,  and  sore  from  recent  impostures 
or  sorceries,  hurried  onwards  and  examined  no  far- 
ther. A  few  of  us,  struck  by  the  manifest  opposition 
of  her  form  and  manners  to  those  of  the  living 
Td jI,  whom  we  had  so  recently  abjured,  agreed  to 
follow  her,  though  with  cautious  circumspection. 
She  led  us  to  an  eminence  in  the  midst  of  the  valley, 
from  the  top  of  which  we  could  command  the  whole 
plain,  and  observe  the  relation  of  the  different  parts 
of  each  to  the  other,  and  of  each  to  the  w7hole,  and 
of  all  to  each.  She  then  gave  us  an  optic  glass  which 


assisted  without  contradicting  our  natural  vision,  and 
enabled  us  to  see  far  beyond  the  limits  of  the  Valley 
of  Life:  though  our  eye  even  thus  assisted  permitted 
us  only  to  behold  a  light  and  a  glory,  but  what  we 
could  not  descry,  save  only  that  it  was,  and  that  it 
was  most  glorious. 

And  now,  with  the  rapid  transition  of  a  dream,  I 
had  overtaken  and  rejoined  the  more  numerous  party 
who  had  abruptly  left  us,  indignant  at  the  very  name 
of  religion.  They  journeyed  on,  goading  each  other 
with  remembrances  of  past  oppressions,  and  never 
looking  back,  till  in  the  eagerness  to  recede  from  the 
Temple  of  Superstition,  they  had  rounded  the  whole 
circle  of  the  valley.  And  lo!  there  faced  us  the 
mouth  of  a  vast  cavern,  at  the  base  of  a  lofty  and 
almost  perpendicular  rock,  the  interior  side  of  which, 
unknown  to  them,  and  unsuspected,  formed  the  ex- 
treme and  backward  wall  of  the  Temple.  An  im- 
patient crowd,  we  entered  the  vast  and  dusky  cave, 
which  was  the  only  perforation  of  the  precipice. 
At  the  mouth  of  the  cave  sale  two  figures;  the  first, 
by  her  dress  and  gestures,  I  knew  to  be  Sensuality; 
the  second  form,  from  the  fierceness  of  his  demeanor, 
and  the  brutal  scomfulness  of  his  looks,  declared 
himself  to  be  the  monster  Blasphemy.  He  uttered 
big  words,  and  yet  ever  and  anon  I  observed  that  he 
turned  pale  at  his  own  courage.  We  entered.  Some 
remained  in  the  opening  of  the  cave,  with  the  one  or 
the  other  of  its  guardians.  The  rest,  and  I  among 
them,  pressed  on,  till  we  reached  an  ample  chamber, 
that  seemed  the  centre  of  the  rock.  The  climate  of 
the  place  was  unnaturally  cold. 

In  the  furthest  distance  of  the  chamber  sate  an 
old  dim-eyed  man,  poring  with  a  microscope  over 
the  Torso  of  a  statue  which  had  neither  basis,  nor 
feet,  nor  head  ;  but  on  its  breast  was  carved  Nature! 
To  this  he  continually  applied  his  glass,  and  seemed 
enraptured  with  the  various  inequalities  which  it 
rendered  visible  on  the  seemingly  polished  surface 
of  the  marble. — Yet  evermore  was  this  delight  and 
triumph  followed  by  expressions  of  hatred,  and  ve- 
hement railings  against  a  Being,  who  yet,  he  assured 
us,  had  no  existence.  This  mystery  suddenly  recalled 
to  me  what  1  had  read  in  the  Holiest  Recess  of  the 
temple  of  Superstition.  The  old  man  spoke  in  divers 
tongues,  and  continued  to  utter  other  and  most  strange 
mysteries.  Among  the  rest  he  talked  much  and  ve- 
hemently concerning  an  infinite  series  of  causes  and 
effects,  which  he  explained  to  be — a  string  of  blind 
men,  the  last  of  whom  caught  hold  of  the  skirt 
of  the  one  before  him,  he  of  the  next,  and  so  on  till 
they  were  all  out  of  sight :  and  that  they  all  walked 
infallibly  straight,  without  making  one  false  step, 
though  all  were  alike  blind.  Methought  I  borrowed 
courage  from  surprise,  and  asked  him. — Who  then  is 
at  the  head  to  guide  them  ?  He  looked  at  me  with 
ineffable  contempt,  not  unmixed  with  an  angry  sus- 
picion, and  then  replied,  "  „\o  one.  The  string  of 
blind  men  went  on  for  ever  without  any  beginning. 
for  although  one  blind  man  could  not  move  without 
stumbling,  yet  infinite  blindness  supplied  the  want  of 
sight."  I  burst  into  laughter,  which  instantly  turned  to 
terror — for  as  he  started  forward  in  rage,  1  caught 
a  glance  of  him  from  behind  ;  and  lo !  I  beheld  a 
monster  biform  and  Janus-headed,  in  the  hinder  face 
and  shape  of  which  I  instantly  recognized  the  dread 
countenance  of  Superstition — and  in  the  terror  I 
awoke. 

231 


222 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


THE  IMPROVISATORE ; 

OR  "JOHN  ANDERSON,  MY  JO,  JOHN." 

Scene: — A  spacious  drawing-room,  with  music-room 
adjoining. 

CATHERINE. 

What  are  the  words  ? 

ELIZA. 

Ask  our  friend,  the  Improvisatore ;  here  he  comes : 
Kate  has  a  favor  to  ask  of  you,  Sir ;  it  is  that  you 
will  repeat  the  ballad  that  Mr. sung  so  sweetly. 

FRIEND. 

It  is  in  Moore's  Irish  Melodies ;  but  I  do  not  re- 
collect the  words  distinctly.  The  moral  of  them, 
however,  I  take  to  be  this  — 

Love  would  remain  the  same  if  true, 
When  we  were  neither  young  nor  new: 
Yea,  and  in  all  within  the  will  that  came, 
By  the  same  proofs  would  show  itself  the  same. 

ELIZA. 
What  are  the  lines  you  repeated  from  Beaumont 
and  Fletcher,  which  my  brother  admired  so  much  ? 
It  begins  with  something  about  two  vines  so  close 
that  their  tendrils  intermingle. 

FRIEND. 

You  mean  Charles'  speech  to  Angelina,  in  "  the 
Elder  Brother." 

We'll  live  together,  like  our  two  neighbor  vines, 
Circling  our  souls  and  loves  in  one  another  ! 
We'll  spring  together,  and  we'll  bear  one  fruit ; 
One  joy  shall  make  us  smile,  and  one  grief  mourn  ! 
One  age  go  with  us,  and  one  hour  of  death 
Shall  close  our  eyes,  and  one  grave  make  us  happy. 

CATHERINE. 

A  precious  boon,  that  would  go  far  to  reconcile 
one  to  old  age — this  love,  if  true !  But  is  there  any 
such  true  love  ? 

FRIEND. 

I  hope  so. 

CATHERINE. 

But  do  you  believe  it  ? 

Eliza  (eagerly). 
I  am  sure  he  does. 

FRIEND. 

From  a  man  turned  of  fifty,  Catherine,  I  imagine, 
expects  a  less  confident  answer. 

CATHERINE. 

A  more  sincere  one,  perhaps. 

FRIEND. 

Even  though  he  should  have  obtained  the  nick- 
name of  Improvisatore,  by  perpetrating  charades  and 
extempore  verses  at  Christmas  times  ? 

ELIZA. 

Nay,  but  be  serious. 

FRIEND. 

Serious  ?  Doubtless.  A  grave  personage  of  my 
years  giving  a  love-lecture  to  two  young  ladies,  can- 
not well  be  otherwise.  The  difficulty,  I  suspect, 
would  be  for  them  to  remain  so.  It  will  be  asked 
whether  I  am  not  the  "  elderly  gentleman  "  who  sate 
"  despairing  beside  a  clear  stream,"  with  a  willow 
for  his  wig-block. 

ELIZA. 

Say  another  word,  and  we  will  call  it  downright 
affectation. 


CATHERINE. 

No !  we  will  be  affronted,  drop  a  courtesy,  and  ask 
pardon  for  our  presumption  in  expecting  that  Mr. 
would  waste  his  sense  on  two  insignificant  girls. 

FRIEND. 

Well,  well,  I  will  be  serious.  Hem !  Now  then 
commences  the  discourse ;  Mr.  Moore's  song  being 
the  text.  Love,  as  distinguished  from  Friendship,  on 
the  one  hand,  and  from  the  passion  that  too  often 
usurps  its  name,  on  the  other — 

LUCIUS. 

(Eliza's  brother,  who  had  just  joined  the  trio,  in  a 
whisper  to  the  Friend).  But  is  not  Love  the  union  of 
both? 

friend  (aside  to  Lucius). 

He  never  loved  who  thinks  so. 

ELIZA. 

Brother,  we  don't  want  you.  There  !  Mrs.  H  can- 
not arrange  the  flower-vase  without  you.  Thank  you, 
Mrs.  Harlman. 

LUCIUS. 

I  '11  have  my  revenge !  I  know  what  I  will  say ! 

ELIZA. 

Off!  off"!  Now  dear  sir, — Love,  you  were  saying — 

FRIEND. 

Hush!  Preaching,  you  mean,  Eliza. 

ELiza  (impatiently). 
Pshaw! 

FRIEND. 

Well  then,  I  was  saying  that  Love,  truly  such,  is 
itself  not  the  most  common  thing  in  the  world :  and 
mutual  love  still  less  so.  But  that  enduring  personal 
attachment,  so  beautifully  delineated  by  Erin's  sweet 
melodist,  and  still  more  touchingly,  perhaps,  in  the 
well-known  ballad,  "John  Anderson,  my  jo,  John," 
in  addition  to  a  depth  and  constancy  of  character  of 
no  every-day  occurrence,  supposes  a  peculiar  sensi- 
bility and  tenderness  of  nature  ;  a  constitutional  com- 
municativeness and  utterancy  of  heart  and  soul ;  a 
delight  in  the  detail  of  sympathy,  in  the  outward  and 
visible  signs  of  the  sacrament  within — to  count,  as  it 
were,  the  pulses  of  the  life  of  love.  But  above  all,  it 
supposes  a  soul  which,  even  in  the  pride  and  sum- 
mer-tide of  life — even  in  the  lustihood  of  heallh  and 
strength,  had  felt  oftenest  and  prized  highest  that 
which  age  cannot  take  away,  and  which,  in  all  our 
lovings,  is  the  Love ; ■ 

ELIZA. 

There  is  something  here  (pointing  to  her  heart)  that 
seems  to  understand  you,  but  wants  the  word  that 
would  make  it  understand  itself. 

CATHERINE. 

I,  too,  seem  to  feel  what  you  mean.  Interpret  the 
feeling  for  us. 

FRIEND. 

1  mean  that  willing  sense  of  the  insufficing- 

ness  of  the  self  for  itself,  which  predisposes  a  gener- 
ous nature  to  see,  in  the  total  being  of  another,  the 
supplement  and  completion  of  its  own — that  quiet 
perpetual  seeking  which  the  presence  of  the  beloved 
object  modulates,  not  suspends,  where  the  heart  mo- 
mently finds,  and,  finding,  again  seeks  on — lastly, 
when  "  life's  changeful  orb  has  pass'd  the  full,"  a 
confirmed  faith  in  the  nobleness  of  humanity,  thus 
brought  home  and  pressed,  as  it  were,  to  the  very 
bosom  of  hourly  experience :  it  supposes,  I  say,  a 
heart-felt  reverence  for  worth,  not  the  less  deep  be- 
cause divested  of  its  solemnity  by  habit,  by  familiar- 
232 


MISCELLANEOUS  POEMS. 


223 


ity,  by  mutual  infirmities,  and  even  by  a  feeling  of 
modesty  which  will  arise  in  delicate  minds,  when 
they  are  conscious  of  possessing  the  same  or  the 
correspondent  excellence  in  their  own  characters. 
In  short,  there  must  be  a  mind,  which,  while  it  feels 
the  beautiful  and  the  excellent  in  the  beloved  as  its 
own,  and  by  right  of  love  appropriates  it,  can  call 
Goodness  its  Playfellow,  and  dares  make  sport  of 
time  and  infirmity,  while,  in  the  person  of  a  thou- 
sand-foldly  endeared  partner,  we  feel  for  aged  Virtue 
the  caressing  fondness  that  belongs  to  the  Innocence 
of  childhood,  and  repeat  the  same  attentions  and 
tender  courtesies  as  had  been  dictated  by  the  same 
affection  to  the  same  object  when  attired  in  feminine 
loveliness  or  in  manly  beauty. 

ELIZA. 

What  a  soothing — what  an  elevating  idea ! 

CATHERINE. 

If  it  be  not  only  an  idea. 

FRIEND. 

At  all  events,  these  qualities  which  I  have  enumer- 
ated, are  rarely  found  united  in  a  single  individual. 
How  much  more  rare  must  it  be,  that  two  such  in- 
dividuals should  meet  together  in  this  wide  world 
under  circumstances  that  admit  of  their  union  as 
Husband  and  Wife!  A  person  may  be  highly  estima- 
ble on  the  whole,  nay,  amiable  as  neighbor,  friend, 
housemate — in  short,  in  all  the  concentric  circles  of 
attachment,  save  only  the  last  and  inmost ;  and  yet 
from  how  many  causes  be  estranged  from  the  highest 
perfection  in  this !  Pride,  coldness  or  fastidiousness 
of  nature,  worldly  cares,  an  anxious  or  ambitious  dis- 
position, a  passion  for  display,  a  sullen  temper — one 
or  the  other — too  often  proves  "  the  dead  fly  in  the 
compost  of  spices,"  and  any  one  is  enough  to  unfit  it 
for  the  precious  balm  of  unction.  For  some  mighty 
good  sort  of  people,  too,  there  is  not  seldom  a  sort  of 
solemn  saturnine,  or,  if  you  will,  ursine  vanity,  that 
keeps  itself  alive  by  sucking  the  paws  of  its  own  self- 
importance.  And  as  this  high  sense,  or  rather  sensa- 
tion of  their  own  value  is,  for  the  most  part,  ground- 
ed on  negative  qualities,  so  they  have  no  better  means 
of  preserving  the  same  but  by  negatives — that  is,  by 
not  doing  or  saying  any  thing,  that  might  be  put  down 
for  fond,  silly,  or  nonsensical, — or  (to  use  their  own 
phrase)  by  never  forgetting  themselves,  which  some  of 
their  acquaintance  are  uncharitable  enough  to  think 
the  most  worthless  object  they  could  be  employed  in 
remembering. 

ei.iza  (m  answer  to  a  whisper  from  Catherine). 
To  a  hair !  He  must  have  sate  for  it  himself.  Save 
me  from  such  folks !  But  they  are  out  of  the  question. 

friend. 
True !  but  the  same  effect  is  produced  in  thousands 
by  the  too  general  insensibility  to  a  very  important 
truth;  this,  namely,  that  the  misery  of  human  life  is 
made  up  of  large  masses,  each  separated  from  the 
other  by  certain  intervals.  One  year,  the  death  of  a 
child  ;  years  after,  a  failure  in  trade ;  after  another 
longer  or  shorter  interval,  a  daughter  may  have 
married  unhappily : — in  all  but  the  singularly  un- 
fortunate, the  integral  ^arts  that  compose  the  sum 
total  of  the  unhappiness  of  a  man's  life,  are  easily 
counted,  and  distinctly  remembered.  The  happiness 
of  life,  on  the  contrary,  is  made  up  of  minute  frac- 
tions— the  little,  soon-forsrotten  charities  of  a  kiss,  a 
smile,  a  kind  look,  a  heartfelt  compliment  in  the  dis- 


guise of  playful  raillery,  and  the  countless  other 
infinitesimals  of  pleasurable  thought  and  genial 
feeling. 

CATHERINE. 

Well,  Sir ;  you  have  said  quite  enough  to  make  mo 
despair  of  finding  a  "  John  Anderson,  my  jo,  John," 
to  totter  down  the  hill  of  life  with. 

FRIEND. 

Not  so !  Good  men  are  not,  I  trust,  so  much  scarcer 
than  good  women,  but  that  what  another  would  find 
in  you,  you  may  hope  to  find  in  another.  But  well, 
however,  may  that  boon  be  rare,  the  possession  of 
which  would  be  more  than  an  adequate  reward  for 
the  rarest  virtue. 

ELIZA. 

Surely,  he  who  has  described  it  so  beautifully, 
must  have  possessed  it  ? 

FRIEND. 

If  he  were  worthy  to  have  possessed  it,  and  had 
believingly  anticipated  and  not  found  it,  how  bitter 
the  disappointment ! 

{Then,  after  a  pause  of  a  few  minutes). 

Answer  (ex  improviso). 
Yes,  yes  !  that  boon,  life's  richest  treat, 
He  had,  or  fancied  that  he  had  ; 
Say,   t  was  but  in  his  own  conceit — 

The  fancy  made  him  glad ! 
Crown  of  his  cup,  and  garnish  of  his  dish ! 
The  boon,  prefigured  in  his  earliest  wish ! 
The  fair  fulfilment  of  his  poesy, 
When  his  young  heart  first  yeam'd  for  sympathy . 

But  e'en  the  meteor  offspring  of  the  brain 

Unnourish'd  wane ! 
Faith  asks  her  daily  bread, 
And  Fancy  must  be  fed! 
Now  so  it  chanced — from  wet  or  dry, 
It  boots  not  how — I  know  not  why — 
She  miss'd  her  wonted  food :  and  quickly 
Poor  Fancy  stagger'd  and  grew  sickly. 
Then  came  a  restless  state,  't  wixt  yea  and  nay, 
His  faith  was  fix'd,  his  heart  all  ebb  and  flow ; 
Or  like  a  bark,  in  some  half-shelter'd  bay, 
Above  its  anchor  driving  to  and  fro. 

That  boon,  which  but  to  have  possess'd 
In  a  belief,  gave  life  a  zest — 
Uncertain  both  what  it  had  been, 
And  if  by  error  lost,  or  luck; 
And  what  it  teas: — an  evergreen 
Which  some  insidious  blight  had  struck, 
Or  annual  flower,  which  past  its  blow, 
No  vernal  spell  shall  e'er  revive ; 
Uncertain,  and  afraid  to  know, 
Doubts  toss'd  him  to  and  fro ; 
Hope  keeping  Love,  Love  Hope  alive, 
Like  babes  bewilder'd  in  a  snow, 
That  cling  and  huddle  from  the  cold 
In  hollow  tree  or  ruin'd  fold. 

Those  sparkling  colors,  once  his  boast, 

Fading,  one  by  one  away, 
Thin  and  hueless  as  a  ghost, 

Poor  Fancy  on  her  sick-bed  lay ; 
III  at  distance,  worse  when  near, 
Telling  her  dreams  to  jealous  Fear ! 
233 


-&A 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Where  was  it  then,  the  sociahle  sprite 
That  crown'd  the  Poet's  cup  and  deck'd  his  dish! 
Poor  shadow  cast  from  an  unsteady  wish, 
Itself  a  substance  by  no  other  right 
But  that  it  intercepted  Reason's  light ; 
It  dimm'd  his  eye,  it.  darken'd  on  his  brow, 
A  peevish  mood,  a  tedious  time,  I  trow! 
Thank  Heaven !  't  is  not  so  now. 


O  bliss  of  blissful  hours ! 
The  boon  of  Heaven's  decreeing, 
While  yet  in  Eden's  bowers 
Dwelt  the  First  Husband  and  his  sinless  Mate ! 
The  one  sweet  plant  which,  piteous  Heaven  agreeing, 
They  bore  with  them  through  Eden's  closing  gate! 
Of  life's  gay  summer-tide  the  sovran  Rose ! 
Late  autumn's  Amaranth,  that  more  fragrant  blows 
When  Passion's  flowers  all  fall  or  fade  ; 
If  this  were  ever  his,  in  outward  being, 
Or  but  his  own  true  love's  projected  shade, 
Now,  that  at  length  by  certain  proof  he  knows, 
That  whether  real  or  magic  show, 
Whate'er  it  was,  it  is  no  longer  so ; 
Though  heart  be  lonesome,  Hope  laid  low, 
Yet,  Lady  !  deem  him  not  unblest : 
The  certainty  that  struck  Hope  dead, 
Hath  left  Contentment  in  her  stead  : 
And  that  is  next  to  best ! 


THE  GARDEN  OF  BOCCACCIO. 

Of  late,  in  one  of  those  most  weary  hours, 
When  life  seems  emptied  of  all  genial  powers, 
A  dreary  mood,  which  he  who  ne'er  has  known 
May  bless  his  happy  lot,  I  sate  alone  ; 
And,  from  the  numbing  spell  to  win  relief, 
Call'd  on  the  past  for  thought  of  glee  or  grief. 
In  vain !  bereft  alike  of  grief  and  glee, 
I  sate  and  cower'd  o'er  my  own  vacancy ! 
And  as  I  watch'd  the  dull  continuous  ache, 
Which,  all  else  slumb'ring,  seem'd  alone  to  wake; 

0  Friend !  long  wont  to  notice  yet  conceal, 
And  soothe  by  silence  what  words  cannot  heal, 

1  but  half  saw  that  quiet  hand  of  thine 
Place  on  my  desk  this  exquisite  design, 
Boccaccio's  Garden  and  its  faery, 

The  love,  the  joyaunce,  and  the  gallantry! 
An  Idyll,  with  Boccaccio's  spirit  warm, 
Framed  in  the  silent  poesy  of  form. 
Like  (locks  adown  a  newly-bathed  steep 

Emerging  from  a  mist :  or  like  a  stream 
Of  music  soft  that  not  dispels  the  sleep, 

But  casts  in  happier  moulds  the  slumberer's  dream 
Gazed  by  an  idle  eye  with  silent  might 
The  picture  stole  upon  my  inward  sight. 
A  tremulous  warmth  crept  gradual  o'er  my  chest, 
As  though  an  infant's  finger  touch'd  my  breast. 
And  one  by  one  (I  know  not  whence)  were  brought 
All  spirits  of  power  that  most  had  stirr'd  my  thought 
In  selfless  boyhood,  on  a  new  world  tost 
Of  wonder,  and  in  its  own  fancies  lost ; 
Or  charm'd  my  youth,  that  kindled  from  above, 
Loved  ere  it  loved,  and  sought  a  form  for  love; 


Or  lent  a  lustre  to  the  earnest  scan 

Of  manhood,  musing  what  and  whence  is  man 

Wild  strain  of  Scalds,  that  in  the  sea-worn  caves 

Rehearsed  their  war-spell  to  the  winds  and  waves 

Or  fateful  hymn  of  those  prophetic  maids, 

That  call'd  on  Hertha  in  deep  forest  glades; 

Or  minstrel  lay,  that  cheer'd  the  baron's  feast; 

Or  rhyme  of  city  pomp,  of  monk  and  priest, 

Judge,  mayor,  and  many  a  guild  in  long  array, 

To  high-church  pacing  on  the  great  saint's  day. 

And  many  a  verse  which  to  myself  I  sang, 

That  woke  the  tear,  yet  stole  away  the  pang, 

Of  hopes  which  in  lamenting  I  renew'd. 

And  last,  a  matron  now,  of  sober  mien, 

Yet  radiant  still  and  with  no  earthly  sheen, 

Whom  as  a  faery  child  my  childhood  woo'd 

Even  in  my  dawn  of  thought — Philosophy. 

Though  then  unconscious  of  herself,  pardie, 

She  bore  no  other  name  than  Poesy; 

And,  like  a  gift  from  heaven,  in  lileful  glee, 

That  had  but  new  ly  left  a  mother's  knee, 

Prattled  and  play'd  with  bird  and  flower,  and  stone, 

As  if  with  elfin  playfellows  well  known, 

And  life  reveal'd  to  innocence  alone. 


Thanks,  gentle  artist!  now  lean  descry 

Thy  fair  creation  with  a  mastering  eye, 

And  all  awake !     And  now  in  fix'd  gaze  stand, 

Now  wander  through  the  Eden  of  thy  hand; 

Praise  the  green  arches,  on  the  fountain  clear 

See  fragment  shadows  of  the  crossing  deer, 

And  with  that  serviceable  nymph  I  stoop, 

The  crystal  from  its  restless  pool  to  scoop. 

I  see  no  longer !  I  myself  am  there, 

Sit  on  the  ground-sward,  and  the  banquet  share. 

'Tis  I,  that  sweep  that  lute's  love-echoing  strings, 

And  gaze  upon  the  maid  who  gazing  sings: 

Or  pause  and  listen  to  the  tinkling  bells 

From  the  high  tower,  and  think  that  there  she  dwells. 

With  old  Boccaccio's  soul  I  stand  possest, 

And  breathe  an  air  like  life,  that  swells  my  chest. 


The  brightness  of  the  world,  O  thou  once  free, 
And  always  fair,  rare  land  of  courtesy ! 
O,  Florence!  with  the  Tuscan  fields  and  hills! 
And  famous  Arno  fed  with  all  their  rills  ; 
Thou  brightest  star  of  star-bright  Italy ! 
Rich,  ornate,  populous,  all  treasures  thine, 
The  golden  corn,  the  olive,  and  the  vine. 
Fair  cities,  gallant  mansions,  castles  old, 
And  forests,  where  beside  his  leafy  hold 
The  sullen  boar  hath  heard  the  distant  horn, 
And  whets  his  tusks  against  the  gnarled  thorn  , 
Palladian  palace  with  its  storied  halls ; 
Fountains,  where  Love  lies  listening  to  their  falls 
Gardens,  where  flings  the  bridge  its  airy  span, 
And  Nature  makes  her  happy  home  with  man; 
Where  many  a  gorgeous  flower  is  duly  fed 
With  its  own  rill,  on  its  own  spangled  bed, 
And  wreathes  the  marble  urn,  or  leans  its  head, 
A  mimic  mourner,  that  with  veil  withdrawn 
Weeps  liquid  gems,  the  presents  of  the  dawn, 
Thine  all  delights,  and  ever)-  muse  is  thine  : 
And  more  than  all,  the  embrace  and  intertwine 
Of  all  with  all  in  gay  and  twinkling  dance ' 
'Mid  gods  of  Greece  and  warriors  of  romance 

234 


MISCELLANEOUS  PIECES. 


225 


See  !  Boccace  sits,  unfolding  on  his  knees 
The  new-found  roll  of  old  Maeonides;* 
But  from  his  mantle's  fold,  and  near  the  heart, 
Peers  Ovid's  Holy  Book  of  Love's  sweet  smart !t 

O  all-enjoying  and  all-blending  sage, 
Long  be  it  mine  to  con  thy  mazy  page, 
Where,  half  conceal'd,  the  eye  of  fancy  views 
Fauns,  nymphs,  and  winged  saints,  all  gracious  to  thy 
muse ! 

Still  in  thy  garden  let  me  watch  their  pranks, 
And  see  in  Dian's  vest  between  the  ranks 
Of  the  trim  vines,  some  maid  that  half  believes 
The  vestal  fires,  of  which  her  lover  grieves, 
With  that  sly  satyr  peering  through  the  leaves! 


MY  BAPTISMAL  BIRTH-DAY. 

LINES  COMPOSED  ON  A  SICK  BED,  UNDER  SEVERE 
BODILY  SUFFERING,  ON  MY  SPIRITUAL  BIRTH-DAY, 
OCTOBER   28th. 

Bow  unto  God  in  Christ — in  Christ,  my  All! 
What,  that  Earth  boasts,  were  not  lost  cheaply,  rather 
Than  forfeit  that  blest  Name,  by  which  we  rail 
The  Holy  One,  the  Almighty  God,  Our  Father? 
Father  !  in  Christ  we  live  :  and  Christ  in  Thee : 
Eternal  Thou,  and  everlasting  We ! 

The  Heir  of  Heaven,  henceforth  I  dread  not  Death, 
In  Christ  I  live,  in  Christ  I  draw  the  breath 
Of  the  true  Life.     Let  Sea,  and  Earth,  and  Sky 
Wage  war  against  me :  on  my  front  I  show 
Their  mighty  Master's  seal !    In  vain  they  try 
To  end  my  Life,  who  can  but  end  its  Woe. 

Is  that  a  Death-bed,  where  the  Christian  lies  ? 
Yes! — But  not  Ms:  'Tis  Death  itself  there  dies. 


FRAGMENTS 
FROM  THE  WRECK  OF  MEMORY: 

OR 
PORTIONS   OF  POEMS   COMPOSED  IN  EARLY  MANHOOD. 

[Note. — It  may  not  be  without  use  or  interest  to 
youthful,  and  especially  to  intelligent  female  readers 

♦Boccaccio  claimed  for  himself  the  glory  of  having  first  in- 
troduced the  works  of  Homer  to  his  countrymen. 

1 1  know  few  more  striking  or  more  interesting  proofs  of  the 
overwhelming  influence  which  the  study  of  the  Greek  and  Ro- 
man classics  exercised  on  the  judgments,  feelings,  and  imagi- 
nations of  the  literati  of  Europe  at  the  commencement  of  the 
restoration  of  literature,  than  the  passage  in  the  Filocopo  of 
Boccaccio;  where  the  sage  instructor,  Racheo.  as  soon  as  the 
young  prince  and  the  beautiful  girl  Biancafiore  had  learned 
their  letters,  sets  them  to  stndy  the  Holy  Book,  Ovid's  Art  of 
Love.  Incomincio  Racheo  a  mettere  il  suo  officio  in  essccu- 
zione  con  inters  sollecitudine.  E  loro,  in  breve  tempo,  inseg- 
nato  a  conoscer  le  lettere,  fccc  legere  il  santo  libro  d'  Ovvidio, 
nel  quale  il  sommo  poeta  mostra,  come  i  savti  fuoc/ii  di  Ve- 
nere  si  debbano  ne  frcddi  cuori  occcndere.''' 

16  v 


of  poetry,  to  observe,  that  in  the  attempt  to  adapt  the 
Greek  metres  to  the  English  language,  we  must  begin 
by  substituting  quality  of  sound  for  quantity  —  that  is. 
accentuated  or  comparatively  emphasized  syllables, 
for  what,  in  the  Greek  and  Latin  verse,  are  named 
long,  and  of  which  the  prosodial  mark  is  "  ;  and  vice 
versa,  unaccenttiated  syllables  for  short,  marked  ", 
Now  the  hexameter  verse  consists  of  two  sorts  of  feet. 
the  spondee,  composed  of  two  long  syllables,  and  the 
dactyl,  composed  of  one  long  syllable  followed  by  two 
short.  The  following  verse  from  the  Psalms,  is  a  rare 
instance  of  a  perfect  hexameter  (i.  e.  line  of  six  feet; 
in  the  English  language:  — 

Gud  came  |  up  with  a  |  shout  :  our  |  Lord  with 
the  |  sound  Gf  a  |  trumpet. 

But  so  few  are  the  truly  spondaic  words  in  our  lan- 
guage, such  as  Egypt,  uproar,  turmoil,  &c,  that  we 
are  compelled  to  substitute,  in  most  instances,  the 
trochee,  or  "  a,  i.  e.  such  words  as  merry,  lightly,  Ac. 
for  the  proper  spondee.  It  need  only  be  added,  that 
in  the  hexameter  the  fifth  foot  must  be  a  dactyl,  and 
the  sixth  a  spondee,  or  trochee.  I  will  end  this  note 
with  two  hexameter  lines,  likewise  from  the  Psalms. 

There  is  ft  |  river  the  |  flowing  where  |  Of  shall  | 
gladden  the  city. 

Halle  |  lujah  the  |  city  of  |  God  Jehovah !  hath  | 
blest  her.] 


I.  HYMN  TO  THE  EARTH. 

Earth  !  thou  mother  of  numberless  children,  the  nurse 

and  the  mother, 
Hail!  O  Goddess,  thrice  hail!    Blest  be  thou!  and, 

blessing,  I  hymn  thee  ! 
Forth,  ye  sweet  sounds  !  from  my  harp,  and  my  voice 

shall  float  on  your  surges  — 
Soar  thou  aloft,  O  my  soul !  and  bear  up  my  song  on 

thy  pinions. 

Travelling  the  vale  with  mine  eyes — green  meadows, 

and  lake  with  green  island, 
Dark  in  its  basin  of  rock,  and  the  bare  stream  flowing 

in  brightness, 
Thrilled  with  thy  beauty  and  love,  in  the  wooded  slope 

of  the  mountain, 
Here,  Great  Mother,  I  lie,  thy  child  with  its  head  on 

thy  bosom ! 
Playful  the  spirits  of  noon,  that  creep  or  rush  through 

thy  tresses : 
Green-haired  Goddess!  refresh  me;  and  hark!  as  they 

hurry  or  linger, 
Fill  the  pause  of  my  harp,  or  sustain  it  with  musical 

murmurs. 
Into  my  being  thou  murmurest  joy;  and  tenderer 

sadness 
Shed'st  thou,  like  dew,  on  my  heart,  till  the  joy  am. 

the  heavenly  gladness 
Pour  themselves  forth  from  my  heart  in  tears,  and  the 

hymns  of  thanksgiving. 
Earth  !  thou  mother  of  numberless  children,  the  nurse 

and  the  mother, 
Sister  thou  of  the  Stars,  and  beloved  by  the  sun,  the 

rejoicer ! 

235 


226 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Guardian  and  friend  of  the  Moon,  O  Earth,  whom 
the  Comets  forget  not, 

Yea,  in  the  measureless  distance  wheel  round,  and 
again  they  behold  thee  ! 

Fadeless  and  young  (and  what  if  the  latest  birth  of 
Creation  ?) 

Bride  and  consort  of  Heaven,  that  looks  down  upon 
thee  enamored ! 

Say,  mysterious  Earth  !  Osay,  great  Mother  and  God- 
dess! 

Was  it  not  well  with  thee  then,  when  first  thy  lap 
was  ungirdled, 

Thy  lap  to  the  genial  Heaven,  the  day  that  he  wooed 
thee  and  won  thee  ! 

Fair  was  thy  blush,  the  fairest  and  first  of  the  blushes 
of  morning ! 

Deep  was  the  shudder,  O  Earth !  the  throe  of  thy 
self-retention : 

July  thou  strovest  to  flee,  and  didst  seek  thyself  at 
thy  centre ! 

Mightier  far  was  the  joy  of  thy  sudden  resilience ; 
and  forthwith 

Myriad  myriads  of  lives  teemed  forth  from  the  mighty 
embracement. 

Thousand-fold  tribes  of  dwellers,  impelled  by  thou- 
sand-fold instincts, 

Filled,  as  a  dream,  the  wide  waters :  the  rivers  sang 
on  their  channels ; 

Laughed  on  their  shores  the  hoarse  seas  :  the  yearn- 
ing ocean  swelled  upward : 

Young  life  lowed  through  the  meadows,  the  woods, 
and  the  echoing  mountains, 

Wandered  bleating  in  valleys,  and  warbled  in  blos- 
soming branches. 


IV.  THE  OVIDIAN  ELEGIAC  METRE  DESCRIBED 
AND  EXEMPLIFIED. 

In  the  hexameter  rises  the  fountain's  silvery  column ; 
In  the  pentameter  aye  falling  in  melody  back. 


II.  ENGLISH  HEXAMETERS,  WRITTEN  DURING 
A  TEMPORARY  BLINDNESS,  IN  1799. 

0,  what  a  life  is  the  Eye's  !  what  a  strange  and 

inscrutable  essence ! 
Him,  that  is  utterly  blind,  nor  glimpses  the  fire  that 

warms  him ; 
Him,  that  never  beheld  the  swelling  breast  of  his 

mother ; 
Him,  that  smiled  in  his  gladness,  as  a  babe  that  smiles 

in  its  slumber ; 
Even  for  Him  it  exists!    It  moves  and  stirs  in  its 

prison ! 
Lives  with  a  separate  life;  and "Is  it  a  Spirit?" 

he  murmurs : 
"  Sure,  it  has  thoughts  of  its  own,  and  to  see  is  only 

a  language !" 


III.    THE    HOMERIC    HEXAMETER    DESCRIBED 
AND  EXEMPLIFIED. 

Strongly  it  bears  us  along  in  swelling  and  limitless 

billows, 
Nothing  before  and  nothing  behind  but  the  sky  and 

the  ocean. 


V.    A  VERSIFIED  REFLECTION. 

[A  Force  is  the  provincial  term  in  Cumberland  for 
any  narrow  fall  of  water  from  the  summit  of  a  moun- 
tain precipice. — The  following  stanza  (it  may  not 
arrogate  the  name  of  poem)  or  versified  reflection, 
was  composed  while  the  author  was  gazing  on  three 
parallel  Forces,  on  a  moonlight  night,  at  the  foot  of 
the  Saddleback  Fell.— S.  T.  C] 

On  stern  Bi.encarthur's  perilous  height 
The  wind  is  tyrannous  and  strong: 
And  (lashing  forth  unsteady  light 
From  stern  Blencarthur's  skiey  height 
As  loud  the  torrents  throng! 

Beneath  the  moon  in  gentle  weather 
They  bind  the  earth  and  sky  together : 
But  oh!  the  Sky,  and  all  its  forms,  how  quiet! 
The  things  that  seek  the  Earth,  how  full  of  noise 
and  riot ! 


LOVE'S  GHOST  AND  RE-EVANITION. 

AN   ALLEGORIC   ROMANCE. 

Like  a  lone  Arab,  old  and  blind, 
Some  caravan  had  left  behind; 
Who  sits  beside  a  ruin'd  well, 
Where  the  shy  Dipsads*  bask  and  swell! 
And  now  he  cowers  with  low-hung  head  aslant, 
And  listens  for  some  human  sound  in  vain  : 
And  now  the  aid,  which  Heaven  alone  can  grant, 

Upturns  his  eyeless  face  from  Heaven  to  gain 

Even  thus,  in  languid  mood  and  vacant  hour, 
Resting  my  eye  upon  a  drooping  plant, 
With  brow  low-bent,  within  my  garden  bower, 
I  sate  upon  its  couch  of  Camomile : 
And  lo ! — or  was  it  a  brief  sleep,  the  while 
I  watch'd  the  sickly  calm  and  aimless  scope 
Of  my  own  heart  ? — I  saw  the  inmate,  Hope, 
That  once  had  made  that  heart  so  warm, 

Lie  lifeless  at  my  feet ! 
And  Love  stole  in,  in  maiden  form, 

Toward  my  arbor-seat! 
She  bent  and  kissed  her  sister's  lips, 

As  she  was  wont  to  do : 
Alas !  't  was  but  a  chilling  breath, 
That  woke  enough  of  life  in  death 
To  make  Hope  die  anew. 


*The  Asps  of  the  sand-deserts,  anciently  named  Dipsads. 

236 


MISCELLANEOUS  PIECES. 


227 


LIGHT-IIEARTEDNESS  IN  RHYME. 


"  I  expect  no  sense,  worth  listening  to,  from  the  man  who 
never  dares  talk  nonsense." — -Qnon. 


I.  THE  REPROOF  AND  REPLY: 

OR,  THE   FLOWER-THIEF'S   ArOLOGY,   FOR   A    ROBBERY 

COMMITTED     IN    MR.  AM)    MRS.  's    GARDEN,   ON 

SUNDAY   MORNING,  25tH    OF    MAY,    1833,   BETWEEN 
THE    HOURS  OF  ELEVEN  AND  TWELVE. 

"Fie,  Mr.  Coleridge!  —  and  can  this  be  you? 
Break  two  commandments? — and  in  church-time  too? 
Have  you  not  heard,  or  have  you  heard  in  vain, 
The  birth-and-parentage-recording  strain?  — 
Confessions  shrill,  that  shrill  cried  mack'rel  drown  — 
Fresh  from  the  drop — the  youth  not  yet  cut  down  — 
Letter  to  sweet-heart — the  last  dying  speech  — 
And  did'nt  all  this  begin  in  Sabbath-breach? 
You,  that  knew  better  !     In  broad  open  day 
Steal  in,  steal  out,  and  steal  our  flowers  away  ? 
What  could  possess  you  ?    Ah !  sweet  youth,  I  fear, 
The  chap  with  horns  and  tail  was  at  your  ear !" 

Such  sounds,  of  late,  accusing  fancy  brought 

From  fair  C to  the  Poet's  thought. 

Now  hear  the  meek  Parnassian  youth's  reply  : — 
A  bow — a  pleading  look — a  downcast  eye  — 
And  then : 

"  Fair  dame !  a  visionary  wight, 
Hard  by  your  hill-side  mansion  sparkling  white, 
His  thought  all  hovering  round  the  Muses'  home, 
Long  hath  it  been  your  Poet's  wont  to  roam. 
And  many  a  morn,  on  his  bed-charmed  sense, 
So  rich  a  stream  of  music  issued  thence, 
He  deem'd  himself,  as  it  flow'd  warbling  on, 
Beside  the  vocal  fount  of  Helicon ! 
But  when,  as  if  to  settle  the  concern, 
A  nymph  too  he  beheld,  in  many  a  turn, 
Guiding  the  sweet  rill  from  its  fontal  urn ; 
Say,  can  you  blame  ? — No !  none,  that  saw  and  heard, 
Could  blame  a  bard,  that  he,  thus  inly  stirr'd, 
A  muse  beholding  in  each  fervent  trail, 

Took  Mary  H for  Polly  Hymnia ! 

Or,  haply  as  thou  stood  beside  the  maid 
One  loftier  form  in  sable  stole  arrayed, 
If  with  regretful  thought  he  hail'd  in  thee, 

C m,  his  long-lost  friend  Mol  Pomone  ? 

But  most  of  you,  soft  warblings,  I  complain ! 
'Twas  ye,  that  from  the  bee-hive  of  my  brain 
Did  lure  the  fancies  forth,  a  freakish  rout. 
And  witched  the  air  with  dreams  turn'd  inside  out. 

Thus  all  conspired — each  power  of  eye  and  ear, 
And  this  gay  month,  th'  enchantress  of  the  year, 
To  cheat  poor  me  (no  conjurer,  God  wot !) 

And  C m's  self  accomplice  in  the  plot. 

Can  you  then  wonder  if  I  went  astray? 

Not  bards  alone,  nor  lovers  mad  as  they  — 

All  Nature  day-dreams  in  the  month  of  May, 

And  if  I  pluck'd  '  each  flower  that  sweetest  blows' — 

Who  walks  in  sleep,  needs  follow  must  his  nose. 


Thus  long  accustomed  on  the  twy-fork'd  hill* 
To  pluck  both  flower  and  floweret  at  my  will ; 
The  garden's  maze,  like  No-man's  land,  I  tread, 
Nor  common  law,  nor  statute  in  my  head  ; 
For  my  own  proper  smell,  sight,  fancy,  feeling, 
With  autocratic  hand  at  once  repealing 
Five  Acts  of  Parliament  'gainst  private  stealing  ! 

But  yet  from  C m,  who  despairs  of  grace  ? 

There  's  no  spring-gun  nor  man-trap  in  that  face  ! 
Let  Moses  then  look  black,  and  Aaron  blue, 
That  look  asif  they  had  little  else  to  do : 

For  C m  speaks.   "  Poor  youth  !  he's  but  a  waif! 

The  spoons  all  right  ?  The  hen  and  chickens  safe  ? 

Well,  well,  he  shall  not  forfeit  our  regards  — 

The  Eighth  Commandment  was  not  made  for  Bards  !" 


II.    IN  ANSWER  TO  A  FRIEND'S  QUESTION. 
Her  attachment  may  differ  from  yours  in  degree, 

Provided  they  are  both  of  one  kind  ; 
But  friendship,  how  tender  so  ever  it  be, 

Gives  no  accord  to  love,  however  refined. 

Love,   that   meets    not  with   love,  its   true  nature 
revealing, 

Grows  ashamed  of  itself,  and  demurs  : 
If  you  cannot  lift  hers  up  to  your  state  of  feeling, 

You  must  lower  down  your  state  to  hers. 


III.    LINES  TO  A  COMIC  AUTHOR,  ON  AN  ABU- 
SIVE REVIEW. 

What  though  the    chilly  wide-mouth'd   quacking 

chorus 
From  the  rank  swamps  of  murk  Review-land  croak: 
So  was  it,  neighbour,  in  the  times  before  us, 
When  Mamas,  throwing  on  his  Attic  cloak. 
Romped  with  the  Graces :  and  each  tickled  Muse 
(That  Turk,  Dan  Phcebus,  whom  bards  call  divine. 
Was  married  to  —  at  least,  he  kept  —  all  nine)  — 
They  fled  ;  but  with  reverted  faces  ran  ! 
Yet,  somewhat  the  broad  freedoms  to  excuse, 
They  had  allured  the  audacious  Greek  to  use, 
Swore  they  mistook  him  for  their  own  Good  Man. 
This  Momus  —  Aristophanes  on  earth 
Men  called  him  —  maugre  all  his  wit  and  worth, 
Was  croaked  and  gabbled  at.    I  iow,  then,  should  you, 
Or  I,  Friend,  hope  to  'scape  the  skulking  crew  ? 
No :  laugh,  and  say  aloud,  in  tones  of  glee, 
"  I  hate  the  quacking  tribe,  and  they  hate  me  !" 


IV.    AN  EXPECTORATION, 

OR  SPLENETIC  EXTEMPORE,  ON  MY  JOYFUL  DEPARTURE 
FROM  THE  CITY  OF  COLOGNE. 

As  I  am  Rhymer, 

And  now  at  least  a  merry  one, 
Mr.  Mum's  Rudesheimer  t 

And  the  church  of  St.  Geryon 

*  The  English  Parnassus  is  remarkable  for  its  two  summits 
of  unequal  height,  the  lower  denominated  Hampstead,  the 
higher  Highgate. 

tThe  apotheosis  of  Rhenish  wine. 

237 


228 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


Are  the  two  things  alone 
That  deserve  to  be  known 
In  the  body-and-soul-stinking  town  of  Cologne. 


EXPECTORATION  THE  SECOND. 

In  Coln.t  a  town  of  monks  and  bones,  $ 

And  pavements  fang'd  with  murderous  stones: 

And  rags,  and  hags,  and  hideous  wenches ; 

I  counted  two-and-seventy  stenches, 

All  well-defined  and  several  stinks! 

Ye  nymphs  that  reign  o'er  sewers  and  sinks, 

The  river  Rhine,  it  is  well  known, 

Doth  wash  your  city  of  Cologne  ; 

But  tell  me,  nymphs!  what  power  divine 

Shall  henceforth  wash  the  river  Rhine  ?§ 


SONG 

EX  IMPROVtSA   ON   HEARING   A  SONG  IN   PRAISE   OF  A 
lady's  BEAUTY. 

'T  is  not  the  lily  brow  I  prize, 
Nor  roseate  cheeks,  nor  sunny  eyes, 
Enough  of  lilies  and  of  roses ! 
A  thousand  fold  more  dear  to  me 
The  gentle  look  that  love  discloses, 
The  look  that  love  alone  can  see. 


THE  POET'S  ANSWER 

TO  A  LADY'S  aUESTION  RESPECTING  THE  ACCOMPLISH- 
MENTS MOST  DESIRABLE  IN  AN  INSTRUCTRESS  OF 
CHILDREN. 

O'er  wayward  childhood  would'st  thou  hold  firm  rule, 
And  sun  thee  in  the  light  of  happy  faces ; 
Love,  Hope,  and  Patience,  these  must  be  thy  Graces, 
And  in  thine  own  heart  let  them  first  keep  school. 
For  as  old  Atlas  on  his  broad  neck  places 
Heaven's  starry  globe,  and  there  sustains  it ;  so 
Do  these  upbear  the  little  world  below 
Of  Education,  Patience,  Love,  and  Hope. 
Methinks,  I  see  them  group'd  in  seemly  show, 
The  straiten'd  arms  upraised,  the  palms  aslope 
And  robes  that  touching,  as  adown  they  flow, 
Distinctly  blend,  like  snow  emboss'd  in  snow. 

O  part  them  never!   If  Hope  prostrate  lie, 

Love  too  will  sink  and  die. 
But  Love  is  subtle,  and  will  proof  derive 
From  her  own  life  that  Hope  is  yet  alive. 
And  bending  o'er,  with  soul-transfusing  eyes, 
And  the  soft  murmurs  of  the  Mother  Dove, 
Wooes  back  the  fleeting  spirit,  and  half  supplies: 
Thus  Love  repays  to  Hope  what  Hope  first  gave  to 
Love. 

tThe  German  name  of  Cologne. 

J  Of  the  eleven  thousand  virgin  martyrs. 

§  As  Necessity  is  the  mother  of  Invention,  and  extremes 
beget  each  other,  the  fact  above  recorder!  may  explain  how  this 
ancient  town  (which,  alas  !  as  sometimes  happens  with  veni- 
Fon,  has  been  kept  ton  long.)  came  to  he  the  hirih-place  of  the 
most  fragrant  of  spirituous  fluids,  the  Knit  do  Cologne. 


Yet  haply  there  will  come  a  weary  day, 
When  over-task'd  at  length 
Both  Love  and  Hope  beneath  the  load  give  way, 
Then  with  a  statue's  smile,  a  statue's  strength, 
Stands  the  mute  sister,  Patience,  nothing  loth, 
And  both  supporting  does  the  work  of  both. 


JULIA. 


medio  de  fonte  leporurn 

Surgit  amari  aliquid. — Lucrct. 

Julia  was  blest  with  beauty,  wit,  and  grace  : 
Small  poets  loved  to  sing  her  blooming  face. 
Before  her  altars,  lo  !  a  numerous  train 
Preferr'd  their  vows  ;  yet  all  preferr'd  in  vain  : 
Till  charming  Florio,  born  to  conquer,  came, 
And  touch'd  the  fair  one  with  an  equal  flame. 
The  flame  she  felt,  and  ill  could  she  conceal 
What  every  look  and  action  would  reveal. 
With  boldness  then,  which  seldom  fails  to  move, 
He  pleads  the  cause  of  marriage  and  of  love  ; 
The  course  of  hymeneal  joys  he  rounds, 
The  fair  one's  eyes  dance  pleasure  at  the  sounds. 
Nought    now    remain'd    but  "  Noes"  —  how  little 

meant  — 
And  the  sweet  coyness  that  endears  consent. 
The  youth  upon  his  knees  enraptured  fell :  — 
The  strange  misfortune,  oh  !  what  words  can  tell  ? 
Tell !  ye  neglected  sylphs  !  who  lap-dogs  guard, 
Why  snatch'd  ye  not  away  your  precious  ward  ? 
Why  suffer'd  ye  the  lover's  weight  to  fall 
On  the  ill-fated  neck  of  much-loved  Ball  ? 
The  favorite  on  his  mistress  casts  his  eyes, 
Gives  a  short  melancholy  howl,  and  — dies  ! 
Sacred  his  ashes  lie,  and  long  his  rest ! 
Anger  and  grief  divide  poor  Julia's  breast. 
Her  eyes  she  fix'd  on  guilty  Florio  first, 
On  him  the  storm  of  angry  grief  must  burst. 
That  storm  he  fled  :  —  he  wooes  a  kinder  fair, 
Whose  fond  affections  no  dear  puppies  share. 
'T  were  vain  to  tell  how  Julia  pined  away  ;  — 
Unhappy  fair,  that  in  one  luckless  day 
(From  future  almanacs  the  day  be  cross'd  !) 
At  once  her  lover  and  her  lap-dog  lost ! 

1789. 


1  yet  remain 

To  mourn  the  hours  of  youth  (yet  mourn  in  vain) 
That  fled  neglected  ;  wisely  thou  hast  trod 
The  better  path  —  and  that  high  meed  which  God 
Assign'd  to  virtue  tow'ring  from  the  dust, 
Shall  wait  thy  rising,  Spirit  pure  and  just ! 

O  God  !  how  sweet  it  were  to  think,  that  all 
Who  silent  mourn  around  this  gloomy  ball 
Might  hear  the  voice  of  joy;  —  but  'tis  the  will 
Of  man's  great  Author,  that  through  good  and  ill 
Calm  he  should  hold  his  course,  and  so  sustain 
His  varied  lot  of  pleasure,  toil,  and  pain. 

1793. 
238 


MISCELLANEOUS  TIECES. 


229 


TO  THE  REV.  \V.  I.  IIORT. 

Hush!  ye  clamorous  cares,  be  mute! 

Again,  dear  harmonist,  again 
Through  the  hollow  of  thy  flute 

Breathe  thai  passion-warbled  strain; 
Till  memory  back  each  form  shall  bring 

The  loveliest  of  her  shadowy  throng, 
And  hope,  that  soars  on  sky-lark's  wing, 

Shall  carol  forth  her  gladdest  song  ! 

O  skill'd  with  magic  spell  to  roll 

The  thrilling  tones  that  concentrate  the  soul! 

Breathe  through  thy  flute  those  tender  notes  again, 

While  near  thee  Bits  the  chaste-eyed  maiden  mild  ; 

And  bid  her  raise  the  poet's  kindred  strain 

In  soft  impaasion'd  voice,  correctly  wild. 

In  freedom's  undivided  dell 
Where  toil  and  health  with  mellow'd  love  shall  dwell : 

Far  from  folly,  far  from  men, 

In  the  rude  romantic  glen, 

Up  the  cliff]  and  through  the  glade, 

Wand'ring  with  the  dear  loved  maid, 

I  shall  listen  to  the  lay 

And  ponder  on  the  far  away ;  — 
Still  as  she  bids  those  thrilling  notes  aspire, 
'Making  my  fond  attuned  heart  her  lyre), 
Thy  honor'd  form,  my  friend  !  shall  reappear, 
And  I  will  thank  thee  with  a  raptured  tear  ! 

1791. 


TO  CHARLES  LAMB. 

WITH     AN     UNFINISHED     POEM. 

Thus  far  my  scanty  brain  hath  built  the  rhyme 
Elaborate  and  swelling;  —  yet  the  heart 
Not  owns  it.     From  thy  spirit-breathing  powers 
1  ask  not  now,  my  friend  !  the  aiding  verse 
Tedious  to  thee,  and  from  thy  anxious  thought 
Of  dissonant  mood.     In  fancy  (well  I  know) 
From  business  wand'ring  far  and  local  cares 
Thou  creepest  round  a  dear  loved  sister's  bed, 
With  noiseless  step,  and  watchest  the  faint  look, 
Soothing  each  pang  with  fond  solicitudes 
And  tenderest  tones  medicinal  of  love. 
I,  too,  a  sister  had,  an  only  sister  — 
She  loved  me  dearly,  and  I  doted  on  her ; 
To  her  I  pour'd  forth  all  my  puny  sorrows ; 
(As  a  sick  patient  in  a  nurse's  arms) 
And  of  the  heart  those  hidden  maladies  — 
That  e'en  from  friendship's  eye  will  shrink  ashamed. 
O!  I  have  waked  at  midnight,  and  have  wept 
Because  she  was  not !  —  Cheerily,  dear  Charles  ! 
Thou  thy  best  friend  shall  cherish  many  a  year; 
Such  warm  presages  feel  I  of  high  hope  ! 
For  not  uninterested  the  dear  maid 
I've  view'd — her  soul  affectionate  yet  wise, 
Her  polish'd  wit  as  mild  as  lambent  glories 
That  play  around  a  sainted  infant's  head. 
He  knows  (the  Spirit  that  in  secret  sees, 
Of  whose  omniscient  and  all-spreading  love 
Aught  to  implore  were  impotence  of  mind  !) 
VS 


That  my  mute  thoughts  are  sad  before  his  throne, — 
Prepared,  when  lie  his  healing  ray  vouchsafes, 
Thanksgiving  to  pour  forth  with  lifted  heart, 
And  praise,  him  gracious  with  a  brother's  joy  ! 

1794. 


TO  THE  NIGHTINGALE. 

Sister  of  lovelorn  poets,  Philomel! 
How  many  bards  in  city  garrets  pent. 
While  at  their  window  they  with  downward  eye 
Mark  the  faint  lamp-beam  on  the  kennell'd  mud. 
And  listen  to  the  drowsy  cry  of  the  watchmen, 
(Those  hoarse  unfeather'd  nightingales  of  time  !/ 
How  many  wretched  bards  address  the  name, 
And  hers,  the  full-orb'd  queen,  that  shines  above. 
But  I  do  hear  thee,  and  the  high  bough  mark, 
Within  whose  mild  moon-mellow'd  foliage  hid, 
Thou  warblest  sad  thy  pity-pleading  strains. 
Oh,  I  have  listcn'd,  till  my  working  soul, 
Waked  by  those  strains  to  thousand  phantasies, 
Absorb'd,  hath  ceased  to  listen  !  Therefore  oft 
I  hymn  thy  name  ;  and  with  a  proud  delight 
Oft  will  I  tell  thee,  minstrel  of  the  moon 
Most  musical,  most  melancholy  bird  ! 
That  all  thy  soft  diversities  of  tone, 
Though  sweeter  far  than  the  delicious  airs 
That  vibrate  from  a  white-arm'd  lady's  harp, 
What  time  the  languishment  of  lonely  love 
Melts  in  her  eye,  and  heaves  her  breast  of  snow 
Are  not  so  sweet,  as  is  the  voice  of  her, 
My  Sara  —  best  beloved  of  human  kind  ! 
When  breathing  the  pure  soul  of  tenderness, 
She  thrills  me  with  the  husband's  promised  name  ! 

1794. 


TO  SARA. 

The  stream  with  languid  murmur  creeps 

In  Sumin's  flow'ry  vale  ; 
Beneath  the  dew  the  lily  weeps, 

Slow  waving  to  the  gale. 

"  Cease,  restless  gale,"  it  seems  to  say, 
"  Nor  wake  me  with  thy  sighing  : 

The  honours  of  my  vernal  day 
On  rapid  wings  are  flying. 

"  To-morrow  shall  the  traveller  come. 
That  erst  beheld  me  blooming  ; 

His  searching  eye  shall  vainly  roam 
The  dreary  vale  of  Sumin." 

With  eager  gaze  and  wetted  cheek 

My  wanton  haunts  along, 
Thus,  lovely  maiden,  thou  shalt  seek 

The  youth  of  simplest  song. 

But  I  along  the  breeze  will  roll 

The  voice  of  feeble  power, 
And  dwell,  the  moon-beam  of  thy  soul, 

In  slumber's  nightly  hour. 


1791. 


239 


230 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


CASIMIR. 

If  we  except  Lucretius  and  Statius,  I  know  no 
Latin  poet,  ancient  or  modern,  who  has  equalled  Casi- 
mir  in  boldness  of  conception,  opulence  of  fancy,  or 
beauty  of  versification.  The  odes  of  this  illustrious 
Jesuit  were  translated  into  English  about  150  years 
ago,  by  a  G.  Hils,  I  think.  I  never  saw  the  transla- 
tion. A  lew  of  the  odes  have  been  translated  in  a 
very  animated  manner  by  Watts.  I  have  subjoined 
ihe  third  ode  of  the  second  Book,  which,  with  the 
exception  of  the  first  line,  is  an  effusion  of  exquisite 
elegance.  In  the  imitation  atlempled  I  am  sensible 
that  I  have  destroyed  the  effect  of  suddenness,  by 
translating  into  two  stanzas  what  is  one  in  the  original. 

1796. 
AD  LYRAM. 

Sonora  buxi  filia  sutilis, 
Pendebis  alta,  barbite  popnlo, 

Dum  ridet  aer,  et  supinas 

Solicitat  levis  aura  frondes. 

Te  sibiluntis  lenior  habitus 
Perflabit  Euri:  me  jiuet  intrim 

Collum  reclinasse,  et  verenti 

Sic  temere  jacuisse  ripa. 

Eheu  !  serenum  quae  nebula;  tegunt 
Repente  caelum  :  quis  sonus  imbrium! 

Surgarnus  —  heu  semper  fugaci 

Gaudia  pra?teritura  passu ! 

IMITATION. 

The  solemn  breathing  air  is  ended  — 
Cease,  oh  Lyre  !  thy  kindred  lay! 

From  the  poplar  branch  suspended, 
Glitter  to  the  eye  of  day  ! 

On  thy  wires,  hov'ring,  dying 

Softly  sighs  the  summer  wind : 
I  will  slumber,  careless  lying 

By  yon  waterfall  reclined. 

In  the  forest  hollow-roaring 

Hark  !  I  hear  a  deep'ning  sound  — 

Clouds  rise  thick  with  heavy  low'ring! 
See !  th'  horizon  blackens  round  ! 

Parent  of  the  soothing  measure, 

Let  me  seize  thy  netted  string! 
Swiftly  flies  the  flatterer,  pleasure, 

Headlong,  ever  on  the  wing! 


DARWINIANA. 

THE  HOUR  WHEN  WE   SHALL  MEET   AGAIN. 

(Composed  during  illness  and  in  absence.) 

Dim  Hour  !  that  sleep'st  on  pillowing  clouds  afar, 
Oh,  rise  and  yoke  the  turtles  to  thy  car! 
Bend  o'er  the  traces,  blame  each  lingering  dove, 
And  give  me  to  the  bosom  of  my  love ! 


My  gentle  love  !  caressing  and  caress'd, 
With  heaving  heart  shall  cradle  me  to  rest; 
Shed  the  warm  tear-drop  from  her  smiling  eyes, 
Lull  the  fond  woe,  and  med'cine  me  with  sighs ; 
While  finely-flushing  float  her  kisses  meek, 
Like  melted  rubies,  o'er  my  pallid  cheek. 
Chill'd  by  the  night,  the  drooping  rose  of  May 
Mourns  the  long  absence  of  the  lovely  day  : 
Young  day  returning  at  the  promised  hour, 
Weeps  o'er  the  sorrows  of  the  fav'rite  flower, — 
Weeps  the  soft  dew,  the  balmy  gale  she  sighs, 
And  darts  a  trembling  lustre  from  her  eyes. 
New  life  and  joy  th'  expanding  flow'ret  feels: 
His  pitying  mistress  mourns,  and  mourning  heals! 

1796. 

In  my  calmer  moments  I  have  the  firmest  faith  that 
all  things  work  together  for  good.  But,  alas!  it  seems 
a  long  and  a  dark  process : — 

The  early  year's  fast-flying  vapors  stray 
In  shadowing  train  across  the  orb  of  day; 
And  we  poor  insects  of  a  few  short  hours, 
Deem  it  a  world  of  gloom. 
Were  it  not  better  hope,  a  nobler  doom, 
Proud  to  believe,  that  with  more  active  powers 
On  rapid  many-colour'd  wing, 
We  thro'  one  bright  perpetual  spring 
Shall  hover  round  the  fruits  and  flowers, 
Screen'd   by  those  clouds,  and   cherish'd   by  those 
showers !  1796. 


COUNT  RUMFORD'S  ESSAYS. 

These,  Virtue,  are  thy  triumph,  that  adorn 
Fitliest  our  nature,  and  bespeak  us  born 
For  loftiest  action  ; — not  to  gaze  and  run 
From  clime  to  clime ;  or  batten  in  the  sun, 
Dragging  a  drony  flight  from  flower  to  flower, 
Like  summer  insects  in  a  gaudy  hour; 
Nor  yet  o'er  lovesick  tales  with  fancy  range, 
And  cry,  '  'Tis  pitiful,  'tis  passing  strange.' ' 
But  on  life's  varied  views  to  look  around, 
And  raise  expiring  sorrow  from  the  ground  : — 
And  he — who  thus  hath  borne  his  part  assign 'd 
In  the  sad  fellowship  of  human  kind, 
Or  for  a  moment  soothed  the  bitter  pain 
Of  a  poor  brother — has  not  lived  in  vain. 

1796. 


EPIGRAMS 


ON   A   LATE    MARRIAGE   BETWEEN   AN  OLD  MAID  AND 
A   FRENCH   TET1T  MAITRE. 


Tho'  Miss  ■ 


-'s  match  is  a  subject  of  mirth, 


She  consider'd  the  matter  full  well, 
And  wisely  preferr'd  leading  one  ape  on  earth 
To  perhaps  a  whole  dozen  in  hell.  1796. 

240 


MISCELLANEOUS  PIECES. 


231 


ON  AN  AMOROUS  DOCTOR. 

From  Rufa's  eye  sly  Cupid  shot  his  dart, 
And  left  it  sticking  in  Sengrado's  heart. 
No  quiet  from  thai  moment  has  he  known, 
And  peaceful  sleep  has  from  his  eyelids  flown; 
And  opium's  lorce,  and  what  is  more,  alack  ! 
His  own  oration's,  cannot  bring  it  back: 
In  short  unless  she  pities  his  afflictions, 
Despair  will  make  him  take  his  own  prescriptions. 

17%. 


TO  A  PRIMROSE, 

(THE   FIRST   SEEN'    IN   THE   SEASON.) 


nitens,  et  roboris  cxpers 

Turget  et  insolida  est :  at  spe  delectat.— Ovid. 


Thy  smiles  I  note,  sweet  early  flower, 
That  peeping  forth  thy  rustic  bower 
The  festive  news  of  earth  dost  bring, 
A  fragrant  messenger  of  spring! 

But  tender  blossom,  why  so  pale  ? 
Dost  hear  stern  winter  in  the  gale? 
And  didst  thou  tempt  th'  ungentle  sky 
To  catch  one  vernal  glance  and  die  ? 

Such  the  wan  lustre  sickness  wears, 
When  health's  first  feeble  beam  appears ; 
So  languid  are  the  smiles  that  seek 
To  settle  on  thy  care-worn  cheek! 

When  timorous  hope  the  head  uprears, 
Still  drooping  and  still  moist  with  tears, 
If,  through  dispersing  grief,  be  seen 
Of  bliss  the  heavenly  spark  serene. 

17%. 


EPIGRAM. 

Hoarse  Maevius  reads  his  hobbling  verse 

To  all,  and  at  all  times  ; 
And  finds  them  both  divinely  smooth, 

His  voice,  as  well  as  rhymes. 

Yet  folks  say — "  Mtevius  is  no  ass :" — 
But  Msevius  makes  it  clear, 

That  he  's  a  monster  of  an  ass, 
An  ass  without  an  ear. 

1797. 


INSCRIPTION  BY  THE  REV.  W.  S.  BOWLES. 

IN    NETHER   STOWEY    CHURCH. 

L.etus  abi;  mundi  strepitu  curisque  remorus, 
Laetus  abi !  cceli  qua  vocat  alma  quies. 

Ipsa  Fides  loquitur,  laerymanque  incausat  inaraen, 
Qua  cadit  in  restros,  care  pater,  cineres. 

Heu  !  tantura  liceat  merilos  hos  soliere  ritus 
Et  longum  tremula  dicere  voce,  vale ! 
2F 


TRANSLATION. 
Depart  in  joy  from  this  world's  noise  and  strife 
To  the  deep  quiet  of  celestial  life ! 
Depart! — Affection's  self  reproves  the  tear 
Which  falls,  O  honour'd  Parent!  on  thy  bier; — 
Yet  ."Nature  will  be  heard,  the  heart  will  swell, 
And  the  voice  tremble  with  a  last  Farewell! 


INTRODUCTION  TO  THE  TALE  OF  THE 
DARK  LADIE. 

The  following  poem  is  intended  as  the  introduction 
to  a  somewhat  longer  one.  The  use  of  the  old  ballad 
word  Ladle  for  Lady,  is  the  only  piece  of  obsoleteness 
in  it;  and  as  it  is  professedly  a  tale  of  ancient  times, 
I  trust  that  the  affectionate  lovers  of  venerable  anti- 
quity, as  Camden  says,  will  grant  me  their  pardon, 
and  perhaps  may  be  induced  to  admit  a  force  and 
propriety  in  it.  A  heavier  objection  may  be  adduced 
against  the  author,  that  in  these  times  of  fear  and 
expectation,  when  novelties  explode  around  us  in  all 
directions,  he  should  presume  to  offer  to  the  public  a 
silly  tale  of  old-fashioned  love  :  and  five  years  ago, 
I  own  I  should  have  allowed  and  felt  the  force  of  this 
objection.  But  alas !  explosion  after  explosion  has  suc- 
ceeded so  rapidly,  that  novelty  itself  ceases  to  appear 
new ;  and  it  is  possible  that  now,  even  a  simple  story 
wholly  uninspired  with  politics  or  personality,  may  find 
some  attention  amid  the  hubbub  of  revolutions,  as  to 
those  who  have  remained  a  long  time  by  the  falls  of 
Niagara,  the  lowest  whispering  becomes  distinctly 
audible. 

1799 

O  leave  the  lily  on  its  stem  ; 
O  leave  the  rose  upon  the  spray; 

0  leave  the  elder  bloom,  fair  maids  ! 
And  listen  to  my  lay. 

A  cypress  and  a  myrtle-bough 
This  morn  around  my  harp  you  twined, 

Because  it  fashion'd  mournfully 
Its  murmurs  in  the  wind. 

And  now  a  tale  of  love  and  woe, 

A  woful  tale  of  love  I  sing; 
Hark,  gentle  maidens,  hark  :  it  sighs 

And  trembles  on  the  string. 

But  most,  my  own  dear  Genevieve, 
It  sighs  and  trembles  most  for  thee  ! 

O  come  and  hear  the  cruel  wrongs 
Befell  the  Dark  Ladie ! 


EPILOGUE  TO  THE  RASH  CONJUROR. 

AN  UNCOMPOSED  POEM. 

We  ask  and  urge — (here  ends  the  story!) 

All  Christian  Papishes  to  pay 

That  this  unhappy  conjuror  may, 

Instead  of  Hell,  be  put  in  Purgatory, — 
For  then  there  's  hope  ; — 
Long  live  the  Pope !  1S05. 

241 


232 


COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


PSYCHE. 

The  butterfly  the  ancient  Grecians  made 
The  soul's  fair  emblem,  and  its  only  name — 
But  the  soul  escaped  the  slavish  trade 
Of  mortal  life ! — For  in  this  earthly  frame 
Ours  is  the  reptile's  lot,  much  toil,  much  blame, 
Manifold  motions  making  little  speed, 
And  to  deform  and  kill  the  things  whereon  we  feed. 

1808. 


COMPLAINT. 

How  seldom,  Friend !  a  good  great  man  inherits 
Honor  or  wealth,  with  all  his  worth  and  pains ! 
It  sounds  like  stories  from  the  land  of  spirits, 
If  any  man  obtain  that  which  he  merits. 
Or  any  merit  that  which  he  obtains. 


REPROOF. 

For  shame,  dear  Friend  !  renounce  this  canting  strain! 
What  would'st  thou  have  a  good  man  to  obtain  ? 
Place — titles — salary — a  gilded  chain — 
Or  throne  of  corses  which  his  sword  hath  slain  ? — 
Greatness  and  goodness  are  not  means,  but  ends ! 
Hath  he  not  always  treasures,  always  friends, 
The  great  good  man  ? — three  treasures,  love,  and  light, 
And  calm  thoughts,  regular  as  infant's  breath ; — 
And  three  firm  friends  more  sure  than  day  and  night — 
Himself,  his  Maker,  and  the  angel  Death. 

1809. 


AN  ODE  TO  RAIN. 

COMPOSED  BEFORE  DAY-LIGHT,  ON  THE  MORNING 
APPOINTED  FOR  THE  DEPARTURE  OF  A  VERY  WOR- 
THY, BUT  NOT  VERY  PLEASANT  VISITOR,  WHOM  IT 
WAS  FEARED  THE   RAIN   MIGHT  DETAIN. 

I  know  it  is  dark ;  and  though  I  have  lain 
Awake,  as  I  guess,  an  hour  or  twain, 
I  have  not  once  open'd  the  lids  of  my  eyes, 
But  lie  in  the  dark,  as  a  blind  man  lies. 

0  Rain !  that  I  lie  listening  to, 
You're  but  a  doleful  sound  at  best: 

1  owe  you  little  thanks,  'tis  true 

For  breaking  thus  my  needful  rest, 
Yet  if,  as  soon  as  it  is  light, 

0  Rain!  you  will  but  take  your  flight, 

1  '11  neither  rail,  nor  malice  keep, 
Though  sick  and  sore  for  want  of  sleep. 
But  only  now  for  this  one  day, 

Do  go,  dear  Rain  !  do  go  away ! 

O  Rain!  with  your  dull  two-fold  sound, 

The  clash  hard  by,  and  the  murmur  all  round ! 

You  know,  if  you  know  aught,  that  we. 

Both  night  and  day,  but  ill  agree  : 

For  days,  and  months,  and  almost  years, 

Have  limp'd  on  through  this  vale  of  tears, 


Since  body  of  mine  and  rainy  weather, 
Have  lived  on  easy  terms  together. 
Yet  if  as  soon  as  it  is  light, 

0  Rain!  you  will  but  take  your  flight, 
Though  you  should  come  again  to  morrow, 
And  bring  with  you  both  pain  and  sorrow ; 
Though  stomach  should  sicken,  and  knees  should 

swell — 

1  '11  nothing  speak  of  you  but  well. 
But  only  for  this  one  day, 

Do  go,  dear  Rain !  do  go  away ! 

Dear  Rain  !  I  ne'er  refuse  to  say 
You  're  a  good  creature  in  your  way. 
Nay,  I  could  write  a  book  myself, 
Would  fit  a  parson's  lower  shelf, 
Showing  how  very  good  you  are. — 
What  then  ?  sometimes  it  must  be  fair, 
And  if  sometimes,  why  not  to-day  ? 
Do  go,  dear  Rain  !  do  go  away ! 

Dear  Rain!  if  I've  been  cold  and  shy, 

Take  no  offence !  I  '11  tell  you  why. 

A  dear  old  Friend  e'en  now  is  here, 

And  with  him  came  my  sister  dear; 

After  long  absence  now  first  met, 

Long  months  by  pain  and  grief  beset 

With  three  dear  Friends!  in  truth,  we  groan 

Impatiently  to  be  alone. 

We  three  you  mark !  and  not  one  more ! 

The  strong  wish  makes  my  spirit  sore. 

We  have  so  much  to  talk  about, 

So  many  sad  things  to  let  out; 

So  many  tears  in  our  eye-corners, 

Sitting  like  little  Jacky  Homers — 

In  short,  as  soon  as  it  is  day, 

Do  go,  dear  Rain!  do  go  away. 

And  this  I  '11  swear  to  you,  dear  Rain ! 

Whenever  you  shall  come  again, 

Be  you  as  dull  as  e'er  you  could; 

(And  by  the  bye  'tis  understood, 

You  're  not  so  pleasant,  as  you  're  good  ;) 

Yet,  knowing  well  your  worth  and  place, 

I  '11  welcome  you  with  cheerful  face; 

And  though  you  stay  a  week  or  more, 

Were  ten  times  duller  than  before  ; 

Yet  with  kind  heart,  and  right  good  will, 

I  '11  sit  and  listen  to  you  still ; 

Nor  should  you  go  away,  dear  Rain  ! 

Uninvited  to  remain, 

But  only  now,  for  this  one  day, 

Do  go,  dear  Rain!  do  go  away.  1809. 


TRANSLATION 

OF  A  PASSAGE   IN   OTTFRIED'S  METRICAL  PARAPHRASE 
OF  THE  GOSPELS. 

"  This  Paraphrase,  written  about  the  time  of  Char- 
lemagne, is  by  no  means  deficient  in  occasional  pas- 
sages of  considerable  poetic  merit.    There  is  a  flow, 
and  a  tender  enthusiasm  in  the  following  lines  (at  the 
242 


Wl-^*! 


<  k 


j 


MISCELLANEOUS  PIECES. 


233 


conclusion  of  Chapter  V.),  which  even  in  the  trans- 
lation will  not,  I  flatter  myself,  fail  to  interest  the 
reader.  Ottfried  is  describing  the  circumstances  im- 
mediately following  the  birth  of  our  Lord." — Biog. 
Lit.  vol.  i.  p.  203. 

She  gave  with  joy  her  virgin  breast; 
She  hid  it  not,  she  bared  the  breast, 
Which  suckled  that  divinest  babe  ; 
Blessed,  blessed  were  the  breasts 
Which  the  Saviour  infant  kiss'd : 
And  blessed,  blessed  was  the  mother 
Who  wrapp'd  his  limbs  in  swaddling  clothes, 
Singing  placed  him  on  her  lap, 
Hung  o'er  him  with  her  looks  of  love, 
And  soothed  him  with  a  lulling  motion. 
Blessed !  for  she  shelter'd  him 
From  the  damp  and  chilling  air;  — 
Blessed,  blessed  !  for  she  lay 
With  such  a  babe  in  one  blest  bed. 
Close  as  babes  and  mothers  lie ! 
Blessed,  blessed  evermore, 
With  her  virgin  lips  she  kiss'd, 
With  her  arms,  and  to  her  breast, 
She  embraced  the  babe  divine, 
Her  babe  divine  the  virgin  mother ! 
There  lives  not  on  this  ring  of  earth 
A  mortal  that  can  sing  her  praise! 
Mighty  mother,  virgin  pure, 
In  the  darkness  and  the  night 
For  us  she  bore  the  heavenly  Lord. 
1810. 

"  Most  interesting  is  it  to  consider  the  effect,  when 
the  feelings  are  wrought  above  the  natural  pitch  by 
the  belief  of  something  mysterious,  while  all  the 
images  are  purely  natural ;  then  it  is  that  religion  and 
poetry  strike  deepest." — Biog.  Lit.  vol.  i.  p.  204. 


ISRAEL'S  LAMENT, 

ON  THE  DEATH    OF    THE     PRINCESS     CHARLOTTE    OF 
WALES. 

[From  the  Hebrew  of  Hyman  Hurioite.] 

Mourn",  Israel !  sons  of  Israel,  mourn  ! 

Give  utterance  to  the  inward  throe, 
As  wails  of  her  first  love  forlorn 

The  virgin  clad  in  robes  of  woe ! 

Mourn  the  young  mother  snatch'd  away 

From  light  and  life's  ascending  sun ! 
Mourn  for  her  babe,  death's  voiceless  prey 

Earn'd  by  long  pangs,  and  lost  ere  won  ! 

Mourn  the  bright  rose  that  bloom'd  and  went, 

Ere  half  disclosed  its  vernal  hue ! 
Mourn  the  green  bud,  so  rudely  rent, 

It  brake  the  stem  on  which  it  grew ! 


Mourn  for  the  universal  woe, 

With  solemn  dirge  and  falt'ring  tongue; 
For  England's  Lady  laid  full  low, 

So  dear,  so  lovely,  and  so  young. 

The  blossoms  on  her  tree  of  life 
Shone  with  the  dews  of  recent  bliss;  — 

Translated  in  that  deadly  strife, 
She  plucks  its  fruit  in  Paradise. 

Mourn  for  the  prince,  who  rose  at  morn 
To  seek  and  bless  the  firstling  bud 

Of  his  own  rose,  and  found  the  thorn 
Its  point  bedew'd  with  tears  of  blood. 

Mourn  for  Britannia's  hopes  decay'd ;  — 
Her  daughters  wail  their  deep  defence, 

Their  fair  example,  prostrate  laid, 
Chaste  love,  and  fervid  innocence ! 

O  Thou!  who  mark'st  the  monarch's  path, 
To  sad  Jeshurum's  sons  attend ! 

Amid  the  lightnings  of  thy  wrath 
The  showers  of  consolation  send ! 

Jehovah  frowns!  —  The  Islands  bow, 
The  prince  and  people  kiss  the  rod ! 

Their  dread  chast'ning  judge  wert  thou  — 
Be  thou  their  comforter,  oh  God  ! 

1817.' 

SENTIMENTAL. 
The  rose  that  blushes  like  the  morn 

Bedecks  the  valleys  low ; 
And  so  dost  thou,  sweet  infant  corn, 

My  Angelina's  toe 

But  on  the  rose  there  grows  a  thorn 

That  breeds  disastrous  woe  ; 
And  so  dost  thou,  remorseless  corn, 

On  Angelina's  toe. 

1825. 

THE  ALTERNATIVE. 

This  way  or  that,  ye  Powers  above  me  ! 

I  of  my  grief  were  rid  — 
Did  Enna  either  really  love  me, 

Or  cease  to  think  she  did. 

1826. 

INSCRIPTION  FOR  A  TIME-PIECE. 

Now !  It  is  gone.  —  Our  brief  hours  travel  post, 
Each  with  its  thought  or  deed,  its  Why  or  How  ; 
But  know,  each  parting  hour  gives  up  a  ghost, 
To  dwell  within  thee  —  an  eternal  Now! 

1830. 


EniTAtlON  AYTOrPAIITON. 
Qua;  linguam,  aut  nihil,  aut  nihili,  aut  vix  sunt 

mea;  —  cosordes 
Do  Morti ;  —  reddo  castera,  Christe !  tibi. 


THE  END  OF  COLERIDGE'S  POETICAL  WORKS. 


243 


THE 


PROSE  WORKS 


OF 


2d    243 


tttogravlua  ILitcraria; 


OR, 


BIOGRAPHICAL  SKETCHES  OF  MY  LITERARY  LIFE  AND  OPINIONS. 


So  wenig  er  auch  bestimmt  seyn  mag  andere  zu  belehren,  so  wunscht  er  doch  sich  denen  mitzutheilen,  die  er  sich 
cleichgcsinnt  weiss  oder  hofft,  dcren  Anzuhl  aber  in  der  Breite  dor  Welt  zerstreut  ist:  er  wunscht  sein  Verhaltniss  za 
den  altesten  Freunden  wieder  anzuknupfen,  mit  neuen  ee  fortzusetzen,  und  in  der  letzen  Generation  sich  wieder 
andere  fur  seine  ubrige  Lehenszcit  zu  gewinnen.  Er  wunscht  der  Jugend  die  Umwege  zu  ersparen,  auf  denen  er 
sich  selbst  verirrte. GOETHE. 

TRANSLATION. — Little  call  as  he  may  have  to  instruct  others,  he  wishes  nevertheless  to  open  out  his  heart  to 
such  as  he  either  knows  or  hopes  to  be  of  like  mind  with  himself,  but  who  are  widely  scattered  in  the  world  :  he 
wishes  to  knit  anew  his  connections  with  his  oldest  friends,  to  continue  those  recently  formed,  and  to  win  other  friends 
among  the  rising  generation  for  the  remaining  course  of  his  life.  He  wishes  to  spare  the  young  those  circuitous 
paths,  oo  which  he  himself  had  lost  his  way. 


CHAPTER  I. 

The  motives  of  the  present  work — Reception  of  the  Author's 
first  publication — The  discipline  of  his  taste  at  school — The 
effect  of  contemporary  writers  on  youthful  minds— Bowles's 
sonnets— Comparison  between  the  Poets  before  and  since 
Mr.  Pope. 

It  has  been  my  lot  to  have  had  my  name  intro- 
duced, both  in  conversation  and  in  print,  more  fre- 
quently than  I  find  it  easy  to  explain,  whether  I 
consider  the  fewness,  unimportance,  and  limited  cir- 
culation of  my  writings,  or  the  retirement  and  dis- 
tance in  which  I  have  lived,  both  from  the  literary 
and  political  world.  Most  often  it  has  been  connect- 
ed with  some  charge  which  I  could  not  acknowledge, 
or  some  principle  which  I  had  never  entertained. 
Nevertheless,  had  I  had  no  other  motive,  or  incite- 
ment, the  reader  would  not  have  been  troubled  with 
this  exculpation.  What  my  additional  purposes  were, 
will  be  seen  in  the  following  pages.  It  will  be 
found,  that  the  least  of  what  I  have  written  concerns 
myself  personally.  I  have  used  the  narration  chiefly 
for  the  purpose  of  giving  a  continuity  to  the  work, 
in  part  for  the  sake  of  the  miscellaneous  reflections 
suggested  to  me  by  particular  events,  but  still  more 
as  introductory  to  the  statement  of  my  principles  in 
politics,  religion,  and  philosophy,  and  the  application 
of  the  rules,  deduced  from  philosophical  principles, 
to  poetry  and  criticism.  But  of  the  objects  which  I 
proposed  to  myself,  it  was  not  the  least  important  to 
effect,  as  far  as  possible,  a  settlement  of  the  long 
continued  controversy  concerning  the  true  nature  of 
poetic  diction:  and,  at  the  same  time,  to  define  with 
the  utmost  impartiality,  the  real  pcetic  character  of 
the  poet,  by  whose  writings  this  controversy  was 
first  kindled,  and  has  been  since  fuelled  and  limned. 

In  1794,  when  I  had  barely  passed  the  verge  of 
manhood,  I  published  a  small  volume  of  juvenile 
poems.  They  were  received  with  a  degree  of  favor 
W 


which,  young  as  I  was,  I  well  knew  was  bestowed 
on  them  not  so  much  for  any  positive  merit,  as  be- 
cause they  were  considered  buds  of  hope,  and  pro- 
mises of  better  works  to  come.  The  critics  of  that 
day,  the  most  flattering,  equally  with  the  severest, 
concurred  in  objecting  to  them,  obscurity,  a  general 
turgid ness  of  diction,  and  a  profusion  of  new-coined 
double  epithets*  The  first  is  the  fault  which  a 
writer  is  the  least  able  to  detect  in  his  own  com- 
positions; and  my  mind  was  not  then  sufficiently 
disciplined  to  receive  the  authority  of  others,  as  a 
substitute  for  my  own  conviction.  Satisfied  that  the 
thoughts,  such  as  they  were,  could  not  have  been 
expressed  otherwise,  or  at  least  more  perspicuously, 
I  forgot  to  inquire,  whether  the  thoughts  themselves 
did  not  demand  a  degree  of  attention  unsuitable  to 
the  nature  and  objects  of  poetry.  This  remark, 
however,  applies  chiefly,  though  not  exclusively,  to 

*  The  authority  of  Milton  and  Shakspeare  may  be  useful- 
ly poii.ted  out  to  young  authors.  In  the  Comus,  and  earlier 
poems  of  Milton,  there  is  a  superfluity  of  double  epithets  ; 
while  in  the  Paradise  Lost  we  find  very  few,  and  in  the  Para- 
dise Regained,  scarce  any.  The  same  remark  holds  almost 
equally  true  of  the  Love's  Labor  Lost,  Romeo  and  Juliet, 
Venus  and  Adonis,  and  Lucrece,  compared  with  the  Lear, 
Macbeth,  Othello,  and  Hamlet  of  our  great  dramatist.  The 
rule  for  the  admission  of  double  epithets  seems  to  be  this: 
either  tnat  they  should  be  already  denizens  of  our  languag e, 
such  as  blood-stained,  terror-stricken,  self-applauding ;  or 
when  a  new  epithet,  or  one  found  in  books  only,  is  hazarded, 
that  it,  at  least,  be  one  word,  not  two  words  made  one  by 
mere  virtue  of  the  printer's  hyphen.  A  language  which,  like 
tin-  IjilHisI),  is  almost  without  cases,  is  indeed  in  its  very 
hi  nius  unfitted  for  compounds.  If  a  writer,  every  time  a  com- 
pounded word  suggests  itself  to  him,  would  seek  for  some 
other  mode  of  expressing  the  same  sense,  the  chances  are 
always  greatly  in  favor  of  his  finding  a  better  word.  "  Tan- 
quam  scopnlum  sic  vites  insolens  verbum,"  is  the  wise  ad 
vice  of  L'aisar  to  the  iinman  orators,  and  the  precept  applies 
with  double  force  to  the  wiiters  in  our  own  language.  But 
it  must  not  be  forgotten,  that  the  same  Caesar  wrote  a  gram- 
matical treatise  for  the  purpose  of  reforming  the  ordinary 
language,  by  bringing  it  to  a  greater  accordance  with  the 
principles  of  logic  or  universal  grammar. 

245 


?36 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


jhe  Religious  Musings.  The  remainder  of  the  charge 
admitted  to  its  full  extent,  and  not  without  sincere 
icknowledgments  to  both  my  private  and  public 
censors  for  their  friendly  admonitions.  In  the  after 
editions,  I  pruned  the  double  epithets  with  no  sparing 
hand,  and  used  my  best  efforts  to  tame  the  swell  and 
glitter,  both  of  thought  and  diction  ;  though,  in  truth, 
these  parasite  plants  of  youthful  poetry  had  insinuat- 
ed themselves  into  my  longer  poems  with  such  intri- 
cacy of  union,  that  I  was  obliged  to  omit  disentang- 
ling the  weed,  from  the  tear  of  snapping  the  flower. 
From  that  period  to  the  date  of  the  present  work,  I 
have  published  nothing,  with  my  name,  which  could, 
by  any  possibility,  have  come  before  the  board  of 
anonymous  criticism.  Even  the  three  or  four  poems, 
printed  with  the  works  of  a  friend,  as  far  as  they 
were  censured  at  all,  were  charged  with  the  same  or 
similar  defects,  though,  I  am  persuaded,  not  with 
equal  justice:  with  an  excess  of  ornament,  in 
addition  to  strained  and  elaborate  diction. 
( Vide  the  criticis/n  on  the  "  Ancient  Mariner,"  in 
the  Monthly  and  Critical  Reviewers  of  the  first  volume 
of  the  Lyrical  Ballads.)  May  I  be  permitted  to  add, 
that,  even  at  the  early  period  of  my  juvenile  poems, 
I  saw  and  admitted  the  superiority  of  an  austerer, 
and  more  natural  style,  with  an  insight  not  less  clear 
than  I  at  present  possess.  My  judgment  was  stronger 
than  were  my  powers  of  realizing  its  dictates ;  and 
the  faults  of  my  language,  though  indeed  partly 
owing  to  a  wrong  choice  of  subjects,  and  the  desire 
of  giving  a  poetic  coloring  to  abstract  and  meta- 
physical truths,  in  which  a  new  world  then  seemed 
to  open  upon  me,  did  yet,  in  part  likewise,  originate 
in  unfeigned  diffidence  of  my  own  comparative 
talent.  During  several  years  of  my  youth  and  early 
manhood,  I  reverenced  those  who  had  re-introduced 
the  manly  simplicity  of  the  Grecian,  and  of  our  own 
elder  poets,  with  such  enthusiasm,  as  made  the  hope 
seem  presumptuous  of  writing  successfully  in  the 
same  style.  Perhaps  a  similar  process  has  happened 
to  others  ;  but  my  earliest  poems  were  marked  by  an 
ease  and  simplicity  which  I  have  studied,  perhaps 
with  inferior  success,  to  impress  on  my  later  com- 
positions. 

At  school  I  enjoyed  the  inestimable  advantage  of 
a  very  sensible,  though  at  the  same  lime,  a  very 
severe  master.  He*  early  moulded  my  taste  to  the 
preference  of  Demosthenes  to  Cicero,  of  Homer  and 
Theocritus  to  Virgil,  and  again  Virgil  to  Ovid.  He 
habituated  me  to  compare  Lucretius,  (in  such  ex- 
tracts as  I  then  read,)  Terence,  and,  above  all,  the 
chaster  poems  of  Catullus,  not  only  with  the  Roman 
poets  of  the,  so  called,  silver  and  brazen  ages,  but 
with  even  those  of  the  Augustan  era ;  and  on 
grounds  of  plain  sense  and  universal  logic,  to  see 
and  assert  the  superiority  of  the  former,  in  the  truth 
and  nativeness,  both  of  their  thoughts  and  diction. 
At  the  same  time  that  we  were  studying  the  Greek 
tragic  poets,  he  made  us  read  Shakspeare  and  Milton 
as  lessons :  and  they  were  lessons,  loo,  w  hich   re- 

*  The  Rev.  James  Bnwyer,  many  years  Head  Master  of 
the  Grammar  school,  Christ  Hospital. 


quired  most  time  and  trouble  to  bring  up,  so  as  to 
escape  his  censure.  I  learnt  from  him  that  poetry, 
even  that  of  the  loftiest,  and,  seemingly,  that  of  the 
wildest  odes,  had  a  logic  of  its  own,  as  severe  as  that 
of  science  ;  and  more  difficult,  because  more  subtle, 
more  complex,  and  dependent  on  more,  and  more 
fugitive  causes.  In  the  truly  great  poets,  he  would 
say,  there  is  a  reason  assignable,  not  only  for  every 
word,  but  for  the  position  of  every  word  ;  and  I  well 
remember,  that,  availing  himself  of  the  synonytnes 
to  the  Homer  of  Didymus,  he  made  us  attempt  to 
show,  with  regard  to  each,  why  it  would  not  have 
answered  the  same  purpose ;  and  wherein  consisted 
the  peculiar  fitness  of  the  word  in  the  original  text. 

In  our  own  English  compositions,  (at  least  for  the 
last  three  years  of  our  school  education.)  he  showed 
no  mercy  to  phrase,  metaphor,  or  image,  unsupported 
by  a  sound  sense,  or  where  the  same  sense  might 
have  been  conveyed  with  equal  force  and  dignity  iD 
plainer  words.  Lute,  harp,  and  lyre  .;  muse,  muses, 
and  inspirations ;  Pegasus,  Parnassus,  and  Hippocrene, 
were  all  an  abomination  to  him.  In  fancy,  I  can 
almost  hear  him  now,  exclaiming,  "  Harp  ?  Harp  1 
Lyre  ?  Pen  and  ink,  boy,  you  mean  .'  Muse,  boy, 
Muse  ?  Your  Nurse's  daughter,  you  mean  !  Pierian 
spring  ?  Oh,  ay !  the  cloister-pump.  I  suppose .'" 
Nay,  certain  introductions,  similes,  and  examples, 
were  placed  by  name  on  a  list  of  interdiction. 
Among  the  similes,  there  was,  I  remember,  that  of 
the  Manchineel  fruit,  as  suiting  equally  well  with 
too  many  subjects ;  in  which,  however,  it  yielded  the 
palm  at  once  to  the  example  of  Alexander  and  Cly- 
tus,  which  was  equally  good  and  apt,  whatever 
might  be  the  theme.  T  Vas  it  Ambition  ?  Alexander 
and  Clytus!  Flattery?  Alexander  and  Clytus.' 
Anger  ?  Drunkenness  ?  Pride  ?  Friendship  ?  In- 
gratitude ?  Late  repentance?  Still,  still  Alexander 
and  Clytus !  At  length,  the  praises  of  agriculture 
having  been  exemplified  in  the  sagacious  observa- 
tion, that,  had  Alexander  been  holding  the  plough, 
he  would  not  have  run  his  friend  Clytus  through 
with  a  spear,  this  tried  and  serviceable  old  friend 
was  banished  by  public  edict  in  secula  seculorum. 
I  have  sometimes  ventured  to  think,  that  a  list  of 
this  kind,  or  an  index  expurgatorius  of  certain  well- 
known  and  ever-returning  phrases,  both  introductory 
and  transitional,  including  the  large  assortment  of 
modest  egotisms,  and  flattering  illeisms,  &c.  &e. 
might  be  hung  tip  in  our  law-courts,  and  both  houses 
of  parliament,  with  great  advantage  to  the  public, 
as  an  important  saving  of  national  time,  an  incal- 
culable relief  to  his  Majesty's  ministers,  but,  above 
all,  as  ensuring  the  thanks  of  the  country  attorneys 
and  their  clients,  who  have  private  bills  to  carry 
through  the  house. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  there  was  one  custom  of  our 
master  which  I  cannot  pass  over  in  silence,  because 
I  think  it  imitable  and  worthy  of  imitation.  He 
would  often  permit  our  theme  exercises,  under  some 
pretext  of  want  of  time,  to  accumulate,  till  each  lad 
had  four  or  five  to  be  looked  over.  Then  placing  the 
whole  number  abreast  on  his  desk,  he  would  ask  the 
writer,  why  this  or  that  sentence  might  not  have 
24G 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


•J  37 


found  as  appropriate  a  place  under  this  or  that  thesis : 
and  if  no  satisfying  answer  could  be  returned,  and 
two  faults  of  the  same  kind  were  found  in  one  ex- 
ercise, the  irrevocable  verdict  followed;  the  exercise 
was  torn  up,  and  another  on  the  same  subject  to  be 
produced  in  addition  to  the  tasks  of  the  day.  The 
reader  will,  I  trust,  excuse  this  tribute  of  recollection 
to  a  man,  whose  severities,  even  now,  not  seldom 
furnish  the  dreams,  by  which  the  blind  fancy  would 
fain  interpret  to  the  mind  the  painful  sensations  of 
distempered  sleep,  but  neither  lessen  nor  dim  the 
deep  sense  of  my  moral  and  intellectual  obligations. 
He  sent  us  to  the  University  excellent  Latin  and 
Greek  scholars,  and  tolerable  Hebraists.  Yet  our 
classical  knowledge  was  the  least  of  the  good  gifts 
which  we  derived  from  his  zealous  and  conscientious 
tutorage.  He  is  now  gone  to  his  final  reward,  full  of 
years,  and  full  of  honors,  even  of  those  honors  which 
were  dearest  to  his  heart,  as  gratefully  bestowed  by 
that  school,  and  still  binding  him  to  the  interests  of 
that  school,  in  which  he  had  been  himself  educated, 
and  to  which,  during  his  whole  life,  he  was  a  dedi- 
cated thing. 

From  causes,  which  this  is  not  the  place  to  investi- 
gate, no  models  of  past  times,  however  perfect,  can 
have  the  same  vivid  effect  on  the  youthful  mind,  as 
the  productions  of  contemporary  genius.  The  dis- 
cipline my  mind  had  undergone,  "  Ne  falleretur  ro- 
tundo  sono  et  versuum  cursu,  cincinnis  et  fioribus  ; 
sed  ut  inspiceret  quidnam  subesset,  quae  sedes,  quod 
firmamentum,  quis  fundus  verbis;  an  figuras  essent 
mera  ornatura  et  orationis  fucus:  vel  sanguinis  e 
materia?  ipsius  corde  effluentes  rubor  quidam  nativus 
et  incalescentia  genuina ;"  removed  all  obstacles  to 
the  appreciation  of  excellence  in  style  without  di- 
minishing my  delight.  That  I  was  thus  prepared 
for  the  perusal  of  Mr.  Bowles's  sonnets  and  earlier 
poems,  at  once  increased  their  influence  and  my  en- 
thusiasm. The  great  works  of  past  ages  seem,  to  a 
young  man,  things  of  another  race,  in  respect  to 
which  his  faculties  must  remain  passive  and  submiss, 
even  as  to  the  stars  and  mountains.  But  the  writings 
of  a  contemporary,  perhaps  not  many  years  elder 
than  himself,  surrounded  by  the  same  circumstances, 
and  disciplined  by  the  same  manners,  possess  a  reality 
for  him,  and  inspire  an  actual  friendship  as  of  a  man 
for  a  man.  His  very  admiration  is  the  wind  which 
fans  and  feeds  his  hope.  The  poems  themselves  as- 
sume the  properties  of  flesh  and  blood.  To  recite,  to 
extol,  to  contend  for  them,  is  but  the  payment  of  a 
debt  due  to  one  who  exists  to  receive  it. 

There  are  indeed  modes  of  teaching  which  have 
produced,  and  are  producing,  youths  of  a  very  differ- 
ent stamp;  modes  of  teaching,  in  comparison  with 
which  we  have  been  called  on  to  despise  our  great 
public  schools  and  universities, 

"In  whose  halls  are  hung 
Armory  of  the  invincible  knights  of  old" 

modes  by  which  children  are  to  be  metamorphosed 
into  prodigies.  And  prodigies,  with  a  vengeance, 
have  I  known  thus  produced  !  Prodigies  of  self-con- 
ceit, shallowness,  arrogance  and  infidelity  !    Instead 


of  storing  the  memory,  during  the  period  when  the 
memorv.is  the  predominant  faculty,  with  facts  for 
the  after  exercise  of  the  judgment;  and  instead  of 
awakening,  by  the  noblest  models,  the  fond  and  un- 
mixed love  and  admiration,  which  is  the  natural 
arid  graceful  temper  of  early  youth  :  these  nurslings 
of  improved  pedagogy  are  taught  to  dispute  and  de- 
cide ;  to  suspect  all  but  their  own  and  their  lecturer's 
wisdom,  and  to  hold  nothing  sacred  from  their  con 
tempt  but  their  own  contemptible  arrogance ;  boy 
graduates  in  all  the  technicals,  and  in  all  the  dirty 
passions  of  anonymous  criticism.  To  such  dispositions 
alone  can  the  admonition  of  Pliny  be  requisite — 
"  Neque  enim  debet  operibus  ejus  obesse,  quod  vivit 
An  si  inter  eos,  quos  nunquam  vidimus,  florui.<spt. 
non  solum  libros  ejus,  verum  etiam  imagines  con- 
quireremus,  ejusdem  nunc  honor  prsesentis,  et  gratia 
quasi  satietate  languescet?  At  hoc  pravum,  mahg- 
numque  est,  non  admirari  hominern  admiratione 
dignissimum,  quia  videre,  complecti,  nee  laudare 
tantum,  verum  etiam  amare  contingit."  Plin.  Epist. 
Lib.  I. 

I  had  just  entered  on  my  seventeenth  year,  when 
the  sonnets  of  Mr.  Bowles,  twenty  in  number,  and 
just  then  published  in  a  quarto  pamphlet,  were  first 
made  known  and  presented  to  me  by  a  school-fellow, 
who  had  quitted  us  for  the  university,  and  who, 
during  the  whole  time  that  he  was  in  our  first  form, 
(or,  in  our  school  language,  a  Grecian,)  had  been  my 
patron  and  protector.  I  refer  to  Dr.  Middleton,  the 
truly  learned,  and  every  way  excellent  Bishop  of 
Calcutta : 

"  Qui  laudibus  amplis 
Ingenium  celebrare  meum,   calamumque  solebat, 
Calcar  agens  animo  validum.    Non  omnia  terra? 
Obruta  !    Vivit  amor,  vivit  dolor  !    Ora  negatur 
Dulcia  conspicere  ;  et  flere  meminisse  *  relictum  est 

Petr.  Ep.  Lib.  I.  Ep.  I. 

It  was  a  double  pleasure  to  me,  and  still  remains 
a  tender  recollection,  that  I  should  have  received 
from  a  friend  so  revered,  the  first  knowledge  of  a 
poet,  by  whose  works,  year  after  year,  I  was  so  en- 
thusiastically delighted  and  inspired.  My  earliest 
acquaintances  will  not  have  forgotten  the  undis- 
ciplined eagerness  and  impetuous  zeal  with  which  I 
labored  to  make  proselytes,  not  only  of  my  compan- 
ions, but  of  all  with  whom  I  conversed,  of  whatever 
rank,  and  in  whatever  place.  As  my  school  finances 
did  not  permit  me  to  purchase  copies,  I  made,  within 
less  than  a  year  and  a  half,  more  than  forty  transcrip- 
tions, as  the  best  presents  I  could  offer  to  those  who 
had  in  any  way  won  my  regard.  And  with  almost 
equal  delight  did  I  receive  the  three  or  four  follow- 
ing publications  of  the  same  author. 

Though  I  have  seen  and  known  enough  of  man- 
kind to  be  well  aware  that  I  shall  perhaps  stand 
alone  in  my  creed,  and  that  it  will  be  well  if  I  sub- 
ject myself  to  no  worse  charge  than  that  of  singular- 

*  I  am  most  happy  to  have  the  necessity  of  informing  the 
reader,  that  since  this  passage  was  written,  the  report  of  Dr. 
Middleton's  death,  on  his  voyage  to  India,  has  been  proved 
erroneous.  He  lives,  and  long  may  he  live;  for  I  dare  pro- 
phesy, that  with  his  life  only  will  his  exertions  for  the  tempo- 
ral and  spiritual  welfare  of  his  fellow-men  be  limited. 
247 


238 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


ity,  I  am  not  therefore  deterred  from  avowing,  that  I 
regard,  and  ever  have  regarded  the  obligations  of 
intellect,  among  the  most  saered  of  the  claims  of 
gratitude.  A  valuable  thought,  or  a  particular  train 
of  thoughts,  gives  me  additional  pleasure,  when  I 
can  safely  refer  and  attribute  it  to  the  conversation 
or  correspondence  of  another.  My  obligations  to 
Mr.  Bowles  were  indeed  important,  and  for  radical 
good.  At  a  very  premature  age,  even  belbre  my 
fifteenth  year,  I  had  bewildered  myself  in  metaphys- 
ics, and  in  theological  controversy.  Nothing  else 
pleased  me.  History,  and  particular  facts  lost  all 
interest  in  my  mind.  Poetry,  (though  for  a  school-boy 
of  that  age,  I  was  above  par  in  English  versification, 
and  had  already  produced  two  or  three  compositions 
which,  I  may  venture  to  say,  without  reference  to 
my  age,  were  somewhat  above  mediocrity,  and  which 
had  gained  me  more  credit  than  the  sound  good  sense 
of  my  old  master  was  at  all  pleased  with.)  poetry, 
itself  yea  novels  and  romances,  became  insipid  to 
me.  In  my  friendless  wanderings  on  our  leave  days* 
(for  I  was  an  orphan,  and  had  scarce  any  connexions 
in  London,)  highly  was  I  delighted  if  any  passenger, 
especially  if  he  were  drest  in  black,  would  enter  into 
conversation  with  me.  For  I  soon  found  the  means 
of  directing  it  to  my  favorite  subjects 

Of  providence,  fore-knowledge,  will,  nnd  fate, 
Fix'd  fate,  free  will,  fore-knowledge  absolute, 
And  found  no  end  in  wandering  mazes  lost. 
This  preposterous  pursuit  was,  beyond  a  doubt,  in- 
jurious, both  to  my  natural  powers,  and  to  the  pro- 
gress of  my  education.  It  would  perhaps  have  been 
destructive,  had  it  been  continued ;  but  from  this  I 
was  auspiciously  withdrawn,  partly  indeed  by  an 
accidental  introduction  to  an  amiable  family,  chiefly, 
however,  by  the  genial  influence  of  a  style  of  poetry 
so  tender,  and  yet  so  manly,  so  natural  and  real,  and 
yet  so  dignified  and  harmonious,  as  the  sonnets,  &c. 
of  Mr.  Bowles  !  Well  were  it  for  me,  perhaps,  had 
I  never  relapsed  into  the  same  mental  disease;  if  I 
had  continued  to  pluck  the  flower  and  reap  the  har- 
vest from  the  cultivated  surface,  instead  of  delving 
in  the  unwholesome  quicksilver  mines  of  metaphysic 
depths.  But  if,  in  after  time,  I  have  sought  a  refuge 
from  bodily  pain  and  mismanaged  sensibility,  in  ab- 
struse researches,  which  exercised  the  strength  and 
subtlety  of  the  understanding  without  awakening 
the  feelings  of  the  heart;  still  there  was  a  long  and 
blessed  interval,  during  which  my  natural  faculties 
were  allowed  to  expand,  and  my  original  tendencies 
to  develop  themselves;  my  fancy,  and  the  love  of 
nature,  and  the  sense  of  beauty  in  forms  and  sounds. 
The  second  advantage,  which  I  owe  to  my  early 
perusal  and  admiration  of  these  poems,  (to  which  let 
me  add,  though  known  to  me  at  a  somewhat  later 
period,  the  Levvsdon  Hill  of  Mr.  Crow,)  bears  more 
immediately  on  my  present  subject.  Among  those 
with  whom  I  conversed,  there  were,  of  course,  very 
many  who  had  formed  their  taste,  and  their  notions 
of  poetry,  from  the  writings  of  Mr.  Pope  and  his 


*  The  Christ  Hospital  phrase,  not  for  holidays  altogether, 
but  for  those  on  which  the  boys  are  permitted  to  go  beyond 
the  precincts  of  the  school. 


followers ;  or,  to  speak  more  generally,  in  that  school 
of  French  poetry,  condensed  and  invigorated  by 
English  understanding,  which  had  predominated 
from  the  last  century.  I  was  not  blind  to  the  merits 
of  this  school,  yet,  as  from  inexperience  of  the  world, 
and  consequent  want  of  sympathy  with  the  general 
subjects  of  these  poems,  they  gave  me  little  pleasure, 
I  doubtless  undervalued  the  kind,  and  with  the  pre- 
sumption of  youth,  withheld  from  its  masters  the 
legitimate  name  of  poets.  I  saw  that  the  excellence 
of  this  kind  consisted  in  just  and  acute  observations 
on  men  and  manners  in  an  artificial  state  of  society, 
as  its  matter  and  substance  ;  and  in  the  logic  of  wit, 
conveyed  in  smooth  and  strong  epigrammatic  coup- 
lets, as  its  form.  Even  when  the  subject  was  ad- 
dressed to  the  fancy,  or  the  intellect,  as  in  the  Rape 
of  the  Lock,  or  the  Essay  on  Man ;  nay,  when  it  was 
a  consecutive  narration,  as  in  that  astonishing  product 
of  matchless  talent  and  ingenuity,  Pope's  translation 
of  the  Iliad  ;  still,  a  point  was  looked  for  at  the  end 
of  each  second  line,  and  the  whole  was  as  it  were  a 
sorites,  or,  if  I  may  exchange  a  logical  for  a  gram- 
matical metaphor,  a  conjunction  disjunctive  of  epi- 
grams. Meantime  the  matter  and  diction  seemed  to 
me  characterised  not  so  much  by  poetic  thoughts,  as 
by  thoughts  translated  into  the  language  of  poetry. 
On  this  last  point,  I  had  occasion  to  render  my  own 
thoughts  gradually  more  and  more  plain  to  myself, 
by  frequent  amicable  disputes  concerning  Darwin's 
Botanic  Gauden,  which,  for  some  years,  was  great- 
ly extolled,  not  only  by  the  reading  public  in  general, 
but  even  by  those  whose  genius  and  natural  robust- 
ness of  understanding  enabled  them  afterwards  to 
act  foremost  in  dissipating  these  "painted  mists  "  that 
occasionally  rise  from  the  marshes  at  the  foot  of  Par- 
nassus. During  my  first  Cambridge  vacation,  I  as- 
sisted a  friend  in  a  contribution  for  a  literary  society 
in  Devonshire ;  and  in  this  I  remember  to  have  com- 
pared Darwin's  work  to  the  Russian  palace  of  ice, 
glittering,  cold  and  transitory.  In  the  same  essay, 
too,  I  assigned  sundry  reasons,  chiefly  drawn  from  a 
comparison  of  passages  in  the  Latin  poets  with  the 
original  Greek,  from  which  they  were  borrowed,  for 
the  preference  of  Collins's  odes  to  those  of  Gray ; 
and  of  the  simile  in  Shakspeare  : 

"  How  like  a  younker  or  a  prodigal, 
The  sharfed  bark  puts  from  her  native  bay 
Ilugg'd  and  embraced  by  the  strumpet  wind! 
How  like  a  prodigal  doth  she  return, 
With  over  weaiher'd  ribs  and  ragged  sails. 
Lean,  rent,  and  heggar'd  by  the  strumpet  wind  !" 
to  the  imitation  in  the  bard  : 

"  Fair  laughs  the  morn,  and  soft  the  zephyr  blows, 

While  proudly  riding  o'er  the  azure  realm, 

In  gallant  trim  the  gilded  vessel  goes, 

}'outh  at  the  prow  and  Pleasure  at  the  helm, 

Regardless  of  the  sweeping  whirlwind's  sway. 

That,  hush'd  in  grim  repose,  expects  its  evening  prey." 

(In  which,  by-the-by,  the  words  "  realm"  and  "  sway" 
are  rhymes  dearly  purchased.)  I  preferred  the  ori- 
ginal, on  the  ground  that  in  the  imitation  it  depended 
wholly  in  the  compositor's  putting,  or  not  putting,  a 
small  capital,  both  in  this  and  many  other  passages 
of  the  same  poet,  whether  the  words  should  be  per- 
248 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


23«J 


sonifications,  or  mere  abstracts.  I  mention  this  be- 
cause, in  referring  various  lines  in  Gray  to  their 
original  in  Shakspeare  and  Milton,  and  in  the  clear 
perception  how  completely  all  the  propriety  was  lost 
in  the  transfer;  I  was,  at  that  early  period,  led  to  a 
conjecture,  which  many  years  afterwards,  was  re- 
called to  me  from  the  same  thought  having  been 
started  in  conversation,  but  far  more  ably,  and  de- 
veloped more  fully,  by  Mr.  Wordsworth  ;  namely, 
that  this  style  of  poetry,  which  I  have  characterised 
above,  as  translations  of  prose  thoughts  into  poetic 
language,  had  been  kept  up  by,  if  it  did  not  wholly 
arise  from,  the  custom  of  writing  Latin  verses,  and 
the  great  importance  attached  to  these  exercises  in 
our  public  schools.  Whatever  might  have  been  the 
case  in  the  fifteenth  century,  when  the  use  of  the 
Latin  tongue  was  so  general  among  learned  men 
that  Erasmus  is  said  to  have  forgotten  his  native  lan- 
guage ;  yet,  in  the  present  day,  it  is  not  to  be  sup- 
posed that  a  youth  can  think  in  Latin,  or  that  he  can 
have  any  other  reliance  on  the  force  or  fitness  of  his 
phrases,  but  the  authority  of  the  author  from  whence 
he  has  adopted  them.  Consequently,  he  must  first 
prepare  his  thoughts,  and  then  pick  out,  from  Virgil, 
Horace,  Ovid,  or  perhaps  more  compendiously  from 
his  Gradus*  halves  and  quarters  of  lines  in  which 
to  embody  them. 

I  never  object  to  a  certain  degree  of  disputatious- 
ness  in  a  young  man  from  the  age  of  seventeen  to 
that  of  four  or  five-and-twenty,  provided  I  find  him 
always  arguing  on  one  side  of  the  question.  The 
controversies  occasioned  by  my  unfeigned  zeal  for 
the  honor  of  a  favorite  contemporary,  then  known 
to  me  only  by  his  works,  were  of  great  advantage 
in  the  formation  and  establishment  of  my  taste  and 
critical  opinions.  In  my  defence  of  the  lines  run- 
ning into  each  other,  instead  of  closing  at  each 
couplet ;  and  of  natural  language,  neither  bookish 
nor  vulgar,  neither  redolent  of  the  lamp  or  of  the 
kennel,  such  as  I  will  remember  thee  ;  instead  of  the 
same  thought,  tricked  up  in  the  rag-fair  finery  of 


Thy  image  on  her  wing. 

Before  my  Fancy's  eye  shall  Memory  bring, 

I  had  continually  to  adduce  the  metre  and  diction  of 
the  Greek  poets,  from  Homer  to  Theocritus,  inclusive ; 
and  still  more  of  our  elder  English  poets,  from  Chau- 
cer to  Milton.  Nor  was  this  all.  But  as  it  was  my 
constant  reply  to  authorities  brought  against  me  from 
later  poets  of  great  name,  that  no  authority  could 
avail  in  opposition  to  Truth,  Nature,  Logic,  and 
Laws  of  Universal  Grammar  ;  actuated,  too,  by 
my  former  passion  for  metaphysical  investigations,  I 
labored  at  a  solid  foundation  on  which,  permanently, 
to  ground  my  opinions  in  the  component  faculties  of 


*  In  the  Nutricia  of  Politian,  there  occurs  this  line 
"  Pura  coloratos  interstrepit  unda  lapillos." 
Casting  my  eye  on  a  University  prize  poem,  I  met  this  line : 
"  Lactea  purpureos  interstrepit  unda  lapillos." 
Now  look  out  in  the  Gradus  for  Pnrvs,  and  you  find,  as  the 
first  synonyme  lacteus  ;  tor  coloratus,  and  ihe  first  synonyme, 
is  purpureus.    I  mention  this  by  way  of  elucidating  one  of 
the  most  ordinary  processes  in  the  fcrrumination  of  these 
centos. 

17  W2 


the  human  mind  itself,  and  their  comparative  dignity 
and  importance.  According  to  the  faculty,  or  source, 
from  which  the  pleasure  given  by  any  poem  or  pas- 
sage was  derived,  I  estimated  the  merit  of  such  poem 
or  passage.  As  the  result  of  all  my  reading  and 
meditation,  I  abstracted  two  critical  aphorisms, deem- 
ing them  to  comprise  the  conditions  and  criteria  of 
poetic  style  ;  first,  that  not  the  poem  which  we  have 
read,  but  that  to  which  we  return,  with  the  greatest 
pleasure,  possesses  the  genuine  power,  and  claim* 
the  name  of  essential  poetry.  Second,  that  whatever 
lines  can  be  translated  into  other  words  of  the  same 
language  without  diminution  of  their  significance, 
either  in  sense  or  association,  or  in  any  worthy  feel- 
ing, are  so  far  vicious  in  their  diction.  Be  it,  how- 
ever, observed,  that  I  excluded  from  the  list  of 
worthy  feelings,  the  pleasure  derived  from  mere 
novelty,  in  the  reader,  and  the  desire  of  exciting 
wonderment  at  his  powers  in  the  author.  Oftentimes 
since  then,  in  perusing  French  tragedies,  I  have  fan- 
cied two  marks  of  admiration  at  the  end  of  each  line, 
as  hieroglyphics  of  the  author's  own  admiration  at 
his  own  cleverness.  Our  genuine  admiration  of  a 
great  poet  is  a  continuous  under-current  of  feeling ; 
it  is  every  where  present,  but  seldom  any  where  as 
a  separate  excitement.  I  was  wont  boldly  to  affirm. 
that  it  would  be  scarcely  more  difficult  to  push  a 
stone  from  the  pyramids  w  ith  the  bare  hand,  than  to 
alter  a  word,  or  the  position  of  a  word,  in  Milton  or 
Shakspeare,  (in  their  most  important  works  at  least, 
without  making  the  author  say  something  else,  or 
something  worse  than  he  does  say.  One  great  dis- 
tinction I  appeared  to  myself  to  see  plainly,  between 
even  the  characteristic  faults  of  our  elder  poets,  and 
the  false  beauty  of  the  moderns.  In  the  former, 
from  Donne  to  Cowley,  wo  find  the  most  fantastic 
out-of-the-way  thoughts,  but  in  the  most  pure  and 
genuine  mother  English ;  in  the  latter,  the  most  ob- 
vious thoughts  in  language  the  most  fantastic  and 
arbitrary.  Our  faulty  elder  poets  sacrificed  the  pas- 
sion, and  passionate  flow  of  poetry,  to  the  subtleties 
of  intellect,  and  to  the  starts  of  wit ;  the  moderns  to 
the  glare  and  glitter  of  a  perpetual,  yet  broken  and 
heterogeneous  imagery,  or  rather  to  an  amphibious 
something,  made  up  half  of  image,  and  half  of  ab- 
stract *  meaning.  The  one  sacrificed  the  heart  to 
the  head,  the  other  both  heart  and  head  to  point  and 
drapery. 

The  reader  must  make  himself  acquainted  with 
the  general  style  of  composition  that  was  at  that 
time  deemed  poetry,  in  order  to  understand  and  ac- 
count for  the  effect  produced  on  me  by  the  Sonnets. 
the  Monody  at  Matlock,  and  the  Hope,  of  Mr 
Bowles  ;  for  it  is  peculiar  to  original  genius  to  become 
less  and  less  striking,  in  proportion  to  its  success  ii. 
improving  the  taste  and  judgment  of  its  contempo- 
raries. The  poems  of  West,  indeed,  had  the  men! 
of  chaste  and  manly  diction,  but  they  were  cold,  and. 

t  I  rememoer  a  ludicrous  instance  in  the  poem  of  a  young 
tradesman 

"  No  more  will  I  endure  love's  pleasing  pain. 
Or  round  my  heart's  leg  tie  his  galling  chain." 
249 


240 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


if  1  may  so  express  it,  only  dead-colored ;  while  in 
the  best  of  Warton's  there  is  a  stiffness,  which  too 
often  gives  them  the  appearance  of  imitations  from 
the  Creek.  Whatever  relation,  therefore,  of  cause 
or  impulse,  Percy's  collection  of  Ballads  may  bear 
to  the  most  popular  poems  of  the  present  day ;  yet, 
in  the  more  sustained  and  elevated  style  of  the  then 
living  poets,  Bowles  and  Cowper*  were,  to  the  best 
of  my  knowledge,  the  first  who  combined  natural 
thoughts  with  natural  diction;  the  first  who  recon- 
ciled the  heart  with  the  head. 

It  is  true,  as  I  have  before  mentioned,  that  from 
diffidence  in  my  own  powers,  I  for  a  short  time 
adopted  a  laborious  and  florid  diction,  which  I  my- 
self deemed,  if  not  absolutely  vicious,  yet  of  very 
inferior  worth.  Gradually,  however,  my  practice 
conformed  to  my  better  judgment;  and  the  com- 
positions of  my  twenty-fourth  and  twenty-fifth  years, 
(ex.  gr.  the  shorter  blank  verse  poems,  the  lines 
which  are  now  adopted  in  the  introductory  part  of 
the  Vision,  in  the  present  collection  in  Mr.  Southey's 
Joan  of  Arc,  2d  book,  1st  edition,  and  the  Tragedy 
of  Remorse,)  are  not  more  below  my  present  ideal 
in  respect  of  the  general  tissue  of  the  style,  than 
those  of  the  latest  date.  Their  faults  were,  at  least, 
a  remnant  of  the  former  leaven,  and  among  the 
many  who  have  done  me  the  honor  of  putting  my 
poems  in  the  same  class  with  those  of  my  betters, 
the  one  or  two  who  have  pretended  to  bring  exam- 
ples of  affected  simplicity  from  my  volume,  have 
been  able  to  adduce  but  one  instance,  and  that  out 
of  a  copy  of  verses  half  ludicrous,  half  splenetic, 
which  I  intended,  and  had  myself  characterized,  as 
sermoni  propriora. 

Every  reform,  however  necessary,  will  by  weak 
minds  be  carried  to  an  excess,  that  itself  will  need 
reforming.  The  reader  will  excuse  me  for  noticing, 
that  I  myself  was  the  first  to  expose  Hsu  honesto  the 
three  sins  of  poetry,  one  or  the  other  of  which  is  the 
most  likely  to  beset  a  young  writer.  So  long  ago  as 
the  publication  of  the  second  number  of  the  Monthly 
Magazine,  under  the  name  of  Nehemiah  Higge.n- 
botto.w,  I  contributed  three  sonnets,  the  first  of  which 
had  for  its  object  to  excite  a  good-natured  laugh,  at 
the  spirit  of  doleful  egotism,  and  at  the  recurrence  of 
favorite  phrases,  with  tke  double  defect  of  being  at 
once  trite  and  licentious.  The  second,  on  low,  creep- 
ing language  and  thoughts,  under  the  pretence  of 
simplicity.  And  the  third,  the  phrases  of  which  were 
borrowed  entirely  from  my  own  poems,  on  the  indis- 
criminate use  of  elaborate  and  swelling  language 


*  Cowper's  Task  was  published  some  time  before  the  son- 
nets of  Mr.  Bowles,  but  I  was  not  familiar  with  it  till  many 
yearB  afterwards.  The  vein  of  satire  which  runs  through 
that  excellent  poem,  together  with  the  sombre  hue  of  its  reli- 
gious opinions,  would  probably,  at  that  time,  have  prevented 
its  lading  any  strong  hold  on  my  affections.  The  love  of  na- 
ture seems  to  have  led  Thomson  to  a  cheerful  religion;  and 
a  gloomy  religion  to  have  led  Cowper  to  a  love  of  nature. 
The  one  would  carry  his  fellow-men  along  with  him  into  na- 
ture ;  the  other  flies  to  nature  from  his  fellow-men.  In  chas- 
tity of  diction,  however,  and  the  harmony  of  blank  verse, 
Cowper  leaves  Thomson  immeasurably  below  him;  yet  still 
I  feel  the  latter  to  have  been  the  born  poet. 


and  imagery.  The  reader  will  find  them  in  the  notet 
below,  and  will,  I  trust,  regard  them  as  reprinted  for 
biographical  purposes,  and  not  for  their  poetic  merits. 
So  general  at  that  time,  and  so  decided  was  the  opin- 
ion concerning  the  characteristic  vices  of  my  style, 
that  a  celebrated  physician,  (now,  alas!  no  more.) 
speaking  of  me,  in  other  respects,  with  his  usual  kind- 
ness, to  a  gentleman  who  was  about  to  meet  me  at  a 
dinner  party,  could  not,  however  resist  giving  him  a 
hint  not  to  mention  the  "  House  that  Jack  built "  in 


t SONNET  I. 
Pensive  at  eve,  on  the  hard  world  I  mused, 
And  my  poor  heart  was  sad  ;  so  at  the  Moon 
I  gazed,  and  sighed,  and  sighed  ;    for  ah,  how  soon 
Eve  saddens  into  night  I  nrne  eyes  perused 
With  tearful  vacancy  the  dampy  grass 
That  wept  and  glitter'd  in  the  paly  ray; 
And  I  did  pause  me  on  my  lonely  way, 
And  mused  me  on  the  wretched  oiies  that  pass 
O'er  the  bleak  heath  of  sorrow.    But  alas! 
IMost  of  tniisilf  I  thought :  when  it  befel. 
That  the  soothe  spirit  of  the  breezy  wood 
Breathed  in  mine  ear:   "All  this  is  very  well, 
But  much  of  one  thing  is  for  no  thing  good." 
Oh  my  poor  heart's  inexplicable  swell! 

SONNET  II. 
Oh  I  do  love  thee,  meek  Simplicity  ! 
For  of  thy  lays  the  lulling  simpleness 
Goes  to  my  heart,  and  soothes  each  small  distress, 
Distress  tho'  small,  yet  haply  great  to  me; 
'T  is  true,  on  Lady  Fortune's  gentlest  pad 
I  amble  on  ;  and  yet  I  know  not  why 
So  sad  I  am  !  but  should  a  friend  and  I 
Frown,  pout  and  part,  then  I  am  very  Bad. 
And  then  with  sonnets  and  with  sympathy 
My  dreamy  bosom's  mystic  woes  I  pall; 
Now  of  my  false  friend  'plaining  plaintively, 
Now  raving  at  mankind  in  general  ; 
But  whether  sad  or  fierce,  't  is  simple  all, 
All  very  simple,  meek  Simplicity ! 

SONNET  III. 
And  this  reft  house  is  that,  the  which  he  built. 
Lamented  Jack  !  and  here  his  malt  he  piled. 
Cautious  in  vain  !  these  rats,  that  squeak  so  wild, 
Squeak  not  unconscious  of  their  father's  guilt. 
Did  he  not  see  her  gleaming  through  the  glade  ? 
Belike  't  was  she,  the  maiden  all  forlorn. 
What  though  she  milk  no  cow  with  crumpled  horn. 
Yet,  aye  she  haunts  the  dale  where  erst  she  stray'd; 
And  aye,  beside  her  stalks  her  amorous  knight ! 
Still  on  his  thighs  their  wonted  brogues  are  worn. 
And  through  those  brogues,  still  laiter'd  and  betorn 
His  hindward  charms  gleam  an  unearthly  white. 
Ah  !  thus  through  broken  clouds  at  night's  high  noon, 
Peeps  in  fair  fragments  forth  the  full-orb'd  harvest  moon! 

The  following  anecdote  will  not  be  wholly  out  of  place 
here,  and  may,  perhaps,  amuse  the  reader.  An  amateur  per- 
former in  verse  expressed  to  a  common  friend,  a  strong  desire 
to  be  introduced  to  me,  but  hesitated  in  accepting  my  friend's 
immediate  offer,  on  the  score  that  "  he  was,  he  must  acknow- 
ledge, the  author  of  a  confounded  severe  epigram  on  my 
Jincient  Mariner,  which  had  given  me  great  pain."  I  as- 
sured my  friend  that  if  the  epigram  was  a  good  one,  it  would 
only  increase  my  desire  to  become  acquainted  with  the  author, 
and  begged  to  hear  it  recited  :  when,  to  my  no  less  surprise 
than  amusement,  it  proved  to  be  one  which  I  had  myself  some 
time  before  written,  and  inserted  in  the  Morning  Post. 

To  the  Author  of  the  Ancient  Mariner. 
Your  poem  must  eternal  be, 
Dear  sir,  it  cannot  fail. 
For  'tis  incomprehensible, 
And  without  head  or  tail. 

250 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


241 


my  presence,  for  "  that  I  was  as  sore  as  a  bile  about 
that  sonnet ;"  he  not  knowing  that  I  was,  myself,  the 
author  of  it. 


CHAPTER  II. 

Supposed  irritability  of  men  of  genius- Brought  to  the  test 
of  facts— Causes  and  occasions  of  the  charge— Its  injustice. 

I  have  often  thought  that  it  would  be  neither  un- 
instruetive  nor  unamusing  to  analyze  and  bring  for- 
ward into  distinct  consciousness,  that  complex  feel- 
ing, with  which  readers  in  general  take  part  against 
the  author,  in  favor  of  the  critic;  and  the  readiness 
with  which  they  apply  to  all  poets  the  old  sarcasm 
of  Horace  upon  the  scribblers  of  his  time,  "  Genus 
irritabile  vatum."  A  debility  and  dimness  of  the 
imaginative  power,  and  a  consequent  necessity  of  re- 
liance on  the  immediate  impressions  of  the  senses,  do, 
we  well  know,  render  the  mind  liable  to  superstition 
and  fanaticism.  Having  a  deficient  portion  of  inter- 
nal and  proper  warmth,  minds  of  this  class  seek  in 
the  crowd  circum  fana  for  a  warmth  in  common, 
which  they  do  not  possess  singly.  Cold  and  phleg- 
matic in  their  own  nature,  like  damp  hay,  they  heat 
and  inflame  by  coacervation;  or,  like  bees,  they  be- 
come restless  and  irritable  through  the  increased 
temperature  of  collected  multitudes.  Hence  the 
German  word  for  fanaticism  (such,  at  least,  was  its 
original  import,)  is  derived  from  the  swarming  of 
bees,  namely,  Schwarmen,  Schwarmery.  The  pas- 
sion being  in  an  inverse  proportion  to  the  insight, 
that  the  more  vivid  as  this  the  less  distinct,  anger  is 
the  inevitable  consequence.  The  absence  of  all 
foundation  within  their  own  minds  for  that  which 
they  yet  believe  both  true  and  indispensable  for  their 
safety  and  happiness,  cannot  but  produce  an  uneasy 
state  of  feeling,  an  involuntary  sense  of  fear,  from 
which  nature  has  no  means  of  rescuing  herself  but 
by  anger.  Experience  informs  us,  that  the  first  de- 
fence of  weak  minds  is  to  recriminate. 

"There's  no  philosopher  but  sees, 
That  rage  and  fear  are  one  disease; 
Though  that  may  burn,  ard  this  may  freeze, 
They  're  both  alike  the  ague." 

Mad  Ox. 

But  where  the  ideas  are  vivid,  and  there  exists  an 
endless  power  of  combining  and  modifying  them,  the 
feelings  and  affections  blend  more  easily  and  inti- 
mately with  these  ideal  creations,  than  with  the  ob- 
jects of  the  senses;  the  mind  is  affected  by  thoughts, 
rather  than  by  things;  and  only  then  feels  the  requi- 
site interest,  even  for  the  most  important  events  and 
accidents,  when  by  means  of  meditation  they  have 
passed  into  thoughts.  The  sanity  of  the  mind  is  be- 
tween superstition  with  fanaticism  on  the  one  hand, 
and  enthusiasm  with  indifference  and  a  diseased  slow- 
ness to  action  on  the  other.  For  the  conceptions  of 
the  mind  may  be  so  vivid  and  adequate  as  to  preclude 
that  impulse  to  the  realizing  of  them,  which  is 
strongest  and  most  restless  in  those  who  possess  more 
than  the  mere  talent,  (or  the  faculty  of  appropriating 
and  applying  the  knowledge  of  others,)  yet  still  want 


something  of  the  creative  and  self-sufficing  power  of 
absolute  genius.  For  this  reason,  therefore,  they  are 
men  of  commanding  genius.  While  the  former  rest 
content  between  thought  and  reality,  as  it  were  in 
an  intermundiurn,  of  which  their  own  living  spirit 
supplies  the  substance,  and  their  imagination  the  ever 
varying/orm,-  the  latter  must  impress  their  precon- 
ceptions on  the  world  without,  in  order  to  present 
them  back  to  their  own  view  with  the  satisfying  de- 
gree of  clearness,  distinctness,  and  individuality. 
These,  in  tranquil  times,  are  formed  to  exhibit  a  per- 
fect poem  in  palace,  or  temple,  or  landscape-garden; 
or  a  tale  of  romance  in  canals  that  join  sea  with  sea, 
or  in  walls  of  rock,  which,  shouldering  back  the  bil- 
lows, imitate  the  power,  and  supply  the  benevolence 
of  nature  to  sheltered  navies;  or  in  aqueducts,  that, 
arching  the  wide  vale  from  mountain  to  mountain, 
give  a  Palmyra  to  the  desert.  But,  alas!  in  times 
of  tumult,  they  are  the  men  destined  to  come  forth 
as  the  shaping  spirit  of  Ruin,  to  destroy  the  wisdom 
of  ages,  in  order  to  substitute  the  fancies  of  a  day, 
and  to  change  kings  and  kingdoms,  as  the  wind  shifts 
and  shapes  the  clouds*  The  records  of  biography 
seem  to  confirm  this  theory.  The  men  of  the  great- 
est genius,  as  far  as  we  can  judge  from  their  own 
works,  or  from  the  accounts  of  their  contemporaries, 
appear  to  have  been  of  calm  and  tranquil  temper  in 
all  that  related  to  themselves.  In  the  inward  assu- 
rance of  permanent  fame,  they  seem  to  have  been 
either  indifferent  or  resigned  with  regard  to  imme- 
diate reputation.  Through  all  the  works  of  Chaucer, 
there  reigns  a  cheerfulness,  a  manly  hilarity,  which 
makes  it  almost  impossible  to  doubt  a  correspondent 
habit  of  feeling  in  the  author  himself.  Shakspeare's 
evenness  and  sweetness  of  temper  were  almost  pro- 
verbial in  his  own  age.  That  this  did  not  arise  from 
ignorance  of  his  own  comparative  greatness,  we  have 
abundant  proof  in  his  sonnets,  which  could  scarcely 
have  been  known  to  Mr.  Popet  when  he  asserted 


*  "  Of  old  things  all  are  over  old, 

Of  good  things  none  are  good  enough  ; — 
We'll  show  that  we  can  help  to  frame 
A  world  of  other  stuff." 
f  Mr.  Pope  was  under  the  common  error  of  his  age,  an 
error  far  from  being  sufficiently  exploded,  even  at  the  present 
day.  It  consists,  (as  I  explained  at  large,  and  proved  in  de- 
tail in  my  public  lectures,)  in  mistaking  for  the  essentials  of 
the  Greek  stage,  certain  rules  which  the  wise  poets  imposed 
upon  themselves,  in  order  to  render  all  the  remaining  parts  of 
the  drama,  consistent  with  those  that  had  been  forced  upon 
them  by  circumstances  independent  of  their  will  ;  out  of 
which  circumstances  the  drama  itself  arose.  The  circum- 
stances in  the  time  of  Shakspeare,  which  it  was  equally  out 
of  his  power  to  alter,  were  different,  and  such  as,  in  my 
opinion,  allowed  a  far  wider  sphere,  and  a  deeper  and  more 
human  interest.  Critics  are  too  apt  to  forget  that  rules  are 
but  means  to  an  end  ;  consequently,  where  the  ends  are  dif- 
ferent, the  rules  must  be  likewise  so.  We  must  have  ascer- 
tained what  the  end  is  before  we  can  determine  what  the  ruleB 
ought  to  be.  Judging  under  this  impression,  I  did  not  hesi- 
tate to  declare  my  full  conviction,  that  the  consummate  judg- 
ment of  Shakspeare,  not  only  in  the  general  construction, 
but  in  all  the  detail  of  his  dramas,  impressed  me  with  greater 
wonder  than  even  the  might  of  his  genius,  or  the  depth  of  his 
philosophy.  The  substance  of  these  lectures  I  hope  soon  to 
publish  ;  and  it  is  but  a  debt  of  justice  to  myself  and  my 
friends,  to  notice,  that  the  first  course  of  .ectures,  which  dif- 
fered from  the  following  courses  only  by  occasionally  varying 
251 


242 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


that  our  great  bard  "  grew  immortal  in  his  own  de- 
spite." Speaking  of  one  whom  he  had  celebrated, 
and  contrasting  the  duration  of  his  works  with  that 
of  his  personal  existence,  Shakspeare  adds: 

"  I  too  will  have  my  kings,  that  take 
From  me  the  sign  of  life  and  death ; 
Kingdoms  shall  shift  about  like  clouds, 
Obedient  to  my  breath." 

Wordsworth's  Rob  Roy. 

"  Your  name  from  hence  immortal  life  shall  have, 
Tho'  1  once  gone,  to  all  the  world  must  die ; 
The  earth  can  yield  me  but  a  common  grave. 
When  you  entombed  in  men's  eyes  shall  lie. 
Your  monument  shall  be  my  gentle  verse. 
Which  eyes  not  yet  created  shall  o'er-read  : 
And  tongues  to  be  your  being  shall  rehearse, 
When  all  the  breathers  of  this  world  are  dead  ; 
You  still  shall  live,  such  virtue  hath  my  pen, 
Where  breath  most  breathes,  e'en  in  the  mouth  of  men." 

Sonnet  81st. 

I  have  taken  the  first  that  occurred  ;  but  Shakspeare's 
readiness  to  praise  his  rivals,  ore  pleno,  and  the  con- 
fidence of  his  own  equality  with  those  whom  he 
deemed  most  worthy  of  his  praise,  are  alike  mani- 
fested in  the  86th  sonnet : 

Was  it  the  proud  full  sail  of  his  great  verse, 
Bound  for  the  praise  of  ail-too  precious  you, 
That  did  my  ripe  thoughts  in  my  brain  inhearse, 
Making  their  tomb  the  womb  wherein  they  grew  1 
Was  it  his  spirit,  by  spirits  taught  to  write 
Above  a  mortal  pitch,  that  struck  me  dead? 
No,  neither  he,  nor  his  compeers  by  night 
Giving  him  aid,  my  verse  astonished. 
He,  nor  that  affable  familiar  ghost. 
Which  nightly  gulls  him  with  intelligence. 
As  victors  of  my  silence  cannot  boast; 
I  was  not  sick  of  any  fear  from  thence ! 
But  when  your  countenance  fill'd  up  his  line, 
Then  lack'd  I  matter,  that  enfeebled  mine." 

In  Spenser,  indeed,  we  trace  a  mind  constitution- 
ally tender,  delicate,  and,  in  comparison  with  his 
three  great  compeers,  I  had  almost  said>  effeminate  t 
and  this  additionally  saddened  by  the  unjust  perse- 
cution of  Burleigh,  and  the  severe  calamities  which 
overwhelmed  his  latter  days.  These  causes  have 
diffused  over  all  his  compositions  "a  melancholy 
grace,"  and  have  drawn  forth  occasional  strains,  the 
more  pathetic  from  their  gentleness.  But  nowhere 
do  we  find  the  least  trace  of  irritability,  and  still  less 
of  quarrelsome  or  affected  contempt  of  his  censurers. 

The  same  calmness,  and  even  greater  self-posses- 
sion, may  be  affirmed  of  Milton,  as  far  as  his  poems 
and  poetic  character  are  concerned.  He  reserved 
his  anger  for  the  enemies  of  religion,  freedom,  and 
his  country.  My  mind  is  not  capable  of  forming  a 
more  august  conception,  than  arises  from  the  contem- 
plation of  this  great  man  in  his  latter  days:  poor, 
sick,  old,  blind,  slandered,  persecuted, 

"Darkness  before,  and  danger's  voice  behind," 

in  an  age  in  which  he  was  as  little  understood  by 
the  party  for  whom  as  by  that  agai?ist  whom,  he  had 
contended  ;  and  among  men  before  whom  he  strode 


the  illustrations  of  the  same  thoughts,  was  addressed  to  very 
numerous,  and,  I  need  not  add,  respectable  audiences,  at  the 
Royal  Institution,  before  Mr.  Schlegel  gave  his  lectures  on  the 
same  subjects  at  Vienna. 


so  far  as  to  dwarf  himself  by  the  distance ;  yet  sftll 
listening  to  the  music  of  his  own  thoughts,  or  if  ad- 
ditionally cheered,  yet  cheered  only  by  the  prophetic 
faith  of  two  or  three  solitary  individuals,  he  did 
nevertheless 


•  "  Argue  not 


Against  Heaven's  hand  or  will,  nor  bate  a  jot 
Of  heart  or  hope ;  but  still  bore  up,  and  steer'd 
Right  onward." 

From  others  only  do  we  derive  our  knowledge  that 
Milton,  in  his  latter  day,  had  his  scorners  and  de- 
tractors; and  even  in  his  day  of  youth  and  hope,  that 
he  had  enemies  would  have  been  unknown  to  us, 
had  they  not  been  likewise  the  enemies  of  his 
country. 

I  am  well  aware,  that  in  advanced  stages  of  litera- 
ture, when  there  exist  many  and  excellent  models, 
a  high  degree  of  talent,  combined  with  taste  and 
judgment,  and  employed  in  works  of  imagination, 
will  acquire  for  a  man  the  name  of  a  great  genius ; 
though  even  that  analogon  of  genius,  which,  in  cer- 
tain states  of  society,  may  even  render  his  writings 
more  popular  than  the  absolute  reality  could  have 
done,  would  be  sought  for  in  vain  in  the  mind  and 
temper  of  the  author  himself.  Yet  even  in  instances 
of  this  kind,  a  close  examination  will  often  detect 
that  the  irritability,  which  has  been  attributed  to  the 
author's  genius  as  its  cause,  did  really  originate  in  an 
ill  conformation  of  body,  obtuse  pain,  or  constitutional 
defect  of  pleasurable  sensation.  What  is  charged  to 
the  author,  belongs  to  the  man,  who  would  probably 
have  been  still  more  impatient,  but  for  the  human- 
izing influences  of  the  very  pursuit,  which  yet  bears 
the  blame  of  his  irritability. 

How  then  are  we  to  explain  the  easy  credence 
generally  given  to  this  charge,  if  the  charge  itself  be 
not,  as  we  have  endeavored  to  show,  supported  by 
experience  ?  This  seems  to  me  of  no  very  difficult 
solution.  In  whatever  country  literature  is  widely 
diffused,  there  will  be  many  who  mistake  an  intense 
desire  to  possess  the  reputation  of  poetic  genius,  for 
the  actual  powers,  and  original  tendencies  which 
constitute  it.  But  men,  whose  dearest  wishes  are 
fixed  on  objects  wholly  out  of  their  power,  become 
in  all  cases  more  or  less  impatient  and  prone  to  anger. 
Besides,  though  it  may  be  paradoxical  to  assert,  that 
a  man  can  know  one  thing,  and  believe  the  opposite, 
yet  assuredly,  a  vain  person  may  have  so  habitually 
indulged  the  wish,  and  persevered  in  the  attempt  to 
appear  what  he  is  not,  as  to  become  himself  one  of 
his  own  proselytes.  Still,  as  this  counterfeit  and 
artificial  persuasion  must  differ,  even  in  the  person^ 
own  feelings,  from  a  real  sense  of  inward  power, 
what  can  be  more  natural  than  that  this  difference 
should  betray  itself  in  suspicion  and  jealous  irritabil- 
ity? Even  as  the  flowery  sod,  which  covers  a  hoi 
low,  may  be  often  detected  by  its  shaking  and  trem 
bling? 

But,  alas !  the  multitude  of  books,  and  the  general 
diffusion  of  literature,  have  produced  other  and  more 
lamentable  effects  in  the  world  of  letters,  and  such 
as  are  abundant  to  explain,  though  by  no  means  to 
justify,  the  contempt  with  which  the  best  grounded 
252 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


243 


complaints  of  injured  genius  are  rejected  as  frivo- 
lous, or  entertained  as  matter  of  merriment.  In  the 
days  of  Chancer  and  Gower,  our  language  might 
(with  due  allowance  for  the  imperfections  of  a  simile,) 
be  compared  to  a  wilderness  of  vocal  reeds,  from 
which  the  favorites  only  of  Pan  or  Apollo  could 
construct  even  the  rude  Svrinx;  a:id  from  this  the 
constructors  alone  could  elicit  strains  of  music.  But 
now,  partly  by  the  labors  of  successive  poets,  and  in 
part  by  the  more  artificial  state  of  society  and  social 
intercourse,  language,  mechanized  as  it  were  into  a 
barrel-organ,  supplies  at  once  both  instrument  and 
tune.  Thus  even  the  deaf  may  play,  so  as  to  delight 
the  many.  Sometimes,  (for  it  is  with  similes  as  it  is 
with  jests  at  a  wine  table,  one  is  sure  to  suggest 
another,)  I  have  attempted  to  illustrate  the  present 
state  of  our  language,  in  its  relation  to  literature,  bv  a 
press-room  of  larger  and  smaller  stereotvpe  pieces, 
which,  in  the  present  anglo-gallican  fashion  of  un- 
connected, epigrammatic  periods,  it  requires  but  an 
ordinary  portion  of  ingenuity  to  van,-  indefinitely,  and 
yet  still  produce  something,  which,  if  710/  sense,  will 
be  so  like  it  as  to  do  as  well.  Perhaps  better;  for  it 
spares  the  reader  the  trouble  of  thinking;  prevents 
vacancy,  'while  it  indulges  innocence;  and  secures 
the  memory  from  all  danger  of  an  intellectual  ple- 
thora. Hence,  of  all  trades,  literature  at  present  de- 
mands the  least  talent  or  information ;  and,  of  all 
modes  of  literature,  the  manufacturing  of  poems. 
The  difference,  indeed,  between  these  and  the  works 
of  genius,  is  not  less  than  between  an  egg  and  an 
egg-shell ;  yet  at  a  distance  they  both  look  alike. 

Now  it  is  no  less  remarkable  than  true,  with  how 
little  examination  the  works  of  polite  literature  are 
commonly  perused,  not  only  by  the  mass  of  readers, 
but  by  men  of  the  first-rate  ability,  till  some  accident 
or  chance*  discussion  have  aroused  their  attention. 


*  In  the  course  of  my  lectures,  I  have  occasion  to  point  out 
the  almost  faultless  position  and  choice  of  words,  in  Mr. 
Pope's  original  compositions,  particularly  in  his  satires  and 
moral  essays,  for  the  purpose  of  comparing  them  with  his 
translation  of  Homer,  which  I  do  not  stand  alone  in  regarding 
as  the  main  source  of  our  pseudo-poetic  diction.  And  this. 
by-lhe-by,  is  an  additional  confirmation  of  a  remark  made,  I 
believe,  by  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  that  next  to  the  man  who 
formed  and  elevated  the  taste  of  the  public,  he  that  corrupt- 
ed it  is  commonly  the  greatest  genius.  Among  other  pas- 
sages, I  analyzed,  sentence  by  sentence,  and  almost  word  by 
word,  the  popular  lines, 

"  As  when  the  moon,  resplendent  lamp  of  light,"  fcc. 

much  in  the  same  way  as  has  been  since  done,  in  an  excellent 
article  on  Chalmers'  British  Poets,  in  the  Quarterly  Review. 
The  impression  on  the  audience,  in  general,  was  sudden  and 
evident :  and  a  number  of  enlightened  and  highly  educated 
individuals,  who  at  different  times  afterwards  addressed  me 
on  tbe  subject,  expressed  their  wonder,  that  truth  so  obvious 
should  not  have  struck  them  before :  but  at  tho  same  lime 
acknowledged  (so  much  had  they  been  accustomed,  in  read- 
ing poetry,  to  receive  pleasure  from  the  separate  images  and 
phrases  successively,  without  asking  themselves  whether  the 
collective  meaning  was  sense  or  nonsense,)  that  they  might 
in  all  probability  have  read  the  same  passage  agnin  twenty 
times  with  undiminished  admiration,  and  without  once  reflect- 
ing that  " asoa  yacnrjv  afHpi  6e\nvnv  ipcuvct  Bftwpewea" 
(i.  e.  the  stars  around,  or  near  the  full  moon,  shine  pre-emi- 
nently bright)  conveys  a  just  and  happy  image  of  a  moonlight 
sky :  while  it  is  difficult  to  determine  whether  in  the  lines, 


and  put  them  on  their  guard.  And  hence,  individuals 
below  mediocrity,  not  less  in  natural  power  than  ac- 
quired knowledge  ;  nay,  bunglers  that  had  failed  in 
the  lowest  mechanic  crafts,  and  whose  presumption 
is  in  due  proportion  to  their  want  of  sense  and  sensi- 
bility; men  who,  being  first  scribblers  from  idleness 
and  ignorance,  next  become  libellers  from  envy  and 
malevolence,  have  been  able  to  drive  a  successful 
trade  in  the  employment  of  booksellers,  nay,  have 
raised  themselves  into  temporary  name  and  reputation 
with  the  public  at  large,  by  that  most  powerful  of  all 
adulation,  the  appeal  to  the  bad  and  malicnant  pas- 
sions of  mankind.t  But  as  it  is  the  nature  of  scorn, 
envy,  and  all  malignant  propensities  to  require  a  quick 
change  of  objects,  such  writers  are  sure,  sooner  or 
later,  to  awake  from  their  dream  of  vanity  to  disap- 
pointment and  neglect,  with  embittered  and  enve- 
nomed feelings.  Even  during  their  short-lived  suc- 
cess, sensible,  in  spite  of  themselves,  on  what  a 
shifting  foundation  it  rested,  they  resent  the  mere  re- 
fusal of  praise,  as  a  robber}-,  and  at  the  justcst  cen- 
sures kindle  at  once  into  violent  and  undisciplined 
abuse  ;  till  the  acute  disease  changing  into  chronical, 
the  more  deadly  as  the  less  violent,  they  become  the 


"  Around  her  throne  the  vivid  planets  roll. 
And  stars  unnumber'd  gild  the  glowing  pole," 

the  sense  or  the  diction  be  the  more  absurd.  My  answer  wag, 
that  though  I  had  derived  peculiar  advantages  from  my  school 
discipline,  and  though  my  general  theory  of  poetry  was  the 
same  then  as  now,  1  had  yet  experienced  the  same  sensations 
myself,  and  felt  almost  as  if  I  had  been  newly  couched,  when 
by  Mr.  Wordsworth's  conversation,  I  had  been  induced  to 
re-examine  with  impartial  strictness  Gray's  celebrated  elegy. 
I  had  long  before  detected  the  defects  in  "  the  Bard  ;"  but 
"the  Elegy"  I  had  considered  as  proof  against  all  fair  at- 
tacks ;  and  to  this  day  I  cannot  read  either  without  delight, 
and  a  portion  of  enthusiasm.  At  all  events,  whatever  plea- 
sure 1  may  have  lost  by  the  clearer  perception  of  the  faults  in 
certain  passages,  has  been  more  than  repaid  to  me,  by  the 
additional  delight  with  which  I  read  the  remainder. 

t  Especially  "  in  this  age  of  personality,  this  age  of  literary 
and  political  gossiping,  when  the  meanest  insects  are  wor- 
shipped with  a  sort  of  Egyptian  superstition,  if  only  tbe 
brainless  head  be  atoned  for  by  the  sting  of  personal  malignity 
in  tha  tail !  When  the  most  vapid  satires  have  become  tbe 
objt-cts  of  a  keen  public  interest,  purely  from  the  number  of 
contemporary  characters  named  in  the  patchwork  notes, 
which  possess,  however,  the  comparative  merit  of  being  more 
poetical  than  the  text,)  and  because,  to  increase  the  stimulus, 
the  author  has  sagaciously  left  his  own  name  for  whispers  and 
conjectures  !  In  an  age,  when  even  sermons  are  published 
with  a  double  appendix  stuffed  with  nanus — in  a  generation 
so  transformed  from  the  characteristic  reserve  of  Britons,  that 
from  the  ephemeral  sheet  of  a  London  newspaper,  to  the 
everlasting  Scotch  Professorial  Quarto,  almost  every  publica- 
tion exhibits  or  flatters  the  epidemic  distemper;  that  tbe  very 
'  last  year's  rebuses'  in  the  Ladies'  Diary,  are  answered  in  a 
serious  elegy  '  on  my  father's  death,'  with  the  name  and  habi- 
tat of  the  elegiac  QCdipus  subscribed  ;  and  '  other  inge- 
nious solutions  icere  likewise  given'  to  the  said  rebuses — 
not,  as  heretofore,  by  Crito,  Philander,  A,  B,  Y,  tc- but  by 
fifty  or  sixty  plain  English  surnames  at  full  length,  with  their 
several  places  of  abode  !  In  an  age,  when  a  bashful  Philalc- 
this,  or  Phileleuthcros,  is  as  rare  on  the  title-pages,  and 
among  the  signatures  of  our  magazines,  as  a  real  name  used 
to  be  in  the  days  of  our  shy  and  notice-shunning  grandfathers  ! 
When  (more  exquisite  than  all)  I  see  an  Epic  Poem  (spirits 
of  Maro  and  Ma-on ides,  make  ready  to  welcome  your  new 
compeer!)  advertised  with  the  special  recommendation,  that 
the  said  Epic  Poem  contains  more  than  an  hundred  names 

of  living  persons." Friend,  No.  10. 

253 


244 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


fit  instruments  of  literary  detraction  and  moral  slander. 
They  are  then  no  longer  to  be  questioned  without  ex- 
posing the  complainant  to  ridicule,  because,  forsooth, 
they  are  anon  >/mous  critics,  and  authorized  as  "  syno- 
dical  individuals"*  to  speak  of  themselves  plurali 
majestatico !  As  if  literature  formed  a  caste,  like  that 
of  the  Paras  in  Hindostan,  who,  however  maltreated, 
must  not  dare  to  deem  themselves  wronged  !  As  if 
that,  which  in  all  other  cases  adds  a  deeper  die  to 
slander,  the  circumstance  of  its  being  anonymous, 
here  acted  only  to  make  the  slanderer  inviolable ! 
Thus,  in  part,  from  the  accidental  tempers  of  indivi- 
duals, (men  of  undoubted  talent,  but  not  men  of 
genius.)  tempers  rendered  yet  more  irritable  by  their 
desire  to  appear  men  of  genius;  but  still  more  effec- 
tively by  the  excesses  of  the  mere  counter/tils  both 
of  talent  and  genius ;  the  number,  too,  being  so  in- 
comparably greater  of  those  who  are  thought  to  be, 
than  of  those  who  really  are  men  of  real  genius;  and 
in  part  from  the  natural,  but  not  therefore  the  less 
partial  and  unjust  distinction,  made  by  the  public 
itself  between  literary  and  all  other  property ;  I  be- 
lieve the  prejudice  to  have  arisen,  which  considers 
an  unusual  irascibility  concerning  the  reception  of  its 
products  as  characteristic  of  genius.  It  might  correct 
the  moral  feelings  of  a  numerous  class  of  readers,  to 
suppose  a  review  set  on  foot,  the  object  of  which 
was  to  criticise  all  the  chief  works  presented  to  the 
public  by  our  ribbon-weavers,  calico-printers,  cabinet- 
makers, and  china-manufacturers ;  a  review  con- 
ducted in  the  same  spirit,  and  which  should  take  the 
same  freedom  with  personal  character  as  our  literary 
journals.  They  would  scarcely,  I  think,  deny  their 
belief,  not  only  that  the  "  genus  irritabile"  would  be 
found  to  include  many  other  species  beside  that  of 
bards,  but  that  the  irritability  of  trade  would  soon  re- 
duce the  resentments  of  poets  into  mere  shadow-tights 
(sicto/ia^iaj)  in  the  comparison.  Or  is  wealth  the  only 
rational  object  of  human  interest  ?  Or  even  if  this 
were  admitted,  has  the  poet  no  property  in  his  works  ? 
Or  is  it  a  rare  or  culpable  case,  that  he  who  serves  at 
the  altar  of  the  muses  should  be  compelled  to  derive 
his  maintenance  from  the  altar,  when,  too,  he  has 
perhaps  deliberately  abandoned  the  fairest  prospects 
of  rank  and  opulence  in  order  to  devote  himself,  an 
entire  and  undistracted  Tnan,  to  the  instruction  or 
refinement  of  his  fellow-citizens  ?  Or  should  we  pass 
by  all  higher  objects  and  motives,  all  disinterested 
benevolence,  and  even  that  ambition  of  lasting  praise, 
which  is  at  once  the  crutch  and  ornament,  which  at 
once  supports  and  betrays  the  infirmity  of  human 
virtue ;  is  the  character  and  property  of  the  indi- 
vidual who  labors  for  our  intellectual  pleasures,  less 
entitled  to  a  share  of  our  fellow-feeling  than  that  of 
the  wine-merchant  or  milliner  ?  Sensibility,  indeed, 
both  quick  and  deep,  is  not  only  a  characteristic 
feature,  but  may  be  deemed  a  component  part  of 
genius.  But  it  is  no  less  an  essential  mark  of  true 
genius,  that  its  sensibility  is  excited  by  any  other 
cause  more  powerfully  than  by  its  own  personal  in- 
terests, for  this  plain  reason,  that  the  man  of  genius 

*  A  phrase  of  Andrew  Marvel's. 


lives  most  In  the  ideal  world,  in  which  the  present  if 
still  constituted  by  the  future  or  the  past ;  and  because 
his  feelings  have  been  habitually  associated  with 
thoughts  and  images,  to  the  number,  clearness,  and 
vivacity  of  which  the  sensation  of  self  is  always  in 
an  inverse  proportion.  And  yet,  should  he  perchance 
have  occasion  to  repel  some  false  charge,  or  to  rectify 
some  erroneous  censure,  nothing  is  more  common, 
than  for  the  many  to  mistake  the  general  liveliness 
of  his  manner  and  language,  whatever  is  the  subject, 
for  the  effects  of  peculiar  irritation  from  its  accidental 
relation  to  himself* 

For  myself,  if  from  my  own  feelings,  or  from  the 
less  suspicious  test  of  the  observations  of  others,  I  had 
been  made  aware  of  any  literary  testiness  or  jealousy, 
I  trust  that  I  should  have  been,  however,  neither  silly 
or  arrogant  enough  to  have  burthened  the  imperfec- 
tion on  genius.  But  an  experience,  (and  I  should 
not  need  documents  in  abundance  to  prove  my  words, 
if  I  added,)  a  tried  experience  of  twenty  years  has 
taught  me  that  the  original  sin  of  my  character  con- 
sists in  a  careless  indifference  to  public  opinion,  and 
to  the  attacks  of  those  who  influence  it;  that  praise 
and  admiration  have  become,  yearly,  less  and  less 
desirable,  except  as  marks  of  sympathy ;  nay,  that  it 
is  difficult  and  distressing  to  me,  to  think  with  any 
interest  even  about  the  sale  and  profit  of  my  works, 
important  as,  in  my  present  circumstances,  such  con- 
siderations must  needs  be.  Yet  it  never  occurred  to 
me  to  believe,  or  fancy,  that  the  quantum  of  intellec- 
tual power  bestowed  on  me  by  nature  or  education 
was  in  any  way  connected  with  this  habit  of  my  feel- 
ings ;  or,  that  it  needed  any  other  parents,  or  fosterers, 
than  constitutional  indolence,  aggravated  into  lan- 
guor by  ill-health;  the  accumulating  embarrass- 
ments of  procrastination;  the  mental  cowardice, 
which  is  the  inseparable  companion  of  procrastina- 
tion, and  which  makes  us  anxious  to  think  and  con- 
verse on  any  thing  rather  than  on  what  concerns  our- 
selves; in  fine,  all  those  close  vexations,  whether 
chargeable  on  my  faults  or  my  fortunes,  which  leave 
me  but  little  grief  to  spare  for  evils  comparatively 
distant  and  alien. 

Indignation  at  literary  wrongs,  I  leave  to  men  born 
under  happier  stars.  I  cannot  afford  it.  But  so  far 
from  condemning  those  who  can,  I  deem  it  a  writer's 
duty,  and  think  it  creditable  to  his  heart,  to  feel  and 
express  a  resentment  proportioned  to  the  grossness  of 


tThis  is  one  instance,  among  many,  of  deception,  by  tell- 
ing tlie  half  of  a  fact,  and  omitting  the  other  half,  when  it  is 
from  their  mutual  counteraction  and  neutralization,  that  tho 
whole  truth  arises,  as  a  tertiam  aliquid  different  from  either. 
Thus  in  Drydcn's  famous  line,  "  Great  wit"  (which  here 
means  genius)  "  to  madness  sure  is  near  allied."  Now,  as  far 
as  the  profound  sensibility,  which  is  doubtless  one  of  the  com- 
ponents of  genius,  wore  alone  considered,  single  and  unbal- 
anced, it  might  be  fairly  described  as  exposing  the  individual 
to  a  greater  chance  of  mental  derangement ;  but  then  a  more 
than  usual  rapidity  of  association,  a  more  than  usual  power 
of  passing  from  thought  to  thought,  and  image  to  image,  is  a 
component  equally  essential ;  and  in  the  duo  modification  of 
each  by  the  other,  the  genius  itself  consists ,  so  that  it 
would  be  just  as  fair  to  describo  the  earth  as  in  imminent  dan- 
ger of  exorbitating,  or  of  fallipg  into  the  sun,  according  as 
the  asserlor  of  the  absurdity  confttttd  his  attention  either  to 
the  projectile  or  to  the  attractive  force  exclusively. 
254 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA, 


245 


the  provocation,  and  the  importance  of  the  object. 
There  is  no  profession  on  earth  which  requires  an 
attention  so  early,  so  long,  or  so  unintermitting,  as 
that  of  poetry ;  and,  indeed,  as  that  of  literary  com- 
position in  general,  if  it  be  such  as  at  all  satisfies  the 
demands  both  of  the  taste  and  of  sound  logic.  How 
^difficult  and  delicate  a  task  even  the  mere  mechan- 
ism of  verse  is,  may  be  conjectured  from  the  failure 
of  those  who  have  attempted  poetry  late  in  life. 
Where,  then,  a  man  has,  from  his  earliest  youth,  de- 
voted his  whole  being  to  an  object  which,  by  the  ad- 
mission of  all  civilized  nations  in  all  ages,  is  honor- 
able as  a  pursuit,  and  glorious  as  an  attainment ;  ft  hat, 
of  all  that  relates  to  himself  and  his  family,  if  only 
we  except  his  moral  character,  can  have  fairer  claims 
to  his  protection,  or  more  authorize  acts  of  self-de- 
fence than  the  elaborate  products  of  his  intellect,  and 
intellectual  industry?  Prudence  itself  would  com- 
mand us  to  show,  even  if  defect  or  diversion  of  natu- 
ral sensibility  had  prevented  us  from  feeling,  a  due 
interest  and  qualified  anxiety  for  the  offspring  and 
representatives  of  our  nobler  being.  I  know  it,  alas! 
by  woful  experience !  I  have  laid  too  many  eggs  in 
the  hot  sand  of  this  wilderness,  the  world,  with  ost- 
rich carelessness  and  ostrich  oblivion.  The  greater 
part,  indeed,  have  been  trod  under  foot,  and  are  for- 
gotten; but  yet  no  small  number  have  crept  forth 
into  life,  some  to  furnish  feathers  for  the  caps  of  others, 
and  still  more  to  plume  the  shafts  in  the  quivers  of 
my  enemies;  of  them  that,  unprovoked,  have  lain  in 
wait  against  my  soul, 

"  Sic  vos,  non  vobis  mellificatis,  apes  !" 

An  instance  in  confirmation  of  the  note,  p.  243,  oc- 
curs to  me  as  I  am  correcting  this  sheet,  with  the 
Faithful  Shepherdess  open  before  me.  Mr.  Sew- 
ard first  traces  Fletcher's  lines : 

"  More  foul  diseases  than  e'er  yet  the  hot 

Sun  bred  through  his  burnings,  while  the  dog 

Pursues  the  raging  lion,  throwing  the  fog 

And  deadly  vapor  from  his  angry  breath. 

Filling  the  lower  world  with  plague  and  death," — 

To  Spenser's  Shepherd's  Calendar, 

"The  rampant  lion  hunts  he  fast 

With  dogs  of  noisome  breath. 
Whose  baleful  barking  brings,  in  haste, 

Pyne,  plagues,  and  dreary  death:" 

He  then  takes  occasion  to  introduce  Homer's  simile 
of  the  sight  of  Achilles's  shield  to  Priam,  compared 
with  the  Dog  Star,  literally  thus — 

"  For  this  indeed  is  most  splendid,  but  it  was  made 
an  evil  sign,  and  brings  many  a  consuming  disease  to 
wretched  mortals."  Nothing  can  be  more  simple  as 
a  description,  or  more  accurate  as  a  simile;  which, 
says  Mr.  S.,  is  thus  finely  translated  by  Mr.  Pope : 

"Terrific  Glory  !  for  his  burning  breath 

Taints  the  red  air  with  fevers,  plagues,  and  death  !" 

Now  here  (not  to  mention  the  tremendous  bom- 
bast) the  Dog  Star,  so  called,  is  turned  into  a  real 
Dog— a  very  odd  Dog — a  fire,  fever,  plague,  and 
4eath-breathing,  r«f-air-tainting  Dog;  and  the  whole 
visual  likeness  is  lost,  while  the  likeness  in  the  effects 


is  rendered  absurd  by  the  exaggeration.  In  Spenser 
and  Fletcher,  the  thought  is  justifiable ;  for  the  images 
ore  at  least  consistent,  and  it  was  the  intention  of  the 
writers  to  mark  the  seasons  by  this  allegory  of  visual- 
ized Puns. 


CHAPTER  LH. 

The  author's  obligations  to  critics,  and  the  probable  occasion 
— Principles  of  modern  criticism — Mr.  Southoy's  works  and 
character. 

To  anonymous  critics  in  reviews,  magazines,  and 
news  journals  of  various  name  and  rank,  and  to  satir- 
ists, with  or  without  a  name,  in  verse  or  prose,  or  in 
verse  text  aided  by  prose  comment,  I  do  seriously  be- 
lieve and  profess,  that  I  owe  full  two-thirds  of  what- 
ever reputation  and  publicity  I  happen  to  possess. 
For  when  the  name  of  an  individual  has  occurred  so 
frequently,  in  so  many  works,  for  so  great  a  length  of 
time,  the  readers  of  these  works,  (which  with  a  shelf 
or  two  of  Beauties,  Elegant  Extracts  and  Anas, 
form  nine-tenths  of  the  reading  public)*  cannot  but 
be  familiar  with  the  name,  without  distinctly  remem- 
bering whether  it  was  introduced  for  an  eulogy  or 
for  censure.  And  this  becomes  the  more  likely,  if 
(as  I  believe)  the  habit  of  perusing  the  periodical 
works  may  be  properly  added  to  Averrhoe'st  cata- 
logue of  Anti-Mnemonics,  or  weakeners  of  the  me- 
mory. But  where  this  has  not  been  the  case,  yet  the 
reader  will  be  apt  to  suspect,  that  there  must  be 


*  For  as  to  the  devotees  of  the  circulation  libraries,  1  dare 
not  compliment  their  pass  time,  or  rather  kill  time,  with  the 
name  of  reading.  Call  it  rather  a  sort  of  beggarly  day-dream- 
ing, during  which  the  mind  of  the  dreamer  furnishes  for  itself 
nothing  but  laziness  and  a  little  mawkish  sensibility;  while 
the  whole  materiel  and  imagery  of  the  doze  is  supplied  ab 
extra  by  a  sort  of  mental  camera  obscura  manufactured  at 
the  printing  office,  which  pro  tempore  fixes,  reflects,  and 
transmits  the  moving  phantasms  of  one  man's  delirium,  so  as 
to  people  the  barrenness  of  an  hundred  other  brains  afflicted 
with  the  same  trance  or  suspension  of  all  common  sense  and 
all  definite  purpose.  We  should,  therefore,  transfer  this  spe- 
cies of  amusement,  (if  indeed  those  can  be  said  to  retire  a 
musis,  who  were  never  in  their  company,  or  relaxation  be 
attributable  to  those  whose  bows  are  never  bent,)  from  the 
genus,  reading,  to  that  comprehensive  class  characterized  by 
the  power  of  reconciling  the  contrary  yet  co-existing  propen- 
sities of  human  nature,  namely,  indulgence  of  sloth  and  hatred 
of  vacancy.  In  addition  to  novels  and  tales  of  chivalry  in 
prose  or  rhyme,  (by  which  last  I  mean  neither  rhythm  nor 
metre,)  this  genus  comprises  as  its  species,  gaming,  swinging, 
or  swaying  on  a  chair  or  gate  ;  spitting  over  a  bridge  ;  smo- 
king ;  snuff-taking  ;  tete-a-tete  quarrels  after  dinner  between 
husband  and  wife ;  conning,  word  by  word,  all  the  advertise- 
ments of  the  daily  advertiser  in  a  public  house  on  a  rainy 
day,  &c.  &c.  &c. 

♦Ex.  gr.  Pediculos  e  capillis  excerptus  in  arenam  jacere 
incontusos  ;  eating  of  unripe  fruit ;  gazing  on  the  clouds,  and 
(in  genere)  on  moveable  things  suspended  in  the  air  ;  riding 
among  a  multitude  of  camels  ;  frequent  laughter;  listening 
to  a  series  of  jests  and  humorous  anecdotes,  as  when  (so  to 
modernize  the  learned  Saracen's  meaning)  one  man's  droll 
slory  of  an  Irishman,  inevitably  occasions  another's  droll 
story  of  a  Scotchman,  which,  again,  by  the  same  sort  of  con- 
junction disjunctive,  leads  to  some  etourderie  of  a  Welch- 
man,  and  that  again  to  some  sly  hit  of  a  Vorkshireman ;  the 
habit  of  reading  tomb-stones  in  church-yards,  &c.  By-the- 
by,  this  catalogue,  strange  as  it  may  appear,  is  not  insuscepti- 
ble of  a  sound  psychological  commentary. 

255 


246 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


something  more  than  usually  strong  and  extensive  in 
a  reputation,  that  could  either  require  or  stand  so 
merciless  and  long-continued  a  cannonading.  With- 
out any  feeling  of  anger,  therefore,  (for  which,  indeed, 
on  my  own  account,  I  have  no  pretext,)  I  may  yet  be 
allowed  to  express  some  degree  of  surprise  that  after 
having  run  the  critical  gauntlet  for  a  certain  class 
of  faults  which  I  had,  nothing  having  come  before 
the  judgment-seat  in  the  interim,  I  should,  year  after 
year,  quarter  after  quarter,  month  after  month,  (not 
to  mention  sundry  petty  periodicals  of  still  quicker 
revolution,  "or  weekly  or  diurnal,")  have  been  for 
at  least  seventeen  years  consecutively,  dragged  forth 
by  them  into  the  foremost  ranks  of  the  proscribed,  and 
forced  to  abide  the  brunt  of  abuse,  for  faults  directly 
opposite,  and  which  I  certainly  had  not.  How  shall 
I  explain  this  ? 

Whatever  may  have  been  the  case  with  others,  I 
certainly  cannot  attribute  this  persecution  to  per- 
sonal dislike,  or  to  envy,  or  to  feelings  of  vindictive 
animosity.  Not  to  the  former ;  for,  with  the  excep- 
tion of  a  very  few  who  are  my  intimate  friends,  and 
were  so  before  they  were  known  as  authors,  I  have 
had  little  other  acquaintance  with  literary  characters 
than  what  may  be  implied  in  an  accidental  introduc- 
tion, or  casual  meeting  in  a  mixt  company.  And,  as 
far  as  words  and  looks  can  be  trusted,  I  must  believe 
that,  even  in  these  instances,  I  had  excited  no  un- 
friendly disposition.*     Neither  by  letter,  or  in  con- 

*  Some  years  ago,  a  gentleman,  the  chief  writer  and  con- 
ductor of  a  celebrated  review,  distinguished  by  its  hostility  to 
Mr.  Southey,  spent  a  day  or  two  at  Keswick.  That  he  was, 
without  diminution  on  this  account,  treated  with  every  hos- 
pitable attention  by  Mr.  Southey  and  myself,  I  trust  I  need 
not  say.  But  one  thing  1  may  venture  to  notice,  that  at  no 
period  of  my  life  do  I  remember  to  have  received  so  many, 
and  such  high  colored  compliments  in  so  short  a  space  of 
time.  He  was  likewise  circumstantially  informed  by  what 
series  of  accidents  it  had  happened,  that  Mr.  Wordsworth, 
Mr.  Southey,  and  I,  had  become  neighbors  ;  and  how  utterly 
unfounded  was  the  supposition,  that  we  considered  ourselves 
aa  belonging  to  any  common  school,  but  that  of  good  sense, 
confirmed  by  the  long-established  models  of  the  best  times  of 
Greece,  Rome,  Italy,  and  England;  and  still  more  ground- 
less the  notion,  that  Mr.  Southey,  [for,  as  to  myself.  I  have 
published  so  little,  and  that  little  of  so  little  importance,  as  to 
make  it  almost  ludicrous  to  mention  my  name  at  all,)  could 
have  been  concerned  in  the  formation  of  a  poetic  sect  with 
Mr.  Wordsworth,  when  so  many  of  bis  works  had  been  pub- 
lished, not  only  previously  to  any  acquaintance  between  them, 
but  before  Mr.  Wordsworth  himself  had  written  any  thing 
but  in  a  diction  ornate,  and  uniformly  sustained  :  when,  too, 
the  slightest  examination  will  make  it  evident,  that  between 
those  and  the  afier  writings  of  Mr.  Southey,  there  exists  no 
other  difference  than  that  of  a  progressive  degree  of  excel- 
lence from  progressive  development  of  power,  and  progres- 
sive facility  from  habit  and  increase  of  experience.  Vet 
among  the  first  articles  which  this  man  wrote  alter  his  return 
from  Keswick,  we  were  characterized  as  "  the  School  of 
whining  and  hypochondriacal  poets  that  haunt  the  Lakes." 
In  reply  to  a  letter  from  the  same  gentleman,  in  which  be 
had  asked  me,  whether  I  was  in  earnest  in  preferring  the  style 
of  Hooker  to  that  of  Dr.  Johnson,  and  Jeremy  Taylor  to 
Burke,  I  stated,  somewhat  at  large,  the  comparative  excel- 
lences and  defects  which  Characterised  "or  best  prose  writers, 
from  the  reformation  to  the  first  half  of  Charles  II. ;  and  that 
of  those  who  bad  nourished  during  the  present  reign,  and  the 
preceding  one.  About  twelve  months  afterwards,  a  review 
appeared  on  the  same  subject,  in  the  concluding  paragraph 
of  which  the  reviewer  asserts,  that  his  chief  motive  for  en- 
tering  into   tho  discussion,  was  to  separate  a  rational  and 


versation,  have  I  ever  had  dispute  or  controversy 
beyond  the  common  social  interchange  of  opinions. 
Nay,  where  I  had  reason  to  suppose  my  convictions 
fundamentally  different,  it  has  been  my  habit,  and  I 
may  add,  the  impulse  of  my  nature,  to  assign  the 
grounds  of  my  belief,  rather  than  the  belief  itself; 
and  not  to  express  dissent,  till  I  could  establish  some 
points  of  complete  sympathy,  some  grounds  common 
to  both  sides,  from  which  to  commence  its  explana- 
tion. 

Still  less  can  I  place  these  attacks  to  the  charge 
of  envy.  The  few  pages  which  I  have  published, 
are  of  too  distant  a  date ;  and  the  extent  of  their  sale 
a  proof  too  conclusive  against  their  having  been 
popular  at  any  time,  to  render  probable,  I  had  almost 
said  possible,  the  excitement  of  envy  on  their  ac- 
count; and  the  man  who  should  envy  me  on  any 
other,  verily  he  must  be  envy-mad! 

Lastly ;  with  as  little  semblance  of  reason  could  I 
suspect  any  animosity  towards  me  from  vindictive 
feelings  as  the  cause.  I  have  before  said,  that  my 
acquaintance  with  literary  men  has  been  limited  and 
distant;  and  that  I  have  had  neither  dispute  nor  con- 
troversy. From  my  first  entrance  into  life,  I  have, 
with  few  and  short  intervals,  lived  either  abroad  or 
in  retirement.  My  different  essays  on  subjects  of 
national  interest,  published  at  different  times,  first  in 
the  Morning  Post  and  then  in  the  Courier,  with  my 
courses  of  lectures  on  the  principles  of  criticism  as 
applied  to  Shakspeare  and  Milton,  constitute  my 
whole  publicity;  the  only  occasions  on  which  I  could 
onend  any  member  of  the  republic  of  letters.  With 
one  solitary  exception,  in  which  my  words  were  first 
mis-stated,  and  then  wantonly  applied  to  an  individ- 
ual, I  could  never  learn  that  I  had  excited  the  dis- 
pleasure of  any  among  my  literary  contemporaries. 
Having  announced  my  intention  to  give  a  course  of 
lectures  on  the  characteristic  merits  and  defects  of 
the  English  poetry  in  its  different  eras;  first,  from 
Chaucer  to  Milton  ;  second,  from  Dryden  inclusive 

qualified  admiration  of  our  elder  writers,  from  the  indiscrimi- 
nate enthusiasm  of  a  recent  school,  who  praised  what  they 
did  not  understand,  and  caricatured  what  they  were  unable 
to  imitate.  And,  that  no  doubt  might  be  left  concerning  the 
persons  alluded  to,  the  writer  annexes  the  names  of  Miss 
Baillie,  R.  Southey,  Wordsworth,  and  Coleridge.  For  that 
which  follows,  I  have  only  hear-say  evidence,  but  yet  such  as 
demands  my  belief;  viz.  that  on  being  questioned  concerning 
this  apparently  wanton  attack,  more  especially  with  refer- 
ence to  Miss  Baillie.  the  writer  had  stated  as  hiB  motives,  that 
tins  lady,  when  at  Edinburgh,  had  declined  a  proposal  of  in- 
troducing him  to  her;  that  Mr.  Southey  had  written  against 
him;  and  Mr.  Wordsworth  had  talked  contemptuously  of 
him ;  but  that  as  to  Coleridge,  he  had  noticed  him  merely 
because  the  names  of  Southey  and  Wordsworth  and  Cole- 
ridge always  went  together.  But  if  it  were  worth  while  to 
mix  together,  as  ingredients,  halfthe  anecdotes  which  I  either 
myself  know  to  be  true,  or  which  I  have  received  from  men 
incapable  of  intentional  falsehood,  concerning  the  characters, 
qualifications,  and  motives  of  our  anonymous  critics,  whoso 
decisions  are  oracles  for  our  reading  public,  I  might  safely 
borrow  the  words  of  the  apocryphal  Daniel  ;  "  Give  me  leave, 
0  Sovereign  Public,  and  I  shall  slay  this  dragon  without 
sword  or  stuff"  For  the  compound  would  be  the  "Pitch, 
inul  fut.  and  hair,  which  Daniel  took,  and  did  seethe  them 
together,  and  wade  lumps  thereof,  and  put  into  the  dragon's 
month,  and  so  the  dragon  burst  in  sunder  ;  and  Daniel  s<uO 
lo,  these  are  the  gods  ye  worship." 

256 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


X>47 


to  Thomson :  and  third,  from  Cowper  to  the  present 
day,  I  changed  my  plan,  and  confined  my  disquisi- 
tion to  the  two  former  eras,  that  I  might  furnish  no 
possible  pretext  for  the  unthinking  to  misconstrue,  or 
the  malignant  to  misapply,  my  words,  and  having 
stamped  their  own  meaning  on  them,  to  pass  them 
as  current  coin  in  the  marls  of  garrulity  or  detraction. 
Praises  of  the  unworthy  are  felt  by  ardent  minds 
as  robberies  of  the  deserving;  and  it  is  too  true,  and 
too  frequent,  that  Bacon,  Harrington,  Machiavel  and 
Spinosa,  are  riot  read,  because  Hume,  Condillac,  and 
Voltaire  are.  But  in  promiscuous  company,  no  pru- 
dent man  will  oppugn  the  merits  of  a  contemporary 
in  his  own  supposed  department ;  contenting  himself 
with  praising  in  his  turn  those  whom  he  deems  ex- 
cellent. If  I  should  ever  deem  it  my  duty  at  all  to 
oppose  the  pretensions  of  individuals,  I  would  oppose 
them  in  books  which  could  be  weighed  and  an- 
swered, in  which  I  could  evolve  the  whole  of  my 
reason  and  feelings,  with  their  requisite  limits  and 
modifications;  not  in  irrecoverable  conversation, 
where,  however  strong  the  reasons  might  be,  the 
feelings  that  prompted  them  would  assuredly  be  at- 
tributed by  some  one  or  other  to  envy  and  discon- 
tent. Besides,  [  well  know,  and  I  trust,  have  acted 
on  that  knowledge,  that  it  rryjst  be  the  ignorant  and 
injudicious  who  extol  the  unworthy ;  and  the  eulogies 
of  critics  without  taste  or  judgment,  are  the  natural 
reward  of  authors  without  feeling  or  genius.  "  Sint 
unicuique  sua  premia." 

How,  then,  dismissing,  as  I  do,  these  three  causes, 
am  I  to  account  for  attacks,  the  long  continuance  and 
inveteracy  of  which  it  would  require  all  three  to 
explain  '  The  solution  may  seem  to  have  been  given, 
or  at  least  suggested,  in  a  note  to  a  preceding  page. 
J  was  in  habits  of  intimacy  with  Mr.  Wordsworth  and 
Mr.  Southey!  This,  however,  transfers,  rather  than 
removes,  the  difficulty.  Be  it,  that  by  an  uncon- 
scionable extension  of  the  old  adage,  "  noscitur  a 
socio,"  my  literary  friends  are  never  under  the  wa- 
ter-fall of  criticism,  but  I  must  be  wet  through  with 
the  spray  :  yet,  how  came  the  torrent  to  descend  upon 
them.  ? 

First,  then,  with  regard  to  Mr.  Southey.  I  well 
remember  the  general  reception  of  his  earlier  publi- 
cations, viz.  the  poems  published  with  Mr.  Lovell, 
under  the  names  of  Moschus  and  Bion  ;  the  two  vo- 
lumes of  poems  under  his  own  name,  and  the  Joan 
of  Arc.  The  censures  of  the  critics  by  profession  are 
extant,  and  may  be  easily  referred  to  : — careless  lines, 
inequality  in  the  merit  of  the  different  poems,  and, 
(in  the  lighter  works.)  a  predilection  for  the  strange 
and  whimsical ;  in  short,  such  faults  as  might  have 
been  anticipated  in  a  young  and  rapid  writer,  were 
indeed  sufficiently  enforced.  Nor  was  there  at  that 
time  wanting,  a  party  spirit  to  aggravate  the  defects 
of  a  poet,  who,  with  all  the  courage  of  uiioorrupted 
youth,  had  avowed  his  zeal  for  a  cause  which  he 
deemed  that  of  liberty,  and  his  abhorrence  of  oppres- 
sion, by  whatever  name  consecrated.  But  it  was  as 
little  objected  by  others,  as  dreamt  of  by  the  poet 
himself,  that  he  preferred  careless  and  prosaic  lines 
on  rule  and  of  forethought,  or,  indeed,  that  he  pre- 
X 


tended  to  any  other  art  or  theory  of  poetic  diction 
beside  that  which  we  may  all  learn  from  Horace, 
Quintilian,  the  admirable  dialogue  de  Causis  Corrup- 
ts Kloquentia,  or  Strada's  Prolusions;  if,  indeed, 
natural  good  sense,  and  the  early  study  of  the  best 
models  in  his  own  language,  had  not  infused  the 
same  maxims  more  securely,  and,  if  I  may  venture 
the  expression,  more  vitally.  All  that  could  have. 
been  fairly  deduced,  was,  that  in  his  taste  and  esti- 
mation of  writers,  Mr.  Southey  agreed  far  more  with 
Warton  than  with  Johnson.  Nor  do  I  mean  to  deny 
that,  at  all  times,  Mr.  Southey  was  of  the  same  mind 
with  Sir  Philip  Sydney,  in  preferring  an  excellent 
ballad  in  the  humblest  style  of  poetry,  to  twenty  indif- 
ferent poems  that  strutted  in  the  highest.  And  by 
what  have  his  works,  published  since  then,  been 
characterized,  each  more  strikingly  than  the  preced- 
ing, but  by  greater  splendor,  a  deeper  pathos,  pro- 
founder  reflections,  and  a  more  sustained  dignity  of 
language  and  of  metre  ?  Distant  may  the  period  be 
— but  whenever  the  time  shall  come  w-hen  all  his 
works  shall  be  collected  by  some  editor  worthy  to  be 
his  biographer,  I  trust,  that  an  excerpta  of  all  the 
passages  in  which  his  writings,  name,  and  character, 
have'been  attacked,  from  the  pamphlets  and  period- 
ical works  of  the  last  twenty  years,  may  be  an  accom- 
paniment. Yet  that  it  would  prove  medicinal  in 
after  times  I  dare  not  hope ;  for  as  long  as  there  are 
readers  to  be  delighted  with  calumny,  there  will  be 
found  reviewers  to  calumniate,  and  such  readers  will 
become,  in  all  probability,  more  numerous  in  propor- 
tion as  a  still  greater  diffusion  of  literature  shall  pro- 
duce an  increase  of  sciolists,  and  sciolism  brings  with 
it  petulance  and  presumption.  In  times  of  old,  books 
were  as  religious  oracles ;  as  literature  advanced, 
they  next  became  venerable  preceptors;  they  then 
descended  to  the  rank  of  instructive  friends;  and,  as 
their  numbers  increased,  they  sunk  still  lower,  to  that 
of  entertaining  companions;  and,  at  present,  they 
seem  degraded  into  culprits  to  hold  up  their  hands  at 
the  bar  of  every  self-elected,  yet  not  the  less  peremp- 
tory, judge,  who  chooses  to  write  from  humour  or 
interest,  from  enmity  or  arrogance,  and  to  abide  the 
decision,  (in  the  words  of  Jeremy  Taylor.)  "  of  him 
that  reads  in  malice,  or  him  that  reads  after  dinner." 
The  same  gradual  retrograde  movement  may  be 
traced  in  the  relation  which  the  authors  themselves 
have  assumed  toward  their  readers.  From  the  lofty 
address  of  Bacon :  "  these  are  the  meditations  of 
Francis  of  Verulam,  which,  that  posterity  should  bo 
possessed  of  he  deemed  their  interest ;"  or  from  dedi- 
cation to  monarch  or  pontiff,  in  which  the  honor 
given  was  asserted  in  equipoise  to  the  patronage  ac- 
knowledged from  Pindar's 


>r,\>>l 


-,-;   b"aX\ot  (isyakot.  to  ftliyarov  Kopxi- 
•tpSai  @asi\ev(t.  fii'iKtri 
TlaTTTaive  koosiov. 
E"j;  ;t  rt  tStov 
YyS  yoorov   -aruv  t\ii 
Te  roisaoe  vucapopoi; 
OjjiXhv,  xotxiavTov  sopiav  «o-S'  EX- 
•  \aia  scovra  -aira.  Ol.VMP.  Od.  I. 

257 


<!48 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Poets  and  Philosophers,  rendered  diffident  by  their 
very  Dumber,  addressed  themselves  to  "  learned 
readers;"  then  aimed  to  conciliate  the  graces  of 
•'the  candid  reader;"  till  the  critic,  still  rising  as  the 
author  sunk,  the  amateurs  of  literature,  collectively, 
were  erected  into  a  municipality  of  judges,  and  ad- 
dressed as  the  town!  And  now,  finally,  all  men 
being  supposed  able  to  read,  and  all  readers  able  to 
judge,  the  multitudinous  public,  shaped  into  per- 
gonal unity  by  the  magic  of  abstraction,  sits  nominal 
despot  on  the  throne  of  criticism.  But,  alas !  as  in 
other  despotisms,  it  but  echoes  the  decisions  of  its  in- 
visible ministers,  whose  intellectual  claims  to  the  guar- 
dianship of  the  muses  seem,  {or  the  greater  part,  ana- 
logous to  the  physical  qualifications  which  adapt  their 
oriental  brethren  for  the  superintendence  of  the 
harem.  Thus,  it  is  said  that  St.  Nepomuc  was  in- 
stalled the  guardian  of  bridges,  because  he  had  fallen 
over  one,  and  sunk  out  of  sight ;  thus,  too,  St.  Cecilia 
is  said  to  have  been  first  propitiated  by  musicians, 
because,  having  failed  in  her  own  attempts,  she  had 
taken  a  dislike  to  the  art,  and  all  its  successful  pro- 
fessors. But  I  shall  probably  have  occasion,  here- 
after, to  deliver  my  convictions  more  at  large  con- 
cerning this  state  of  things,  and  its  influences  on  taste, 
genius  and  morality. 

In  the  "  Thalaba,"  the  "  Madoc,"  and  still  more 
evidently  in  the  unique*  "Cid,"  the  "  Kehama,"  and 
as  last,  so  best,  the  "Don  Roderick,"  Southey  has 
given  abundant  proof,  "  se  cogitasse  quam  sit  mag- 
num dare  aliquid  in  manus  hominum  :  nee  persuadere 
sibi  posse,  non  sa>pe  tractandum  quod  placere  et  sem- 
per et  omnibus  cupiat."  Plin.  Ep.  Lib.  7.  Ep.  17. 
Bu.t,  on  the  other  hand,  I  guess  that  Mr.  Southey  was 
quite  unable  to  comprehend  wherein  could  consist 
the  crime  or  mischief  of  printing  half  a  dozen  or  more 
playful  poems ;  or,  to  speak  more  generally,  composi- 
tions which  would  be  enjoyed  or  passed  over,  accord- 
ing as  the  taste  and  humor  of  the  reader  might  chance 
to  be;  provided  they  contained  nothing  immoral.  In 
the  present  age,  "  periturae  parcere  charts,"  is  em- 
phatically an  unreasonable  demand.  The  merest 
trifle  he  ever  sent  abroad  had  tenfold  better  claims 
to  its  ink  and  paper,  than  all  the  silly  criticisms,  which 
prove  no  more  than  that  the  critic  was  not  one  of 
those  for  whom  the  trifle  was  written,  and  than  all 
the  grave  exhortations  to  a  greater  reverence  for  the 
public.  As  if  the  passive  page  of  a  book,  by  having 
an  epigram  or  doggerel  tale  impressed  on  it,  instantly 
assumed  at  once  locomotive  power  and  a  sort  of  ubi- 
quity, so  as  to  flutter  and  buzz  in  the  ear  of  the  public 
to  the  sore  annoyance  of  the  said  mysterious  person- 
age. But  what  gives  an  additional  and  more  ludi- 
crous absurdity  to  these  lamentations  is  the  curious 


*  t  have  ventured  to  call  it  "  unique,"  not  only  Imcause  I 
know  no  work  of  the  kind  in  our  language  (if  we  except  a 
lew  chapters  of  the  old  translation  of  Froissart.)  none  which, 
uniting  the  charms  of  romance  and  history,  keeps  the  imagi- 
nation so  constantly  on  the  win!!,  and  yet  leaves  so  much  for 
after  reflection  ;  hut  likewise,  and  chiefly,  hecniine  it  is  a 
compilation  which,  in  the  various  excellences  of  translation, 
selection,  and  arrangement,  required,  and  proves  greater  ge- 
nius in  the  compiler,  a--  living  in  the  present  state  of  society, 
tbau  in  the,  original  composers. 


fact,  that  if,  in  a  volume  of  poetry,  the  critic  should 
find  poem  or  passage  which  he  deems  more  especially 
worthless,  he  is  sure  to  select  and  reprint  it  in  the 
review ;  by  which,  on  his  own  grounds,  he  wastes  as 
much  more  paper  than  the  author  as  the  copies  of  a 
fashionable  review  are  more  numerous  than  those  of 
the  original  book;  in  some,  and  those  the  most  promi- 
nent instances,  as  ten  thousand  to  five  hundred.  I 
know  nothing  that  surpasses  the  vileness  of  deciding 
on  the  merits  of  a  poet  or  painter  (not  by  characteristic 
defects;  for  where  there  is  genius,  these  always  point 
to  his  characteristic  beauties  ;  but)  by  accidental  fail- 
ures or  faulty  passages;  except  the  impudence  of  de- 
fending it,  as  the  proper  duty,  and  most  instructive  part, 
of  criticism.  Omit,  or  pass  slightly  over,  the  expression, 
grace,  and  grouping  of  Raphael's  fgures  ;  but  ridicule 
in  detail  the  knitting-needles  and  broom-twigs,  that 
are  to  represent  trees  in  his  back  grounds;  and  never 
let  him  hear  the  last  of  his  gallipots  !  Admit,  that 
the  Allegro  and  Penseroso  of  Milton  are  not  without 
merit ;  but  repay  yourself  for  this  concession,  by  re- 
printing at  length  the  two  poems  on  the  University 
Carrier  !  As  a  fair  specimen  of  his  sonnets,  quote 
"o  book  was  v;rit  of  late  called  Tetrachordon ;"  and 
as  characteristic  of  his  rhythm  and  metre,  cite  his  lit- 
eral translation  of  the  first  and  second  psalm !  In  or- 
der to  justify  yourself,  ybu  need  only  assert,  that  had 
you  dwelt  chiefly  on  the  beauties  and  excellences  of 
the  poet,  the  admiration  of  these  might  seduce  the 
attention  of  future  writers  from  the  objects  of  their 
love  and  wonder,  to  an  imitation  of  the  few  poems  and 
passages  in  which  the  poet  was  most  unlike  himself. 
But  till  reviews  are  conducted  on  far  other  prin- 
ciples, and  with  far  other  motives ;  till,  in  the  place 
of  arbitrary  dictation  and  petulant  sneers,  the  review- 
ers support  their  decisions  by  reference  to  fixed  can- 
ons of  criticism,  previously  established  and  deduced 
from  the  nature  of  man,  reflecting  minds  will  pro- 
nounce it  arrogance  in  them  thus  to  announce  them- 
selves, to  men  of  letters,  as  the  guides  of  their  taste 
and  judgment.  To  the  purchaser  and  mere  reader, 
it  is,  at  all  events,  an  injustice.  He  who  tells  me 
that  there  are  defects  in  a  new  work,  tells  me  nothing 
which  I  should  not  have  taken  for  granted  without 
his  information.  But  he  who  points  out  and  eluci- 
dates the  beauties  of  an  original  work,  does  indeed 
give  me  interesting  information,  such  as  experience 
would  not  have  authorized  me  in  anticipating.  And 
as  to  compositions  which  the  authors  Ihemselve3 
announce  with  "Usee  ipsi  novimus  esse  nihil,"  why 
should  we  judge  by  a  different  rule  two  printed 
works,  only  because  the  one  author  was  alive,  and 
the  other  in  his  grave?  What  literary  man  has  not 
regretted  the  prudery  of  Spratt  in  refusing  to  let  his 
friend  Cowley  appear  in  his  slippers  and  dressing 
gown  ?  I  am  not  perhaps  the  only  one  who  has 
derived  an  innocent  amusement  from  the  riddles, 
conundrums,  tri-syllable  lines,  <vc.  &c.  of  Swift  and 
his  correspondents,  in  hours  of  languor,  when,  to 
have  read  his  more  finished  works  would  have  been 
useless  to  myself,  and,  in  some  sort,  an  act  of  in- 
justice to  the  author.  But  I  am  at  a  loss  to  conceive 
by  what  perversity  of  judgment  these  relaxations  of 
258 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITER  ARIA. 


249 


i  could  be  employed  to  diminish  bat  fame 

ter  of  -  Gulliver's  Traveh,"  and  the  -  Tale 
b."    Had  Mr.  Souther  written  twice  as 

~-  ;:'  .-.:•-  :  -.-•--.  .:  :;;-::  ..  —■  •  -•.  •- 
•  --.-.  .  :'-■  :  :.— .i-i  ::"  ::.•=  :  i;-  :'..-  '•'•  ..  - 
ed  to  his  honor  with  good  and  wise  men. 
r,  or  principally- .  as  pro  vine  the  wan 
nE.  but  as  eridences  of  the  purity  of  that 
:b,  even  in  is  levities,  never  wrote  a  line 
.  :   ."-   :  .  r.  ir.v  :      -;.  :         :?.:. 

.  ._■      ...         • .    -:    :•■;•;    :.     :-:■:-'  .r-i 

■  -J-.r    :.'•"    ::"     ::.  -^  .:..-    S-    .ii-- ■.   -    :  .  r  . 

i.— .-.■:  :  i.-.:r    '■'■■  .    .   '  .-   i    .-     i:.i   .:. .    :..  .- 

..rv    ::"   :.  -    :r.: :.--.    .-      r."...s    :":  :.:    ...- 

fe  :     km   naaal   ~\r.:.  "•<:.     "•_:  I     am  : 


'-•;: 


"     I  ..•.£:.-  Vi;;.  ;"  :  -.;..-  v. .-.  T;   v. .. 
i;::.   _.;.;—;".."     :r  ~    ;     rv.i:  . 
- 
n,  in  a  style  so  lively  and  pnignmt, 
.   !—.   i".  or.i  :•;>;...  :j:  r...   :"■?. 
i  combined  so  much  wisdom 
.  ■;.';.  ::  .:  .   in  i    -:r.    -.^  :ir  %v  -  .  - 

.  His  prose  is  always  intelligible 
:;  ...  j  '.:.'<  iT:  :.--  :-  i">  i::-  : 
::r>  ::  :  ::::;■-•  . ".  .-.  -;-  r.  :~: ".:■?. 
ri  new  ones:  and  if  we  except  the 
which  bow  few,  how  very  few  even 
-  >  :."■■;  ;-^r.  :*:::■  :r.L:r.  >.-?  his 
;  ---::;•:"...:-  11  :_-.■?  :•.  .z- 
."■'  '-'--:  :'.  ::"."::.--.  .v:V.  :'r-:::-T. 
id  patriotic  exultation,  to  * 
s:    -r:  :  i-      .    :  .--      .  .1   :  .:: .    : 

:-  :      • ..    i-   !i~v.;  r. :   :>::.-_ 


as  they  are  described  with  religious  tenderness,  so 
are  they  read,  with  allowing  sympathy,  indeed,  hut 
yet  with  rational  deduction.  There  are  men  who 
deserve  a  higher  record;  men  with  whose  characters 
it  is  the  interest  of  their  contemporaries,  no  less  than 
that  of  posterity,  to  be  made  acquainted ;  wh: 

■  ..  ».-.    .■:  :   •     ..    ■..-   ..        -    ••    v  i  r-.-.r.  :   -  .  .. 

sighted  envy,  to  cross-examine  the  tale  without  offence 

to  the  courtesies  of  humanity :  and  while  the  eulogist 

detected  in  exaggeration  or  falsehood,  most  pay  the 

full  penalty  of  his  baseness  in  the  contempt  which 

brands  the  convict:  Publicly  has  Mr. 

Sou  they  been  reviled  by  men,  who  (I  would  lain 

:..;.•?:'..-:  •     :    :.    :.. \:    :  "  i"    .r    ..  ::.-:  .    :':-:- 

brands  against  a  figure  of  their  own  imagination: 

:..../.    .1-.  -      .-    \        -       - .    .-    '      V-.-:   :.  -  ;  .-  -  ... 

I  pies  denounced ;  as  publicly  do  I,  therefore,  who  have 

1  known  him  intimately,  deem  it  my  duty  to  leave  re- 

-      .    ■     .:.--:  :z\  -  i  :..  -:  ..:.-    .~-      :  :-_..- 

:"_•  ..  i  .  :1.  -  ..-  .1.-1 ;-..-.-:  i-re.i-  T  .  -~  ■'■ :.: 
:...:..  -.-:  ::.-.-  -:..'r    :'  .  i-  s      .■;.:.-    .:„-.  er- 

st ties  some  twenty  years  past,  it  will  appear  no  ordi- 
nary praise  in  any  man  to  have  passed  from  innocence 
,  into  virtue,  not  only  free  from  all  vicious  habit,  but 
I  —m*meA  by  one  act  of  intemperance,  or  the  degra- 
i   ■      -   .-.:.-    .    ■    ..v-ru.v      T.m"  - .  .-:  ~s  .:  '..t.:. 
heart,  and  habitual  demeanor,  which,  in  his  early 
manhood    and  first  controversial  writ 
\  ftaimiiMr  the  privflesre  of  selAiefence.  asserts  of  him- 


will 


-"...   ~ ::-.  - 


i 

- 
■e  who,  by  biography,  or  by 

.  ;iv  re'r.-il 
rseveranee  in  his  pursuits; 
y  of  those  pursuits ;  his  ge- 

■5    .:'  :-:.-.::--  ■.:.•.   :v-'      : 
r_ikr     "  ir.-v  :-e  .    l-'.l 


\tf  ::  the  aawaahefy     :.    the 

r. : -c.'    .".  "•'. :..        -r"-:.:      _•   ... 

:■.-■"•■"  r~  :.-•  -.-.-  ;--.  r  ..•:•- 

a  ani|itwil  himself  in  lan- 

•  •  .  :  ::.r  v  :.:.r 

The  charac- 

f  :>.r  •:.-     -::     .  :.-":•■:.  -.■=- 

toiiBm.  m  the  QtEUtarlr  Review; 

-   ■ 


rare  in  the  most  mechanical  pursuits,  and  n  i 

re  man  of  basiaess.  loses  all  sem- 
blance of  formality  in  the  dignified  simplicity  of  his 
manners,  in  the  spring  and  healthful  cheerfulness  of 

...  .  . 

-  ■!  leisure-  No  less  punctual  in  trifles,  than 
steadfast  in  the  performance  of  highest  duties,  he  in- 
flicts none  of  those  small  pains  and  discomforts  which 
irregular  men  scatter  about  them,  and  which  in  the 
aggregate,  so  often  become  formidable  obstacles  both 
to  happiness  and  utility:  while,  on  the  contrary,  be 
-:■=:. '■•-  -..  :.-  :  .t1-  :--  :.:.i  .:.-:  »<  i'.I  ::.  ..  :--  : 
:;..:.!   .:.   ..a  i.-:_._  :.z.    ::  ;;r_.T.rl   •'.:..   :..:.: 


250 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


which  perfect  consistency,  antl  (if  such  a  word  might 
he  framed)  absolute  reliability,  equally  in  small  as  in 
zreat  concerns,  cannot  but  inspire  and  bestow:  when 
this,  too,  is  softened  without  being  weakened  by  kind- 
ness and  gentleness.  I  know  few  men  who  so  well 
deserve  the  character  which  an  ancient  attributes  to 
Marcus  Cato,  namely,  that  he  was  likest  virtue,  inas- 
much as  he  seemed  to  act  aright,  not  in  obedience  to 
any  law  or  outward  motive,  but  by  the  necessity  of  a 
happy  nature,  which  could  not  act  otherwise.  As 
son,  brother,  husband,  father,  master,  friend,  he  moves 
with  firm,  yet  light  steps,  alike  unostentatious,  and 
alike  exemplary.  As  a  writer,  he  has  uniformly  made 
his  talents  subservient  to  the  best  interests  of  huma- 
nity, of  public  virtue,  and  domestic  piety;  his  cause 
has  ever  been  the  cause  of  pure  religion  and  of  liber- 
ty, of  national  independence,  and  of  national  illumi- 
nation. When  future  critics  shall  weigh  out  his 
guerdon  of  praise  and  censure,  it  will  be  Southey 
the  poet  only,  that  will  supply  them  with  the  scanty 
materials  for  the  latter.  They  will  likewise  not  fail 
to  record,  that  as  no  man  was  ever  a  more  constant 
friend,  never  had  poet  more  friends  and  honorers 
among  the  good  of  all  parties;  and  that  quacks  in 
education,  quacks  in  politics,  and  quacks  in  criticism, 
were  his  only  enemies.* 

*  It  is  not  easy  to  estimate  the  effects  which  the  example 
of  a  young  man,  as  highly  distinguished  for  strict  purity  of 
disposition  and  conduct  as  for  intellectual  power  and  literary 
acquirements,  may  produce  on  those  of  the  same  age  with 
himself,  especially  on  those  of  similar  pursuits  and  congenial 
minds.  For  many  years,  my  opportunities  of  intercourse 
with  Mr.  Southey  have  been  rare,  and  at  long  intervals ;  but 
I  dwell  with  unabated  pleasure  on  the  strong  and  sudden,  yet, 
I  trust,  not  fleeting  influence,  which  my  moral  being  under- 
went on  my  acquaintance  with  him  at  Oxford,  whither  I  had 
gone  at  the  commencement  of  our  Cambridge  vacation  on  a 
visit  to  an  old  school-fellow.  Not,  indeed,  on  my  moral  or 
religious"  principles,  for  they  had  never  been  contaminated  ; 
but  in  awakening  the  sense  of  the  duty  and  dignity  of  making 
my  actions  accord  with  those  principles  both  in  word  and 
deed.  The  irregularities  only  not  universal  among  the  young 
men  of  my  standing,  which  I  always  knew  to  be  wrong,  I 
then  learnt  to  feel  as  degrading  ;  learnt  to  know  that  an  op- 
posite conduct,  which  was  at  that  time  considered  by  us  as 
the  easy  virtue  of  cold  and  selfish  prudence,  might  originate 
in  the  noblest  emotions,  in  views  the  most  disinterested  and 
imaginative.  It  is  not,  however,  from  grateful  recollections 
only,  that  I  have  been  impelled  thus  to  leave  these,  my  delibe- 
rate sentiments,  on  record  ;  but,  in  some  sense,  as  a  debt  of 
justice  to  the  man  whose  name  has  been  so  often  connected 
with  mine,  for  evil  to  which  he  is  a  stranger.  As  a  specimen, 
I  subjoin  part  of  a  note,  from  "  the  Beauties  of  the  Anti- 
Jacobin,"  in  which,  having  previously  informed  the  public 
that  I  had  been  dishonored  at  Cambridge  for  preaching  deism, 
at  a  time  when,  for  my  youthful  ardor  in  defence  of  Chris- 
tianity, I  was  decried  as  a  bigot  by  the  proselytes  of  the 
French  Phi-  (or  to  -speak  more  truly,  Psi-)  losophy,  the 
writer  concludes  with  these  words:  "Since  this  lime  he  has 
hit  his  native  country,  commenced  citizen  of  the  world,  lift 
his  poor  children  fatherless,  and  his  wife  destitute.  Ex  his 
disce,  his  friends,  Lamb  and  Southeii."  With  severest 
truth  it  may  be  asserted,  that  it  would  not  be  easy  to  select 
two  men  more  exemplary  in  their  domestic  affections  than 
those  whose  names  were  thus  printed  at  full  length  as  in  the 
same  rank  of  morals  with  a  denounced  infidel  and  fugitive, 
and  who  had  left  his  children  fatherless,  and  his  wife  desti- 
tute !  Is  it  surprising,  that  many  good  men  remained  longer 
than,  perhaps,  they  otherwise  would  have  done,  adverse  to  a 
party  which  encouraged  and  openly  rewarded  the  authors  of 
sue!;  a'rocious  calumnies  1  Qualis  es,  ncscio  ;  sed  per  quales 
agis,  scio  et  doleo. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

The  Lyrical  Ballads  with  the  preface— Mr.  Wordsworth's 
earlier  poems— On  fancy  and  imagination— The  investigation 
of  the  distinction  important  to  the  fine  arts. 

I  have  wandered  far  from  the  object  in  view,  but 
as  I  fancied  to  myself  readers  who  would  respect  the 
feelings  that  had  tempted  me  from  the  main  road,  so 
I  dare  calculate  on  not  a  few  who  will  warmly  sym- 
pathise with  them.  At  present  it  will  be  sufficient 
for  my  purpose,  if  I  have  proved,  that  Mr.  Southey's 
writings,  no  more  than  my  own,  furnished  the  ori- 
ginal occasion  to  this  fiction  of  a  new  school  of  poetry, 
and  of  clamours  against  its  supposed  founders  and 
proselytes. 

As  little  do  I  believe  that "  Mr.  Wordsworth's 
Lyrical  Ballads  "  were  in  themselves  the  cause.  I 
speak  exclusively  of  the  two  volumes  so  entitled.  A 
careful  and  repeated  examination  of  these,  confirms 
me  in  the  belief,  that  the  omission  of  less  than  an 
hundred  lines  would  have  precluded  nine-tenths  of 
the  criticism  on  this  work.  I  hazard  this  declaration, 
however,  on  the  supposition,  that  the  reader  had 
taken  it  up,  as  he  would  have  done  any  other  col- 
lection of  poems  purporting  to  derive  their  subjects 
or  interests  from  the  incidents  of  domestic  or  ordi- 
nary life,  intermingled  with  higher  strains  of  medi- 
tation, which  the  poet  utters  in  his  own  person  and 
character ;  with  the  proviso,  that  they  were  perused 
without  knowledge  of,  or  reference  to,  the  author's 
peculiar  opinions,  and  that  the  reader  had  not  had 
his  attention  previously  directed  to  those  peculiarities. 
In  these,  as  was  actually  the  case  with  Mr.  Southey's 
earlier  works,  the  lines  and  passages  which  might 
have  offended  the  general  taste,  would  have  been 
considered  as  mere  inequalities,  and  attributed  to 
inattention,  not  to  perversity  of  judgment.  The  men 
of  business  who  had  passed  their  lives  chiefly  in 
cities,  and  who  might  therefore  be  expected  to  derive 
the  highest  pleasure  from  acute  notices  of  men  and 
manners,  conveyed  in  easy,  yet  correct  and  pointed 
language  ;  and  all  those  who,  reading  but  little  poet- 
ry, are  most  stimulated  with  that  species  of  it  which 
seems  most  distant  from  prose,  would  probably  have 
passed  by  the  volume  altogether.  Others  more  catho- 
lic in  their  taste,  and  yet  habituated  to  be  most  pleased 
when  most  excited,  would  have  contented  themselves 
with  deciding  that  the  author  had  been  successful  in 
proportion  to  the  elevation  of  his  style  and  subject. 
Not  a  few,  perhaps,  might,  by  their  admiration  of 
"  The  lines  written  near  Tintern  Abbey,"  those  "  left 
upon  a  seat  under  a  Yew  Tree,"  the  "  old  Cum- 
berland beggar,"  and  "  Ruth,"  have  been  gradually 
led  to  peruse  with  kindred  feeling  the  "Brothers," 
the  "  Hart  leap  well,"  and  whatever  other  poems  in 
that  collection  may  be  described  as  holding  a  middle 
place  between  those  written  in  the  highest  and  those 
in  the  humblest  style  ;  as,  for  instance,  between  the 
"  Tintern  Abbey,"  and  "  the  Thorn,"  or  the  "  Simon 
Lee."  Should  their  taste  submit  to  no  farther  change, 
and  still  remain  unreconciled  to  the  colloquial  phrases, 
or  the  imitations  of  them,  that  are,  more  or  less,  scat 
260 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


251 


tered  through  the  class  last  mentioned ;  yet,  even 
from  the  small  number  of  the  latter,  they  would  have 
deemed  them  but  an  inconsiderable  subtraction  from 
the  merii  of  the  whole  work;  or,  what  is  sometimes 
not  unpleasing  in  the  publication  of  a  new  writer,  as 
serving  to  ascertain  the  natural  tendency,  and  conse- 
quently, the  proper  direction  of  the  author's  genius. 
■>  In  the  critical  remarks,  therefore,  prefixed  and  an- 
nexed to  the  "  Lyrical  Ballads,"  I  believe,  that  we 
may  safely  rest,  as  the  true  origin  of  the  unexampled 
opposition  which  Mr.  Wordsworth's  writings  have 
been  since  doomed  to  encounter.  The  humbler  pas- 
sages in  the  poems  themselves,  were  dwelt  on  and 
cited  to  justify  the  rejection  of  the  theory.  What  in 
and  for  themselves  would  have  been  either  forgotten 
or  forgiven  as  imperfections,  or  at  least  comparative 
failures,  provoked  direct  hostility  when  announced 
as  intentional,  as  the  result  of  choice  afier  full  delib- 
eration. Thus  the  poems,  admitted  by  all  as  excel- 
lent, joined  with  those  which  had  pleased  the  far 
greater  number,  though  they  formed  two-thirds  of  the 
whole  work,  instead  of  being  deemed  (as  in  all  right 
they  should  have  been,)  even  if  we  take  for  granted 
that  the  reader  judged  aright)  an  atonement  for  the 
few  exceptions,  gave  wind  and  fuel  to  the  animosity 
against  both  the  poems  and  the  poet.  In  all  per- 
plexity there  is  a  portion  of  fear,  which  predisposes 
the  mind  to  anger.  Not  able  to  deny  that  the  author 
possessed  both  genius  and  a  powerful  intellect,  they 
felt  very  positive,  but  were  not  quite  certain,  that  he 
might  not  be  in  the  right,  and  they  themselves  in  the 
wrong ;  an  unquiet  state  of  mind,  which  seeks  alle- 
viation by  quarrelling  with  the  occasion  of  it,  and  by 
wondering  at  the  perverseness  of  the  man  who  had 
written  a  long  and  argumentative  essay  to  persuade 
them  that 

"  Fair  is  foul,  and  foul  is  fair  ;" 

in  other  words,  that  they  had  been  all  their  lives  ad- 
miring without  judgment,  and  were  now  about  to 
censure  without  reason.* 


*  In  opinions  of  long  continuance,  and  in  which  we  had 
never  before  been  molested  by  a  single  doubt,  to  be  suddenly 
convinced  of  an  error,  is  almost  like  being  convicted  of  a 
fault.  There  is  a  state  of  mind,  which  is  the  direct  antithesis 
of  that  which  takes  place  when  we  make  a  bull.  The  bull, 
namely,  consists  in  the  liringins  together  two  incompatible 
thoughts,  with  the  sensation,  but  without  the  sense  of  their 
connexion.  The  psychological  condition,  or  that  which  con- 
stitutes the  possibility  of  this  state,  being  such  disproportion- 
ate vividness  of  two  distinct  thoughts,  as  extinguishes  or  ob- 
scures the  consciousness  of  the  intermediate  images  or  con- 
ceptions, or  wholly  abstracts  the  attention  from  them.  Thus 
in  the  well-known  bull,  "  I  was  aftnechild,  but  then  changed 
mt  ;"  the  first  conception  expressed  in  the  word  "  /,"  is  that 
of  personal  identity— Ego  eontemplans  ;  the  second  express- 
ed in  the  word  "  me,"  is  the  visual  image  or  object  by  which 
the  mind  represents  to  itself  its  past  condition,  or  rather,  its 
personal  identity  under  the  form  in  which  it  imagined  itself 
previously  to  have  existed— Ego  contemplatus.  Now,  the 
change  of  one  visual  image  for  another  involves  in  itself  no 
absurdity,  and  becomes  absurd  only  by  its  immediate  juxta- 
position with  the  first  thought,  which  is  rendered  possible  by 
the  whole  attention  being  successively  absorbed  in  each 
singly,  so  as  not  to  notice  the  interjacent  notion,  "  changed." 
Which,  by  its  incongruity  with  the  first  thought,  "7,"  con- 
stitutes the  bull.  Add  only,  that  this  process  is  facilitated  by 
the  circumstance  of  the  words  "2"  and  "  me"  beine  some- 


That  this  conjecture  is  not  wide  from  the  mark,  I 
am  induced  to  believe  from  the  noticeable  fact,  which 
I  can  slate  on  my  own  knowledge,  that  the  same 
general  censure  should  have  been  grounded  almost 
by  each  different  person  on  some  different  poem. 
Among  those,  whose  candour  and  judgment  I  esti- 
mate highly,  I  distinctly  remember  six  who  expressed 
their  objections  to  the  "  Lyrical  Ballads,"  almost  in 
the  same  words,  and  altogether  to  the  same  purport, 
at  the  same  time  admitting,  that  several  of  the  poems 
had  given  them  great  pleasure ;  and,  strange  as  it 
might  seem,  the  composition  which  one  had  cited  as 
execrable,  another  had  quoted  as  his  favorite.  I  am 
indeed  convinced,  in  my  own  mind,  that  could  the 
same  experiment  have  been  tried  with  these  volumes 
as  was  made  in  the  well-known  story  of  the  picture, 
the  result  would  have  been  thesame  ;  the  parts  which 
had  been  covered  by  the  number  of  the  black  spots 
on  the  one  day,  would  be  (bund  equally  alio  lapide 
notate  on  the  succeeding. 

However  this  may  be,  it  is  assuredly  hard  and  un- 
just to  fix  the  attention  on  a  few  separate  and  insu- 
lated poems,  with  as  much  aversion  as  if  they  had 
been  so  many  plague-spots  on  the  whole  work,  in- 
stead of  passing  them  over  in  silence,  as  so  much 
blank  paper,  or  leaves  of  bookseller's  catalogue  ;  es- 
pecially, as  no  one  pretends  to  have  found  immorality 
or  indelicacy  ;  and  the  poems,  therefore,  at  the  worst, 
could  only  be  regarded  as  so  many  light  or  inferior 
coins  in  a  roleau  of  gold,  not  as  so  much  alloy  in  a 
weight  of  bullion.  A  friend  whose  talents  I  hold  in 
the  highest  "respect,  but  whose  judgment  and  strong 
sound  sense  I  have  had  almost  continued  occasion  to 
revere,  making  the  usual  complaints  to  me  concerning 
both  the  style  and  subjects  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  mi- 
nor poems :  I  admitted  that  there  were  some  few  tales 
and  incidents,  in  which  I  could  not  myself  find  a 
sufficient  cause  for  their  having  been  recorded  in 
metre.  I  mentioned  "Alice  Fell"  as  an  instance; 
"nay,"  replied  my  friend,  with  more  than  usual 
quickness  of  manner,  "  I  cannot  agree  with  you  there ! 
that  I  own  does  seem  to  me  a  remarkably  pleasing 
poem."  In  the  "  Lyrical  Ballads,"  (for  my  experi- 
ence does  not  enable  me  to  extend  the  remark  equally 
unqualified  to  the  two  subsequent  volumes)  I  have 
heard,  at  different  times,  and  from  different  individu- 
als, every  single  poem  extolled  and  reprobated,  with 
the  exception  of  those  of  loftier  kind,  which,  as  was 
before  observed,  seem  to  have  won  universal  praise. 
This  fact  of  itself  would  have  made  me  diffident  in 
my  censures,  had  not  a  still  stronger  ground  been  fur- 


times  equivalent,  and  sometimes  having  a  distinct  meaning  ; 
sometimes,  namely,  signifying  the  act  of  self  consciousness, 
sometimes  the  external  im:ige  in  and  by  which  the  mind  re 
presents  that  act  to  itself,  the  result  and  symbol  of  its  indi- 
viduality. Now,  suppose  the  direct  contrary  state,  and  you 
will  have  a  distinct  sense  of  the  connection  between  two  con- 
ceptions, without  that  sensation  of  such  connexion  which  is 
supplied  by  habit.  The  man  feels,  as  if  he  were  standing  on 
his  head,  though  he  cannot  but  see,  that  he  is  truly  standing 
on  his  feet.  This,  as  a  painful  sensation,  will  of  course  have 
a  tendency  to  associate  itself  with  the  person  who  occasions 
it;  even  as  persons,  who  have  been  by  painful  means  restored 
from  derangement,  nre  known  to  feel  an  involuntary  dislike 
towards  their  physician. 


252 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


nished  by  the  strange  contrast  of  the  heat  and  long 
continuance  of  the  opposition,  with  the  nature  of  the 
faults  stated  as  justifying  it.  The  seductive  faults, 
the  dulcia  vitia  of  Cowley,  Marini,  or  Darwin,  might 
reasonably  be  thought  capable  of  corrupting  the  pub- 
lic judgment  for  half  a  century,  and  require  a  twenty 
years'  war,  campaign  after  campaign,  in  order  to  de- 
throne the  usurper,  and  re-establish  the  legitimate 
tr:<:e.  But  that  a  downright  simpleness,  under  the 
affectation  of  simplicity,  prosaic  words  in  leeble  me- 
tre, silly  thoughts  in  childish  phrases,  and  a  prefer- 
ence of  mean,  degrading,  or,  at  best,  trivial  associa- 
tions and  characters,  should  succeed  in  forming  a 
school  of  imitators,  a  company  of  almost  religious  ad- 
mirers, and  this  among  young  men  of  ardent  minds, 
liberal  education,  and  not 

"  With  academic  laurels  unbestowed  ;" 
and  that  this  bare  and  bold  counterfeit  of  poetry, 
which  is  characterised  as  below  criticism,  should,  for 
nearly  twenty  years,  have  well  nigli  engrossed  criti- 
cism as  the  main,  if  not  the  only,  butt  of  review,  ma- 
gazine, pamphlets,  poem,  and  paragraph;  —  this  is, 
indeed,  matter  of  wonder!  Of  yet  greater  is  it,  that 
the  contest  should  still  continue  as*  undecided  as 
that  between  Bacchus  and  the  frogs  in  Aristophanes  ; 
when  the  former  descended  to  the  realms  of  the  de- 
parted to  bring  back  the  spirit  of  old  and  genuine 
poesy. 

Xopos  Barpa^uiv  ;   Aiovvsog. 
X.     flptKCKCKei;,  Koai;,  kou^. 
A.     aAX'  tfoAoisS-'   avrd   Kod^.       ' 

ov6iv  yap  ts"'   a'AV   'i)  Kodl;. 

oi/iaj^ET'   •  ov  yap  u.01  u.i\ei. 

X.      dWa  /xr/v  KEKpa%6fits$d 

y',  birosov  11   (papvy^  uv  rjuiv 

%av6avr)  61  ijfii6as, 

fipSKtKtKi^,  Kod^,  Kod^. 
A.      tovtu)   yap  ov  VlKtlSCTC. 
X.      ovci  p>iv  ijpds  ;v  TravTio;. 
A-     ov6e  p.t)v  vpzls  ye  6fi  /*' 


*  Without,  however,  the  apprehensions  attributed  to  the 
Pagan  reformer  of  the  poetic  republic.  If  we  may  judge 
from  the  preface  to  the  recent  collection  of  his  poems,  Mr.  W. 
would  have  answered  with  Xanthias— 

Tv  6'  hk  tSeisa;  tov  xpoipov  ruv  'prjitarwv, 

Kai  ras  annXas  ;    HAN.  np.a  Ai',  so"  ctppovrtsa. 

And  here  let  me  dare  hint  to  the  authors  of  the  numerous 
parodies  and  pretended  imitations  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  style, 
that,  at  once  to  convey  wit  and  wisdom  in  the  semblance  of 
folly  and  dulness,  as  is  done  in  the  clowns  and  fools,  nay,  even 
in  the  Dogberry  of  our  Shakspeare,  is,  doubtless,  a  proof  of 
genius ;  or,  at  all  events,  of  satiric  talent ;  but  that  the  at- 
tempt to  ridicule  a  silly  and  childish  poem,  by  writing  another 
still  sillier  and  still  more  childish,  can  only  prove,  (if  it  prove 
any  thing  at  all,)  that  the  parodist  is  a  still  greater  blockhead 
than  the  original  writer,  and,  what  is  far  worse,  a  malignant 
coxcomb  to  boot.  The  talent  for  mimicry  seems  strongest 
wheie  the  human  race  are  most  degraded.  The  poor,  naked, 
half  human  savages  of  New  Holland,  were  found  excellent 
mimics;  and  in  civilized  society,  minds  of  the  very  lowest 
stamp  alone  satirize  by  copying.  At  least  the  difference, 
which  must  blend  with,  and  balance  the  likeness,  in  order  to 
constitute  a  just  imitation,  existing  here  merely  in  caricature, 
detracts  from  the  libeller's  heart,  without  adding  an  iota  to 
the  credit  of  his  understanding. 


ovoi-OTt.  KCK&d^opat  yap, 

Kav  pi  htr),  61  fi/iipa;, 

£tl)C    UV    VflWV    [TTlKpaTt'jCti)    tov    Koa%, 

X.     PpoctKCKit,  KOAH,  KOAH! 

During  the  last  year  of  my  residence  at  Cambridge, 
I  became  acquainted  with  Mr.  Wordsworth's  first  pub- 
lications, entitled  "  Descriptive  Sketches ;"  and  sel- 
dom, if  ever,  was  the  emergence  of  an  original  poetic 
genius  above  the  literary  horizon  more  evidently  an- 
nounced. In  the  form,  style,  and  manner  of  the 
whole  poem,  and  in  the  structure  of  the  particular 
lines  and  periods,  there  is  a  harshness  and  an  acer- 
bity connected  and  combined  with  words  and  images 
all  a-glow,  which  might  recall  those  products  of  the 
vegetable  world,  where  gorgeous  blossoms  rise  out 
of  the  hard  and  thorny  rind  and  shell,  within  which 
the  rich  fruit  was  elaborating.  The  language  was 
not  only  peculiar  and  strong,  but  at  times  knotty  and 
contorted,  as  by  its  own  impatient  strength ;  while 
the  novelty  and  struggling  crowd  of  images,  acting 
in  conjunction  with  the  difficulties  of  the  style,  de- 
manded always  a  greater  closeness  of  attention  than 
poetry,  (at  all  events,  than  descriptive  poetry,)  has  a 
right  to  claim.  It  not  seldom,  therefore,  justified  the 
complaint  of  obscurity.  In  the  following  extract  I 
have  sometimes  fancied  that  I  saw  an  emblem  of 
the  poet  itself,  and  of  the  author's  genius  as  it  was 
then  displayed. 

"  'T  is  storm  ;  and  hid  in  mist  from  hour  to  hour, 
All  day  the  floods  a  deepening  murmur  pour  ; 
The  sky  is  veiled,  and  every  cheerful  sight ; 
Dark  is  the  region  as  with  coming  night ; 
And  yet  what  frequent  bursts  of  overpowering  light ; 
Triumphant  on  the  bosom  of  the  storm. 
Glances  the  fire-clad  eagle's  wheeling  form  ; 
Eastward,  in  long  perspective  glittering,  shine 
The  wood-crowned  cliffs  that  o'er  the  lake  recline  ; 
Wide  o'er  the  Alps  a  hundred  streams  unfold, 
At  once  to  pillars  turned  that  flame  with  gold; 
Behind  his  sail  the  peasant  strives  to  shun 
The  West,  that  bums  like  one  dilated  sun, 
Where  in  a  mighty  crucible  expire 
The  mountains,  glowing  hot,  like  coals  of  fire." 

The  poetic  Psyche,  in  its  process  to  full  develop- 
ment, undergoes  as  many  changes  as  its  Greek  name- 
sake, the  butterfly .t  And  it  is  remarkable  how  soon 
genius  clears  and  purifies  itself  from  the  faults  and 
errors  of  its  earliest  products;  faults  which,  in  its 
earliest  compositions,  are  the  more  obtrusive  and 
confluent;  because,  as  heterogeneous  elements  which 
had  only  a  temporary  use,  they  constitute  the  very 
ferment  by  which  themselves  are  carried  off  Or 
we  may  compare  them  to  some  diseases,  which  must 
work  on  the  humours,  and  be  thrown  out  on  the  sur- 


t  The  fact  that  in  Greek,  Psyche  is  the  common  name  for 
the  soul,  and  the  butterfly,  is  thus  alluded  to  in  tho  following 
stanza  from  an  unpublished  poem  of  the  author  : 
"  The  butterfly  the  ancient  Grecians  made 
The  soul's  fair  emblem,  and  its  only  name- 
But  of  the  soul,  escaped  the  slavish  trade 
Of  mortal  life  I    For  in  this  earthly  frame 
Our's  is  the  reptile's  lot,  much  toil,  much  blame, 
Manifold  motions  making  little  speed. 
And  to  deform  and  kill  the  things  whereon  we  feed." 

S.T.C. 

262 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


253 


face,  in  order  to  secure  the  patient  from  their  future 
recurrence.  I  was  in  my  twenty-fourth  year  when 
I  had  the  happiness  of  knowing  Mr.  Wordsworth 
personally,  and  while  memory  lasts,  I  shall  hardly 
forget  the  sudden  effect  produced  on  my  mind,  by 
his  recitation  of  a  manuscript  poem,  which  still  re- 
mains unpublished,  but  of  which  the  stanza,  and 
tone  of  style,  were  the  same  as  those  of  the  "  Female 
Vagrant,"  as  originally  printed  in  the  first  volume  of 
the  ■'  Lyrical  Ballads."  There  was  here  no  mark  of 
strained  thought  or  forced  diction,  no  crowd  or  tur- 
bulence of  imagery;  and  as  the  poet  hath  himself 
well  described  in  his  lines  "on  revisiting  the  Wye." 
manly  reflection,  and  human  associations,  had  given 
both  variety  and  an  additional  interest  to  natural  ob- 
jects, which  in  the  passion  and  appetite  of  the  first 
love,  they  had  seemed  to  him  neither  to  need  or  per- 
mit. The  occasional  obscurities  which  had  risen 
from  an  imperfect  control  over  the  resources  of  his 
native  language,  had  almost  wholly  disappeared, 
together  with  that  worse  defect  of  arbitrary  and  il- 
logical phrases,  at  once  hackneyed  and  fantastic, 
which  holds  so  distinguished  a  place  in  the  technique 
of  ordinary  poetry,  and  will,  more  or  less,  allov  the 
earlier  poems  of  the  truest  genius,  unless  the  atten- 
tion has  been  specificallv  directed  to  their  worthless- 
ness  and  incongruity.*  I  did  not  perceive  any  thing 
particular  in  the  mere  style  of  the  poem  alluded  to 
during  its  recitation,  except,  indeed,  such  difference 
as  was  not  separable  from  the  thought  and  manner ; 
and  the  Spenserian  stanza,  which  always,  more  or 
less,  recalls  to  the  reader's  mind  Spenser's  own  stvle, 
would  doubtless  have  authorized,  in  my  then  opinion, 
a  more  frequent  descent  to  the  phrases  of  ordinary 
life,  than  could,  without  an  ill  effect,  have  been 
hazarded  in  the  heroic  couplet.  It  was  not,  however, 
the  freedom  from  false  taste,  whether  as  to  common 
defects,  or  to  those  more  properly  his  own,  which 
made  so  unusual  an  impression  on  my  feelings  im- 
mediately, and  subsequently  on  my  judgment.  It 
was  the  union  of  deep  feeling  with  profound  thought; 
the  fine  balance  of  truth  in  observing,  with  the 
imaginative  faculty  in  modifying  the  objects  ob- 
served ;  and,  above  all,  the  original  gift  of  spreading 
the  tone,  the  atmosphere,  and,  with  it,  the  depth  and 
height  of  the  ideal  world  around  forms,  incidents, 


*  Mr.  Word? worth,  even  in  his  two  earliest,  "  the  Evening 
Walk,"  and  "the  Descriptive  Sketches,"  is  more  free  finm 
this  latter  defect  than  most  nf  the  young  poets,  his  cootempo- 
rariea.  It  may,  however,  be  exemplified — together  with  the 
harsh  and  obscure  construction,  in  which  he  more  often 
offended — in  the  following  lin.s  : 

"  '.Mid  stormy  vapors  ever  driving  by, 
Where  ospreys.  cormorants,  and  herons  cry  ; 
Where  hardly  given  the  hopeless  waste  lo  cheer, 
Denied  the  bread  of  life  the  foodful  ear. 
Dwindles  the  pear  un  autumn's  latest  spray, 
And  apple  sickens  pale  in  summer's  ray  ; 
E'en  here  content  has  fixed  htr  smiling  reign 
Tilth  independence,  child  of  high  disdain." 

I  hope  I  need  not  say,  that  1  have  quoted  these  lines  for  no 
other  purpose  than  to  make  my  meaning  fully  understood.  It 
is  to  be  regretted  that  Mr.  Wordsworth  has  not  re-published 
these  two  poems  entire. 


and  situations,  of  which,  for  the  common  view,  cus- 
tom had  bedimmed  all  the  lustre,  had  dried  up  the 
sparkle  and  the  dew  drops.  "  To  find  no  contradic- 
tion in  the  union  of  old  and  new;  to  contemplate  the 
Ancient  of  days  and  all  his  works  with  feelings  as 
fresh  as  if  all  had  then  sprung  forth  at  the  first 
creative  fiat;  characterizes  the  mind  that  feels  the 
riddle  of  the  world,  and  may  help  to  unravel  it. 
To  carry  on  the  feelings  of  childhood  into  the  pow- 
ers of  manhood ;  to  combine  the  child's  sense  of 
wonder  and  novelty  with  the  appearances  which 
every  day,  for,  perhaps,  forty  years,  had  rendered 
familiar; 

"  With  sun  and  moon  and  stars  throughout  the  year, 
And  man  and  woman  ;" 

this  is  the  character  and  privilege  of  genius,  and  one 
of  the  marks  which  distinguish  genius  from  talents. 
And  therefore,  it  is  the  prime  merit  of  genius,  and  its 
most  unequivocal  mode  of  manifestation,  so  to  repre- 
sent familiar  objects  as  to  awaken  in  the  minds  of 
others  a  kindred  feeling  concerning  them,  and  that 
freshness  of  sensation  which  is  the  constant  accompa- 
niment of  mental,  no  less  than  of  bodily  convales- 
cence. Who  has  not  a  thousand  times  seen  snow 
fall  on  water  ?  Who  has  not  watched  it  with  a  new- 
feeling  from  the  time  that  he  has  read  Burns'  compa- 
rison of  sensual  pleasure, 

"  To  snow  that  falls  upon  a  river, 

A  moment  white — then  gone  forever  !" 

"  In  poems,  equally  as  in  philosophic  disquisitions, 
genius  produces  the  strongest  impressions  of  novelty, 
while  it  rescues  the  most  admitted  truths  from  the 
impotence,  caused  by  the  very  circumstance  of  their 
universal  admission.  Truths,  of  all  others  the  most 
awful  and  mysterious,  yet  being,  at  the  same  time,  of 
universal  interest,  are  too  often  considered  as  so  true, 
that  they  lose  all  the  life  and  efficiency  of  truth,  and 
lie  bed-ridden  in  the  dormitory  of  the  soul,  side  by 
side  with  the  most  despised  and  exploded  errors." 
The  FRiEND.t  page  76.  No.  5. 

This  excellence,  which,  in  all  Mr.  Wordsworth's 
writings,  is  more  or  less  predominant,  and  which 
constitutes  the  character  of  his  mind,  I  no  sooner  felt 
than  I  sought  to  understand.  Repeated  meditations 
led  me  first  to  suspect,  (and  a  more  intimate  analysis 
of  the  human  faculties,  their  appropriate  marks,  func- 
tions and  effects,  matured  my  conjecture  into  full 
conviction,)  that  fancy  and  imagination  were  two  dis- 
tinct and  widely  different  faculties,  instead  of  being, 
according  to  the  general  belief,  either  two  names  with 
one  meaning,  or,  at  furthest,  the  lower  and  higher 
degree  of  one  and  the  same  power.  It  is  not,  I  own, 
easy  to  conceive  a  more  opposite  translation  of  the 
Greek  phantasia  than  the  Latin  imaginatio :  but  it  is 
equally  true,  that  in  all  societies  there  exists  an  in- 
stinct of  growth,  a  certain  collective,  unconscious 


t  As  "The  Friend"  was  printed  on  stampt  sheets,  and 
sent  only  by  the  post,  to  a  very  limited  number  of  subscri- 
bers, the  author  has  felt  less  objection  to  quote  from  it,  though 
a  work  of  hie  own.  To  the  public  at  large,  indeed,  it  is  the 
same  as  a  volume  in  manuscript. 

263 


254 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


good  sense,  working  progressively  to  desynonymise* 
those  words,  originally  of  the  same  meaning,  which 
the  conflux  of  dialects  had  supplied  to  the  more  ho- 
mogeneous languages,  as  the  Greek  and  German: 
and  which  the  same  cause,  joined  with  accidents  of 
translation  from  original  works  of  different  countries, 
occasion  in  mixed  languages  like  our  own.  The  first 
and  most  important  point  to  be  proved,  is,  that  two 
conceptions  perfectly  distinct  are  confused  under  one 
and  the  same  word,  and,  (this  done,)  to  appropriate 
that  word  exclusively  to  one  meaning,  and  the  syno- 
nyme,  (should  there  be  one,)  to  the  other.  But  if  (as 
will  be  often  the  case  in  the  arts  and  sciences,)  no  sy- 
nonyme  exists,  we  must  either  invent  or  borrow  a 
word.  In  the  present  instance,  the  appropriation  had 
already  begun,  and  been  legitimated  in  the  derivative 
adjective :  Milton  had  a  highly  imaginative,  Cowley 
a  very  fanciful  mind.  If,  therefore,  I  should  succeed 
in  establishing  the  actual  existences  of  two  faculties 
generally  different,  the  nomenclature  would  be  at 
once  determined.  To  the  faculty  by  which  I  had 
characterized  Milton,  we  should  confine  the  term 
imagination;  while  the  other  would  be  contra-dis- 
tinguished as  fancy.  Now,  were  it  once  fully  ascer- 
tained, that  this  division  is  no  less  grounded  in  nature 
than  that  of  delirium  from  mania,  or  Otway's 

"  Lutes,  lobsters,  seas  of  milk,  and  ships  of  amber," 

from  Shakspeare's 

"  What,  have  his  daughters  brought  him  to  this  pass  1 " 

or  from  the  preceding  apostrophe  to  the  elements ;  the 
theory  of  the  fine  arts,  and  of  poetry  in  particular, 
could  not,  I  thought,  but  derive  some  additional  and 
important  light.  It  would,  in  its  immediate  effects, 
furnish  a  torch  of  guidance  to  the  philosophical  critic ; 
and,  ultimately,  to  the  poet  himself.  In  energetic 
minds,  truth  soon  changes,  by  domestication,  into 


*  This  is  effected  either  by  giving  to  the  one  word  a  gen- 
eral, and  to  the  other  an  exclusive  use  ;  as,  "  to  put  on  the 
back,"  and  "to  endorse;"  or,  by  an  actual  distinction  of 
meanings,  as  "naturalist,"  and  "  physician  ;"  or,  by  differ- 
ence of  relation,  as  "1,"  and  "me;"  (each  of  which  the 
rustics  of  our  different  provinces  still  use  in  all  the  cases  sin- 
gular of  the  first  personal  pronoun.)  Even  the  mere  differ- 
ence, or  corruption,  in  the  pronunciation  of  the  same  word, 
if  it  have  become  general,  will  produce  a  new  word  with  a 
distinct  signification;  thus,  "property,"  and  "propriety," 
the  latter  of  which,  even  to  the  time  of  Charles  II.  was 
the  written  word  for  all  tho  senses  of  both.  Thus,  too, 
"  mister,"  and  "  master,"  both  hasty  pronunciations  of 
the  same  word;  "  magister,"  "mistress,"  and  "miss," 
"  if,"  and  "  give,"  &c.  &c.  There  is  a  sort  of  minim 
immortal  among  the  animalcula  infusoria,  which  has  not, 
naturally,  either  birth  or  death,  absolute  beginning  or  ab- 
solute end  ;  for,  at  a  certain  period,  a  small  point  appears 
on  its  back,  which  deepens  and  lengthens  till  the  creature 
divides  into  two,  and  the  same  process  recommences  in  each 
of  the  halves  now  become  integral.  This  may  be  a  fanciful, 
but  it  is  by  no  means  a  bad  emblem  of  the  formation  of 
words,  and  may  facilitate  the  conception,  how  immense  a 
nomenclature  may  be  organized  from  a  few  simple  sounds  by 
rational  beings  in  a  social  state.  For  each  new  application 
or  excitement  of  the  same  sound  will  call  forth  a  different 
sensation,  which  cannot  but  affect  the  pronunciation.  The 
after  recollection  of  the  sound,  without  the  same  vivid  sensa- 
tion, will  modify  it  still  further ;  till,  at  length,  all  trace  of 
the  original  likeness  is  worn  away. 


power;  and  from  directing  in  the  discrimination  and 
appraisal  of  the  product,  becomes  influencive  in  the 
production.  To  admire  on  principle,  is  the  only  way 
to  imitate  without  loss  of  originality. 

It  has  been  already  hinted,  that  metaphysics  and 
psychology  have  long  been  my  hobby-horse.  But  to 
have  a  hobby-horse,  and  be  vain  of  it,  are  so  com- 
monly found  together,  that  they  pass  almost  for  the 
same.  I  trust,  therefore,  that  there  will  be  more 
good  humor  than  contempt,  in  the  smile  with  which 
the  reader  chastises  my  self-complacency,  if  I  confess 
myself  uncertain,  whether  the  satisfaction  from  the 
perception  of  a  truth  new  to  myself,  may  not  have 
been  rendered  more  poignant,  by  the  conceit  that  it 
would  be  equally  so  to  the  public.  There  was  a 
time,  certainly,  in  which  I  took  some  little  credit  to 
myself,  in  the  belief  that  I  had  been  the  first  of  my 
countrymen  who  had  pointed  out  the  diverse  meaning 
of  which  the  two  terms  were  capable,  and  analyzed 
the  faculties  to  which  they  should  be  appropriated. 
Mr.  W.  Taylor's  recent  volumes  of  synonymes,  I 
have  not  yet  seen  ;t  but  his  specification  of  the  terms 
in  epiestion,  has  been  clearly  shown  to  be  both  insuf- 
ficient and  erroneous  by  Mr.  Wordsworth,  in  the 
preface  added  to  the  late  collection  of  his  "  Lyrical 
Ballads  and  other  poems."  The  explanation  which 
Mr.  Wordsworth  has  himself  given,  will  be  found  to 
differ  from  mine,  chiefly,  perhaps,  as  our  objects  are 


t  I  ought  to  have  added,  with  the  exception  of  a  single 
sheet  which  I  accidentally  met  with  at  the  printer's.  Even 
from  this  scanty  specimen.  I  found  it  impossible  to  doubt  the 
talent,  or  not  to  admire  the  ingenuity  of  the  author.  That 
his  distinctions  were,  for  the  greater  part,  unsatisfactory  to 
my  mind,  proves  nothing  against  their  accuracy  ;  but  it  may 
possibly  be  serviceable  to  him  in  case  of  a  second  edition,  if 
I  take  this  opportunity  of  suggesting  the  query,  whether  ho 
may  not  have  been  occasionally  misled,  by  having  assumed, 
as  to  me  he  appeared  to  have  done,  the  non-existence  of  any 
absolute  synonymes  in  our  language1?  Now,  I  cannot  but 
think,  that  there  are  many  which  remain  for  our  posterity  to 
distinguish  and  appropriate,  and  which  I  regard  as  so  much 
reversionary  wealth  in  our  mother  tongue.  When  two  dis- 
tinct meanings  are  confounded  under  one  or  more  words, 
(and  such  must  be  the  case,  as  sure  as  our  knowledge  is  pro- 
gressive, and,  of  course,  imperfect)  erroneous  consequences 
will  be  drawn,  and  what  is  true  in  one  sense  of  the  word, 
will  be  affirmed  as  true  in  toto.  Men  of  research,  startled  by 
the  consequences,  seek  in  the  things  themselves  (whether  in 
or  out  of  the  mind)  for  a  knowledge  of  the  fact,  and  having 
discovered  the  difference,  remove  the  equivocation  either  by 
the  substitution  of  a  new  word,  or  by  the  appropriation  of 
one  of  the  two  or  more  words,  that  had  before  been  used 
promiscuously.  When  this  distinction  has  been  so  natura- 
lized and  of  such  general  cunency  that  the  language  itself 
does,  as  it  were,  think  fur  us,  (like  the  sliding  rule  which  is 
the  mechanic's  safe  substitute  for  arithmetical  knowledge,) 
we  then  say,  that  it  is  evident  to  common  sense.  Common 
sense,  therefore,  differs  in  different  ages.  What  was  born 
and  christened  in  tho  schools,  passes  by  degrees  into  the  world 
at  large,  and  becomes  the  property  of  the  market  and  the  tea- 
table.  At  least,  I  can  discover  no  other  meaning  of  the  term 
common  sense,  if  it  is  to  convey  any  specific  difference  from 
sense  and  judgment  in  genere,  and  where  it  is  not  used 
scholastically  for  the  universal  reason.  Thus,  in  the  reign 
of  Charles  II.,  the  philosophic  world  was  called  to  arms  by 
the  moral  sophisms  of  Ilobbs,  and  the  ablest  writers  exerted 
themselves  in  the  detection  of  an  error  which  a  school-boy 
would  now  be  able  to  confute  by  the  mere  recollection,  that 
compulsion  and  obligation  conveyed  two  ideas  perfectly  dis- 
parate, and  that  what  appertained  to  the  one  had  been  falsely 
transferred  to  the  other,  by  a  rcere  confusion  of  terms. 
2G4 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


255 


different.  It  could  scarcely,  indeed,  happen  other- 
wise, from  the  advantage  I  have  enjoyed  of  frequent 
conversation  with  him  on  a  subject  to  which  a  poem 
of  his  own  tirst  directed  my  attention,  and  my  conclu- 
sions concerning  which,  he  had  made  more  lucid  to 
myself  by  many  happy  instances  drawn  from  the 
operation  of  natural  objects  on  the  mind.  But  it  was 
Mr.  Wordsworth's  purpose  to  consider  the  influences 
of  fancy  and  imagination  as  they  are  manifested  in 
poetrv,  and,  from  the  different  effects,  to  conclude 
their  diversity  in  kind  ;  while  it  is  my  object  to  inves- 
tigate the  seminal  principle,  and  then,  from  the  kind, 
to  deduce  the  degree.  My  friend  has  drawn  a  mas- 
terly sketch  of  the  branches,  with  their  poetic  fruit- 
age. I  wish  to  add  the  trunk,  and  even  the  roots,  as 
far  as  they  lift  themselves  above  ground,  and  are  vi- 
sible to  the  naked  eye  of  our  common  consciousness. 
Yet,  even  in  this  attempt,  I  am  aware  that  I  shall 
be  obliged  to  draw  more  largely  on  the  reader's  at- 
tention, than  so  immethodical  a  miscellany  can  au- 
thorize; when  in  such  a  work  {the  Ecclesiastical 
Policy)  of  such  a  mind  as  Hooker's,  the  judicious 
author,  though  no  less  admirable  for  the  perspicuity 
than  for  the  port  and  dignity  of  his  language ;  and 
though  he  wrote  for  men  of  learning  in  a  learned 
age,  saw,  nevertheless,  occasion  to  anticipate  and 
guard  against  "complaints  of  obscurity,"  as  often  as 
he  was  to  trace  his  subject  "  to  the  highest  well- 
spring  and  fountain."  Which,  (continues  he,)  "be- 
cause men  are  not  accustomed  to,  the  pains  we  take 
are  more  needful,  a  great  deal,  than  acceptable ;  and 
the  matters  we  handle  seem,  by  reason  of  newness, 
(till  the  mind  grow  better  acquainted  with  them,) 
dark  and  intricate."  I  would  gladly,  therefore,  spare 
both  myself  and  others  this  labour,  if  I  knew  how 
without  it  to  present  an  intelligible  statement  of  my 
poetic  creed;  not  as  my  opitrions,  which  weigh  for 
nothing,  but  as  deductions  from  established  premises, 
conveyed  in  such  a  form  as  is  calculated  either  to 
effect  a  fundamental  conviction,  or  to  receive  a  fun- 
damental confutation.  If  I  may  dare  once  more 
adopt  the  words  of  Hooker,  "  they,  unto  whom  we 
shall  seem  tedious,  are  in  no  wise  injured  by  us,  be- 
cause it  is  in  their  own  hands  to  spare  that  labour, 
which  they  are  not  willing  to  endure."  Those  at 
least,  let  me  be  permitted  to  add,  who  have  taken  so 
much  pains  to  render  me  ridiculous  for  a  perversion 
of  taste,  and  have  supported  the  charge  by  attributing 
strange  notions  to  me  on  no  other  authority  than  their 
own  conjectures,  owe  it  to  themselves,  as  well  as  to 
me,  not  to  refuse  their  attention  to  my  own  statement 
of  the  theory,  which  I  do  acknowledge ;  or  shrink 
from  the  trouble  of  examining  the  grounds  on  which 
I  rest  it,  or  the  arguments  which  I  offer  in  its  justifi- 
cation. 


CHAPTER  V. 

On  the  law  of  association— Its  history  traced  from  Aristotle 
to  Hartley.  " 

There  have  been  men  in  all  ages,  who  have  been 
impelled,  as  by  an  instinct,  to  propose  their  own  na- 
ture as  a  problem,  and  who  devote  their  attempts  to 
18 


its  solution.  The  first  step  was  to  construct  a  table 
of  distinctions,  which  they  seem  to  have  formed  on 
the  principle  of  the  absence  or  presence  of  the  will. 

;  Our  various  sensations,  perceptions,  and  movements, 

1  were  classed  as  active  or  passive,  or  as  media  partak- 
ing of  both.  A  still  finer  distinction  was  soon  estab- 
lished between  the  voluntary  and  the  spontaneous. 
In  our  perceptions  we  seem  to  ourselves  merely  pas- 

|  sive  to  an  external  power,  whether  as  a  mirror  re- 
flecting the  landscape,  or  as  a  blank  canvas  on  which 
some  unknown  hand  paints  it.  For  it  is  worthy  of 
notice,  that  the  latter,  or  the  system  of  idealism,  may 
be  traced  to  sources  equally  remote  with  the  former. 

;  or  materialism ;  and  Berkeley  can  boast  an  ancestry 
at  least  as  venerable  as  Gassendi  or  Hobbs.  These 
conjectures,  however,  concerning  the  mode  in  which 
our  perceptions  originated,  could  not  alter  the  natural 

'  difference  in  things  and  thoughts.  In  the  former,  the 
cause  appeared  wholly  external ;  while  in  the  latter, 
sometimes  our  will  interfered  as  the  producing  or  de- 
termining cause,  and  sometimes  our  nature  seemed 
to  act  by  a  mechanism  of  its  own,  without  any  con- 
scious effort  of  the  will,  or  even  against  it.  Our  in- 
ward experiences  were  thus  arranged  in  three  sepa- 
rate classes,  the  passive  sense,  or  what  the  school- 
men call  the  merely  receptive  quality  of  the  mind ; 
the  voluntary ;  and  the  spontaneous,  which  holds  the 
middle  place  between  both.  But  it  is  not  in  human 
nature  to  meditate  on  any  mode  of  action,  without 
inquiring  after  the  law  that  governs  it;  and  in  the 
explanation  of  the  spontaneous  movements  of  our  be- 
ing, the  metaphysician  took  the  lead  of  the  anatomist 
and  natural  philosopher.  In  Egypt,  Palestine,  Greece, 
and  India,  the  analysis  of  the  mind  had  reached  its 
noon  and  manhood,  while  experimental  research  was 
still  in  its  dawn  and  infancy.  For  many,  very  many 
centuries,  it  has  been  difficult  to  advance  a  new- 
truth,  or  even  a  new  error,  in  the  philosophy  of  the 
intellect  or  morals.  With  regard,  however,  to  the 
laws  that  direct  the  spontaneous  movements  of 
thought,  and  the  principle  of  their  intellectual  me- 
chanism, there  exists,  it  has  been  asserted,  an  import- 
ant exception,  most  honorable  to  the  moderns,  and  in 
the  merit  of  which  our  own  country  claims  the  largest 
share.  Sir  James  Mackintosh  (who,  amid  the  variety 
of  his  talents  and  attainments,  is  not  of  less  repute  for 
the  depth  and  accuracy  of  his  philosophical  inquiries, 
than  for  the  eloquence  with  which  he  is  said  to  ren- 
der their  most  difficult  results  perspicuous,  and  the 
driest  attractive,)  affirmed,  in  the  lectures  delivered 
by  him  at  Lincoln's  Inn  Hall,  that  the  law  of  associa- 
tion, as  established  in  the  contemporaneity  of  the  ori- 
ginal impressions,  formed  the  basis  of  all  true  psycho, 
logy ;  and  any  ontological  or  metaphysical  science, 
not  contained  in  such  (i.  e.  empirical)  psychology,  was 
but  a  web  of  abstractions  and  generalizations.  Of 
this  prolific  truth,  of  this  great  fundamental  law,  he 
declared  Hobbs  to  have  been  the  original  discovert r, 
while  its  full  application  to  the  whole  intellectual 
system  we  owe  to  David  Hartley ;  who  stood  in  the 
same  relation  to  Hobbs,  as  Newton  to  Kepler ;  the 
law  of  association  being  that  to  the  mind,  which  gra- 
vitation is  to  matter. 

265 


256 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Of  the  former  clause  in  this  assertion,  as  it  respects 
the  comparative  merits  of  the  ancient  metaphysicians, 
including  their  commentators,  the  school-men,  and  of 
the  modern  French  and  British  philosophers,  from 


constitutes  a  representation,  and  there  remains  an  im- 
pression of  the  same,  or  a  certain  disposition  to  repeat 
the  same  motion.  Whenever  we  feel  several  objects 
at  the  same  time,  the  impressions  that  are  left  (or,  in 


Hobbs  to  Hume,  Hartley,  and  Condillac,  this  is  not  i  the  language  of  Mr.  Hume,  the  ideas)  are  linked  to- 
the  place  to  speak.  So  wide  indeed  is  the  chasm  be-  j  gether.  Whenever,  therefore,  any  one  of  the  move- 
tween  this  gentleman's  philosophical  creed  and  mine,  ments  which  constitute  a  complex  impression,  are  re- 
that  so  far  from  being  able  to  join  hands,  we  could  J  newed  through  the  senses,  the  others  succeed  me- 
scarce  make  our  voices  intelligible  to  each  other:  and  j  chanically.  It  follows  of  necessity,  therefore,  that 
to  bridge  it  over,  would  require  more  time,  skill,  and  Hobbs,  as  well  as  Hartley,  and  all  others  who  derive 
power,  than  I  believe  myself  to  possess.  But  the  lat-  association  from  the  connexion  and  interdependence 
ter  clause  involves  for  the  greater  part  a  mere  ques-  j  of  the  supposed  matter,  the  movements  of  which  con- 
tion  of  fact  and  history,  and  the  accuracy  of  the  state-  i  stitute  our  thoughts,  must  have  reduced  all  its  forms 


ment  is  to  be  tried  by  documents  rather  than  reason- 
ing. 

First,  then,  I  deny  Hobbs's  claim  in  toto:  for  he 
had  been  anticipated  by  Des  Cartes,  whose  work 
"De  Methodo"  preceded  Hobbs's  "  De  Natura  Hu- 
mana," by  more  than  a  year.    But  what  is  of  much 
more  importance,  Hobbs  builds  nothing  on  the  prin- 
ciple which  he  had  announced.     He  does  not  even 
announce  it,  as  differing  in  any  respect  from  the  gen- 
eral laws  of  material  motion  and  impact :  nor  was  it, 
indeed,  possible  for  him  so  to  do,  compatibly  with  his 
6ystem,  which  was  exclusively  material  and  mechan- 
ical.   Far  otherwise  is  it  with  Des  Cartes;  greatly 
as  he  too,  in  his  after  writings,  (and  still  more  egre- 
giously  his  followers,  De  la  Forge,  and  others,)  ob- 
scured the  truth  by  their  attempts  to  explain  it  on  the 
theory  of  nervous  fluids  and  material  configurations. 
But  in   his  interesting  work  "  De   Methodo,"  Des 
Cartes  relates  the  circumstance  which  first  led  him 
to  meditate  on  this  subject,  and  which  since  then  has 
been  often  noticed  and  employed  as  an  instance  and 
illustration  of  the  law.    A  child  who,  with  his  eyes 
bandaged,  had  lost  several  of  his  fingers  by  amputa- 
tion, continued  to  complain  for  many  days  succes- 
sively of  pains,  now  in  his  joint,  and  now  in  that  of 
the  very  fingers  which  had  been  cut  off    Des  Cartes 
was  led  by  this  incident  to  reflect  on  the  uncertainty 
with  which  we  attribute  any  particular  place  to  any 
inward  pain  or  uneasiness,  and  proceeded,  after  long 
consideration,  to  establish  it  as  a  general  law,  that 
contemporaneous  impressions,  whether  images  or  sen- 
sations, recal  each  other  mechanically.    On  this  prin- 
ciple, as  a  ground  work,  he  built  up  the  whole  sys- 
tem of  human  language,  as  one  continued  process  of 
association.    He  showed  in  what  sense  not  only  gen- 
eral terms,  but  generic  images,  (under  the  name  of 
abstract  ideas,)  actually  existed,  and  in  what  consists 
their  nature  and  power.    As  one  word  may  become 
the  general  exponent  of  many,  so,  by  association,  a 
simple  image  may  represent  a  whole  class.    But  in 
truth,  Hobbs  himself  makes  no  claims  to  any  discov- 
ery, and  introduces  this  law  of  association,  or,  (in  his 
own  language,)  discursus  mentalis,  as  an  admitted 
fact,  in  the  solution  alone  of  which  it  is,  by  causes 
purely  physiological,   he  arrogates  any  originality. 
His  system  is  briefly  this :  whenever  the  senses  are 
impinged  on  by  external  objects,  whether  by  the  rays 
of  light  reflected  from  them,  or  by  effluxes  of  their 
finer  particles,  there  results  a  correspondent  motion 
of  the  innermost  and  subtlest  organs.    This  motion 


to  the  one  law  of  time.  But  even  the  merit  of  an- 
nouncing this  law  with  philosophic  precision  cannot 
be  fairly  conceded  to  him.  For  the  objects  of  any 
two  ideas*  need  not  have  co-existed  in  the  same  sen- 
sation in  order  to  become  mutually  associable.  The 
same  result  will  follow,  when  one  only  of  the  two 
ideas  has  been  represented  by  the  senses,  and  the 
other  by  the  memory. 

Long,  however,  before  either  Hobbs  or  Des  Cartes, 
the  law  of  association  had  been  defined,  and  its  im- 
portant functions  set  forth  by  Melancthon,  Ammer- 
bach,  and  Ludovicus  Vives ;  more  especially  by  the 
last.  Phantasia,  it  is  to  be  noticed,  is  employed  by 
Vives  to  express  the  mental  power  of  comprehension, 


*  I  here  use  the  word  "  idea"  in  Mr.  Hume's  sense,  on  ac- 
count of  its  general  currency  among  the  English  metaphy- 
sicians, though  against  my  own  judgment  ;  for  I  believe  that 
the  vague  use  of  this  word  has  been  the  cause  of  much  error 
and  more  confusion.  The  word  lSea,  in  its  original  sense,  as 
used  by  Pindar,  Aristophanes,  and  in  the  gospel  of  Matthew, 
represented  the  visual  abstraction  of  a  distant  object,  when 
we  see  the  whole  without  distinguishing  its  parts.  Plato 
adopted  it  as  a  technical  term,  and  as  the  antithesis  to 
EicwAa,  or  sensuous  images  ;  the  transient  and  perishable 
emblems,  or  mental  words,  of  ideas.  The  ideas  themselves 
he  considered  as  mysterious  powers,  living,  seminal,  forma- 
tive, and  exempt  from  time.  In  this  sense  the  word  became 
the  property  of  the  Platonic  school;  and  it  seldom  occurs  in 
Aristotle,  without  some  such  phrase  annexed  to  it,  as  accord- 
ing to  Plato,  or  as  Plato  says.  Our  English  writers  to  the  end 
of  Charles  2nd's  reign,  or  somewhat  later,  employed  it  either 
in  the  original  sense,  or  Platonically,  or  in  a  sense  nearly 
correspondent  to  our  present  use  of  the  substantive.  Ideal, 
always,  however,  opposing  it,  more  or  less,  to  image,  whether 
of  present  or  absent  objects.  The  reader  will  not  be  displeased 
with  the  following  interesting  exemplification  from  biBhop 
Jeremy  Taylor:  "St.  Lewis  the  king  sent  Ivo  bishop  of 
Chartres  on  an  embassy,  and  he  told,  that  he  met  a  grave  and 
stately  matron  on  the  way,  with  a  censer  of  fire  in  one  hand, 
and  a  vessel  of  water  in  the  other  ;  and  observing  her  to  have 
a  melancholy,  religious,  and  phantastic  deportment  and  look, 
he  asked  her  what  those  symbols  meant,  and  what  she  meant 
to  do  with  her  fire  and  water ;  she  answered,  my  purpose  is 
with  the  fire  to  burn  paradise,  and  with  my  water  to  quench 
the  flames  of  hell,  that  men  may  serve  God  purely  for  the 
love  of  God.  But  we  rarely  meet  with  such  spirits,  which 
love  virtue  so  metaphysically  as  to  abstract  her  from  all  w*- 
siblc  compositions,  and  lure  the  purity  of  the  idea."  Des 
Cartes  having  introduced  into  his  philosophy  the  fanciful  hy- 
pothesis of  material  ideas,  or  certain  configurations  of  the 
brain,  which  were  as  so  many  moulds  to  the  influxes  of  the 
external  world  ;  Mr.  Locke  adopted  the  term,  but  extended  its 
signification  to  whatever  is  the  immediate  objoct  of  the  mind's 
attention  or  consciousness.  Mr.  Hume,  distinguishing  those 
representations  which  are  accompanied  with  a  sense  of  a  pre- 
sent object,  from  those  reproduced  by  the  mind  itself,  desig- 
nated the  former  by  impressions,  and  confined  the  word  idea 
to  the  latter.  260 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


257 


or  the  active  function  of  the  mind ;  and  imaginatio 
for  the  receptivity  (vis  receptiva)  of  impressions,  or 
for  the  passive  perception.  The  power  of  combina- 
tion he  appropriates  to  the  former : — '•  quae  singula  et 
simpliciter  acceperat  imaginatio,  ea  conjungit  et  dis- 
gungit  phantasia."  And  the  law  by  which  the 
thoughts  are  spontaneously  presented  follows  thus: —  ' 
"  quae  simul  sunt  a  phantasa  comprehensa  si  alteru- 
trum  occurrat,  solet  secum  alierum  representare." 
To  time,  therefore,  he  subordinates  all  the  other  ex- 
citing causes  of  association.  The  soul  proceeds  "  a 
causa  ad  affectum,  ab  hoc  ad  instrumentum,  a  parte 
ad  totum;"  thence  to  the  place,  from  place  to  person, 
and  from  this  to  whatever  preceded  or  followed,  all 
as  being  parts  of  a  total  impression,  each  of  which 
may  recal  the  other.  The  apparent  springs  "  Saltus 
vel  transitus  etiam  longisimos."  he  explains  by  the 
same  thought  having  been  a  component  part  of  two 
or  more  total  impressions.  Thus  "  ex  Scipione  venio 
incogitarionem  potentia?  Turcica?  proper  victorias  ejus 
in  ea  parte  Asia?  in  qua  regnabat  Antiochus." 

But  from  Vives  I  pass  at  once  to  the  source  of  his 
doctrines,  and  (as  far  as  we  can  judge  from  ihe  re- 
mains yet  extant  of  Greek  philosophy)  as  to  the  first, 
so  to  the  fullest  and  most  perfect  enunciation  of  the 
associative  principle,  viz  :  to  the  writings  of  Aristo- 
tle ;  and  of  these  principally  to  the  books  "  De  Ani- 
ma."  ••  De  Memoria,"  and  that  which  is  entitled  in 
the  old  translations  "  Farva  Xaturalia.''  In  as  much 
as  later  writers  have  either  deviated  from,  or  added 
to  his  doctrines,  they  appear  to  me  to  have  introduced 
either  error  or  groundless  supposition. 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  to  be  observed,  that  Aristo- 
tle's positions  on  this  subject  are  unmixed  with  fic- 
tion. The  wise  Stagyrite  speaks  of  no  successive 
particles  propagating  motion  like  billiard  balls,  (as 
Hobbs:)  nor  of  nervous  or  animal  spirits,  where  inani- 
mate  and  irrational  solids  are  thawed  down,  and  dis- 
tilled, or  filtrated  by  ascension,  into  livine  and  intel- 
ligent fluids,  that  etch  and  re-etch  engravings  on  the 
brain,  (as  the  followers  of  Des  Cartes,  and  the  hu- 
moral pathologists  in  general :)  nor  of  an  oscil  latin  sr 
ether  which  was  to  effect  the  same  service  for  the 
nerves  of  the  brain  considered  as  solid  fibres,  as  the 
animal  spirits  perform  for  them  under  the  notion  of 
hollow  tubes,  (as  Hartley  teaches) — nor  finally,  with 
yet  more  recent  dreamers,)  of  chemical  compositions 
by  elective  affinity,  or  of  an  electric  light  at  once  the 
immediate  object  and  the  ultimate  organ  of  inward 
vision,  which  rises  to  the  brain  like  an  Aurora  Bore- 
alis.  and  there  disporting  in  various  shapes,  ;as  the 
balance  of  plus  and  minus,  or  negative  and  positive, 
:-s  destroyed  or  re-established.)  images  out  both  past 
and  present.  Aristotle  delivers  a  just  theory,  without 
pretending  to  an  hypothesis  :  or  in  other  words,  a 
comprehensive  survey  of  the  different  facts,  and  of 
their  relations  to  each  other,  without  supposition,  i.  e. 
i  fact  placed  under  a  number  of  facts,  as  their  com- 
wn  support  and  explanation  ;  though  in  the  majority 
of  instances,  these  hypotheses  or  suppositions  better 
deserve  the  name  of  YrorroimU,  or  sufUctions.  He 
nses,  indeed,  the  word  KuhkuSi  to  express  what  we 
call  representations  or  ideas,  but  he  carefully  distin- 


guishes them  from  material  motion,  designating  the 
latter  always  by  annexing  the  words  Ev  ro-rw.or  Kara 

. .    On  the  contrary,  in  his  treatise  '  De  Aniraa," 

he  excludes  place  and  motion  from  all  the  operations 
of  thought,  whether  representations  or  volitions,  as 
attributes  utterly  and  absurdly  heterogeneous. 

The  general  law  of  association,  or  more  accurately 
the  common  condition  under  which  all  eiciting  causes 
act,  and  in  which  they  may  be  generalized,  accord- 
ing to  Aristotle,  is  this  :  Ideas,  by  having  been  toge- 
ther, acquire  a  power  of  recalling  each  other;  or 
even,-  partial  representation  awakes  the  total  repre- 
sentation of  which  it  had  been  a  part.  In  the  practi- 
cal determination  of  this  common  principle  to  partic- 
ular recollections,  he  admits  five  agents  or  occasion- 
ing causes :  1st,  connexion  in  time,  whether  simul- 
taneous, preceding  or  successive ;  2d,  vicinity  or 
connexion  in  space ;  3d,  interdependence  or  neces- 
sary connexion,  as  cause  and  effect ;  4th,  likeness ; 
and  5th,  contrast.  As  an  additional  solution  of  the 
occasional  seeming  chasms  in  the  continuity  of  repro- 
duction, he  proves  that  movements  or  ideas  j 
ing  one  or  the  other  of  these  five  characters  had 
passed  through  the  mind  as  intermediate  links,  suffi- 
ciently clear  to  recal  other  parts  of  the  same  total 
impressions  with  which  they  had  co-existed,  though 
not  vivid  enough  to  excite  that  degree  of  attention 
which  is  requisite  for  distinct  recollection,  or  as  we 
may  aptly  express  it,  after-consciousness.  In  associa- 
tion, then,  consists  the  whole  mechanism  of  the  re- 
production of  impressions,  in  the  Aristotelian  Psy- 
chology. It  is  the  universal  law  of  the  passive  fancy 
and  mechanical  memory  ;  that  which  supplies  to  all 
other  faculties  their  objects,  to  all  thought  the  ele- 
ments of  its  materials. 

In  consulting  the  excellent  commentary  of  St.  Tho- 
mas Aquinas  on  the  Parva  Naturalia  of  Aristotle,  I 
was  struck  at  once  with  its  close  resemblance  to 
Hume's  essay  on  association.  The  main  thoughts 
were  the  same  in  both,  the  order  of  the  thoughts  was 
the  same,  and  even  the  illustrations  differed  only  by 
Hume's  occasional  substitution  of  more  modem  ex- 
amples. I  mentioned  the  circumstance  to  several  of 
my  literary  acquaintances,  who  admitted  the  close- 
ness of  the  resemblance,  and  that  it  seemed  too  great 
to  be  explained  by  mere  coincidence ;  but  thev 
thought  it  improbable  that  Hume  should  have  held 
the  pages  of  the  angelic  Doctor  worth  turning  over. 
But  some  time  after,  Mr.  Payne,  of  the  King's  mews, 
showed  Sir  James  Mackintosh  some  odd  volumes  of 
St.  Thomas  Aquinas,  partly  perhaps  from  having 
heard  that  Sir  James  (then  Mr.)  Mackintosh  had  in 
his  lectures  passed  a  hish  encomium  on  this  canon- 
ized philosopher,  but  chiefly  from  the  fact,  that  the 
volumes  had  belonged  to  Mr.  Hume,  and  had  here 
and  there  marginal  marks  and  notes  of  reference  in 
his  own  hand-writing.  Among  these  volumes  was 
that  which  contains  the  Parva  yaturalia,  in  the  old 
latin  versions,  swathed  and  swaddled  in  the  com- 
mentarv  afore  mentioned ! 

It  remains,  then,  for  me,  first,  to  state   wherein 
Hartley  differs  from  Aristotle;  then,  to  exhibit  the 
grounds  of  my  conviction,  that  he  differed  only  to 
26? 


258 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


err ;  and  next,  as  the  result,  to  show,  by  what  in- 
fluences of  the  choice  and  judgment  the  associative 
power  becomes  either  memory  or  fancy  ;  and,  in  con- 
clusion, to  appropriate  the  remaining  offices  of  the 
mind  to  the  reason  and  the  imagination.  With  my 
best  efforts  to  be  as  perspicuous  as  the  nature  of  lan- 
guage will  permit  on  such  a  subject,  I  earnestly  so- 
licit the  good  wishes  and  friendly  patience  of  my 
readers,  while  I  thus  go  "  sounding  on  my  dim  and 
perilous  way." 


CHAPTER  VI. 

That  Hartley's  system,  as  far  as  it  differs  from  that  of  Aris- 
totle, is  neither  tenable  in  theory,  nor  founded  in  facts. 

Of  Hartley's  hypothetical  vibrations  in  his  hypo- 
thetical oscillating  ether  of  the  nerves,  which  is  the 
first  and  most  obvious  distinction  between  his  system 
and  that  of  Aristotle,  I  shall  say  little.  This,  with 
all  other  similar  attempts  to  render  that  an  object  of 
the  sight  which  has  no  relation  to  sight,  has  been 
already  sufficiently  exposed  by  the  younger  Reimarus, 
Maasse,  &c.  as  outraging  the  very  axioms  of  mechan- 
ics, in  a  scheme,  the  merit  of  which  consists  in  its 
being  mechanical.  Whether  any  other  philosophy 
be  possible,  but  the  mechanical ;  and  again,  whether 
the  mechanical  system  can  have  any  claim  to  be 
called  philosophy;  are  questions  for  another  place. 
It  is,  however,  certain,  that  as  long  as  we  deny  the 
former,  and  affirm  the  latter,  we  must  bewilder  our- 
selves, whenever  we  would  pierce  into  the  adyta  of 
causation  ;  and  all  that  laborious  conjecture  can  do, 
is  to  fill  up  the  gaps  of  fancy.  Under  that  despotism 
of  the  eye,  (the  emancipation  from  which  Pythagoras 
by  his  mumeral,  and  Plato  by  his  musical,  symbols, 
and  both  by  geometric  discipline,  aimed  at,  as  the 
first  TrpoiraiocvTi  ov  of  the  mind)  under  this  strong 
sensuous  influence,  we  are  restless,  because  invisible 
things  are  not  the  objects  of  vision ;  and  metaphysical 
systems,  for  the  most  part,  become  popular,  not  for 
their  truth,  but  in  proportion  as  they  attribute  to 
causes  a  susceptibility  of  being  seen,  if  only  our  visual 
organs  were  sufficiently  powerful. 

From  a  hundred  possible  confutations,  let  one  suf- 
fice. According  to  this  system,  the  idea  or  vibration 
a  from  the  external  object  A  becomes  associable 
with  the  idea  or  vibration  m  from  the  external  object 
M,  because  the  oscillation  a  propagated  itself  so  as 
to  re-produce  the  oscillation  to.  But  the  original 
impression  from  M  was  essentially  different  from  the 
impression  A  :  unless,  therefore,  different  causes  may 
produce  the  same  effect,  the  vibration  a  could  never 
produce  the  vibration  ?n;and  this,  therefore,  could 
never  be  the  means  by  which  a  and  m  are  associated. 
To  understand  this,  the  attentive  reader  need  only 
be  reminded,  that  the  ideas  are  themselves,  in  Hart- 
ley's system,  nothing  more  than  their  appropriate 
configurative  vibrations.  It  is  a  mere  delusion  of 
the  fancy  to  conceive  the  pre-existence  of  the  ideas, 
in  any  chain  of  association,  as  so  many  differently 
colored  billiard-balls  in  contact,  so  that  when  an  ob- 


ject, the  billiard-stick,  strikes  the  first  or  white  ball 
;  the  same  motion  propagates  itself  through  the  red, 
J  green,  blue,  black,  &C.  and  sets  the  whole  in  motion. 
No!  we  must  suppose  the  very  same  force,  which 
constitutes  the  white  ball,  to  constitute  the  red  or 
black ;  or  the  idea  of  a  circle  to  constitute  the  idea 
of  a  triangle  ;  which  is  impossible. 

Cut  it  may  be  said,  that,  by  the  sensations  from  the 
objects  A  and  M,  the  nerves  have  acquired  a  dispo- 
sition to  the  vibrations  a  and  m,  and  therefore  a  need 
only  be  repeated  in  order  to  re-produce  to.  Now 
we  will  grant,  for  a  moment,  the  possibility  of  such 
a  disposition  in  a  material  nerve ;  which  yet  seems 
scarcely  less  absurd  than  to  say,  that  a  weather-cock 
had  acquired  a  habit  of  turning  to  the  east,  from  tho 
wind  having  been  so  long  in  that  quarter :  for  if  it 
be  replied,  that  we  must  take  in  the  circumstance  of 
life,  what  then  becomes  of  the  mechanical  philoso- 
phy ?  And  what  is  the  nerve,  but  the  flint  which 
the  wag  placed  in  the  pot  as  the  first  ingredient  of 
his  stone-broth,  requiring  only  salt,  turnips,  and  mut- 
ton, for  the  remainder  ?  But  if  we  waive  this,  and 
pre-suppose  the  actual  existence  of  such  a  disposition, 
two  cases  are  possible.  Either,  every  idea  has  its 
own  nerve  and  correspondent  oscillation,  or  this  is 
not  the  case.  If  the  latter  be  the  truth,  we  should 
gain  nothing  by  these  dispositions ;  for  then,  every 
nerve  having  several  dispositions,  when  the  motion 
of  any  other  nerve  is  propagated  into  it,  there  will 
be  no  ground  or  cause  present,  why  exactly  the  os- 
cillation m  should  arise,  rather  than  any  other  to 
which  it  was  equally  pre-disposed.  But  if  we  take 
the  former,  and  let  every  idea  have  a  nerve  of  its 
own,  then  every  nerve  must  be  capable  of  propa- 
gating its  motion  into  many  other  nerves ;  and  again, 
there  is  no  reason  assignable,  why  the  vibration  to 
should  arise,  rather  than  any  other  ad  libitum. 

It  is  fashionable  to  smile  at  Hartley's  vibrations 
and  vibratiuncles ;  and  his  work  has  been  re-edited 
by  Priestley,  with  the  omission  of  the  material  hypo- 
thesis. But  Hartley  was  too  great  a  man,  too  cohe- 
rent a  thinker,  for  this  to  have  been  done  either 
consistently  or  to  any  wise  purpose.  For  all  other 
parts  of  his  system,  as  far  as  they  are  peculiar  to  that 
system,  once  removed  from  their  mechanical  basis, 
not  only  lose  their  main  support,  but  the  very  motive 
which  led  to  their  adoption.  Thus  the  principle  of 
contemporaneity,  which  Aristotle  had  made  the  com- 
mon condition  of  all  the  laws  of  association,  Hartley 
was  constrained  to  represent  as  being  itself  the  sole 
lav).  For  to  what  law  can  the  action  of  material  atoms 
be  subject,  but  that  of  proximity  in  place  ?  And  to  what 
law  can  their  motion  be  subjected,  but  that  of  time  ? 
Again,  from  this  results  inevitably,  that  the  will,  the 
reason,  the  judgment,  and  the  understanding,  instead 
of  being  the  determining  causes  of  association,  must 
needs  be  represented  as  its  creatures,  and  among  its 
mechanical  effects.  Conceive,  for  instance,  a  broad 
stream,  winding  through  a  mountainous  country, 
with  an  indefinite  number  of  currents,  varying  and 
running  into  each  other  according  as  the  gusts  chance 
to  blow  from  the  opening  of  the  mountains.  The 
temporary  union  of  several  currents  in  one,  so  as  to 
208 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


259 


form  the  main  current  of  the  moment,  would  present 
an  acccurate  imace  of  Hartley's  theory  of  the  will. 

Had  this  really  been  the  case,  the  consequence 
would  have  been,  that  our  whole  life  would  be  di- 
vided between  the  despotism  of  the  outward  impres- 
sions, and  that  of  senseless  and  passive  memory. 
Take  his  law  in  its  highest  abstraction  and  most 
philosophical  form,  viz :  that  every  partial  represen- 
tation recalls  the  total  representation  of  which  it  was 
a  part ;  and  the  law  becomes  nugatory,  were  it  only 
from  its  universality.    In  practice  it  would,  indeed. 

b^  mere  law. :.sider  how  immense  must 

be  the  sphere  of  a  total  impression  from  the  top  of 
St  Paul's  church:  and  how  rapid   and  continuous 
the  series  of  such  total  impressions.    If.  therefore. 
we  suppose  the  absence  of  all  interference  of  the 
will,  reason,  and  judgment,  one  or  other  of  two  con- 
sequences must  result.    Either  the  ideas,  'or  relicts 
.  impressions.)  will  exactly  imitate  the  order 
of  the  impression  itself,  which  would  be  absolute 
delirium  ;  or  any  one  part  of  that  impress:'  : 
recall  any  other  part.  and.  ;as  from  the  lav. 
tinuity  there  must  exist  in  every  total  impression. 
some  one  or  more  parts,  which  are  comp»: : 
some  other  following  impression,  and  so  on  ad  infini- 
tum, any  part  of  any  impression  might  recall  any 
part  of  any  other,  without  a  cause  present  to  deter- 
mine what  it  should  be.    For  to  bring  in  the 
reason,  as  causes  of  their  own  cause,  that  is.  at  once 
causes  and  effects,  can  satisfy  those  onlv  who.  in 

retended  evidence  of  a  God.  having,  first, 
demanded  organization  as  the  sole  cause  and  ground 
of  intellect,  will.  then,  coolly  demand  the  pre-exist- 
ence  of  intellect  as  the  cause  and  gronnd-wort  of 
organization.  in  truth,  but  one   - 

which  this  th  •  at  all.  namely,  that  of  com- 

plete lightheadedness ;  and  even  to  this  - 

partially,  because  the  will  and  reason  are,  perhaps, 
never  wholly  suspended. 

A  case  of  this  kind  occurred  in  a  Catholic  town  in 
Germany,  a  year  or  two  before  mv  arrival  at  Gottin- 
gen.  and  had  not  then  ceased  to  be  a  fr~ 
of  conversation.     A  young  woman  of  four  or  : 

who  could  neither  read  nor  w:  --    - 

with  a  nervous  fever:  duril  ■  » 

asseverations  of  all  the  priests  and  monk? 
neighborhood,  she  became  postesffJ.  and.  as  il 
peared,  by  a  very  learned  devil.  She  continued  in- 
cessantly talk  reek,  and  Hebrew 
pompous  tones,  and  with  most  distinct  en>:; 
This  possession  \\  as  re:.?ered  more  probab^ 
known  fact  that  she  was  or  had  been  an  heretic. 

-humorous'!;.-  •   •  .  to  decline  all 

medical  me:, : 
been  more  to  his  reputation  if  he  had  I 
vice  in  the  present  instance.    The  case  had 
the  particular  attention  o:  -ician.  and,  by 

his  statement  many  eminent  physio!  girts 
cholog-ists  visited  the  town,  and  cross-examined  the 

-  fall  of  her  r 
taken  down  from  her  own  mouth,  and  were  found  to 

f  sentences  coherent  and  intelligible 

at  with  little  or  no  connection  with  each 
Y 


other.  Of  the  Hebrew,  a  small  portion  only  could 
'  be  traced  to  the  Bible;  the  remainder  seemed  to  be 
in  the  rabbinical  dialect  All  trick  or  conspiracy  was 
out  of  the  question.  Not  only  bad  the  young  woman 
ever  been  an  harmless,  simple  creature,  but  she  was 
evidently  labouring  under  a  nervous  fever.  In  the 
town  in  which  she  had  been  resident  for  many  years, 
as  a  servant  in  different  families,  no  solution  presented 
The  young  physician,  however,  determined  to 
trace  her  past  life  step  by  step:  for  the  patieni 
was  incapable  of  returning  a  rational  answer.  He, 
at  length,  succeeded  in  discovering  the  place  where 
her  parents  had  lived;  travelled  thither,  found  them 
dead,  but  an  uncle  surviving:  and  from  him  learnt, 
that  the  patient  had  been  charitably  taken  .:. 
old  protectant  pastor  at  nine  years  old,  and  had  re- 
mained with  him  some  years,  even  till  the  old  man's 
death.  Of  this  pastor  the  uncle  knew  nothing,  but 
that  he  was  a  very  good  man.  'With  great  difficulty. 
and  after  much  search,  our  young  medical  philoso- 
pher discovered  a  niece  of  the  pastor's,  who  had  lived 
with  him  as  his  house-keeper,  and  had  inherited  his 
effects.  She  remembered  the  girl;  related,  that  her 
venerable  uncle  had  been  too  indulgent  and  could 
■  not  bear  to  hear  the  girl  scolded :  that  she  was  willing 
to  have  kept  her,  but  that,  after  her  patron's  death, 
;  the  girl  herself  refused  to  stay.  Anxious  inquiries 
',  were  then,  of  course,  made  concerning  the  pastor's 
'  habits,  and  the  solution  of  the  phenomenon  was  soon 
obtained.  For  it  appeared,  that  it  had  been  the  old 
man's  custom  for  years,  to  walk  up  and  down  a  pas- 
sage of  his  house,  into  v\  hich  the  kitchen  door  opened, 
and  to  read  to  himself,  with  a  loud  voice,  out  of  his 
favorite  books.  A  considerable  number  of  these  were 
still  in  the  niece's  possession.  She  added,  that  he  was 
a  very  learned  man,  and  a  great  Hebraist.  Among 
the  bo  :    :nd  a  collection  of  rabbinical 

writings,  together  with  several  of  the  Greek  and 
Latin  fathers;  and  the  physician  succeeded  in  identi- 
fying so  many  passages  with  those  taken  down  at  the 
young  woman's  bedside,  that  no  doubt  could  remain 
rational  mind,  concerning  the  true  origin  of 
the  impressions  made  on  her  nervous  system. 

-.uthenticated  case  furnishes  both  proof  and 
■-.  that  relics  of  sensation  may  exist,  for  an 
'.  indefinite  time,  in  a  latent  state,  in  the  very  same 
order  in  which  they  were  -  •   J  :  and, 

as  we  cannot  rationally  suppose  I  -;ate  of 

the  brain  to  act  in  any  other  way  than  as  a  stimulus. 
:.  ;and  it  would  not  be  difficult  to  adduce  se- 
veral of  the  same  kind.;  contributes  to  make 
probable,  that  all  thoughts  are,  in  themselv*  - 

f  the  intelligent  £v: 
rendered  more  comprehensive,  it  would  require  only 
rent  and  apportioned  organization,  the  ' 

■-;al.  to  bring  before 
everv  human  soul  erience  of  is 

whole  past  existence.     And  this — this,  percr 
the  dread  book  of  judgment,  in  whose  nr  - 
hieroglyphics  every  idle  word  is  recorded  '. 
the  very  nature  oi  :.  e  more 

-  that  heaven  and  earth  should   pe-< 
than  that  a  single  act.  a  single  thoc; 
. 


200 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


loosened,  or  lost,  from  that  living  chain  of  causes,  to 
all  whose  links,  conscious  or  unconscious,  the  free 
will,  our  only  absolute  self,  is  co-extensive  and  co- 
present.  But  not  now  dare  1  longer  discourse  of  this, 
waiting  for  a  loftier  mood,  and  a  nobler  subject, 
warned  from  within  and  from  without,  that  it  is  pro- 
fanation to  speak  of  these  mysteries*  toIs  urihi-nort 
(havTa&USlV,  (1){  «a\bv  to  ri);  h<aiosivt]S  Kal  ju)i/>pofi5vr;s 
rrposmnov,  Kal  wj  &T«  cs-rcpos  arc  eutog  Btuj  ku\&.  Tdv 
yap  opwvTa  Trpb;  to  bpufitvov  svyycvh  Kal  bfioiov  770117- 
Hijiciiov  iu  i-i  ftdWuv  Trj  la'  6v  yap  av  -nib-ore  uitv 
"OtpSaXpos  H\iov  S)\iotl6t]S  frt";  yeytvt)^tvoi,  S6c  to  Ka\ov 
av  lit)  y?v%r]  fii]  /ca.\e  ysvopivn.  PlOTINUS. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

Of  the  necessary  consequences  of  the  Hartleian  theory — Of 
the  original  mistake  or  equivocation  which  procured  admis- 
sion for  the  theory — Memoria  Technica. 

We  will  pass  by  the  utter  incompatibility  of  such 
a  law,  (if  law  it  may  be  called,  which  would  itself 
be  the  slave  of  chances,  with  even  that  appearance 
of  rationality  forced  upon  us  by  the  outward  pheno- 
mena of  human  conduct,  abstracted  from  our  own 
consciousness.  We  will  agree  to  forget  this  for  the 
moment,  in  order  to  fix  our  attention  on  that  subordi- 
nation of  final  to  efficient  causes  in  the  human  being, 
which  flows  of  necessity  from  the  assumption,  that 
the  will,  and  with  the  will  all  acts  of  thought  and 
attention,  are  parts  and  products  of  this  blind  me- 
chanism, instead  of  being  distinct  powers,  whose 
function  it  is  to  control,  determine,  and  modify  the 
phantasma  chaos  of  association.  The  soul  becomes 
a  mere  ens  logicum ;  for  as  a  real  separable  being,  it 
would  be  more  worthless  and  ludicrous,  than  the 
Grimalkins  in  the  Catharpsichord,  described  in  the 
Spectator.  For  these  did  form  a  part  of  the  process ; 
but  in  Hartley "s  scheme  the  soul  is  present  only  to  be 
pinched  or  stroked,  while  the  very  squeals  or  purring 
are  produced  by  an  agency  wholly  independent  and 
alien.  It  involves  all  the  difficulties,  all  the  incom- 
prehensibility (if  it  be  not  indeed,  wj  Ijioiyc  cok2i,  the 
absurdity)  of  intercommunion  between  substances 
that  have  no  one  property  in  common,  without  any  of 
the  convenient  consequences  that  bribed  the  judg- 
ment to  the  admission  of  the  dualislic  hypothesis. 
Accordingly,  this  caput  mortuum  of  the  Hartleian 
process  has  been  rejected  by  his  followers,  and  the 
consciousness  considered  as  a  result,  as  a  tune,  the 
common  product  of  the  breeze  and  the  harp:  though 
this  again  is  the  mere  remotion  of  one  absurdity,  to 
make  way  for  another  equally  preposterous.  For 
what  is  harmony  but  a  mode  of  relation,  fhe  very 

*  "  To  those  to  whose  imagination  it  has  never  been  pre- 
sented, how  beautiful  is  the  countenance  of  justice  and  wis- 
dom; ami  that  neither  the  morning  nor  the  evening  star  are 
so  fair.  For,  in  order  to  direct  the  view  aright,  it  behoves 
that  the  beholder  should  have  made  himself  congenerous  and 
similar  to  the  object  beheld.  Never  could  the  eye  have  be- 
held the  sun,  had  not  its  own  essence  been  soliform,"  (that 
itt,  pre-configurcd  to  light  by  a  similarity  of  essence  with 
thai  of  light,)  "  neither  can  a  eoul  not  beautiful  attain  to  an 
intuition  of  beauty." 


esse  of  which  is  percipi  1  An  ens  rationale,  which 
presupposes  the  power,  that  by  perceiving  creates  it? 
The  razor's  edge  becomes  a  saw  to  the  armed  vision; 
and  the  delicious  melodies  of  Purcell  or  Cimarosa 
might  be  disjointed  stammerings  to  a  hearer,  whose 
partition  of  time  should  be  a  thousand  times  subtler 
than  ours.  But  this  obstacle  too,  let  us  imagine 
ourselves  to  have  surmounted,  and  "at  one  bound 
high  overleap  all  bound !"  Yet,  according  to  his 
hypothesis,  the  disquisition,  to  which  I  am  at  pre- 
sent soliciting  the  reader's  attention,  may  be  as  truly 
said  to  be  written  by  Saint  Paul's  church,  as  by 
me ;  for  it  is  the  mere  motion  of  my  muscles  and 
nerves :  and  these  again  are  set  in  motion  from  exter- 
nal causes  equally  passive,  which  external  causes 
stand  themselves  in  interdependent  connection  with 
every  thing  trgit  exists  or  has  existed.  Thus  the 
whole  universe  co-operates  to  produce  the  minutest 
stroke  of  every  letter,  save  only  that  I  myself,  and  I 
alone,  have  nothing  to  do  with  it,  but  merely  the 
causeless  and  effectless  beholding  of  it  when  it  is 
done.  Yet  scarcely  can  it  be  called  a  beholding  ;  for 
it  is  neither  an  act  nor  an  effect ;  but  an  impossible 
creation  of  a  something-nothing  out  of  its  very  con- 
trary! It  is  the  mere  quick-silver  plating  behind  a 
looking-glass;  and  in  this  alone  consists  the  poor 
worthless  I !  The  sum  total  of  my  moral  and  intel- 
lectual intercourse,  dissolved  into  its  elements,  are 
reduced  to  extension,  motion,  degrees  of  velocity,  and 
those  diminished  copies  of  configurative  motion, 
which  form  what  we  call  notions,  and  notions  of  no- 
tions.   Of  such  philosophy  well  might  Butler  say — 

"  The  metaphysics  but  a  puppet  motion 
That  goes  with  screws,  the  notion  of  a  notion; 
The  copy  of  a  copy,  and  lame  draught 
Unnaturally  taken  from  a  thought: 
That  counterfeits  all  pantomimic  tricks. 
And  turns  the  eyes  like  an  old  crucifix  ; 
That  counterchanges  whatsoe'er  it  calls 
P.'  another  name,  and  makes  it  true  or  false ; 
Turns  truth  to  falsehood,  falsehood  into  truth, 
13 y  virtue  of  the  Babylonian's  tooth." 

Miscellaneous  Thoughts. 

The  inventor  of  the  watch  did  not  in  reality  invent 
it;  he  only  looked  on,  while  the  blind  causes,  the 
only  true  artists,  'were  unfolding  themselves.  So 
must  it  have  been  too  with  my  friend  Allston,  when 
he  sketched  his  picture  of  the  dead  man  revived  by 
the  bones  of  the  prophet  Elijah.  So  must  it  have 
been  with  Mr.  Southey  and  Lord  Byron,  when  the 
one  fancied  himself  composing  his  "  Roderick,"  and 
the  other  his  "Childe  Harold."  The  same  must 
hold  good  of  all  systems  of  philosophy;  of  all  arts, 
governments,  wars  by  sea  and  by  land ;  in  short,  of 
all  tinners  that  ever  have  been  or  that  ever  will  be 
produced.  For,  according  to  this  system,  it  is  not  the 
affections  and  passions  that  are  at  work,  i/i  as  far  as 
they  are  sensations  or  thoughts.  We  only  fancy  that 
we  a*!  from  rational  resolves,  or  prudent  motives,  or 
from  impulses  of  anger,  love,  or  generosity.  In  all 
these  cases  the  real  agent  is  a  something-nothing- 
every -thing,  which  docs  all  of  which  we  know,  and 
knows  nothing  of  all  that  itself  does. 

The  existence  of  an  infinite  spirit,  of  an  intelligent 
and  holy  will,  must,  on  this  system,  be  mere  articu- 
270 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


261 


lated  motions  of  the  air.  For  as  the  function  of  the 
human  understanding  is  no  other  than  merely  (to  ap- 
pear to  itself)  to  combine  and  to  apply  the  phenome- 
na of  the  association;  and  as  these  derive  all  their 
reality  from  the  primary  sensations ;  and  the  sensa- 
tions again  all  their  reality  from  the.  impressions  ab 
extra ;  a  God  not  visible,  audible,  or  tangible,  can  ex- 
ist only  in  the  sounds  and  letters  that  form  his  name 
and  attributes.  If  in  ourselves  there  be  no  such  fac- 
ulties as  those  of  the  will,  and  the  scientific  reason, 
we  must  either  have  an  innate  idea  of  them,  which 
would  overthrow  the  whole  system,  or  we  can  have 
no  idea  at  all.  The  process,  by  which  Hume  degra- 
ded the  notion  of  cause  and  efTect  into  a  blind  product 
of  delusion  and  habit,  into  the  mere  sensation  of  pro- 
ceeding life  (nisus  vitalis)  associated  with  the  images 
of  the  memory;  this  same  process  must  be  repeated 
to  the  equal  degradation  of  every  fundamental  idea 
in  ethics  or  theology. 

Far,  very  far,  am  I  from  burthening  with  the  odi- 
um of  these  consequences  the  moral  characters  of 
those  who  first  formed,  or  have  since  adopted  the  sys- 
tem !  It  is  most  noticeable  of  the  excellent  and  pious 
Hartley,  that  in  the  proofs  of  the  existence  and  attri- 
butes of  God,  with  which  his  second  volume  com- 
mences, he  makes  no  reference  to  the  principles  or 
results  of  the  first.  Nay,  he  assumes,  as  his  founda- 
tion, ideas  which,  if  we  embrace  the  doctrine  of  his 
first  volume,  can  exist  no  where  but  in  the  vibrations 
of  the  ethereal  medium  common  to  the  nerves  and  to 
the  atmosphere.  Indeed,  the  whole  of  the  second 
volume  is,  with  the  fewest  possible  exceptions,  inde- 
pendent of  his  peculiar  system.  So  true  is  it,  that  the 
faith,  which  saves  and  sanctifies,  is  a  collective  ener- 
gy, a  total  act  of  the  whole  moral  being;  that  its  liv- 
ing sensorium  is  in  the  heart ,•  and  that  no  errors  of 
the  understanding  can  be  morally  arraigned,  unless 
they  have  proceeded  from  the  heart.  But  whether 
they  be  such,  no  man  can  be  certain  in  the  case  of 
another,  scarcely,  perhaps,  even  in  his  own.  Hence 
it  follows,  by  inevitable  consequence,  that  man  may 
perchance  determine  what  is  an  heresy  ;  but  God  can 
only  know  who  is  a  heretic.  It  does  not,  however,  by 
any  means  follow,  that  opinions  fundamentally  false 
are  harmless.  An  hundred  causes  may  co-exist  to 
form  one  complex  antidote.  Yet  the  sting  of  the  ad- 
der remains  venomous,  though  there  are  many  who 
have  taken  up  the  evil  thing;  and  it  hurted  them 
not !  Some  indeed  there  seem  to  have  been,  in  an 
unfortunate  neighbor-nation  at  least,  who  have  em- 
braced this  system  with  a  full  view  of  all  its  moral 
and  religious  consequences ;  some — 


-who  deem  themselves  most  free, 


When  they  within  this  gross  and  visible  sphere 
Chain  down  the  winged  thought,  scoffing  assent. 
Proud  in  their  meannes9 ;  and  themselves  they  cheat 
With  noisy  emptiness  of  learned  phrase. 
Their  subtle  fluids,  impacts,  essences, 
Self-working  tools,  uncaused  effects,  and  all 
Those  blink  omniscients,  those  almighty  slaves. 
Untenanting  Creation  of  its  God  I" 

Such  men  need  discipline,  not  argument;  they  must 
be  made  better  men.  before  thev  can  become  wiser. 


The  attention  will  be  more  profitably  employed  in 
attempting  to  discover  and  expose  the  paralogisms, 
by  the  magic  of  which  such  a  faith  could  find  admis- 
sion into  minds  framed  for  a  nobler  creed.  These,  it 
appears  to  me,  may  be  all  reduced  to  one  sophism  as 
their  common  genus;  the  mistaking  the  conditions  of 
a  thing  for  its  causes  and  essence  ;  and  the  process  by 
which  we  arrive  at  the  knowledge  of  a  faculty,  for 
the  faculty  itself  The  air  I  breathe  is  the  condition 
of  my  life,  not  its  cause.  We  could  never  have  learnt 
that  we  had  eyes  but  by  the  process  of  seeing;  yet 
having  seen,  we  know  that  the  eyes  must  have  pre- 
existed in  order  to  render  the  process  of  sight  possi- 
ble. Let  us  cross-examine  Hartley's  scheme  under 
the  guidance  of  this  distinction  ;  and  we  shall  disco- 
ver, that  contemporaneity  (Leibnitz's  Lex  Co?i!inui) 
is  the  limit  and  conditio?*  of  the  laws  of  mind,  itself 
being  rather  a  law  of  matter,  at  least  of  phenomena 
considered  as  material.  At  the  utmost,  it  is  to  thought 
the  same  as  the  law  of  gravitation  is  to  loco-motion. 
In  every  voluntary  movement  we  first  counteract 
gravitation,  in  order  to  avail  ourselves  of  it.  It  must 
exist,  that  there  may  be  a  something  to  be  counter- 
acted, and  which  by  its  re-aciion,  aids  the  force  that 
is  exerted  to  resist  it.  Let  us  consider  what  we  do 
when  we  leap.  We  first  resist  the  gravitating  power 
by  an  act  purely  voluntary,  and  then  by  another  act, 
voluntary  in  part,  we  yield  to  it  in  order  to  light  on 
the  spot  which  we  had  previously  proposed  to  our- 
selves. Now,  let  a  man  watch  his  mind  while  he  is 
composing;  or,  to  take  a  still  more  common  case, 
while  he  is  trying  to  recollect  a  name;  and  he  will 
find  the  process  completely  analogous.  Most  of  my 
readers  will  have  observed  a  small  water  insect  on 
the  surface  of  rivulets,  which  throws  a  cinque-spot- 
ted shadow,  fringed  with  prismatic  colors,  on  the  sun- 
ny bottom  of  the  brook;  and  will  have  noticed,  how 
the  little  animal  wins  its  way  up  against  the  stream, 
by  alternate  pulses  of  active  and  passive  motion,  now 
resisting  the  current,  and  now  yielding  to  it  in  order 
to  gather  strength  and  a  momentary  fulcrum  for  a 
further  propulsion.  This  is  no  unapt  emblem  of  the 
mind's  self-experience  in  the  act  of  thinking.  There 
are  evidently  two  powers  at  work,  which  relatively 
to  each  other  are  active  and  passive;  and  this  is  not 
possible  without  an  intermediate  faculty,  which  is  at 
once  both  active  and  passive.  (In  philosophical  lan- 
guage, we  must  denominate  this  .intermediate  faculty 
in  all  its  degrees  and  determinations,  the  imagina- 
tion. But  in  common  language,  and  especially  on 
the  subject  of  poetry,  we  appropriate  the  name  to  a 
superior  degree  of  faculty,  joined  to  a  superior  volun- 
tary control  over  it.) 

Contemporaneity  then,  being  the  common  condition 
of  all  the  laws  of  association,  and  a  component  ele- 
ment in  all  the  materia  subjects,  the  parts  of  which 
are  to  be  associated,  must  needs  be  co-present  with 
all.  Nothing,  therefore,  can  be  more  easy  than  to  pass 
off  on  an  incautious  mind,  this  constant  companion 
of  each,  for  the  essential  substance  of  all.  But  if  we 
appeal  to  our  own  consciousness,  we  shall  find  that 
even  time  itself,  as  the  cause  of  a  particular  act  of  as- 
sociation, is  distinct  from  contemporaneity,  as  the  con- 
2T1 


262 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


dition  of  all  association.  Seeing  a  mackerel,  it  may 
happen  that  I  immediately  think  of  gooseberries,  be- 
cause I  at  the  same  time  ate  mackerel  with  goose- 
berries as  the  sauce.  The  first  syllable  of  the  latter 
word,  being  that  which  had  co-existed  with  the  im- 
age of  the  bird  so  called,  I  may  then  think  of  a  goose. 
In  the  next  moment  the  image  of  a  swan  may  arise 
before  me,  though  I  had  never  seen  the  two  birds  to- 
gether. In  the  two  former  instances,  I  am  conscious 
thai  iheir  co-existence  in  time  was  (he  circumstance 
that  enabled  me  to  recollect  them  ;  and  equally  con- 
scious am  I,  that  the  latter  was  recalled  to  me  by  the 
joint  operation  of  likeness  and  contrast.  So  it  is  with 
cause  and  effect;  so  too  with  order.  So  am  I  able  to 
distinguish  whether  it  was  proximity  in  time,  or  con- 
tinuity in  space,  that  occasioned  me  to  recall  B  on 
the  mention  of  A.  They  c.-Minot  be  indeed  separated 
from  contemporaneity;  for  that  would  be  to  separate 
them  from  the  mind  itself.  The  act  of  consciousness 
is  indeed  identical  with  time,  considered  in  its  essence. 
(I  mean  time  per  se,  as  contra-distinguished  from  our 
notion  of  time ;  for  this  is  always  blended  with  the 
idea  of  space,  which,  as  the  contrary  of  time,  is  there- 
fore its  measure.)  Nevertheless,  the  accident  of  see- 
ing two  objects  at  the  same  moment,  acts  as  a  distin- 
guishable cause  from  that  of  having  seen  them  in  the 
same  place ;  and  the  true  practical  general  law  of 
association  is  this:  that  whatever  makes  certain  parts 
of  a  total  impression  more  vivid  or  distinct  than  the 
rest,  will  determine  the  mind  to  recall  these,  in  pre- 
ference to  others  equally  linked  together  by  the  com- 
mon condition  of  contemporaneity,  or  (what  I  deem  a 
more  appropriate  and  philosophical  term)  of  continu- 
ity. But  the  will  itself,  by  confining  and  intensify- 
ing* the  attention,  may  arbitrarily  give  vividness  or 
distinctness  to  any  object  whatsoever;  and  from 
hence  we  may  deduce  the  uselessness,  if  not  the  ab- 
surdity, of  certain  recent  schemes,  which  promise,  an 
artificial  memory,  but  which  in  reality  can  only  pro- 
duce a  confusion  and  debasement  of  the  fancy. 
Sound  logic,  as  the  habitual  subordination  of  the  in- 
dividual to  the  species,  and  of  the  species  to  the  ge- 
nus; philosophical  knowledge  of  facts  under  the  rela- 
tion of  cause  and  effect;  a  cheerful  and  communica- 
tive temper,  that  disposes  us  to  notice  the  similarities 
and  contrasts  of  things,  that  we  may  be  able  to  illus- 
trate the  one  by  the  other;  a  quiet  conscience;  a 
condition  free  from  anxieties ;  sound  health,  and, 
above  all,  (as  far  as  relates  to  passive  remembrance,) 
a  healthy  digestion  ;  these  are  the  best — these  are  the 
only  Arts  of  Memory. 


*  I  am  aware  that  this  word  occurs  neither  in  Johnson's 
Dictionary,  nor  in  any  classical  writer.  But  the  word  "  to 
intend,"  which  Newton  and  others  before  him  employ  in  this 
sense,  is  now  so  completely  appropriated  to  another  meaning, 
that  I  could  not  use  it  without  ambiguity  :  while  to  para- 
phrase the  sense,  as  by  render  intense,  would  often  break  up 
the  sentence,  and  destroy  that  harmony  of  the  position  of  the 
words  with  the  logical  position  of  the  thoughts,  which  is  a 
beauty  in  all  composition,  and  more  especially  desirable  in  a 
close  philosophical  investigation.  I  have  therefore  hazarded 
the  word  intensify  ;  though  I  confess  it  sounds  uncouth  to 
my  own  ear. 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

The  system  of  Dualism,  introduced  by  Des  Cartes— Refined 
first  by  Spinoza,  and  afterwards  by  Leibnitz,  into  the  doc- 
trine of  Harmonia  pnestabilita — Hylozoism— Materialism— 
Neither  of  these  systems,  on  any  possible  tneory  of  associa- 
tion, supplies  or  supersedes  a  theory  of  perception,  or  ex- 
plains the  formation  of  the  associable. 

To  the  best  of  my  knowledge,  Des  Cartes  was  the 
first  philosopher  who  introduced  the  absolute  and 
essential  heterogeneity  of  the  soul  as  intelligence, 
and  the  body  as  matter.  The  assumption,  and  the 
form  of  speaking,  have  remained,  though  the  denial 
of  all  other  properties  to  matter  but  that  of  extension, 
on  which  denial  the  whole  system  of  dualism  is 
grounded,  has  been  long  exploded.  For  since  im- 
penetrability is  intelligible  only  as  a  mode  of  resist- 
ance, its  admission  places  the  essence  of  mailer  in  an 
act  or  power,  which  it  possesses  in  common  with 
spirit ;  and  body  and  spirit  are  therefore  no  longer 
absolutely  heterogeneous,  but  may,  without  any  ab- 
surd'iti/,  be  supposed  to  be  different  modes  or  degrees 
in  perfection,  of  a  common  substratum.  To  this  pos- 
sibility, however,  it  was  not  the  fashion  to  advert. 
The  soul  was  a  thinking  substance;  and  body  a 
spare-filling  substance.  Yet  the  apparent  action  of 
each  on  the  other  pressed  heavy  on  the  philosopher, 
on  the  one  hand  ;  and  no  less  heavily,  on  the  other 
hand,  pressed  the  evident  truth,  that  the  law  of 
causality  holds  only  between  homogeneous  things, 
i.  e.  things  having  some  common  property,  and  cannot 
extend  from  one  world  into  another,  its  opposite.  A 
close  analysis  evinced  it  to  be  no  less  absurd,  than 
the  question,  whether  a  man's  affection  for  his  wife 
lay  north-east  or  south-west  of  the  love  he  bore  to- 
wards his  child  ?  Leibnitz's  doctrine  of  a  pre-estab- 
lished harmony,  which  he  certainly  borrowed  from 
Spinoza,  who  had  himself  taken  the  hint  from  Des 
Cartes'  animal  machines,  was  in  its  common  interpre- 
tation too  strange  to  survive  the' inventor — too  repug- 
nant to  our  common  sense  (which  is  not  indeed  enti- 
tled to  a  judicial  voice  in  the  courts  of  scientific  phi- 
losophy ;  but  whose  whispers  still  exert  a  strong  secret 
influence.)  Even  Wolf,  the  admirer,  and  illustrious 
systematizer  of  the  Leibnitzian  doctrine,  contents 
himself  with  defending  the  possibility  of  the  idea,  but 
does  not  adopt  it  as  a  part  of  the  edifice. 

The  hypothesis  of  Hylozoism,  on  the  other  side,  is 
the  death  of  all  rational  physiology,  and,  indeed,  of 
all  physical  science;  for  that  requires  a  limitation  of 
terms,  and  cannot  consist  with  the  arbitrary  power 
of  multiplying  attributes  by  occult  qualities.  Besides, 
it  answers  no  purpose  ;  unless,  indeed,  a  difficulty 
can  be  solved  by  multiplying  it,  or  that  we  can  ac- 
quire a  clearer  notion  of  our  soul,  by  being  told  that 
we  have  a  million  souls,  and  that  every  atom  of  our 
bodies  has  a  soul  of  its  own.  Far  more  prudent  is  it 
to  admit  the  difficulty  once  for  all,  and  then  Jet  it  lie 
at  rest.  There  is  a  sediment,  indeed,  at  the  bottom 
of  the  vessel,  but  all  the  water  above  it  is  clear  and 
transparent.  The  Hylozoist  only  shakes  it  up,  and 
renders  the  whole  turbid. 

72 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


263 


But  it  is  not  either  the  nature  of  man,  or  the  duty 
of  the  philosopher,  to  despair,  concerning  any  import- 
ant problem,  until,  as  in  the  squaring  of  the  circle, 
the  impossibility  of  a  solution  has  been  demonstrated. 
How  the  etst  assumed  as  originally  distinct  from  the 
scire,  can  ever  unite  itself  with  it;  how  being  can 
transform  itself  into  a  knowing,  becomes  conceivable 
on  one  only  condition ;  namely,  if  it  can  be  shown 
that  the  vis  representative,  or  the  sentient,  is  itself  a 
species  of  being;  i.e.  either  as  a  property  or  attri- 
bute, or  as  an  hypostasis  or  self  subsistence.  The 
firmer  is,  indeed,  the  assumption  of  materialism ;  a 
system  which  could  not  but  be  patronized  by  the  phi- 
losopher, if  only  it  actually  performed  what  it  pro- 
mises. But  how  any  affection  from  without  can  me- 
tamorphose itself  into  perception  or  will,  the  mate- 
rialist has  hitherto  left,  not  only  as  incomprehensible 
as  he  found  it,  but  has  aggravated  it  into  a  compre- 
hensible absurdity.  For,  grant  that  an  object  from 
without  could  act  upon  the  conscious  self,  as  on  a 
consubstaniial  object;  yet  such  an  affection  could 
only  engender  something  homogeneous  with  itself. 
Motion  could  only  propagate  motion.  Matter  has  no 
inward.  We  remove  one  surface  but  to  meet  with 
another.  We  can  but  divide  a  particle  into  particles  ; 
and  each  atom  comprehends  in  itself  the  properties 
of  the  material  universe.  Let  any  reflecting  mind 
make  the  experiment  of  explaining  to  itself  the  evi- 
dence of  our  sensuous  intuitions,  from  the  hypothesis 
that  in  any  given  perception  there  is  a  something 
which  has  been  communicated  to  it  by  an  impact  or 
an  impression  ab  extra.  In  the  first  place,  by  the 
impact  on  the  percipient  or  ens  representans,  not  the 
object  itself,  but  only  its  action  or  effect,  will  pass 
into  the  same.  Not  the  iron  tongue,  but  its  vibra- 
tions, pass  into  the  metal  of  the  bell.  Now  in  our 
immediate  perception,  it  is  not  the  mere  power  or 
act  of  the  object,  but  the  object  itself,  which  is  imme- 
diately present.  We  might,  indeed,  attempt  to  ex- 
plain this  result  by  a  chain  of  deductions  and  conclu- 
sions ;  but  that,  first,  the  very  faculty  of  deducing 
and  concluding  would  equally  demand  an  explana- 
tion :  and,  secondly,  that  there  exists,  in  fact,  no  such 
intermediation  by  logical  notions,  such  a3  those  of 
cause  and  effect.  It  is  the  object  itself,  not  the  pro- 
duct of  a  syllogism,  which  is  present  to  our  conscious- 
ness. Or  would  we  explain  this  supervention  of  the 
object  to  the  sensation,  by  a  productive  faculty  Bet  in 
motion  by  an  impulse  ;  still  the  transition,  into  the 
percipient,  of  the  object  itself,  from  which  the  im- 
pulse proceeded,  assumes  a  power  that  can  permeate 
and  wholly  possess  the  soul, 

"  And  like  a  God,  by  spiritual  art. 
Be  all  in  all,  and  all  in  every  part." 

Cowley. 

And  how  came  the  percepient  here?  And  what  is 
become  of  the  wonder-pressing  matter,  that  was  to 
perform  all  these  marvels  by  force  of  mere  figure, 
weight,  and  motion  ?  The  most  consistent  proceeding 
of  the  dogmatic  materialist  is  to  fall  back  into  the 
common  rank  of  soid-and-bodyists  :  to  affect  the  mys- 
terious, and  declare  the  whole  process  a  revelation 
given,  and  not  to  be  understood,  which  it  would  be 


profane  to  examine  too  closely,  Datur  non  intelligi- 
tur.  But  a  revelation  unconfirmed  by  miracles,  and 
a  faith  not  commanded  by  the  conscience,  a  philoso- 
pher may  venture  to  pass  hy,  without  suspecting 
himself  of  any  irreligious  tendency. 

Thus,  as  materialism  has  been  generally  taught,  it 
is  utterly  unintelligible,  and  owes  all  its  proselytes 
to  the  propensity  so  common  among  men,  to  mistake 
distinct  images  for  clear  conceptions ;  and,  vice  versa, 
to  reject  as  inconceivable  whatever  from  its  own  na- 
ture is  unimaginable.  But  as  soon  as  it  becomes 
intelligible,  it  ceases  to  be  materialism.  In  order  to 
explain  thinking,  as  a  material  phenomenon,  il  is 
necessary  to  refine  matter  into  a  mere  modification 
of  intelligence,  with  the  two-fold  function  of  appear- 
ing and  perceiving.  Even  so  did  Priestley  in  his  con- 
troversy with  Price!  He  stript  matter  of  all  its  ma- 
terial properties;  substituted  spiritual  powers,  and 
when  we  expected  to  find  a  body,  behold  !  we  had 
nothing  but  its  ghost!  the  apparition  of  a  defunct 
substance  ! 

I  shall  not  dilate  further  on  this  subject;  because 
it  will  (if  God  grant  health  and  permission)  be  treat- 
ed of  at  large,  and  systematically,  in  a  work,  which 
I  have  many  years  been  preparing,  on  the  Produc- 
tive Logos  human  and  divine;  with,  and  as  the 
introduction  to,  a  full  commentary  on  the  Gospel  of 
St.  John.  To  make  myself  intelligible  as  far  as  my 
present  subject  requires,  it  will  be  sufficient  briefly 
to  observe — 1.  That  all  association  demands  and  pre- 
supposes the  existence  of  the  thoughts  and  images 
to  be  associated.  2.  The  hypothesis  of  an  external 
world  exactly  correspondent  to  those  images  or  modi- 
fications of  our  own  being,  which  alone  (according 
to  this  system)  we  actually  behold,  is  as  thorough 
idealism  as  Berkeley's,  inasmuch  as  it  equally  (per- 
haps, in  a  more  perfect  degree)  removes  all  reality 
and  immediateness  of  perception,  and  places  us  in  a 
dream-world  of  phantoms  and  spectres,  the  inexpli- 
cable swarm  and  equivocal  generation  of  motions  in 
our  own  brains.  3.  That  this  hypothesis  neither  in- 
volves the  explanation,  nor  precludes  the  necessity, 
of  a  mechanism  and  co-adequate  forces  in  the  per- 
cipient, which  at  the  more  than  magic  touch  of  the 
impulse  from  without,  is  to  create  anew  for  itself  the 
correspondent  object.  The  formation  of  a  copy  is 
not  solved  by  the  mere  pre-existence  of  an  original  ; 
the  copyist  of  Raphael's  Transfiguration  must  repeat 
more  or  less  perfectly  the  process  of  Raphael,  ft 
would  be  easy  to  explain  a  thought  from  the  image 
on  the  retrna,  and  that  from  the  geometry  of  light, 
if  this  very  light  did  not  present  the  very  same  diffi- 
culty. We  might  as  rationally  chant  the  Brahmin 
creed  of  the  tortoise  that  supported  the  bear,  that 
supported 'the  elephant,  that  supported  the  world,  to 
the  tune  of  "This  is  the  house  that  Jack  built."  The 
sic  Deo  placilvm  est  we  all  admit  as  the  sufficien' 
cause,  and  the  divine  goodness  as  the  sufficien; 
reason;  but  an  answer  to  the  whence  ?  and  why? 
is  no  answer  to  the  how;  which  alone  is  the  physi- 
ologist's concern.  It  is  a  mere  sophisma  pigrum,  and 
(as  Bacon  hath  said)  the  arrogance  of  pusillanimity, 
which  lifts  up  the  idol  of  a  mortal's  fancy,  and  com- 
273 


264 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


mands  us  to  fall  down  and  worship  it,  as  a  work  of 
divine  wisdom,  an  ancile  or  palladium  fallen  from 
heaven.  By  the  very  same  argument  the  supporters 
of  the  Ptolemaic  system  might  have  rebuffed  the 
Newtonian,  and  pointing  to  the  sky  with  self-com- 
placent *  grin,  have  appealed  to  common  sense  whe- 
ther the  sun  did  not  move,  and  the  earth  stand  still. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

Is  philosophy  possible  as  a  science  7  anil  what  are  its  condi- 
tions?— Giordano  Bruno — Literary  aristocracy,  or  the  ex- 
istence of  a  tacit  compact  among  the  learned  as  a  privileged 
order — The  author's  obligations  to  the  IViy:>tics — To  Eman- 
uel Kant — The  difference  between  the  letter  and  the  spirit 
of  Kant's  writings,  and  a  vindication  of  prudence  in  the 
teaching  of  philosophy — Fichte's  attempt  to  complete  the 
critical  system — Its  partial  success  and  ultimate  failure — 
Obligations  to  Schelling ;  and,  among  English  writers,  to 
Saumarez. 

After  I  had  successively  studied  in  the  schools  of 
Locke,  Berkeley,  Leibnitz,  and  Hartley,  and  could 
find  in  neither  of  them  an  abiding  place  for  my  rea- 
son, I  began  to  ask  myself,  is  a  system  of  philosophy, 
as  different  from  mere  history  and  historic  classifica- 
tion, possible?  If  possible,  what  are  its  necessary 
conditions  ?  I  was  for  a  while  disposed  to  answer 
the  first  question  in  the  negative,  and  to  admit  that 
the  sole  practicable  employment  for  the  human  mind 
was  to  observe,  to  collect,  and  to  classify.  But  I  soon 
felt,  that  human  nature  itself  fought  up  against  this 
wilful  resignation  of  intellect;  and  as  soon  did  I  find, 
that  the  scheme,  taken  with  all  its  consequences,  and 
cleared  of  all  inconsistencies,  was  not  less  impracti- 
cable, than  contra-natural.  Assume,  in  its  full  extent, 
the  position,  nihil  in  inlelleclu  quod  non  prius  in 
sensa,  without  Leibnitz's  qualifying  prater  ipsum  in- 
tellectum,  and  in  the  same  sense  in  which  it  was 
understood  by  Hartley  and  Condi llac,  and  what  Hume 
had  demonstratively  deduced  from  this  concession 
concerning  cause  and  effect,  will  apply  with  equal 
and  crushing  force  to  all  thet  other  eleven  categori- 
cal forms,  and  the  logical  functions  corresponding  to 
them  How  can  we  make  bricks  without  straw?  Or 
build  without  cement?  We  learn  all  things  indeed 
by  occasion  of  experience ;  but  the  very  facts  so  learnt 
force  us  inward  on  the  antecedents,  that  must  be  pre- 
supposed in  order  to  render  experience  itself  possible. 
The  first  book  of  Locke's  Essays  (if  the  supposed 
error,  which  it  labors  to  subvert,  be  not  a  mere 
thing  of  straw;  an  absurdity,  which  no  man  ever 
did,  or,  indeed,  ever  could  believe)  is  formed  on  a 
2<50ij/<a  Er£po£»)r>7jfwtf,  and  involves  the  old  mistake 
of  cum  hoc:  ergo  propter  hoc. 

The  term  Philosophy,  defines  itself  as  an  affection- 
ate seeking  after  the  truth ;  but  Truth  is  the  correla- 
tive of  Being.  This  again  is  no  way  conceivable  ; 
but  by  assuming  as  a  postulate,  that  both  are,  ab 


*  "  And  coxcombs  vanquish  Berkeley  with  a  grin." — Pope. 

t  Videlicet;  Quantity,  quality,  relation,  and  mode,  each 
consisting  of  three  subdivisions.  Vide  Kritik  der  reineu  Ver- 
nunft,  p.  95,  and  100.  Bee,  too,  the  judicious  remarks  in 
Locke  and  Hume. 


initio,  identical  and  co-inherent;  that  intelligence 
and  being  are  reciprocally  each  other's  Substrate.  1 
presumed  that  this  was  a  possible  conception  (i.  e.  that 
it  involved  no  logical  inconsonance)  from  the  length 
of  time  during  which  the  scholastic  definition  of  the 
Supreme  Being,  as  actus  purissimus  sine  ulla  poten- 
tialilate,  was  received  in  the  schools  of  Theology, 
both  by  the  Pontifican  and  the  Reformed  divines. 
The  early  study  of  Plato  and  Plotinus,  with  the  com- 
mentaries and  the  Theologica  Platonica,  of  the 
illustrious  Florentine;  of  Proclus,  dhd  Gemistius 
Pletho;  and,  at  a  later  period,  of  the  "  De  Immenso 
et  Innumerabili,"  and  the  "  De  la  causa,  principio  et 
uno"  of  the  philosopher  of  Nola,  who  could  boast  of 
a  Sir  Philip  Sydney  and  Fulke  Greville  among  his 
patrons,  and  whom  the  idolaters  of  Rome  burnt  as  an 
atheist  in  the  year  16G0;  had  all  contributed  to  pre- 
pare my  mind  for  the  reception  and  welcoming  of  the 
Cogito  quia  sum,  et  sum  quia  Cogito;  a  philosophy  of 
seeming  hardihood,  but  certainly  the  most  ancient, 
and  therefore,  presumptively,  the  most  natural. 

Why  need  I  be  afraid  ?  Say  rather  how  dare  I  be 
ashamed  of  the  Teutonic  theosophist,  Jacob  Behmen  ? 
Many,  indeed,  and  gross  were  his  delusions;  and 
such  as  furnish  frequent  and  ample  occasion  for  the 
triumph  of  the  learned  over  the  poor  ignorant  shoe- 
maker, who  had  dared  to  think  for  himself".  But 
while  we  remember  that  these  delusions  were  such 
as  might  be  anticipated  from  his  utter  want  of  all  in- 
tellectual discipline,  and  from  his  ignorance  of  rational 
psychology,  let  it  not  be  forgotten  that  the  latter  defect 
he  had  in  common  with  the  most  learned  theologians 
of  his  age.  Neither  with  books,  nor  with  book- 
learned  men,  was  he  conversant.  A  meek  and  shy 
quietist,  his  intellectual  powers  were  never  stimu- 
lated into  feverous  energy  by  crowds  of  proselytes,  or 
by  the  ambition  of  proselyting.  Jacob  Behmen  was 
an  enthusiast,  in  the  strictest  sense,  as  not  merely  dis- 
tinguished, but  as  contra-distinguished,  from  a  fanatic. 
While  I  in  part  translate  the  following  observations 
from  a  contemporary  writer  of  the  Continent,  let  me 
be  permitted  to  premise,  that  I  might  have  transcribed 
the  substance  from  memoranda  of  my  own,  which 
were  written  many  years  before  his  pamphlet  was 
given  to  the  world  ;  and  that  I  prefer  another's  words 
to  my  own,  partly  as  a  tribute  due  to  priority  of  pub- 
lication, but  still  more  from  the  pleasure  of  sympathy, 
in  a  case  where  coincidence  only  was  possible. 

Whoever  is  acquainted  with  the  history  of  philoso- 
phy, during  the  two  or  three  last  centuries,  cannot 
but  admit,  that  there  appears  to  have  existed  a  sort 
of  secret  and  tacit  compact  among  the  learned,  not  to 
pass  beyond  a  certain  limit  in  speculative  science. 
The  privilege  of  free  thought,  so  highly  extolled,  has 
at  no  time  been  held  valid  in  actual  practice,  except 
within  this  limit;  and  not  a  single  stride  beyond  it 
has  ever  been  ventured  without  bringing  obloquy  on 
the  transgressor.  The  few  men  of  genius  among  the 
learned  class,  who  actually  did  overstep  this  bound- 
ary, anxiously  avoided  the  appearance  of  having  so 
done.  Therefore,  the  true  depth  of  science,  and  the 
penetration  to  the  inmost  centre,  from  which  all  the 
lines  of  knowledge  diverge,  to  their  ever  distant  cir- 
274 


BI0GRAPI1IA  LITERARIA. 


265 


cumferencc.  was  abandoned  to  the  illiterate,  and  the 
simple,  whom  unstilled  yearning,  and  an  original 
ebulliency  of  spirit,  had  urged  to  the  investigation  of 
the  indwelling  and  living  ground  of  all  things. 
These,  then,  because  their  names  had  never  been 
enrolled  in  the  guilds  of  the  learned,  were  persecuted 
by  the  registered  livery-men  as  interlopers  on  their 
rights  and  privileges.  All,  without  distinction,  were 
branded  as  fanatics  and  phantasts;  not  only  those 
whose  wild  and  exorbitant  imaginations  had  actually 
engendered  only  extravagant  and  grotesque  phan- 
tasms, and  whose  productions  were,  for  the  most 
part,  poor  copies  and  gross  caricatures  of  genuine  in- 
spiration ;  but  the  truly  inspired  likewise,  the  origin- 
als themselves!  And  this  for  no  other  reason  but 
because  they  were  the  unlearned  men  of  humble  and 
obscure  occupations.  When,  and  from  whom  among 
the  literati  by  profession,  have  we  ever  heard  the  di- 
vine doxology  repeated,  "  I  thank  thee,  O  Father ! 
Lord  of  Heaven  and  Earth !  because  thou  hast  hid 
these  things  from  the  wise  and  prudent,  and  hast  re- 
vealed them  unto  babes  ?"  Xo !  the  haughty  priests 
of  learning  not  only  banished  from  the  schools  and 
marls  of  science  all  who  had  dared  draw  living  wa- 
ters from  the  fountain,  but  drove  them  out  of  the  very- 
temple,  which,  mean  time.  "  buyers  and  sellers,  and 
money-changers "  were  suffered  to  make  "  a  den  of 
thieves." 

And  yet  it  would  not  be  easy  to  discover  any  sub- 
stantial ground  for  this  contemptuous  pride  in  those 
literati,  who  have  most  distinguished  themselves  by 
their  scorn  of  Behmen,  De  Thoyras,  George  Fox, 
&c.;  unless  it  be,  that  (hey  could  write  ortographical-  I 
ly,  make  smooth  periods,  and  had  the  fashions  of  au-  J 
thorship  almost  literally  at  their  finger  s  ends,  while 
the  latter,  in  simplicity  of  soul,  made  their  words 
immediate  echoes  of  their  feelings.  Hence  the  fre- 
quency of  those  phrases  among  them,  which  have 
been  mistaken  for  pretences  to  immediate  inspiration : 
as  for  instance,  "  it  was  delivered  unto  me,"  "  /  strove 
not  to  speak,"  "  I  said,  I  will  be  silent,"  "  but  the  word 
uas  in  my  heart  as  a  burning  fire,"  "and  I  could  not 
forbear."  Hence,  too,  the  unwillingness  to  give  of- 
fence ;  hence  the  foresight,  and  the  dread  of  the  cla- 
mors which  would  be  raised  against  them,  so  fre- 
quently avowed  in  the  writings  of  these  men,  and 
expressed,  as  was  natural,  in  the  words  of  the  only 
book  with  which  they  were  familiar.  "  Woe  is  me 
that  I  am  become  a  man  of  strife,  and  a  man  of  con- 
tention—  I  love  peace:  the  souls  of  men  are  dear 
unto  me :  yet  because  I  seek  for  light,  every  one  of 
them  doth  curse  me !"  O !  it  requires  deeper  feeling, 
and  a  stronger  imagination,  than  belong  to  most  of 
those  to  whom  reasoning  and  fluent  expression  have 
been  as  a  trade  learnt  in  bov-hood,  to  conceive  with 
what  might,  with  what  inward  strivings  and  commo- 
tion, the  perception  of  a  new  and  vital  truth  takes 
possession  of  an  uneducated  man  of  genius.  His 
meditations  are  almost  inevitably  employed  on  the 
eternal,  or  the  everlasting :  for  "  the  world  is  not  his 
friend,  nor  the  world's  law."  Need  we  then  be  sur- 
prised, that  under  an  excitement  at  once  so  strong 


and  so  unusual,  the  man's  body  should  sympathize 
with  the  struggles  of  his  mind ;  or  that  he  should  at 
times  be  so  far  deluded  as  to  mistake  the  tumultuous 
sensations  of  his  nerves,  and  the  co-existing  spectres 
of  his  fancy,  as  parts  or  symbols  of  the  truths  which 
were  opening  on  him  ?  It  has  indeed  been  plausibly 
observed,  that  in  order  to  derive  any  advantage,  or  to 
collect  any  intelligible  meaning,  from  the  writings  of 
these  ignorant  mystics,  the  reader  must  bring  with 
him  a  spirit  and  judgment  superior  to  that  of  the 
writers  themselves : 

"  And  what  he  brings,  what  needs  he  elsewhere  seek  V 
Paradise  Regained. 

— A  sophism,  which,  I  fully  agree  with  Warburton, 
is  unworthy  of  Milton:  how  much  more  so  of  the 
awful  person,  in  whose  mouth  he  has  placed  it  ?  One 
assertion  I  will  venture  to  make,  as  suggested  by  my 
own  experience,  that  there  exist  folios  on  the  human 
understanding,  and  nature  of  man,  which  would  have 
a  far  juster  claim  to  their  high  rank  and  celebrity,  if 
in  the  whole  huge  volume  there  could  be  found  as 
much  fulness  of  heart  and  intellect  as  burst  forth  in 
many  a  simple  page  of  George  Fox,  Jacoe  Behmen. 
and  even  of  Behmen's  commentator,  the  pious  and 
fervid  William  Law. 

The  feeling  of  gratitude  which  I  cherish  towards 
these  men  has  caused  me  to  digress  further  than  1 
had  foreseen  or  proposed ;  but  to  have  passed  them 
over  in  an  historical  sketch  of  my  literary  life  and* 
opinions,  would  have  seemed  to  me  like  the  denial 
of  a  debt,  the  concealment  of  a  boon.  For  the  writ- 
ings of  these  mystics  acted  in  no  slight  degree  to  pre- 
vent my  mind  from  being  imprisoned  within  the  out- 
line of  any  single  dogmatic  system.  They  contributed 
to  keep  alive  the  heart  in  the  head;  gave  me  an  in- 
distinct, yet  stirring  and  working  presentiment,  that 
all  the  products  of  the  mere  reflective  faculty  partook 
of  death,  and  were  as  the  rattling  twigs  and  sprays 
in  winter,  into  which  a  sap  was  yet  to  be  propelled 
from  some  root  to  which  I  had  not  yet  penetrated,  if 
thev  were  to  afford  my  soul  either  food  or  shelter.  If 
they  were  too  often  a  moving  cloud  of  smoke  to  me 
by  day.  yet  they  were  always  a  pillar  of  fire  through- 
out the  night,  during  my  wanderings  through  the 
j  wilderness  of  doubt,  and  enabled  me  to  skirt,  without 
I  crossing,  the  sandy  deserts  of  utter  unbelief.  That 
ihe  svstem  is  capable  of  being  converted  into  an  irre- 
lisious  Pantheism,  I  well  know.  The  Ethics  of 
SriNOZA  may,  or  may  not,  be  an  instance.  But,  at  no 
time  could  I  believe,  that  in  itself,  and  essentially,  it 
is  incompatible  with  religion,  natural  or  revealed  ; 
and  now  I  am  most  thoroughly  persuaded  of  the  con- 
trary. The  writings  of  the  illustrious  sage  of  Kon- 
igsberg,  the  founder  of  the  Critical  Philosophy,  more 
than  any  other  work,  at  once  invigorated  and  disci- 
plined my  understanding.  The  originality,  the  depth, 
and  the  compression  of  the  thoughts;  the  novelty  and 
subtletv,  vet  solidity -and  importance,  of  the  distinc- 
tions ;  the  adamantine  chain  of  the  logic  ;  and,  I  will 
venture  to  add,  (paradox  as  it  will  appear  to  those 
who  have  taken  their  notion  of  Emanuel  Kant,  from 
Reviewers  and  Frenchmen.)  the  clearness  and  evi~ 


275 


266 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


dence  of  the  "  Critique  of  the  Pure  Reason  ;"  of 
the  "Judgment;"  of  the  *'  Metaphysical  Elements 
of  Natural  Philosophy,"  and  of  his  "  Religion 

WITHIN  THE  BOUNDS  OF  PURE  REASON,"  took  posses- 
sion of  me  as  with  a  giant's  hand.  After  fifteen  years 
familiarity  with  them,  I  still  read  these  and  all  his 
other  productions  with  undiminished  delight  and  in- 
creasing admiration.  The  few  passages  that  remain- 
ed obscure  to  me,  after  due  efforts  of  thought,  (as  the 
chapter  on  original  apperception,)  and  the  apparent 
contradictions  which  occur,  I  soon  found  were  hints 
and  insinuations  referring  to  ideas,  which  Kant  either 
did  not  think  it  prudent  to  avow,  or  which  he  con- 
sidered as  consistently  left  behind  in  a  pure  analysis, 
not  of  human  nature  in  toto,  but  of  the  speculative  in- 
tellect alone.  Here,  therefore/he  was  constrained  to 
commence  at  the  point  of  reflection,  or  natural  con- 
sciousness :  while  in  his  moral  system  he  was  permit- 
ted to  assume  a  higher  ground  (the  autonomy  of  the 
will)  as  a  postulate  deducible  from  the  uncondi- 
tional command,  or  (in  the  technical  language  of  his 
school)  the  categorical  imperative,  of  the  conscience. 
He  had  been  in  imminent  clanger  of  persecution  dur- 
ing the  reign  of  the  late  king  of  Prussia,  that  strange 
compound  of  lawless  debauchery,  and  priest-ridden 
superstition ;  and  it  is  probable  that  he  had  little  in- 
clination, in  his  old  age,  to  act  over  again  the  fortunes 
and  hair-breadth  escapes  of  Wolf.  The  expulsion  of 
'the  first  among  Kant's  disciples,  who  attempted  to 
complete  his  system,  from  the  university  of  Jena,  with 
the  confiscation  and  prohibition  of  the  obnoxious  work, 
by  the  joint  efforts  of  the  courts  of  Saxony  and  Hano- 
ver, supplied  experimental  proof,  that  the  venerable 
old  man's  caution  was  not  groundless.  In  spite,  there- 
fore, of  his  own  declarations,  I  could  never  believe  it 
was  possible  for  him  to  have  meant  no  more  by  his 
Noumenon,  or  Thing  in  Itself,  than  his  mere  words 
express ;  or,  that  in  his  own  conception  he  confined 
the  whole  plastic  power  to  the  forms  of  the  intellect, 
leaving  for  the  external  cause,  for  the  materiale  of  our 
sensations,  a  matter  without  form,  which  is  doubtless 
inconceivable.  I  entertained  doubts  likewise,  whe- 
ther, in  his  own  mind,  he  even  laid  all  the  stress, 
which  he  appears  to  do,  on  the  moral  postulates. 

An  idea,  in  the  highest  sense  of  that  word,  cannot 
be  conveyed  but  by  a  symbol ;  and,  except  in  geome- 
try, all  symbols  of  necessity  involve  an  apparent  con- 
tradiction. $<!>vnsz  Twhoistv :  and  for  those  who 
could  not  pierce  through  this  symbolical  husk',  his 
writings  were  not  intended.  Questions  which  can- 
not be  fully  answered  without  exposing  the  respond- 
ent lo  personal  danger,  are  not  entitled  to  a  fair  an- 
swer; and  yet  to  say  this  openly,  would  in  many 
cases  furnish  the  very  advantage  which  the  adver- 
sary is  insidiously  seeking  after.  Veracity  does  not 
consist  in  saying,  but  in  the  intention  of  communicat- 
ing truth ;  and  the  philosopher  who  cannot  utter  the 
whole  truth  without  conveying  falsehood,  and  at  the 
same  time,  perhaps,  exciting  the  most  malignant  pas- 
s-ions, is  constrained  to  express  himself  either  mythi- 
cally or  equivocally.  When  Kant,  therefore,  was  im- 
portuned to  settle  the  disputes  of  his  commentators 


himself,  by  declaring  what  he  meant,  how  could  he 
decline  the  honors  of  martyrdom  with  less  offence 
than  by  simply  replying,  "  I  meant  what  I  said  ;  and 
at  the  age  of  near  four  score,  I  have  something  else, 
and  more  important  to  do,  than  to  write  a  comment- 
ary on  my  own  works." 

Ficiite's  Wissenschaftslehre,  or  Lore  of  Ultimate 
Science,  was  to  add  the  key-stone  of  the  arch ;  and 
by  commencing  with  an  act,  instead  of  a  thing  or  sub- 
stance, Fichte  assuredly  gave  the  "first  mortal  blow  to 
Spinozism,  as  taught  by  Spinoza  himself;  and  sup- 
plied the  idea  of  a  system  truly  metaphysical,  and  of 
a  metaphysique  truly  systematic :  (i.  e.  having  its 
spring  and  principle  within  itself)  But  this  funda- 
mental idea  he  overbuilt  with  a  heavy  mass  of  mere 
notions,  and  psychological  acts  of  arbitrary  reflection. 
Thus  his  theory  degenerated  into  a  crude  egoismus,* 
a  boastful  and  hyperstoic  hostility  to  Nature,  as  life- 
less, godless,  and  altogether  unholy:  while  his  reli- 
gion consisted  in  the  assumption  of  a  mere  ordo  or- 
dinans,  which  we  were  permitted  exoterice  to  call 
God  ;  and  his  ethics  in  an  ascetic,  and  almost  monk- 
ish mortification  of  the  natural  passions  and  desires. 

In  Schilling's  "  Natur-Philosophie,"  and  the 
"  System  des  transcendentalen  Idealismus,"  I 
first  found  a  genial  coincidence  with  much  that  I  had 
toiled  out  for  myself,  and  a  powerful  assistance  in 
what  I  had  yet  to  do. 

*  The  following  burlesque  on  the  Fichtean  Egoismus  may, 
perhaps,  be  amusing  to  the  few  who  have  studied  the  system, 
and  to  those  who  are  unacquainted  with  it,  may  convey  as 
tolerable  a  likeness  of  Fichte's  idealism  as  can  be  expected 
from  an  avowed  caricature. 

The  categorical  imperative,  or  the  annunciation  of  the  new 
Teutonic  God,  ETftENKAinAN :  a  dithyrambic  Ode,  by 
Querkope  Von  Klubslick,  Grammarian,  and  Subrector  in 
Gymnasio.**** 

Eu !  Dei  vices  gerens,  ipse  Divus, 

(Speak  English,  Friend  !)  the  God  Imperativus, 

Here  on  this  market-cross  aloud  I  cry: 

1,1,  I!  I  itself  I! 

The  form  and  the  substance,  the  what  and  the  why, 

The  when  and  the  where,  and  the  low  and  the  high, 

The  inside  and  outside,  the  earth  and  the  sky, 

I,  you,  and  he,  and  he,  you  and  I, 

All  souls  and  all  bodies  are  I  itself  I  ! 

All  I  itself  I ! 

(Fools,  a  truce  with  this  startling  !) 
All  my  I !  all  my  I ! 
He 's  a  heretic  dog  who  but  adds  Betty  Martin  ! 

Thus  cried  the  God  wilh  high  imperial  tone : 

In  robe  of  stillest  state,  that  scoff'd  at  beauty, 

A  pronoun-verb  imperative  he  shone — 

Then  substantive  and  plural-singular  grown, 

He  thus  spake  on  :  Behold  in  I  alone 

(For  ethics  boast  a  syntax  of  their  own) 

Or  if  in  ye,  yet  as  I  doth  depute  ye, 

In  O  !  I,  you,  the  vocative  of  duty  ! 

I  of  the  world's  whole  Lexicon  the  root  1 

Of  the  whole  universe  of  touch,  sound,  sight, 

The  genitive  and  ablative  to  boot : 

The  accusative  of  wrong,  the  nom'native  of  right, 

And  in  all  cases  the  case  absolute  ! 

Self  construed,  I  all  other  moods  decline: 

Imperative,  from  nothing  we  derive  us  ; 

Yet  as  a  super-postulate  of  mine, 

Unconstrued  antecedence  I  assign 

To  X,  Y,  Z,  the  God  infinitivua ! 

276 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


267 


I  have  introduced  this  statement  as  appropriate  to 
the  narrative  nature  of  this  sketch  ;  yet  rather  in 
reference  to  the  work  which  I  have  announced  in  a 
preceding  page,  than  to  my  present  subject.  It  would 
be  but  a  mere  act  of  justice  to  myself,  were  I  to  warn 
my  future  readers,  that  an  identity  of  thought,  or  even 
similarity  of  phrase  will  not  be  at  all  times  a  certain 
proof  thai  (he  passage  has  been  borrowed  from  Sehel- 
ling,  or  that  the  conceptions  were  originally  learnt 
from  him.  In  this  instance,  as  in  the  dramatic  lec- 
tures of  Schlegel  to  which  I  have  before  alluded, 
from  the  same  motive  of  self-defence  against  the 
charge  of  plagiarism,  many  of  the  most  striking  re- 
semblances; indeed,  all  the  main  and  fundamental 
ideas,  were  born  and  matured  in  my  mind  before  I 
had  ever  seen  a  single  page  of  the  German  Philoso- 
pher; and  I  might  indeed,  affirm  with  truth,  be- 
fore the  more  important  works  of  Schelling  had  been 
written,  or  at  least  made  public.  Nor  is  this  coin- 
cidence at  all  to  be  wondered  at.  We  had  studied 
in  the  same  school ;  been  disciplined  by  the  same 
preparatory  philosophy,  namely,  the  writings  of  Kant  ; 
we  had  both  equal  obligation  to  the  polar  logic 
and  dynamic  philosophy  of  Giordano  Bruno;  and 
Schelling  has  lately,  and,  as  of  recent  acquisition, 
avowed  that  same  affectionate  reverence  for  the  la- 
bors of  Behmen,  and  other  mystics,  which  I  had  form- 
ed at  a  much  earlier  period.  The  coincidence  of 
Schellixg's  system  with  certain  general  ideas  of 
Behmen,  he  declares  to  have  been  mere  coincidence ; 
while  my  obligations  have  been  more  direct.  He 
needs  give  to  Behmen  only  feelings  of  sympathy; 
while  I  owe  him  a  debt  of  gratitude.  God  forbid 
that  I  should  be  suspected  of  a  wish  to  enter  into  a 
rivalry  with  Schelling  for  the  honors  so  unequivo- 
cally his  right,  not  only  as  a  great  and  original  ge- 
nius, but  as  the  founder  of  the  Philosophy  of  Na- 
ture, and  as  the  most  successful  improver  of  the  Dy- 
namic System,*  which,  begun  by  Bruno,  was  re-in- 


*It  would  be  an  act  of  high  and  almost  criminal  injustice 
to  pass  over  in  silence  the  name  of  Mr.  Richard  Saumarez, 
a  gentleman  equally  well  known  as  a  medical  man  and  as  a 
philanthropist,  but  who  demands  notice  on  the  present  occa- 
sion as  the  author  of  "A  new  System  of  Physiology,"  in 
two  volumes  octavo,  published  1797 ;  and  in  1812,  of  "  An 
Examination  of  the  natural  and  artificial  Systems  of  Philoso- 
phy which  now  prevail,"  in  one  volume  octavo,  entitled, 
"The  Principles  of  physiological  and  physical  science." 
The  latter  work  is  not  quite  equal  to  the  former  in  style  or 
arrangement;  and  there  is  a  greater  necessity  of  distinguish- 
ing the  principles  of  the  author's  philosophy  from  his  conjec- 
tures concerning  color,  the  atmospheric  matter,  comets,  &c, 
which,  whether  just  or  erroneous,  are  by  no  means  necessary 
consequences  of  that  philosophy.  Yet  even  in  this  depart- 
ment of  this  volume,  which  I  regard  as  comparatively  the  in- 
ferior work,  the  reasonings  by  which  Mr.  Saumarez  invali- 
dates the  immanence  of  an  infinite  power  in  any  finite  sub- 
stance, are  the  offspring  of  no  common  mind;  and  the 
experiment  on  the  expansibility  of  the  air  is  at  least  plausible 
and  highly  ingenious.  But  the  merit,  which  will  secure  both 
to  the  book  and  to  the  writer  a  high  and  honorable  name 
with  posterity,  consists  in  the  masterly  force  of  reasoning,  and 
the  copiousness  of  induction,  with  which  he  has  assailed,  and 
(in  my  opinion)  subverted  the  tyranny  of  the  mechanic  sys- 
tem in  physiology  ;  established  not  only  the  existence  of  final 
causes,  but  their  necessity  and  efficiency  in  every  system  that 
merits  the  name  of  philosophical ;  and  substituting  life  and 


troduced  (in  a  more  philosophical  form,  and  freed 
from  all  its  impurities  and  visionary  accompaniments) 
by  Kant  ;  in  whom  it  was  the  native  and  necessary 
growth  of  his  own  system.  Kant's  followers,  how- 
ever, on  whom  (for  the  greater  part)  their  master's 
cloak  had  fallen,  without,  or  with  a  very  scanty  por- 
tion of,  his  spirit,  had  adopted  his  dynamic  ideas  only 
as  a  more  refined  species  of  mechanics.  With  ex- 
ception of  one  or  two  fundamental  ideas,  which  can- 
not be  withheld  from  Ficiite,  to  Schelling  we  owe 
the  completion,  and  the  most  important  victories,  of 
this  revolution  in  philosophy.  To  me  it  will  be  hap- 
piness and  honor  enough,  should  I  succeed  in  render- 
ing the  system  itself  intelligible  to  my  countrymen, 
and  in  the  application  of  it  to  the  most  awful  of  sub- 
jects for  the  most  important  of  purposes.  Whether  a 
work  is  the  offspring  of  a  man's  own  spirit,  and  the 
product  of  original  thinking,  will  be  discovered  by 
those  who  are  its  sole  legitimate  judges,  by  better 
tests  than  the  mere  reference  to  dates.  For  readers 
in  general,  let  whatever  shall  be  found  in  this,  or 
any  future  work  of  mine,  that  resembles,  or  coincides 
with,  the  doctrines  of  my  German  predecessor,  though 
contemporary,  be  wholly  attributed  to  him  :  provided, 
that  the  absence  of  distinct  references  to  his  books, 
which  I  could  not  at  all  times  make  with  truth  as  de- 
signating citations  or  thoughts  actually  derived  from 
him,  and  which,  I  trust,  would,  after  this  general  ac- 
knowledgment, be  superfluous,  be  not  charged  on  me 
as  an  ungenerous  concealment  or  intentional  plagiar- 
ism. I  have  not  indeed  (eheu !  res  angusta  domi !) 
been  hitherto  able  to  procure  more  than  two  of  his 
books,  viz:  the  first  volume  of  his  collected  Tracts, 
and  his  System  of  Transcendental  Idealism ;  to  which, 
however,  I  must  add  a  small  pamphlet  against  Fichte, 
the  spirit  of  which  was  to  my  feelings  painfully  in- 
congruous with  the  principles,  and  which  (with  the 
usual  allowance  afforded  to  an  antithesis)  displayed 
the  love  of  wisdom  rather  than  the  wisdom  of  love. 
I  regard  truth  as  a  divine  ventriloquist:  I  care  not 
from  whose  mouth  the  sounds  are  supposed  to  proceed, 
if  only  the  words  are  audible  and  intelligible.  "Albeit, 
I  must  confess  to  be  half  in  doubt,  whether  I  should 
bring  it  forth  or  no,  it  being  so  contrary  to  the  eye  of 
the  world,  and  the  world  so  potent  in  most  men's 
hearts,  that  I  shall  endanger  either  not  to  be  regarded 
or  not  to  be  understood."  —  Milton:  Reason  of 
Church  Government. 

progressive  power,  for  the  contradictory  inert  force,  has  a 
light  to  be  known  and  remembered  as  the  first  instaurator  of 
the  dynamic  philosophy  in  England.  The  author's  views,  as 
far  as  concerns  himself,  are  unborrowed  and  completely  his 
own,  as  he  neither  possessed,  nor  do  his  writings  discover, 
the  least  acquaintance  with  the  works  of  Kant,  in  which  the 
germs  of  philosophy  exist,  and  his  volumes  were  published 
many  years  before  the  full  development  of  these  germs  by 
Schelling.  Mr.  Saumarez's  detection  of  the  Brunonian  sys- 
tem was  no  light  or  ordinary  service  at  the  time ;  and  I 
scarcely  remember  in  any  work  on  any  subject  a  confutation 
so  thoroughly  satisfactory.  It  is  sufficient  at  this  time  to  have 
staled  the  fa9t;  as  in  the  preface  to  the  work,  which  I  have 
already  announced  on  the  Logos,  I  have  exhibited  in  detail 
the  merits  of  this  writer  and  genuine  philosopher  who  need- 
ed only  have  taken  his  foundations  somewhat  deeper  and 
wider  to  have  superseded  a  considerable  part  of  my  labors. 
277 


268 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


And  to  conclude  Ihe  subject  of  citation,  with  a 
cluster  of  citations,  which,  as  taken  from  books  not 
in  common  use,  may  contribute  to  the  reader's  amuse- 
ment, as  a  voluntary  before  a  sermon. 

"  Dolet  mihi  quidem  deliciis  literarum  inescatos 
subito  jam  homines  "adeo  esse,  prresertim  dui  Christ- 
ianos  se  profitentur,  et  legere  nisi  quod  ad  delectation- 
em  facit,  sustineant  nihil :  unde  et  discipline  severio- 
res  et  philosophia  ipsa  jam  fere  prorsus  etiam  a  doctis 
negliguntur.  Quod  quidem  propositum  studiorum, 
nisi  mature  corrigitur,  tarn  magnum  rebus  incom- 
modum  dabit,  quam  dedit  Barbaries  olim.  Pertinax 
res  Barbaries  est,  fateor:  sed  minus  potest  tamen, 
quam  ilia  mollities  et  persuasa  prudentia  literarum, 
quae  si  ratione  caret,  sapientias  virtutisque  specie 
mortales  misere  circumducit.  Succedet  igitur,  ut 
arbitror,  haud  ita  multo  post,  pro  rusticana  seculi 
nostri  ruditate  captatrix  ilia  communiloquentia  robur 
animi  virilis  omne,  omnem  virtutem  masculam  profli- 
gatura,  nisi  cavetur." 

Simon  Gryn.«us,  candido  lectori,  prefixed  to  the 
Latin  translation  of  Plato,  by  Marsilius  Ficinus. 
Lugduni,  1557.  A  too  prophetic  remark,  which  has 
been  in  fulfilment  from  the  year  1680  to  the  present, 
1815.  N.  B.  By  "  persuasa  prudentia,"  Grynaeus 
means  self-complacent  common  sense  as  opposed  to 
science  and  philosophic  reason. 

"  Est  medius  ordo  et  velut  equestris  Ingeniorum 
quidem  sagacium  et  rebus  humanis  commodorum, 
non  tamen  in  primam  magnitudinem  patentium. 
Eorum  hominum,  ut  ita  dicam,  major  annona  est. 
Sedulum  esse,  nihil  temere  loqui,  assuescere  labori, 
et  imagine  prudential  et  modestise  tegere  angustiores 
partes  captus  dum  exercitationem  et  usum,  quo  isti 
in  civilibus  rebus  pollent,  pro  natura  et  magnitudine 

ingenii  plerique  accipiunt." Barclaii  Argenis, 

p.  71. 

"  As  therefore  physicians  are  many  times  forced  to 
leave  such  methods  of  curing  as  themselves  know  to 
be  fittest,  and,  being  over-ruled  by  the  sick  man's 
impatience,  are  fain  to  try  the  best  they  can ;  in  like 
sort,  considering  how  the  case  doth  stand  with  the 
present  age,  full  of  tongue  and  weak  of  brain,  behold 
we  would  (if  our  subject  permitted  it)  yield  to  the 
stream  thereof.  That  way  we  would  be  contented 
to  prove  our  thesis,  which,  being  the  worse  in  itself, 
notwithstanding,  is  now,  by  reason  of  common  im- 
becility, the  fitter  and  likelier  to  be  brooked." 

Hooker. 

If  this  fear  could  be  rationally  entertained  in  the 
controversial  age  of  Hooker,  under  the  then  robust 
discipline  of  the  scholastic  logic,  pardonably  may  a 
writer  of  the  present  times  anticipate  a  scanty  audi- 
ence for  abstrusest  themes,  and  truths  that  can  neither 
be  communicated  nor  received  without  effort  of 
thought,  as  well  as  patience  of  attention. 

"  Che  e'io  non  erro  al  calcular  de'  punti. 
Par  ch'  Asinini  Stella  a  noi  predomini. 
E'l  Somaro  e'l  castron  si  sian  congiunti 
II  tempo  d'Apulcio  plu  non  si  Domini: 
Che  se  alloro  un  sol  Huom  sembrava  un  Asino, 
Mille  Asini  a  miei  di  rassembran  Huomini!" 

JDi  Saluator  Rosa,  Satix.  1. 1.  10. 


CHAPTER  X. 

A  chapter  of  digression  and  anecdotes,  as  an  interlude  pre- 
ceding that  on  the  nature  and  genesis  of  the  imagination  oi 
plastic  power — On  pedantry  and  pedantic  expressions — Ad- 
vice to  young  authors  respecting  publication — Various 
anecdotes  of  the  author's  literary  life,  and  the  progress  of 
his  opinions  in  religion  and  politics. 

"  Esemplastic.  The  word  is  not  in  Johnson,  nor 
have  I  met  with  it  elsewhere."  Neither  have  1 1  I 
constructed  it  myself  from  the  Greek  word  ci;  cv 
Tr\aTTttv,  i.  e.  to  shape  into  one  ;  because,  having  to 
convey  a  new  sense,  I  thought  that  a  new  term 
would  both  aid  the  recollection  of  my  meaning,  and 
prevent  its  being  confounded  with  the  usual  import 
of  the  word  imagination.  "  But  this  is  pedantry  !  " 
Not  necessarily  so,  I  hope.  If  I  am  not  misinformed, 
pedantry  consists  in  the  use  of  words  unsuitable  to 
the  time,  place,  and  company.  The  language  of  the 
market  would  be  in  the  schools  as  pedantic,  though 
it  might  not  be  reprobated  by  that  name,  as  the  lan- 
guage of  the  schools  in  the  market.  The  mere  man  of 
the  world,  who  insists  that  no  other  terms  but  such  as 
occur  in  common  conversation  should  be  employed 
in  a  scientific  disquisition,  and,  with  no  greater  pre- 
cision, is  as  truly  a  pedant  as  the  man  of  letters,  who, 
either  over-rating  the  acquirements  of  his  auditors, 
or  misled  by  his  own  familiarity  with  technical  or 
scholastic  terms,  converses  at  the  wine-table  with 
his  mind  fixed  on  his  museum  or  laboratory;  even 
though  the  latter  pedant,  instead  of  desiring  his  wife 
to  make  the  tea,  should  bid  her  add  to  the  quant.  suff 
of  thea  sinensis  the  oxyd  of  hydrogen  saturated  with 
caloric.  To  use  the  colloquial  (and  in  truth,  some- 
what vulgar)  metaphor,  if  the  pedant  of  the  cloister, 
and  the  pedant  of  the  lobby,  both  smell  equally  of 
the  shop,  yet  the  odour  from  the  Russian  binding  of 
good  old  authentic-looking  folios  and  quartos,  is  less 
annoying  than  the  steams  from  the  tavern  or  bagnio. 
Nay,  though  the  pedantry  of  the  scholar  should  be- 
tray a  little  ostentation,  yet  a  well-conditioned  mind 
would  more  easily,  methinks,  tolerate  the  fox  brush 
of  learned  vanity,  than  the  sans  culotterie  of  a  con- 
temptuous ignorance,  that  assumes  a  merit  from  mu- 
tilation in  the  self  consoling  sneer  at  the  pompous 
incumbrance  of  tails. 

The  first  lesson  of  philosophic  discipline  is  to  wean 
the  student's  attention  from  the  degrees  of  things, 
which  alone  form  the  vocabulary  of  common  life, 
and  to  direct  it  to  the  kind,  abstracted  from  degree. 
Thus  the  chemical  student  is  taught  not  to  be  startled 
at  disquisitions  on  heat  in  ice,  or  on  latent  and  fixible 
light.  In  such  discourse,  the  instructor  has  no  other 
alternative  than  either  to  use  old  words  with  new 
meanings,  (the  plan  adopted  by  Darwin  in  his  Zoono- 
mia,)  or  to  introduce  new  terms,  after  the  example  of 
LirmtBUB,  and  the  framers  of  the  present  chemical 
nomenclature.  The  latter  mode  is  evidently  prefer- 
able, were  it  only  that  the  former  demands  a  two- 
fold exertion  of  thought  in  one  and  the  same  act. 
For  the  reader  (or  hearer)  is  required  not  only  to  learn 
and  bear  in  mind  the  new  definition,  but  to  unlearn 
and  keep  out  of  his  view,  the  old  and  habitual  mean- 
278 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


269 


ing;  a  far  raore  difficult  and  perplexing  task,  and  for 
which  the  mere  semblance  of  eschewing  pedantry 
seems  to  me  an  inadequate  compensation.  Where, 
indeed,  it  is  in  our  power  to  recall  an  appropriate 
term  that  had,  without  sufficient  reason,  become 
obsolete,  it  is  doubtless  a  less  evil  to  restore  than  to 
coin  anew.  Thus,  to  express  in  one  word  all  that 
appertains  to  the  perception  considered  as  passive, 
and  merely  recipient,  I  have  adopted  from  our  elder 
classics  the  word  serisuous ;  because  sensual  is  not  at 
present  used  except  in  a  bad  sense,  or  at  least  as  a 
moral  distinction,  while  sensitive  and  sensible  would 
each  convey  a  different  meaning.  Thus,  too,  I  have 
followed  Hooker,  Sanderson,  Milton,  &c.  in  desig- 
nating the  immediateness  of  any  act  or  object  of 
knowledge  by  the  word  intuition,  used  sometimes 
subjectively,  sometimes  objectively,  even  as  we  use 
the  word  thought;  now  as  the  thought,  or  act  of 
thinking,  and  now  as  a  thought,  or  the  object  of  our 
reflection  :  and  we  do  this  without  confusion  or  ob- 
scurity. The  very  words  objective  and  subjective, 
of  such  constant  recurrence  in  the  schools  of  yore, 
I  have  ventured  to  re-introduce,  because  I  could  not 
so  briefly,  or  conveniently,  by  any  more  familiar 
terms,  distinguish  the  percipere  from  the  percipi. 
Lastly,  I  have  cautiously  discriminated  the  terms, 
the  reason,  and  the  understanding,  encouraged 
and  confirmed  by  the  authority  of  our  genuine  divines 
and  philosophers,  before  the  revolution  s 


-"both  life,  and  sense. 


Fancy,  and  understanding  :  whence  the  soul 
Reason  receives,  and  reason  is  her  being, 
Discursive  or  intuitive.    Discourse'" 
Is  oftesl  your's,  the  latter  most  is  our's, 
Differing  but  in  degree,  in  kind  the  same." 

Paradise  Lost,  Book  V. 

I  say,  that  I  was  conjirmed  by  authority  so  venera- 
ble;  for  I  had  previous  and  higher  motives  in  my 
own  conviction  of  the  importance,  nay,  of  the  neces- 
sity of  the  distinction,  as  both  an  indispensable  con- 
dition and  a  vital  part  of  all  sound  speculation  in 
metaphysics,  ethical  or  theological.  To  establish  this 
distinction  was  one  main  object  of  The  Friend  ;  if 
even  in  a  biography  of  my  own  literary  life  I  can 
with  propriety  refer  to  a  work  which  was  printed 
rather  than  published,  or  so  published  that  it  had 
been  well  for  the  unfortunate  author  if  it  had  re- 
mained in  manuscript!  I  have  even  at  this  time 
bitter  cause  for  remembering  that  which  a  number 
of  my  subscribers  have  but  a  trifling  motive  for  for- 
getting. This  effusion  might  have  been  spared ;  but  I 
would  fain  flatter  myself  that  the  reader  will  be  less 
austere  than  an  oriental  professor  of  the  bastinado, 
who,  during  an  attempt  to  extort  per  argumentum 
baculinum  a  full  confession  from  a  culprit,  interrupt- 
ed his  outcry  of  pain  by  reminding  him  that  it  was 


*  But  for  sundry  notes  on  Shakspearc,  &c.  which  have 
fallen  in  my  way,  1  should  have  deemed  it  unnecessary  to 
observe,  that  discourse  here,  or  elsewhere,  does  not  mean 
what  we  now  call  discoursing ;  but  the  discursion  of  the 
mind,  the  processes  of  generalization  and  stibsumption,  of 
deduction  and  conclusion.  Thus  philosophy  has  hitherto  been 
discursive,  while  Geometry  is  always  and  essentially,  in- 
tuitive. 


"  a  mere  digression !"  All  this  noise,  sir,  is  nothing 
to  the  point,  and  no  sort  of  answer  to  my  questions  ! 
Ah  !  but  (replied  the  sufferer)  it  is  the  most  pertinent 
reply  in  nature  to  your  blows. 

An  imprudent  man,  of  common  goodness  of  heart, 
cannot  but  wish  to  turn  even  his  imprudences  to  the 
benefit  of  others,  as  far  as  this  is  possible.  If,  there- 
fore, any  one  of  the  readers  of  this  semi-narrative 
should  be  preparing  or  intending  a  periodical  work,  I 
warn  him,  in  the  first  place,  against  trusting  in  the 
number  of  names  on  his  subscription  list.  For  he 
cannot  be  certain  that  the  names  were  put  down  by 
sufficient  authority;  or  should  that  be  ascertained,  it 
still  remains  to  be  known,  whether  they  were  not 
extorted  by  some  over-zealous  friend's  importunity  ; 
whether  the  subscriber  had  not  yielded  his  name 
merely  from  want  of  courage  to  answer  no  !  and  with 
the  intention  of  dropping  the  work  as  soon  as  possible. 
One  gentleman  procured  me  nearly  a  hundred  names 
for  The  Friend,  and  not  only  took  frequent  opportu- 
nity to  remind  me  of  his  success  in  his  canvass,  but 
labored  to  impress  my  mind  with  the  sense  of 
the  obligation  I  was  under  to  the  subscribers ;  for  (as 
he  very  pertinently  admonished  me)  "ffty-two  shil- 
lings a  year  was  a  large  sum  to  be  bestowed  on  one 
individual,  where  there  were  so  many  objects  of 
charity  with  strong  claims  to  the  assistance  of  the 
benevolent."  Of  these  hundred  patrons  ninety  threw 
up  the  publication  before  the  fourth  number,  without 
any  notice ;  though  it  was  well  known  to  them,  that 
in  consequence  of  the  distance,  and  slowness  and 
irregularity  of  the  conveyance,  I  was  compelled  to 
lay  in  a  stock  of  stamped  paper  for  at  least  eight 
weeks  beforehand  ;  each  sheet  of  which  stood  me  in 
five  pence  previous  to  its  arrival  at  my  printer's ; 
though  the  subscription  money  was  not  to  be  received 
till  the  twenty-first  week  after  the  commencement 
of  the  work ;  and  lastly,  though  it  was  in  nine  cases 
out  of  ten  impracticable  for  me  to  receive  the  money 
for  two  or  three  numbers,  without  paying  an  equal 
sum  for  the  postage. 

In  confirmation  of  my  first  caveat,  I  will  select  one 
fact  among  many.  On  my  list  of  subscribers,  among 
a  considerable  number  of  names  equally  flattering, 
was  that  of  an  Earl  of  Cork,  with  his  address.  He 
might  as  well  have  been  an  Earl  of  Bottle,  for  aught 
/knew  of  him,  who  had  been  content  to  reverence 
the  peerage  in  abstracto,  rather  than  in  concretis. 
Of  course,  The  Friend  was  regularly  sent  as  far,  if 
I  remember  right,  as  the  eighteenth  number,  i.  e.  till 
a  fortnight  before  the  subscription  was  to  be  paid. 
And  lo!  just  at  this  time  I  received  a  letter  from  his 
lordship,  reproving  me  in  language  far  more  lordly 
than  courteous,  for  my  impudence  in  directing  my 
pamphlets  to  him,  who  knew  nothing  of  me  or  my 
work !  Seventeen  or  eighteen  numbers  of  which, 
however,  his  lordship  was  pleased  to  retain,  probably 
for  the  culinary  or  post-culinary  conveniences  of  his 
servants. 

Secondly,  I  warn  all  others  from  the  attempt  to 

deviate  from  the  ordinary  mode  of  publishing  a  work 

by  the  trade.     I  thought,  indeed,  that  to  the  purchaser 

it  was  indifferent,  whether  thirty  per  cent,  of  the 

279 


270 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


purchase-money  went  to  the  booksellers  or  to  the 
government ;  and  that  the  convenience  of  receiv- 
ing the  work  by  the  post  at  his  own  door  would  give 
the  preference  to  the  latter.  It  is  hard,  I  own,  to 
have  been  laboring  for  years,  in  collecting  and  ar- 
ranging the  materials;  to  have  spent  every  shilling 
that  could  be  spared  after  the  necessaries  of  life  had 
been  furnished,  in  buying  books,  or  in  journeys  for  the 
purpose  of  consulting  them,  or  of  acquiring  facts  at 
the  fountain  head  ;  then  to  buy  the  paper,  pay  for  the 
printing,  &c.  all  at  least  fifteen  per  cent,  beyond  what 
the  trade  would  have  paid;  and  then,  after  all,  to 
give  thirty  per  cent,  not  of  the  nett  profits,  but  of  the 
gross  results  of  the  sale,  to  a  man  who  has  merely  to 
give  the  books  shelf  or  warehouse  room,  and  permit 
his  apprentice  to  hand  them  over  the  counter  to  those 
who  may  ask  for  them  ;  and  this,  too,  copy  by  copy, 
although,  if  the  work  be  on  any  philosophical  or  sci- 
entific subject,  it  may  be  years  before  the  edition  is 
sold  off.  All  this,  I  confess,  must  seem  a  hardship, 
and  one  to  which  the  products  of  industry  in  no  other 
mode  of  exertion  are  subject.  Yet  even  this  is  bet- 
ter, far  better,  than  to  attempt  in  any  way  to  unite 
the  functions  of  author  and  publisher.  But  the  most 
prudent  mode  is  to  sell  the  copy-right,  at  least  of  one 
or  more  editions,  lor  the  most  that  the  trade  will  offer. 
By  few,  only,  can  a  large  remuneration  be  expected  ; 
but  fifty  pounds  and  ease  of  mind  are  of  more  real 
advantage  to  a  literary  man,  than  the  chance  of  five 
hundred,  with  the  certainly  of  insult  and  degrading 
anxieties.  I  shall  have  been  grievously  misunder- 
stood, if  this  statement  should  be  interpreted  as  writ- 
ten with  the  desire  of  detracting  from  the  character 
of  booksellers  or  publishers.  The  individuals  did  not 
make  the  laws  and  customs  of  their  trade  ;  but,  as  in 
every  other  trade,  take  them  as  they  find  them.  Till 
the  evil  can  be  proved  to  be  removable,  and  without 
the  substitution  of  an  equal  or  greater  inconvenience, 
it  were  neither  wise  nor  manly  even  to  complain  of 
it.  But  to  use  it  as  a  pretext  for  speaking,  or  even 
for  thinking,  or  feeling,  unkindly  or  opprobriously  of 
the  tradesmen  as  individuate,  would  be  something 
worse  than  unwise  or  even  than  unmanly ;  it  would 
be  immoral  and  calumnious !  My  motives  point  in  a 
far  different  direction,  and  to  far  other  objects,  as 
will  be  seen  in  the  conclusion  of  the  chapter. 

A  learned  and  exemplary  old  clergvman,  who 
many  years  ago  went  to  his  reward,  followed  by  the 
regrets  and  blessings  of  his  flock,  published,  at  his 
own  expense,  two  volumes  octavo,  entitled,  a  new 
Theory  of  Redemption.  The  work  was  most  severely 
handled  in  the  Monthly  or  Critical  Review,  I  forget 
which ;  and  this  unprovoked  hostility  became  the 
good  old  man's  favorite  topic  of  conversation  among 
his  friends.  Well !  (he  used  to  exclaim,)  in  the  se- 
cond edition,  I  shall  have  an  opportunity  of  exposing 
both  the  ignorance  and  the  malignity  of  the  anony- 
mous critic.  Two  or  three  years,  however,  passed 
by  without  any  tidings  from  the  bookseller  who  had 
undertaken  the  printing  and  publication  of  the  work, 
ami  who  was  perfectly  at  his  ease,  as  the  author  was 
known  to  be  a  man  of  large  property.  At  length  the 
accounts  were  written  for;  and  in  the  course  of  a  few 


weeks  they  were  presented  by  the  rider  for  the  house, 
in  person.  My  old  friend  put  on  his  spectacles,  and 
holding  the  scroll  with  no  very  firm  hand,  began — 
Paper,  so  much:  O,  moderate  enough  —  not  at  all 
beyond  my  expectation  !  Printing,  so  much  :  Well ! 
moderate  enough  !  Stitching,  covers,  advertisements, 
carriage,  tyc.  so  much :  Still  nothing  amiss.  Seller- 
idge,  (for  orthography  is  no  necessary  part  of  a  book- 
seller's literary  acquirements)  £3.  3s.  Bless  me! 
only  three  guineas  for  the  what  d'ye  call  it  ?  the  sell- 
eridge  ?  No  more,  sir,  replied  the  rider.  Nay,  but 
that  is  too  moderate!  rejoined  my  old  friend.  Only 
three  guineas  for  selling  a  thousand  copies  of  a  work 
in  two  volumes  ?  O  sir !  (cries  the  young  traveller,) 
you  have  mistaken  the  word.  There  have  been  none 
of  them  sold  ;  they  have  been  sent  back  from  London 
long  ago ;  and  this  £3.  3s.  is  for  the  cellaridge,  or 
warehouse-room  in  our  book  cellar.  The  work  was 
in  consequence  preferred  from  the  ominous  cellar  of 
the  publisher  to  the  author's  garret;  and  on  present- 
ing a  copy  to  an  acquaintance,  the  old  gentleman 
used  to  tell  the  anecdote  with  great  humor,  and  still 
greater  good  nature. 

With  equal  lack  of  worldly  knowledge,  I  was  a  far 
more  than  equal  sufferer  for  it,  at  the  very  outset  of 
my  authorship.  Toward  the  close  of  the  first  year 
from  the  time  that,  in  an  inauspicious  hour,  I  left  the 
friendly  cloisters,  and  the  happy  grove  of  quiet,  ever 
honored  Jesus  College,  Cambridge,  I  was  persuaded 
by  sundry  Philanthropists  and  Anti-polemists,  to  set 
on  foot  a  periodical  work,  entitled  The  Watchman, 
that  (according  to  the  general  motto  of  the  work)  all 
might  know  the  truth,  and  that  the  truth  might  make  us 
free !  In  order  to  exempt  it  from  the  stamp  tax,  and 
likewise  to  contribute  as  little  as  possible  to  the  sup- 
posed guilt  of  a  war  against  freedom,  it  was  to  be 
published  on  every  eighth  day,  thirty-two  pages, 
large  octavo,  closely  printed,  and  price  only  four 
pence.  Accordingly,  with  a  flaming  prospectus, 
"  Knowledge  is  Power,"  fyc.  to  try  the  state  of  the  po- 
litical atmosphere,  and  so  forth,  I  set  off"  on  a  tour  to 
the  north,  from  Bristol  to  Sheffield,  for  the  purpose 
of  procuring  customers,  preaching  by  the  way  in  most 
of  the  great  towns,  as  an  hireless  volunteer,  in  a  blue 
coat  and  white  waistcoat,  that  not  a  rag  of  the  woman 
of  Babylon  might  be  seen  on  me.  For  I  was  at  that 
time,  and  long  after,  though  a  Trinitarian  (i.  e.  ad 
normam  Platonis)  in  philosophy,  yet  a  zealous  Unita- 
rian in  religion  ;  more  accurately,  I  was  a  psilanlhro- 
pist,  one  of  those  who  believe  our  Lord  to  have  been 
the  real  son  of  Joseph,  and  who  lay  the  main  stress 
on  the  resurrection  rather  than  on  the  crucifixion. 
O!  never  can  I  remember  those  days  with  either 
shame  or  regret.  For  I  was  most  sincere,  most  dis- 
interested !  My  opinions  were,  indeed,  in  many  and 
most  important  points,  erroneous;  but  my  heart  was 
single.  Wealth,  rank,  life  itself,  then  seemed  cheap 
to  me,  compared  with  the  interests  of  (what  I  believed 
to  be)  the  truth,  and  the  will  of  my  Maker.  I  cannot 
even  accuse  myself  of  having  been  actuated  by  va- 
nity ;  for  in  the  expansion  of  my  enthusiasm,  I  did 
not  think  of  myself  at  all. 

My  campaign  commenced  at  Birmingham ;  and  my 
280 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


271 


first  attack  was  on  a  rigid  Calvinist,  a  tallow  chan- 
cer by  trade.  He  was  a  tall  dingy  man,  in  whom 
length  was  so  predominant  over  breadth,  that  he 
might  almost  have  been  borrowed  for  a  foundery 
poker.  O  that  lace!  a  face  icar'e/i^ojiv !  I  have  it  be- 
fore me  at  this  moment.  The  lank,  black,  twine-like 
hair,  pingvi  nitesceni,  cut  in  a  strait  line  along  the 
black  stubble  of  his  thin  gunpowder  eye-brows,  that 
looked  like  a  Bcorched  after-mirth  from  a  last  week's 
shaving.  His  coat  collar  behind  in  perfect  unison, 
both  of  colour  and  lustre,  with  the  coarse  yet  glib 
i  ordage,  that  I  suppose  he  called  his  hair,  and  which 
with  a  bend  inward  at  the  nape  of  the  neck,  (the  only 
approach  to  flexure  in  his  whole  figure,)  slunk  in  be- 
hind his  waistcoat;  while  the  countenance,  lank, 
dark,  very  hard,  and  with  strong  perpendicular  fur- 
rows, gave  me  a  dim  notion  of  some  one  looking  at 
me  through  a  used  gridiron,  all  soot,  crease  and  iron! 
But  he  was  one  of  the  thorough  bred,  a  true  lover  of 
libertv,  and  (I  was  informed)  had  proved  to  the  satis- 
faction of  many,  that  Mr.  Pitt  was  one  of  the  horns 
of  the  second  beast  in  the  Revelations,  that  spoke  like 
a  dragon.  A  person,  to  whom  one  of  my  letters  of 
recommendation  had  been  addressed,  was  my  intro- 
ducer. It  was  a  new  event  in  my  life,  my  first  stroke 
in  the  new  business  I  had  undertaken  of  an  author, 
yea,  and  of  an  author  trading  on  his  own  account. 
My  companion,  after  some  imperfect  sentences,  and 
a  multitude  of  hums  and  haas,  abandoned  the  cause 
to  his  client ;  and  I  commenced  an  harangue  of  half 
an  hour  to  Phileleutheros,  the  tallow  chandler:  vary- 
ing my  notes  through  the  whole  gamut  of  eloquence, 
from  the  ratiocinative  to  the  declamatory,  and  in  the 
latter  from  the  pathetic  to  the  indignant.  I  argued,  I 
described,  I  promised,  I  prophesied;  and  beginning 
with  the  captivity  of  nations,  I  ended  with  the  near 
approach  of  the  millennium,  finishing  the  whole  with 
some  of  my  own  verses  describing  that  glorious  state, 
out  of  the  Religious  Musings: 

-Pueh  delights, 


As  float  to  earth,  permitted  visitants  ! 
When  in  some  hour  of  solemn  jubilee 
The  massive  pates  of  Paradise  are  thrown 
Wide  open  :  and  forth  come  in  fragments  wild 
Sweet  echoes  of  unearthly  melodies. 
And  odours  snateh'd  from  hpds  of  armran'h, 
And  they  that  from  the  crystal  river  of  life 
Spring  up  on  freshen'd  win?s,  ambrosial  tales  ! 

Religious  Musings,  I.  3.16. 

My  taper  man  of  lights  listened  with  perseverant 
and  praiseworthy  patience,  though  (as  I  was  after- 
wards told  on  complaining  of  certain  gales  that  were 
not  altogether  ambrosial)  it  was  a  melting  day  with 
him.  And  what.  Sir.  (he  said,  after  a  short  pause) 
mignt  the  cost  be?  Only  four-pence,  (O!  how  1  felt 
the  anti-climax,  the  abysmal  bathos  of  that  four- 
pence!)  only  four-pence,  Sir.  each  nvmler  to  be  pub- 
lished on  every  eighth  day.  That  comes  to  a  deal  of 
money  at  the  end  of  a  vear.  And  how  much  did  von 
say  there  was  to  be  fi >r  the  money  !  Thirty-two  pa"t  a, 
Sir!  large  octavo,  closely  printed.  Thirty  and  two 
pages!  Bless  me!  why,  except  what  I  does  in  a 
family  way  on  the  Sabbath,  that's  more  than  I  ever 
reads,  Sir,  all  the  vear  round !  I  am  as  great  a  one, 
19  Z 


as  any  man  in  Brummagem,  Sir!  for  liberty  and  truth, 
and  all  them  sort  of  things,  but  as  to  this,  (no  offence, 
I  hope,  Sir!)  I  must  beg  to  be  excused. 

So  ended  my  first  canvass  ;  from  causes  that  I  shall 
presently  mention,  I  made  but  one  other  application 
in  person.  This  took  place  at  Manchester,  to  a  stately 
and  opulent  wholesale  dealer  in  cottons.  He  took  my 
letter  of  introduction,  and  having  perused  it,  mea- 
sured me  from  head  to  foot,  and  again  from  foot  to 
head  and  then  asked  if  I  had  any  bill  or  invoice  of 
the  thing;  I  presented  my  prospectus  to  him;  he  ra- 
pidly skimmed  and  hummed  over  the  first  side,  and 
siill  more  rapidly  the  second  and  concluding  page; 
crushed  it  within  his  fingers  and  the  palm  of  his 
hand  ;  then,  most  deliberately  and  significantly 
rubbed  and  smoothed  one  part  against  the  other; 
and,  lastly,  putting  it  into  his  pocket,  turned  his  back 
on  me  with  an  "  over-run  with  these  articles !"  and  so, 
without  another  syllable,  retired  into  his  counting- 
house;  and,  I  can  truly  say,  to  my  unspeakable 
amusement. 

This,  I  have  said,  was  my  second  and  last  attempt. 
On  returning  baffled  from  the  first,  in  which  I  had 
vainly  essayed  to  repeat  the  miracle  of  Orpheus  wiih 
the  Brummagem  patriot,  I  dined  with  the  tradesman 
who  had  introduced  me  to  him.  After  dinner,  he  im- 
portuned me  to  smoke  a  pipe  with  him,  and  two  or 
three  other  illuminati  of  the  same  rank.  I  objected, 
both  because  I  was  engaged  to  spend  the  evening 
with  a  minister  and  his  friends,  and  because  I  had 
never  smoked  except  once  or  twice  in  my  life  lime, 
and  then  it  was  herb  tobacco  mixed  with  Oronooko. 
On  the  assurance,  however,  that  the  tobacco  was 
equally  mild,  and  seeing,  too,  that  it  was  of  a  yellow 
colour,  (not  forgetting  the  lamentable  difficulty  I  have 
always  experienced  in  saying  no!  and  in  abstaining 
from  what  the  people  about  me  were  doing,)  I  took 
half  a  pipe,  filling  the  lower  part  of  the  bowl  with 
salt.  I  was  soon,  however,  compelled  to  resign  it  in 
consequence  of  a  giddiness  and  distressful  feeling  in 
my  eyes,  which,  as  I  had  drunk  hut  a  single  glass  of 
ale,  must.  I  knew,  have  been  the  effect  of  the  tobac- 
co. Soon  after,  deeming  myself  recovered,  I  sallied 
forth  to  mv  engagement,  but  the  walk  and  the  fresh 
air  brought  on  all  the  symptoms  again,  and  I  had 
scarcely  entered  the  minister's  drawing  room,  and 
opened  a  small  paeqtiet  of  letters,  which  he  had  re- 
ceived from  Bristol  for  me,  ere  I  sunk  back  on  the 
sofa  in  a  sort  of  swoon  rather  than  sleep.  Fortunate- 
ly, I  had  found  just  time  enough  to  inform  him  of  the 
confused  state  of  my  feelings,  and  of  the  occasion. 
For  here  and  thus  I  lay,  my  face  like  a  wall  that  is 
white-washing,  deathly  pale,  and  with  the  cold  drops 
of  perspiration  running  down  it  from  my  forehead, 
while,  one  affer  another,  there  dropt  in  the  different 
'.Hilt  men  who  had  been  invited  to  meet  and  spend 
the  evening  with  me,  to  the  number  of  from  fifteen 
to  twenty.  As  the  poison  of  tobacco  acts  but  for  a 
short  time.  I  at  length  awoke  from  insensibility,  and 
looked  round  on  the  party,  my  eyes  dazzled  by  the 
candles  which  had  been  lighted  in  the  interim.  Bv 
way  of  relieving  my  embarrassment,  one  of  the  gen- 
tlemen began  the  conversation,  with  "Have  you  seen 

281 


272 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


a  paper  to-day,  Mr.  Coleridge?"  Sir!  (I  replied,  rub- 
bing my  eyes,)  "  I  am  far  from  convinced,  that  a 
Christian  is  permitted  to  read  either  newspapers  or 
any  other  works  of  merely  political  and  temporary 
interest."  This  remark,  so  ludicrously  inapposite  to, 
or,  rather,  incongruous  with,  the  purpose  for  which  I 
was  known  to  have  visited  Birmingham,  and  to  assist 
me  in  which  they  were  all  then  met,  produced  an 
involuntary  and  general  burst  of  laughter ;  and  sel- 
dom, indeed,  have  I  passed  so  many  delightful  hours, 
as  I  enjoyed  in  that  room  from  the  moment  of  that 
laugh  to  an  early  hour  the  next  morning.  Never, 
perhaps,  in  so  mixed  and  numerous  a  parly,  have  1 
since  heard  conversation  sustained  with  such  anima- 
tion, enriched  with  such  variety  of  information,  and 
enlivened  with  such  a  (low  of  anecdote.  Both  then 
and  afterwards,  they  all  joined  in  dissuading  me  from 
proceeding  with  my  scheme  ;  assured  me,  in  the  most 
friendly,  and  yet  most  flattering  expressions,  that  the 
employment  was  neither  fit  for  me,  nor  I  fit  for  the 
employment.  Yet  if  I  had  determined  on  persevering 
in  it,  they  promised  to  exert  themselves  to  the  utmost 
to  procure  subscribers,  and  insisted  that  I  should  make 
no  more  applications  in  person,  but  carry  on  the  can- 
vass by  proxy.  The  same  hospitable  reception,  the 
same  dissuasion,  and,  (that  (ailing.)  the  same  kind  ex- 
ertions in  my  behalf,  I  met  with  at  Manchester, 
Derby,  Nottingham,  Sheffield,  indeed,  at  every  place 
in  which  I  took  up  my  sojourn.  I  often  recall  with 
affectionate  pleasure  the  many  respectable  men  who 
interested  themselves  for  me,  a  perfect  stranger  to 
them,  not  a  few  of  whom  I  can  still  name  among  my 
friends.  They  will  bear  witness  for  me,  how  oppo- 
site even  then  my  principles  were  to  those  of  jacobin- 
ism, or  even  of  democracy,  and  can  attest  the  strict 
accuracy  of  the  statement  which  I  have  left  on 
record  in  the  10th  and  11th  numbers  of  The 
Friend. 

From  this  rememberable  tour  I  returned  with  nearly 
a  thousand  names  on  the  subscription  Iistof  the  Watch- 
man ;  yet  more  than  half  convinced,  that  prudence 
dictated  the  abandonment  of  the  scheme.  But  for 
this  very  reason  I  persevered  in  it;  for  I  was  at  that 
period  of  my  life  so  completely  hag-ridden  by  the  fear 
of  being  influenced  by  selfish  motives,  that  to  know 
a  mode  of  conduct  to  be  the  dictate  of  prudence,  was 
a  sort  of  presumptive  proof  to  my  feelings,  that  the 
contrary  was  the  dictate  of  duly.  Accordingly,  I 
commenced  the  work,  which  was  announced  in  Lon- 
don by  long  bills,  in  letters  larger  than  had  ever  been 
seen  before,  and  which  (I  have  been  informed,  for  I 
did  not  see  them  myself)  eclipspd  the  glories  even  of 
the  lottery  puffs.  But,  alas!  the  publication  of  the 
very  first  number  was  delayed  beyond  the  day  an- 
nounced for  its  appearance.  In  the  second  number, 
an  essay  against  fast  days,  with  a  most  censurable  ap- 
plication of  a  text  from  Isaiah  for  its  motto,  lost  me 
near  five  hundred  of  my  subscribers  at  one  blow.  In 
the  two  following  numbers  I  made  enemies  of  all  mr 
Jacobin  and  Democratic  patrons;  for,  disgusted  by 
their  infidelity,  and  their  adoption  of  French  morals 
with  French  philosophy;  and  perhaps  thinking,  that 
charity  ought  to    begin   nearest  home;   instead   of 


abusing  the  Government  and  the  Aristocrats  chiefly 
or  entirely,  as  had  been  expected  of  me,  I  levelled 
my  attacks  at  "modern  patriotism,"  and  even  ven- 
tured to  declare  my  belief,  that  whatever  the  motives 
of  ministers  might  have  been  for  the  sedition  (or  as  it 
was  then  the  fashion  to  call  them,  the  gagging)  bills, 
yet,  the  hills  themselves  would  produce  an  effect  to 
bedesired  by  all  the  true  friends  of  freedom,  as  far  as 
they  should  contribute  to  deter  men  from  openly  de- 
claiming on  subjects,  the  principles  of  which  they  had 
never  bottomed,  and  from  "  pleading  to  the  poor  and 
ignorant,  instead  of  pleading  for  them."  At  the  same 
time  I  avowed  my  conviction,  that  national  educa- 
tion, and  a  concurring  spread  of  the  gospel,  were  the 
indispensable  condition  of  any  true  political  amelio- 
ration. Thus,  by  the  lime  the  seventh  number  was 
published,  I  had  the  mortification  (but  why  should  I 
say  this,  when,  in  truth,  I  cared  too  little  for  anything 
that  concerned  my  worldly  interests  to  be  at  all  mor- 
tified about  it  0  of  seeing  the  preceding  numbers  ex- 
posed in  sundry  old  iron-shops  for  a  penny  apiece. 
At  the  ninth  number  I  dropt  the  work.  But  from 
the  London  publisher  I  could  not  obtain  a  shilling. 

he  was  a and  set  me  at  defiance.    From  other 

places  I  procured  but  little,  and  after  such  delays  as 
rendered  that  little  worth  nothing;  and  I  should  have 
been  inevitably  thrown  into  jail  by  my  Bristol  print- 
er, who  refused  to  wait  even  for  a  month  for  a  sum 
between  eighty  and  ninety  pounds,  if  the  money  had 
not  been  paid  for  me  by  a  man  by  no  means  affluent, 
a  dear  friend  who  attached  himself  to  me  from  my 
first  arrival  at  Bristol,  who  has  continued  my  friend 
with  a  fidelity  unconquered  by  time  or  even  by  my 
own  apparent  neglect ;  a  friend  from  whom  I  never 
received  an  advice  that  was  not  wise,  or  a  remon- 
strance that  was  not  gentle  and  affectionate. 

Conscientiously  an  opponent  of  the  first  revolu- 
tionary war,  yet  with  my  eyes  thoroughly  opened  to 
the  true  character  and  impotence  of  the 'favorers  of 
revolutionary  principles  in  England,  principles  which 
I  held  in  abhorrence  (for  it  was  part  of  my  political 
creed,  that  whoever  ceased  to  act  as  an  individual 
by  making  himself  a  member  of  any  society  not  sanc- 
tioned by  his  government,  forfeited  the  rights  of  a 
citizen) — a  vehement  anti-ministerialist,  but  after  the 
invasion  of  Switzerland,  a  more  vehement  anti-galli- 
can,  and  still  more  intensely  an  anti-jacobin,  I  retired 
to  a  cottage  at  Stowey,  and  provided  for  my  scanty 
maintenance  by  writing  verses  for  a  London  Morning 
Paper.  I  saw  plainly,  that  literature  was  not  a  pro- 
fession by  which  I  could  expect  to  live ;  for  I  could 
not  disguise  from  myself,  that  whatever  my  talents 
might  or  might  not  be  in  other  respects,  yet  they  were 
not  of  the  sort  that  could  enable  me  to  become  a  pop- 
ular writer;  and  that  whatever  my  opinions  might 
be  in  themselves,  they  were  almost  equi-distant  from 
all  the  three  prominent  parties,  the  Pittites,  the  Fox- 
ilcs,  and  the  Democrats.  Of  the  unsaleable  nature 
of  my  writings  I  had  an  amusing  memento  one 
morning  from  my  own  servant  girl.  For  happening 
to  rise  at  an  earlier  hour  than  usual,  I  observed  her 
putting  an  extravagant  quantity  of  paper  into  the 
grate  in  order  to  light  the  fire,  and  mildly  checked 
282 


BI0GRAPI1IA  LITERARIA. 


273 


her  for  her  wastefulness;  la,  Sir!  (replied  poor  Nan- 
ny,) why,  it  is  only  "  Watchmen." 

I  now  devoted  myself  to  jxsetry  and  to  the  study 
of  ethics  and  psychology ;  and  so  profound  was  my 
admiration  at  this  time  of  Hartley's  Essays  on  Man, 
that  I  gave  his  name  to  my  first  born.  In  addition 
to  the  gentleman,  my  neighbour,  whose  garden  joined 
on  to  my  little  orchard,  and  the  cultivation  of  whose 
'  friendship  had  been  my  sole  motive  in  choosing 
Stowey  for  my  residence,  I  was  so  fortunate  as  to 
acquire,  shortly  after  my  settlement  there,  an  inval- 
uable blessing  in  the  society  and  neighborhood  of 
one,  to  whom  I  could  look  up  with  equal  reverence, 
whether  1  regarded  him  as  a  poet,  a  philosopher,  or 
a  man.  His  conversation  extended  to  almost  all  sub- 
jects, except  physics  and  politics  ;  with  the  latter  he 
never  troubled  himself.  Yet  neither  my  retirement 
nor  my  utter  abstraction  from  all  the  disputes  of  the 
day  could  secure  me  in  those  jealous  times  from  sus- 
picion and  obloquy,  which  did  not  stop  at  me,  but 
extended  to  my  excellent  friend,  whose  perfect  inno- 
cence was  even  adduced  as  a  proof  of  his  guilt.  One 
of  the  many  busy  sycophants*  of  that  day  (I  here  use 
the  word  sycophant  in  its  original  sense,  as  a  wretch 
who  flatters  the  prevailing  party  by  informing  against 
his  neighbors,  under  pretence  that  they  are  exporters 
of  prohibited  figs  or  fancies !  for  the  moral  application 
of  the  term  it  matters  not  which) — one  of  these  syco- 
phantic law-mongrels,  discoursing  on  the  politics  of 
the  neighbourhood,  uttered  the  following  deep  re- 
mark :  "  As  to  Coleridge,  there  is  not  so  much  harm 
in  him,  for  he  is  a  whirlbrain  that  talks  whatever 

comes  uppermost;  but  that !  he  is  the  dark 

traitor.     You  never  heard  him  say  a  syllable  on  (he 
subject." 

Now  that  the  hand  of  Providence  has  disciplined 
all  Europe  into  sobriety,  as  men  tame  wild  elephants, 
by  alternate  blows  and  caresses;  now  that  English- 
men of  all  classes  are  restored  to  their  old  English 
notions  and  feelings,  it  will  with  difficulty  be  credit- 
ed, how  great  an  influence  was  at  that  time  possessed 
and  exerted  by  the  spirit  of  secret  defamation,  (the 
too  constant  attendant  on  party  zeal !)  during  the  rest- 
less interim  from  1793  to  the  commencement  of  the 
Addington  administration,  or  the  year  before  the 
truce  of  Amiens.  For  by  the  latter  period  the  minds 
of  the  partisans,  exhausted  by  excess  of  stimulation, 
and  humbled  by  mutual  disappointment,  had  become 
languid.  The  same  causes  that  inclined  the  nation 
to  peace,  disposed  the  individuals  to  reconciliation. 
Both  parties  had  found  themselves  in  the  wrong. 
The  one  had  confessedly  mistaken  the  moral  charac- 
ter of  the  revolution,  and  the  other  had  miscalculated 
both  its  moral  and  its  physical  resources.  The  ex- 
periment was  made  at  the  price  of  great,  almost  we 
may  say,  of  humiliating  sacrifices  ;  and  wise  men 
foresaw  that  it  would  fail,  at  least  in  its  direct  and 
ostensible  object.  Yet  it  was  purchased  cheaply, 
and  realized  an  object  of  equal  value,  and,  if  pos- 
sible, of  still  more  vital  importance.     For  it  brought 

*  Zvkus  (patvttv,  to  show  or  detect  fiss,  the  exportation  of 
which,  trim  Attica,  was  forbidden  by  the  laws. 


about  a  national  unanimity,  unexampled  in  our  his 
tory  since  the  reign  of  Elizabeth  ;  and  Providence, 
never  wanting  to  a  good  work  when  men  have  done 
their  pans,  Boon  provided  a  common  locus  in  the 
cause  of  Spain,  which  made  us  all  once  more  Eng- 
lishmen, by  at  once  gratifying  and  correcting  the 
predilections  of  both  parties.  The  sincere  reverers 
of  the  throne  felt  the  cause  of  loyalty  ennobled  by 
its  alliance  with  that  of  freedom ;  while  the  honest 
zealots  of  the  people  could  not  but  admit  that  freedom 
itself  assumed  a  more  winning  form,  humanized  by 
loyalty,  and  consecrated  by  religious  principle-.  The 
youthful  enthusiasts,  who,  flattered  by  the  morning 
rainbow  of  the  French  revolution,  had  made  a  boast 
of  expatriating  their  hopes  and  fears,  now  disciplined 
by  the  succeeding  storms,  and  sobered  by  increase 
of  years,  had  been  taught  to  prize  and  honor  the 
spirit  of  nationality  as  the  best  safeguard  of  national 
independence,  and  this  again  as  the  absolute  prere- 
quisite and  necessary  basis  of  popular  rights. 

If  in  Spain,  too,  disappointment  has  nipt  our  too 
forward  expectations,  yet  all  is  not  destroyed  that  is 
checked.  The  crop  was  perhaps  springing  up  too 
rank  in  the  stalk  to  kern  well ;  and  there  were, 
doubtless,  symptoms  of  the  Gallican  blight  on  it.  If 
superstition  and  despotism  have  been  suffered  to  let 
in  their  wolvish  sheep  to  trample  and  eat  it  down 
even  to  the  surface,  yet  the  roots  remain  alive,  and 
the  second  growth  may  prove  all  the  stronger  and 
healthier  for  the  temporary  interruption.  At  all 
events,  to  us  heaven  has  been  just  and  gracious. 
The  people  of  England  did  their  best,  and  have  re- 
ceived their  rewards.  Long  may  we  continue  to 
deserve  it !  Causes,  which  it  had  been  too  generally 
the  habit  of  former  statesmen  to  regard  as  belonging 
to  another  world,  are  now  admitted,  by  all  ranks,  to 
have  been  the  main  agents  of  our  success.  "  We  fought 
from  heaven  ;  the  stars  in  their  courses  fought  against 
Sisera."  If,  then,  unanimity,  grounded  on  moral 
feelings,  has  been  among  the  least  equivocal  sources 
of  our  national  glory,  that  man  deserves  the  esteem 
of  his  countrymen,  even  as  patriots,  who  devotes  his 
life  and  the  utmost  efforts  of  his  intellect  to  the  pre- 
servation and  continuance  of  that  unanimity  by  the 
disclosure  and  establishment  of  principle.  For  by 
these  all  opinions  must  be  ultimately  tried  ;  and  (as 
the  feelings  of  men  are  worthy  of  regard  only  as  far 
as  they  are  the  representatives  of  their  fixed  opinions) 
on  the  knowledge  of  these,  all  unanimity,  not  acci- 
dental and  fleeting,  must  be  grounded.  Let  the 
scholar  who  doubts  this  assertion,  refer  only  to  the 
speeches  and  writings  of  Edmund  Burke,  at  the 
commencement  of  the  American  war,  and  compare 
them  with  his  speeches  and  writings  at  the  com- 
mencement of  the  French  revolution.  He  will  find 
the  principles  exactly  the  same,  and  the  deductions 
the  same;  but  the  practical  inferences  almost  op- 
posite, in  the  one  case,  from  those  drawn  in  the 
other;  yet  in  both  equally  legitimate,  and  in  both 
equally  confirmed  by  the  results.  Whence  gained 
he  this  superiority  of  foresight  ?  Whence  arose  the 
striking  difference,  and,  in  most  instances,  even  the 
discrepancy  between  the  grounds  assigned  by  him 
2S3 


274 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


and  by  those  who  voted  with  him,  on  the  same 
questions?  How  are  we  to  explain  the  notorious 
(act,  that  the  speeches  and  writings  of  Edmund 
Burke  are  more  interesting  at  the  present  day  than 
they  were  found  at  the  time  of  their  first  publication; 
while  those  of  his  illustrious  confederates  are  either 
forgotten,  or  exist  only  to  furnish  proofs  that  the  same 
conclusion  which  one  man  had  deduced  scientifically, 
maybe  brought  out  by  another,  in  consequence  of 
errors  that  luckily  chanced  to  neutralize  each  other  ? 
It  would  be  unhandsome  as  a  conjecture,  even  were 
it  not,  aS/it  actually  is,  false  in  point  of  fact,  to  at- 
tribute this  difference  to  deficiency  of  talent  on  the 
part  of  Burke's  friends,  or  of  experience,  or  of  his- 
torical knowledge.  The  satisfactory  solution  is,  that 
Edmund  Burke  possessed,  and  had  sedulously  sharp- 
ened, that  eye  which  sees  all  things,  actions,  and 
events,  in  relation  to  the  laws  that  determine  their 
existence,  and  circumscribe  their  possibility.  lie 
referred  habitually  to  pruwiples.  He  was  a  scien- 
tific statesman ;  and,  therefore,  a  seer.  For  every 
principle  contains,  in  itself,  the  germs  of  a  prophecy  ; 
and  as  the  prophetic  power  is  the  essential  privilege 
of  science,  so  the  fulfilment  of  its  oracles  supplies 
the  outward,  and  (to  men  in  general)  the  only  test  of 
its  claim  to  the  title.  Wearisome  as  Burke's  refine- 
ments appeared  to  his  parliamentary  auditors,  yet  the 
cultivated  classes  throughout  Europe  have  reason  to 
be  thankful  that 

he  went  on  refining, 


And  thought  of  convincing,  while  they  thought  of  dining. 

Our  very  sign-boards  (said  an  illustrious  friend  to 
me)  give  evidence  that  there  has  been  a  Titian  in 
the  world.  In  like  manner,  not  only  the  debates  in 
parliament,  not  only  our  proclamations  and  state  pa- 
pers, but  the  essays  and  leading  paragraphs  of  our 
journals  are  so  many  remembrancers  of  Edmund 
Burke.  Of  this  the  reader  may  easily  convince  him- 
self, if  either  by  recollection  or  reference  he  will 
compare  the  opposition  newspapers  at  the  commence- 
ment and  during  the  five  or  six  following  years  of 
the  French  revolution,  with  the  sentiments,  and 
grounds  of  argument  assumed  in  the  same  class  of 
journals  at  present,  and  for  some  years  past. 

Whether  the  spirit  of  jacobinism,  which  the  writ- 
ings of  Burke  exorcised  from  the  higher  and  from  the  ' 
literary  classes,  may  not,  like  the  ghost  in  Hamlet,  ' 
be  heard  moving  and  mining  in   the  underground 
chambers  with  an  activity  the  more  dangerous  be- 
cause less  noisy,  may  admit  of  a  question.     I  have 
given  my  opinions  on  this  point,  and  the  grounds  of  I 
them,  in  my  letters  to  Judge  Fletcher,  occasioned  by 
his  charge  to  the  Wexford  grand  jury,  and  published 
in  the  Courier.     Be  this  as  it  may,  the  evil  spirit  of  ! 
jealousy,  and  with  it  the  cerberean  whelps  of  feud 
and  slander,  no  longer  walk  their  rounds  in  cultivated 
society. 

Far  different  were  the  days  to  which  these  anec- 
dotes have  carried  me  back.  The  dark  guesses  of 
some  zealous  quidnunc  met  with  so  congenial  a  sod 
in  the  grave  alarm  of  a  titled  Dogberry  of  our  neigh- 
borhood, that  a  srY  was  actually  sent  down  from  the 


government  pour  surveillance  of  myself  and  friend. 
There  must  have  been  not  only  abundance,  but  vari- 
ety of  these  "  honorable  men,"  at  the  disposal  of  Min- 
isters ;  for  this  proved  a  very  honest  fellow.  After 
three  weeks'  truly  Indian  perseverance  in  tracking 
us,  (for  we  were  commonly  together,)  during  all  which 
time  seldom  were  we  out  of  doors,  but  he  contrived 
to  be  within  hearing,  (and  all  the  time  utterly  unsus- 
pected;  how,  indeed,  could  such  a  suspicion  enter 
our  fancies  ?)  he  not  only  rejected  Sir  Dogberry's  re- 
quest that  he  would  try  yet  a  little  longer,  but  de- 
clared to  him  his  belief,  that  both  my  friend  and  my- 
self were  as  good  subjects,  for  aught  he  could  disco- 
ver to  the  contrary,  as  any  in  His  Majesty's  domin- 
ions. He  had  repeatedly  hid  himself,  he  said,  for 
hours  together,  behind  a  bank  at  the  sea-side,  (our 
favorite  seat,)  and  overheard  our  conversation.  At 
first  he  fancied  that  we  were  aware  of  our  danger; 
for  he  often  heard  me  talk  of  one  Spy  Nozy,  which 
he  was  inclined  to  interpret  of  himself,  and  of  a  re- 
markable feature  belonging  to  him  ;  but  he  was  speed- 
ily convinced  that  it  was  a  man  who  had  made  a 
book,  .and  lived  long  ago.  Our  talk  ran  most  upon 
books,  and  we  were  perpetually  desiring  each  other 
to  look  at  this,  and  to  listen  to  that ;  but  he  could  not 
catch  a  word  about  politics.  Once  he  had  joined  me 
on  the  road  ;  (this  occurred  as  I  was  returning  home 
alone  from  my  friend's  house,  which  was  about  three 
miles  from  my  own  cottage,)  and  passing  himself  off 
as  a  traveller,  he  had  entered  into  conversation  with 
me,  and  talked,  of  purpose,  in  a  democrat  way,  in  or- 
der to  draw  me  out.  The  result,  it  appears,  not  only 
convinced  him  that  I  was  no  friend  to  jacobinism,  but 
(he  added)  I  had  "  plainly  made  it  out  to  be  such  a 
silly  as  w:ell  as  wicked  thing,  that  he  felt  ashamed, 
though  he  had  only  put  it  on."  I  distinctly  remem- 
bered the  occurrence,  and  had  mentioned  it  immedi- 
ately on  my  return,  repeating  what  the  traveller  with 
his  Bardolph  nose  had  said,  with  my  own  answer; 
and  so  little  did  I  suspect  the  true  object  of  my 
"  tempter  ere  accuser,"  that  I  expressed,  with  no  small 
pleasure,  my  hope  and  belief  that  the  conversation 
had  been  of  some  service  to  the  poor  misled  malcontent. 
This  incident,  therefore,  prevented  all  doubt  as  to  the 
truth  of  the  report,  which,  through  a  friendly  medi- 
um, came  to  me  from  the  master  of  the  village  inn, 
who  had  been  ordered  to  entertain  the  government 
gentleman  in  his  best  manner,  but,  above  all,  to  be 
silent  concerning  such  a  person  being  in  his  house. 
At  length  he  received  Sir  Dogberry's  commands  to 
accompany  his  guest  at  the  final  interview ;  and  after 
the  absolving  suffrage  of  the  gentleman  honored  with 
the  confidence  of  ministers,  answered,  as  follows,  to 
the  following  queries:  D.  Well,  landlord  !  and  what 
do  you  know  of  the  person  in  question?    L.  I  see 

him  often  pass  by  with  maister ,  my  landlord, 

(/.  e.  the  owner  of  the  house,)  and  sometimes  with  the 
new-comers  at  Holford  ;  but  I  never  said  a  word  tc 
him,  or  he  to  me.  D.  But  do  you  not  know  that  he 
has  distributed  papers  and  hand-bills  of  a  seditious 
nature  among  the  common  people  ?  L.  IN'o,  your  ho- 
nor !  I  never  heard  of  such  a  thing.  D.  Have  you 
not  seen  this  Mr.  Coleridge,  or  heard  of  his  haranguing 
284 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


275 


and  talking  to  knots,  and  clusters  of  the  inhabitants  ! 
—  _  -         .-        9r  ?    I«  Beg  tout  ho- 

nor's pardon !   but  I  was  only  thinking  how  they'd 
haTe  stared  at  him.    If  what  I  have  heard 
jour  honor !  thev  would  not  have  onderstoo: 
he  said.    When  oar  vicar  was  here.  Dr.  I_.  the  mas- 
ter of  the  zreat  school,  and  canon  of  Windsor,  there 

was  a  great  dinner  party  at  maister  s:  and 

one  of  the  tanners,  that  was  ther-  he  and 

the  doctor  talked  real  Hebrew  Greek  at  each  other 
for  an  hoar  together  alter  dinner.  D.  Answer  the 
question.  Sir !  Does  he  ever  harangue  the  people! 
■e  yoor  honor  a'nt  angry  with  me.  I  can  say 
no  more  than  I  know.  I  never  saw  bin 
any  one  bat  my  landlord,  and  our  curate 
strange  gentleman.     D.  Has  he  not  been  seen  wan- 

-  a  the  hills  towards  the  channel,  an 
the  shore,  with  books  and  papers  in  his  hand,  taking 
charts  and  maps  of  the  country  I  L.  Why.  as  to  that. 
yoor  honor !  I  own.  I  have  heard :  I  am  sure  I  would 
not  wish  to  say  ill  of  any  body :  but  it  is  certain  that 
I  have  heard — D.  Speak  out  man !  don't  be  afraid, 
yoa  are  doing  your  duty  I  r  king 

nave  you  heard  ?     L.  "• 

-  how  that  be    -  md  that 

agoing  ek  and  all  about  here  m 

;-.d  as  they  be  so  much  together.  I  suppose 
that  the  strange  gentleman  -  in  the 

business.     So  ende: 
latter  part  of  which  alone  requires  ct 
at  the  same  time,  entitles  the  i 
in  my  literary  life.    I  had  cons; ;  .  efect  in 

.\;rable  poem  of  di 

tie  to  the  w   r  .        • 
deed  could  not  be.  carried  on  beyond  the  three  or 

! 

connexions  a.-  awkward.. 

;._:.-  -.-:.::  i:.  :  -.:  -.:--:.-      I  -     _.-;:.-.?::    :: 

should  give  equal  room  a 

incident,  and  impas.-  ions  on  men.  nature. 

and  society,  yet  s 

to  the  pans,  and  unity  to  "  Sbcb 

-rream,  traced 
-  source  in  ". 
moss  and  conical  glass-shaped  runs  of  Bent 
(bat break  ::  fall,  where  its    hope     :  ace  audible, 

rbmhofthesa  •    .ares  as 

-red;  to  the  sheep-: 
plot  of  ground,  to  the  lonely  cottage  and 
den  won  from  the  heath  : 

the  market-town,  the  manufactc:  -ea-port. 

-efore.  were  almost  daily  on  the  top  of 

k.  and  among  its  sloping  coombs.    With  my 

md  memorandum  book  in  my  hand.  I  was 

making  studies,  as  the  artist3  call  them,  and  often 

moulding  my  objects 

and  imagery 

circumstances,  evil  and  good,  interve:  > 
the  com  -         .ve  been 

I  -Inished  the 
was  my  purpose,  in  the  heat  of  : 
dedicated  it  to  our  then  commi:- 
ZS 


as  containing  the  charts  and  maps,  with  which  I  was 
to  have  supplied  the  French  government  in  aid  of 
their  plans  of  '     .        -      too,  for  a  tract 

of  coast  ead.  scarcely 

permits  the  approac.  ;-boat! 

v  experience,  from  my  first  entrance  into  life 
to  the  present  hour,  is  in  favor  of  the  warning  maxim, 
that  the  man  who  opposes  in  toto  the  political  or  re- 

■  ■  ■  "heir  obloquy, 
than  he  who  differs  from  them  in  one  or  two  points, 
or.  perh  •  -                 :<?gree.     By  that  transfer  of  the 

-     ska  of  public 
in  the  hive    I 
-m.  the  partisan  has  more  svn  • 
intemp<  - 

an  interna;.--  og  may  it  con- 

.  i:tion  to  far  higher  and  more  important 
•     --sent  bible  s.  -  -  - 

J   or  charitable 
•    carry  off  the  superfluo;,- 
ity.anc  .  .  innocent  hyperboles 

and  the  bustle  of  rr. ..  -  )n-tree 

is  not  dead,  though 

subside.  let  us  not  be  lulled 

into  sit'   .  t"  our  entire  sec.  t 

keep  watch  and  ward,  even  on  our  be<:  :-  _•  I 
have  seen  gross  intolerance  shown  in  support  of  tol- 

flnr  most  obtrasr 
played  in  the  .1  com- 

prehension of  sects 

said  of  treac'r.  ::ed  in  furtherance  of  an 

object  vitally  important  to  the  cause  of  humanitv : 
and  ali  rf  naturally  kind  disposi- 

■ 
The  magic  rod  of  is  preserve-i 

the  re- 

Is.    The  horror  of  the  pea- 
rl the  direful  effects  of  the 
Efered  only  from  those 
-  substitution  of  theological  for 
struck  i  for  a  time 

Yet  little  more  than  a  century  was 
■  . :"  these 
The  though 

less  drea  -  -        re  again  at  wot 

..   produced   a    civil   war. 
The  war  ended  in  t"r.    -  airgente;  but 

.i    abundant 
■  Presbyter  was  but  Old 
One  good  result,  thank  hea- 
ven !  of  •    -stabhshment  of  the 

■  e  been  hop-. 

i  e  been  bound  for  a 
-     -  D  that  he  misht  de- 

The  ball  ol 
r.  up  with  undiminishe  . 

•        :>.  that 

M&  and  covenant  had  turned 

I  the  rarest  trophies 

.inted  the  brightest 


276 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


ornaments  of  learning  and  religion  into  holes  and 
comers,  now  marched  under  episcopal  banners;  and 
having  first  crowded  the  prisons  of  England,  emptied 
ils  whole  vial  of  wrath  on  the  miserable  covenanters 
of  Scotland.  (Laing's  History  of  Scotland.—  Walter 
Scott's  Bard's  Ballads,  &c.)  A  merciful  Providence 
at  length  constrained  both  parties  to  join  against  a 
common  enemy.  A  wise  government  followed  ;  and 
the  established  church  became,  and  now  is,  not  only 
the  brightest  example,  but  our  best  and  only  sure 
bulwark,  of  toleration!  The  true  and  indispensable 
bank  against  a  new  inundation  of  persecuting  zeal— 
Esto  perpetua! 

A  long  interval  of  quiet  succeeded  ;  or,  rather,  the 
exhaustion  had  produced  a  cold  fit  of  the  ague,  which 
was  symptomatized  by  indifference  among  the  many, 
and  a  tendency  to  infidelity  or  scepticism  in  the  edu- 
cated classes.  At  length  those  feelings  of  disgust 
and  hatred  which,  for  a  brief  while,  the  multitude 
had  attached  to  the  crimes  and  absurdities  of  secta- 
rian and  democratic  fanaticism,  were  transferred  to 
the  oppressive  privileges  of  the  noblesse,  and  the  lux- 
ury, intrigues,  and  favoritism  of  the  continental 
courts.  The  same  principles,  dressed  in  the  ostenta- 
tious garb  of  a  fashionable  philosophy,  once  more 
rose  triumphant,  and  effected  the  French  revolution. 
And  have  we  not,  within  the  last  three  or  four  years, 
had  reason  to  apprehend,  that  the  detestable  maxims 
and  correspondent  measures  of  the  late  French  des- 
potism had  already  bedimmed  the  public  recollec- 
tions of  democratic  frenzy;  had  drawn  off,  to  other 
objects,  the  electric  force  of  the  feelings  which  had 
massed  and  upheld  those  recollections ;  and  that  a 
favorable  concurrence  of  occasions  was  alone  want- 
ing to  awaken  the  thunder,  and  precipitate  the  light- 
ning, from  the  opposite  quarter  of  the  political  hea- 
ven ?    (See  The  Friend,  p.  110.) 

In  part  from  constitutional  indolence,  which,  in 
the  very  hey-dey  of  hope,  had  kept  my  enthusiasm 
in  check,  but  still  more  from  the  habits  and  in- 
fluences of  a  classical  education  and  academic  pur- 
suits, scarcely  had  a  year  elapsed  from  the  com- 
mencement of  my  literary  and  political  adventures, 
before  my  mind  sunk  into  a  state  of  thorough  disgust 
and  despondency,  both  with  regard  to  the  disputes 
and  the  parties  disputant.  With  more  than  poetic 
feeling  I  exclaimed: 

"The  sensual  and  the  dark  rebel  in  vain. 
Slaves  by  their  own  compulsion  !  In  mad  game 
They  break  their  manacles,  to  wear  the  name 
Of  freedom,  graven  on  a  heavier  chain. 
O  liberty  !  with  profitless  endeavor. 
Have  I  pursued  thee  many  a  weary  hour ; 
Cut  thou  nor  Bvvell'st  the  victor's  pomp,  nor  ever 
Didst  breathe  thy  soul  in  forms  of  human  power  ! 
Alike  from  all,  howe'er  they  praise  thee 
(Nor  prayer  nor  boastful  name  delays  thee) 
From  superstition's  harpy  minions 
And  factious  blasphemy's  obscener  Blaves, 
Thou  speedest  on  thy  cherub  pinions. 

The  guide  of  homeless  winds,  and  playmate  of  the  waves  !" 
France,  a  Palinodia. 

I  retired  to  a  cottage  in  Somersetshire  at  the  foot 
of  Quantock,  and  devoted  my  thoughts  and  studies 
to  the  foundations  of  religion  and  morals.     litre  I 


found  myself  all  afloat.  Doubts  rushed  in ;  broke 
upon  me  "from  the  fountains  of  the  great  deep,"  and 
fell  "from  the  windows  of  heaven."  The  fbntal 
truths  of  natural  religion,  and  the  books  of  Revela- 
tion, alike  contributed  to  the  flood  ;  and  it  was  long 
ere  my  ark  touched  on  an  Ararat;  and  rested.  The 
idea  of  the  Supreme  Being  appeared  to  me  to  be  as 
necessarily  implied  in  all  particular  modes  of  being, 
as  the  idea  of  infinite  space  in  all  the  geometrical 
figures  by  which  space  is  limited.  I  was  pleased 
wilh  the  Cartesian  opinion,  that  the  idea  of  God  is 
distinguished  from  all  other  ideas  by  involving  its 
reality  ;  but  I  was  not  wholly  satisfied.  I  began 
then  to  ask  myself  what  proof  I  had  of  the  outward 
i  i  istt  are  of  any  thing !  Of  this  sheet  of  paper,  for 
instance,  as  a  thing,  in  itself,  separate  from  the  phe- 
nomena  or  image  in  my  perception.  I  saw,  that  in 
the  nature  of  things,  such  proof  is  impossible;  and 
that  of  all  modes  of  being,  that  are  not  objects  of  the 
souses,  the  existence  is  assumed  by  a  logical  necessity 
arising  from  the  constitution  of  the  mind  itself,  by 
the  absence  of  all  motive  to  doubt  it,  not  from  any 
absolute  contradiction  in  the  supposition  of  the  con- 
trary. Still,  the  existence  of  a  being,  the  ground  of 
all  existence,  was  not  yet  the  existence  of  a  moral 
creator  and  governor.  "  In  the  position,  that  all 
reality  is  either  contained  in  the  necessary  being  as 
an  attribute,  or  exists  through  him,  as  its  ground,  it 
remains  undecided  whether  the  properties  of  intelli- 
gence and  will  are  to  be  referred  to  the  Supreme 
Being  in  the  former,  or  only  in  the  latler  sense  ;  as 
inherent  attributes,  or  only  as  consequences  that  have 
existence  in  other  things  through  him.  Thus,  organ- 
ization and  motion  are  regarded  as  from  God,  not  in 
God.  Were  the  latter  the  truth,  then,  notwithstanding 
all  the  pre-eminence  which  must  be  assigned  to  the 
Eternal  First  from  the  sufficiency,  unity,  and  in- 
dependence of  his  being,  as  the  dread  ground  of  the 
universe,  his  nature  would  yet  fall  far  short  of  that 
which  we  are  bound  to  comprehend  in  the  idea  of 
God.  For  without  any  knowledge  or  determining 
resolve  of  its  own,  it  would  only  be  a  blind  necessary 
ground  of  other  things  and  other  spirits ;  and  thus 
would  be  distinguished  from  the  fate  of  certain  an- 
cient philosophers  in  no  respect,  but  that  of  being 
more  definitely  and  intelligibly  described."  Kant's 
einzig  moglicher  Beweisgrund :  vermischle  Schriften, 
Zweiter  Band,  §  102  and  103. 

For  a  very  long  time,  indeed,  I  could  not  reconcile 
personality  with  infinity  ;  and  my  head  was  with 
Spinoza,  though  my  whole  heart  remained  with  Paul 
and  John.  Yet  there  had  dawned  upon  me,  even 
before  I  had  met  with  the  Critique  of  the  Pure 
Reason,  a  certain  guiding  light.  If  the  mere  intel- 
lect could  make  no  certain  discovery  of  a  holy  and 
intelligent  first  cause,  it  might  yet  supply  a  demon- 
stration, that  no  legitimate  argument  could  be  drawn 
from  the  intellect  against  its  truth.  And  what  is 
this  more  than  St.  Paul's  assertion,  that  by  wisdom 
(more  properly  translated,  by  the  powers  of  reason- 
ing) no  man  ever  arrived  at  the  knowledge  of  God  ? 
What  more  than  the  sublimest,  and,  probably,  the 
oldest  book  on  earth,  has  taught  us? 

286 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


277 


Silver  and  gold  man  seareheth  out: 

Bringeth  tlie  ore  out  of  the  earth,  and  darkness  into  light. 

But  where  findeth  he  wisdom  7 
Where  13  the  place  of  understanding'? 

The  abyss  crit-th  :  it  is  not  in  me ! 
Ocean  echoeth  back :  not  in  me ! 

Whence  then  cometh  wisdom  ? 
Where  dwelleth  understanding'? 

Hidden  from  tho  eyes  of  the  living 
Kept  secret  from  the  fowls  of  heaven  ! 

Hell  and  death  answer: 

We  have  heard  the  rumour  thereof  from  afar: 

God  marketh  out  the  road  to  it; 
God  knoweth  its  abiding  place  ! 

He  beholdeth  the  ends  of  the  earth ; 

lie  surveyeth  what  is  beneath  the  heavens  ! 

And  as  he  weighed  out  the  winds,  and  measured  the  sea, 

And  appointed  laws  to  the  rain, 

And  a  path  to  the  thunder, 

A  path  to  the  flashes  of  the  lightning  ! 

Then  did  he  see  it, 

And  he  counted  it  ; 

He  searched  into  the  depth  thereof. 

And  with  a  line  did  he  compass  it  round  ! 

But  to  man  he  said, 

The  fear  of  the  Lord  is  wisdom  for  thee ! 

And   to  avoid  evil, 

That  is  tlm  understanding.  Job,  Chap.  28r.A. 

I  became  convinced,  that  religion,  as  both  the  cor- 
ner-stone and  the  key-stone  of  morality,  must  have  a 
moral  origin;  so  far  at  least,  that  the  evidence  of  its 
doctrines  could  not,  like  the  truths  of  abstract  science, 
be  wholly  independent  of  the  will.  It  were  there- 
fore to  be  expected,  that  its  fundamental  truth  would 
be  such  as  might  be  denied  ;  though  only  by  the  fool, 
and  even  by  the  fool  from  the  madness  of  the  heart 
alone ! 

The  question  then  concerning  our  faith  in  the  ex- 
istence of  a  God,  not  only  as  the  ground  of  the  uni- 
verse by  his  essence,  but  as  its  maker  and  judge  by 
his  wisdom  and  holy  will,  appeared  to  stand  thus  : 
The  sciential  reason,  whose  objects  are  purely  theo- 
retical, remains  neutral,  as  long  as  its  name  and  sem- 
blance are  not  usurped  by  the  opponents  of  the 
doctrine.  But  it  then  becomes  an  effective  ally  by 
exposing  the  false  show  of  demonstration,  or  by 
evincing  the  equal  demonstrability  of  the  contrary 
from  premises  equally  logical.  The  understanding 
mean  time  suggests,  the  analogy  of  experience  facili- 
tates, the  belief.  Nature  excites  and  recalls  it,  as  by 
a  perpetual  revelation.  Our  feelings  almost  necessi- 
tate it;  and  the  law  of"  conscience  peremptorily 
commands  it.  The  arguments,  that  at  all  apply  to  it, 
are  in  its  favor;  and  there  is  nothing  against  it,  but 
its  own  sublimity  It  could  not  be  intellectually 
more  evident  without  becoming  morally  less  effective; 
without  counteracting  its  own  end,  by  sacrificing  the 
life  of  faith  to  the  cold  mechanism  of  a  worthless, 
because  compulsory  assent.  The  belief  of  a  God 
and  a  future  state  (if  passive  acquiescence  may  be 
flattered  with  the  name  of  belief)  does  not  indeed 
always  beget  a  good  heart;  but  a  good  heart  so  na- 
turally begets  the  belief,  that  the  very  few  exceptions 


must  be  regarded  as  strange  anomalies  from  strange 
and  unfortunate  circumstances. 

From  these  premises  I  proceed  to  draw  the  follow- 
ing conclusions:  first,  that  having  once  fully  ad- 
mitted the  existence  of  an  infinite  yet  self-conscious 
Creator,  we  are  not  allowed  to  ground  the  irration- 
ality of  any  other  article  of  faith  on  arguments  which 
would  equally  pi;ove  that  to  be  the  irrational  which 
we  had  allowed  to  be  real.  Secondly,  that  whatever 
is  deducible  from  the  admission  of  a  self  comprehend- 
ing and  creative  spirit,  may  be  legitimately  used  in 
proof  of  the  possibility  of  any  further  mystery  con 
cerning  the  divine  nature.  Possibilitalein,  mysteri 
orum,  (Trinitatis,  <fcc.,)  contra  insultus  Infidelium  et 
Ilereticorum  a  contradictionibus  vindico ;  haud  qui- 
dem  verilalem,  qua?  revelatione  solo  stabiliri  possit , 
says  Leibnitz,  in  a  letter  to  his  Duke.  He  then  adds 
the  following  just  and  important  remark:  "  In  vain 
will  tradition  or  texts  of  scripture  be  adduced  in 
support  of  a  doctrine,  donee  clava  impossibilitatis  et 
contradictionis  e  manibus  horum  Herculum  extorta 
fuerit.  For  the  heretic  will  still  reply,  that  texts,  the 
literal  sense  of  which  is  not  so  much  above  as  directly 
against  all  reason,  must  be  understood  figuratively, 
as  Herod  is  a  fox,  &c." 

These  principles  I  held,  philosophically,  while,  in 
respect  of  revealed  religion,  I  remained  a  zealous 
Unitarian.  I  considered  the  idea  of  the  Trinity  a 
fair  scholastic  inference  from  the  being  of  God,  as  a 
creative  intelligence  ;  and  that  it  was,  therefore,  en- 
titled to  the  rank  of  an  esoteric  doctrine  of  natural 
religion.  But  seeing  in  the  same  no  practical  or 
moral  bearing,  I  confined  it  to  the  schools  of  philoso- 
phy. The  admission  of  the  logos,  as'  hypostasized, 
(i.  e.  neither  a  mere  attribute  or  a  personification,)  in 
no  respect  removed  my  doubts  concerning  the  incar- 
nation and  the  redemption  by  the  cross ;  which  I 
could  neither  reconcile  in  reason  with  the  impassive- 
ness  of  the  Divine  Being,  nor,  in  my  moral  feelings, 
with  the  sacred  distinction  between  things  and  per- 
sons, the  vicarious  payment  of  a  debt,  and  the  vicari- 
ous expiation  of  guilt.  A  more  thorough  revolution 
in  my  philosophic  principles,  and  a  deeper  insight 
into  my  own  heart,  were  yet  wanting.  Nevertheless, 
1  cannot  doubt,  that  the  difference  of  my  metaphysical 
notions  from  those  of  Unitarians  in  general,  contrib- 
uted to  my  final  re-conversion  to  the  whole  truth  in 
Christ;  even  as,  according  to  his  own  confession,  the 
In  inks  1  if  certain  Platonic  philosophers,  (libri  quorun- 
dam  Plalonicorum,)  commenced  the  rescue  of  St. 
Augustine's  faith  from  the  same  error,  aggravated  by 
the  far  darker  accompaniment  of  the  Manichaean 
heresy. 

While  my  mind  was  thus  perplexed,  by  a  gracious 
Providence,  for  which  I  can  never  be  sufficiently 
grateful,  the  generous  and  munificent  patronage  of 
Mr.  Josiah,  and  Mr.  Thomas  Wedgewood,  enabled 
me  to  finish  my  education  in  Germany.  Instead  of 
troubling  others  with  my  own  crude  notions  and  ju- 
venile  compositions,  I  was  thenceforward  better  em- 
ployed 111  attempting  to  store  my  own  head  with  the 
wisdom  of  others.  I  made  the  best  use  of  my  time 
ami  means  ;  and  there  is,  therefore,  no  period  of  my 
287 


278 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


life  on  which  I  can  look  back  with  such  unmingled 
satisfaction.  After  acquiring  a  tolerable  sufficiency 
in  the  German  language*  at  Ratzeburg,  which,  with 
my  voyage  and  journey  thither,  I  have  described  in 
The  Friend,  I  proceeded  through  Hanover  to  Got- 
tingen. 

Here  I  regularly  attended  the  lectures  on  physio- 
logy in  the  morning,  and  on  natural  history  in  the 
evening,  under  Blumenbach,  a  name  as  dear  to 
every  Englishman  who  has  studied  at  that  university, 
as  it  is  venerable  to  men  of  science  throughout  Eu- 
rope! Eichhorn's  lectures  on  the  New  Testament 
were  repeated  to  me  from  notes,  by  a  student  from 
Ratzeburg,  a  young  man  of  sound  learning  and  inde- 
fatigable industry;  who  is  now,  I  believe,  a  professor 
of  the  oriental  languages  at  Heidelberg.  But  my 
chief  efforts  were  directed  towards  a  grounded  know- 
ledge of  the  German  language  and  literature.  From 
professor  Tychsen,  I  received  as  many  lessons  in  the 
Gothic  of  Ulphilas  as  sufficed  to  make  me  acquainted 
with  its  grammar,  and  the  radical  words  of  most  fre- 
quent occurrence  ;  and  with  the  occasional  assistance 
of  the  same  philosophical  linguist,  I  read  through 
OrTFRiED'st  metrical  paraphrase  of  the  gospel,  and 


*  To  those  who  design  to  acquire  the  language  of  a  coun- 
try in  the  country  itself,  it  may  be  useful  if  I  mention  the  in- 
calculable advantage  which  I  derived  from  learning  all  the 
words  that  could  possibly  be  so  learnt,  with  the  objects  before 
me,  and  without  the  intermediation  of  the  English.  It  was  a 
regular  part  of  my  morning  studies,  for  the  first  six  weeks  of 
my  residence  at  Ratzeburg,  to  accompany  the  good  and  kind 
old  pastor  with  whom  I  lived,  from  the  cellar  to  the  roof, 
through  gardens,  farm  yards,  &c,  and  to  call  every,  the  mi- 
nutest thing,  by  its  German  name.  Advertisements,  farces, 
jest  books,  and  the  conversation  of  children  while  I  was  at 
play  with  them,  contributed  their  share  to  more  home-like 
acquaintance  with  the  language  than  I  could  have  acquired 
from  works  of  polite  literature  alone,  or  even  from  polite  so- 
ciety. There  is  a  passage  of  hearty  sound  sense  in  Luther's 
German  letter  on  interpretation,  to  the  translation  of  which 
1  shall  prefix,  for  the  sake  of  those  who  read  the  German, 
yet  are  not  likely  to  have  dipt  often  in  the  massive  folios  of 
this  heroic  reformer,  the  simple,  sinewy,  idiomatic  words  of 
the  original :  "Dennman  muss  nicht  die  Buchstaben  in  der 
Lateinischen  Sprache  fragen  vvie  man  soil  Deutsch  reden ; 
sondern  man  muss  die  mutter  in  Hause,  die  Kinder  auf  den 
Gassen,  den  gemeinen  Mann  aufdem  Markte,  durum  fragen: 
und  denselbigen  auf  das  Maul  sehen  wie  sie  reden,  und  dar- 
nach  dollmetschen.  So  verstehen  sie  es  denn,  und  merken 
dass  man  Deutsch  mit  ihnen  redet." 

TRANSLATION. 

For  one  must  not  ask  the  letters  in  the  Latin  tongue,  how 
one  ought  to  speak  German ;  but  one  must  ask  the  mother  in 
the  house,  the  children  in  the  lanes  and  alleys,  the  common 
man  in  the  market,  concerning  this  ;  yea,  and  look  at  the 
moves  of  their  mouths  while  they  are  talking,  and  thereafter 
interpret.  They  understand  you  then,  and  mark  that  one  talks 
German  with  them. 

t  This  paraphrase,  written  about  the  time  of  Charlemagne, 
is  by  no  means  deficient  in  occasional  passages  of  considera- 
ble poetic  merit.  There  is  a  flow,  and  a  tender  enthusiasm  in 
the  following  lines,  (at  the  conclusion  of  Chapter  V.)  which 
even  in  the  translation  will  not,  I  flatter  myself,  fail  to  inte- 
rest the  reader.  Ottfried  is  describing  the  circumstances  im- 
mediately following  the  birth  of  our  Lord  : 

She  gave  with  joy  her  virgin  breast; 
She  hid  it  not,  she  bared  the  breast, 
Which  suckled  that  divinest  babe  ! 
Blessed,  blessed  were  the  breasts 


the  most  important  remains  of  the  Theotiscan,  or 
the  transitional  state  of  the  Teutonic  language  from 
the  Gothic  to  the  old  German  of  the  Swabian  period. 
Of  this  period  (the  polished  dialect  of  which  is  analo- 
gous to  that  of  our  Chaucer,  and  which  leaves  the 
philosophic  student  in  doubt,  whether  the  language 
has  not  since  then  lost  more  in  sweetness  and  flexibi- 
lity, than  it  has  gained  in  condensation  and  copious- 
ness)! read  with  sedulous  accuracy  the  Minnesinger. 
(or  singers  of  love,  the  provencal  poets  of  the  Swa- 
bian court,)  and  the  metrical  romances ;  and  then  la- 
bored through  sufficient  specimens  of  the  master 
singers,  their  degenerate  successors ;  not,  however, 
without  occasional  pleasure  from  the  rude  yet  inte- 
resting strains  of  Hans  Sachs,  the  cobbler  of  Nurem- 
berg. Of  this  man's  genius,  five  folio  volumes,  with 
double  columns,  are  extant  in  print,  and  nearly  an 
equal  number  in  manuscript;  yet,  the  indefatigable 
bard  takes  care  to  inform  his  readers,  that  he  never 
made  a  shoe  the  less,  but  had  virtuously  reared  a  large 
family  by  the  labor  of  his  hands. 

In  Pindar,  Chaucer,  Dante,  Milton,  &c.  &c.  we 
have  instances  of  the  close  connection  of  poetic  ge- 
nius with  the  love  of  liberty  and  of  genuine  reforma- 
tion. The  moral  sense  at  least  will  not  be  outraged, 
if  I  add  to  the  list  the  name  of  this  honest  shoemaker ; 
(a  trade,  by  the  bye,  remarkable  for  the  production  of 
philosophers  and  poets.)  His  poem  entitled  the  Morn- 
ing Star,  was  the  very  first  publication  that  appeared 
in  praise  and  support  of  Luther  ;  and  an  excellent 
hymn  of  Hans  Sachs',  which  has  been  deservedly 
translated  into  almost  all  the  European  languages, 
was  commonly  sung  in  the  Protestant  churches,  when- 
ever the  heroic  reformer  visited  them. 

In  Luther's  own  German  writings,  and  eminently 
in  his  translation  of  the  bible,  the  German  language 
commenced.  I  mean  the  language,  as  it  is  at  present 
written  ;  that  which  is  called  the  High  German,  as 
contra-distinguished  from  the  Platt-Teutsch,  the 
dialect  of  the  flat  or  northern  countries,  and  from  the 
Ober-Teutsch,  the  language  of  the  middle  and 


Which  the  Saviour  infant  kiss'd  ; 

And  blessed,  blessed  was  the  mother 

Who  wrapped  his  limbs  in  swaddling  clothes, 

Singing  placed  him  on  her  lap, 

Hung  o'er  him  with  her  looks  of  love, 

And  soothed  him  with  a  lulling  motion. 

Blessed  !  for  she  sheltered  him 

From  the  damp  and  chilling  air: 

Blessed,  blessed!   for  she  lay 

With  such  a  babe  in  one  blest  bed. 

Close  as  babes  and  mothers  lie  ! 

Blessed,  blessed  evermore  ; 

With  her  virgin  lips  she  kiss'd, 

With  her  arms,  and  to  her  breast 

She  embraced  the  babe  divine. 

Her  babe  divine  the  virgin  mother  ! 

There  lives  not  on  this  ring  of  earth 

A  mortal,  that  can  sing  her  praise. 

Mighty  mother,  virgin  pure. 

In  the  darkness  and  the  night, 

For  us  she  bore  the  heavenly  Lord ! 

Most  interesting  is  it  to  consider  the  effect,  when  the  feel- 
ings are  wrought  above  the  natural  pitch   by  the  belief  of 
something  mysterious,  while  all  the  images  ate  purely  natural 
Then  it  is  that  religion  and  poetry  strike  deepest. 
288 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


279 


southern  Germany.  The  High  German  is  indeed  a 
lingua  communis  not  actually  the  native  language  of 
any  province,  but  the  choice  and  fragrancy  of  all  the 
dialects.  From  this  cause  it  is  at  once  the  most  co- 
pious and  the  most  grammatical  of  all  the  European 
tongues. 

Within  less  than  a  century  after  Luther's  death, 
the  German  was  inundated  with  pedantic  barbar- 
isms. A  few  volumes  of  this  period  I  read  through 
from  motives  of  curiosity  ;  for  it  is  not  easy  to  imagine 
any  thing  more  fantastic  than  the  very  appearance  of 
their  pages.  Almost  every  third  word  is  a  Latin 
word,  with  a  Germanized  ending;  the  Latin  portion 
being  always  printed  in  Roman  letters,  while  in  the 
last  syllable  the  German  character  is  retained. 

At  length,  about  the  year  16*20,  Opitz  arose,  whose 
genius  more  nearly  resembled  that  of  Dryden  than 
any  other  poet,  who  at  present  occurs  to  my  recollec- 
tion. In  the  opinion  of  Lessing,  the  most  acute  of 
critics,  and  of  Adelung,  the  first  of  lexicographers, 
Opitz,  and  the  Silesian  poets,  his  followers,  not  only 
restored  the  language,  but  still  remain  the  models  of 
pure  diction.  A  stranger  has  no  vote  on  such  a  ques- 
tion ;  but  after  repeated  perusals  of  the  work,  my  feel- 
ings justified  the  verdict,  and  I  seemed  to  have  ac- 
quired from  them  a  sort  of  tact  for  what  is  genuine 
in  the  style  of  later  writers. 

Of  the  splendid  era  which  commenced  with  Gel- 
lert,  Klopstock,  Ramler,  Lessing,  and  their  compeers, 
I  need  not  speak.  With  the  opportunities  which  I 
enjoyed,  it  would  have  been  disgraceful  not  to  have 
been  familiar  with  their  writings ;  and  I  have  already 
said  as  much  as  the  present  biographical  sketch  re- 
quires concerning  the  German  philosophers,  whose 
works,  for  the  greater  part,  I  became  acquainted  with 
at  a  far  later  period. 

Soon  after  my  return  from  Germany,  I  was  solicited 
to  undertake  the  literary  and  political  department  in 
the  Morning  Post ;  and  I  acceded  to  the  proposal,  on 
the  condition  that  the  paper  should,  thenceforward, 
be  conducted  on  certain  fixed  and  announced  princi- 
ples, and  that  I  should  be  neither  obliged  or  request- 
ed to  deviate  from  them,  in  favor  of  any  party  or 
any  event.  In  consequence,  that  Journal  became, 
and  for  many  years  continued,  anti-ministerial  in- 
deed; yet,  with  a  very  qualified  approbation  of  the  op- 
position, and  with  far  greater  earnestness  and  zeal,  both 
anti-jacobin  and  anti-gallican.  To  this  hour,  I  cannot 
find  reason  to  approve  of  the  first  war,  either  in  its 
commencement  or  its  conduct.  Nor  can  I  understand 
with  what  reason,  either  Mr.  Percival,  (whom  I  am 
singular  enough  to  regard  as  the  best  and  wisest  min- 
ister of  this  reign,)  or  the  present  administration,  can 
be  said  to  have  pursued  the  plans  of  Mr.  Pitt.  The 
love  of  their  country,  and  perseverant  hostility  to 
French  principles  and  French  ambition  are,  indeed, 
honorable  qualities,  common  to  them  and  to  their 
predecessors.  But  it  appears  to  me  as  clear  as  the 
evidence  of  facts  can  render  any  question  of  history, 
that  the  successes  of  the  Percival  and  of  the  existing 
ministry,  have  been  owing  to  their  having  pursued 
measures  the  direct  contrary  to  Mr.  Pitt's.  Such,  for 
instance,  are  the  concentration  of  the  national  force  to 


one  object ;  the  abandonment  of  the  subsidizing  poli- 
cy, so  far,  at  least,  as  neither  to  goad  or  bribe  the  con- 
tinental courts  into  war,  till  the  convictions  of  their 
subjects  had  rendered  it  a  war  of  their  own  seeking; 
and  above  all,  in  their  manly  and  generous  reliance 
on  the  good  sense  of  the  English  people,  and  on  that 
loyalty  which  is  linked  to  the  very  heart*  of  the  na- 

*  Lord  Grenville  has  lately  re-asserted,  (in  the  House  of 
Lords,)  the  imminent  danger  of  a  revolution  in  the  earlier 
part  of  the  war  against  France.  I  doubt  not  that  his  Lord- 
ship is  sincere  ;  and  it  must  be  flattering  to  his  feelings  to  be- 
lieve it.  But  where  are  the  evidences  of  the  danger,  to  which 
a  future  historian  can  appeal  1  Or  must  he  rest  on  an  asser- 
tion 1  Let  me  be  permitted  to  extract  a  passage  on  the  sub- 
ject from  The  Frit  ad.  "  I  have  said  that  to  withstand  the 
arguments  of  the  lawless,  the  anti  jacobins  proposed  to  sus- 
pend the  law,  and  by  the  interposition  of  a  particular  statute, 
to  eclipse  the  blessed  light  of  the  universal  sun,  that  spies 
and  informers  might  tyrannize  and  escape  in  the  ominous 
darkness.  Oh  !  if  these  mistaken  men,  intoxicated  and  be- 
wildered with  the  panic  of  property,  which  they  themselves 
were  the  chief  agents  in  exciting,  had  ever  lived  in  a  country 
where  there  really  existed  a  general  disposition  to  change  and 
rebellion  '.  Had  they  ever  travelled  through  Sicily  ;  or  through 
France  at  the  first  coming  on  of  the  Revolution  ;  or  even,  alas ! 
through  too  many  of  the  provinces  of  a  sister  island,  they 
could  not  but  have  shrunk  from  their  own  declarations  con- 
cerning the  state  of  feeling,  an  opinion  at  that  time  predomi- 
nant throughout  Great  Britain.  There  was  a  time,  (heaven 
grant  that  that  time  may  have  passed  by  !)  when,  by  crossing 
a  narrow  strait,  they  might  have  learnt  the  true  symptoms  of 
approaching  danger,  and  have  secured  themselves  from  mis- 
taking the  meetings  and  idle  rant  of  such  sedition,  as  shrunk 
appalled  from  the  sight  of  a  constable,  for  the  dire  murmur- 
ing and  strange  consternation  which  precedes  the  storm  or 
earthquake  of  national  discord.  Not  only  in  coffee-houses 
and  public  theatres,  but  even  at  the  tables  of  the  wealthy, 
they  would  have  heard  the  advocates  of  existing  government 
defend  their  cause  in  the  language,  and  with  the  tone  of  men, 
who  are  conscious  that  they  are  in  a  minority.  But  in  Eng- 
land, when  the  alarm  was  at  its  highest,  there  was  not  a  city, 
no,  nt/a  town  or  village,  in  which  a  man  suspected  of  hold- 
ing democratic  principles  could  move  abroad  without  receiv- 
ing some  unpleasant  proof  of  the  hatred  in  which  his  sup- 
posed opinions  were  held  by  the  great  majority  of  the  people  ; 
and  the  only  instances  of  popular  excess  and  indignation, 
were  in  favor  of  the  government  and  the  established  church. 
But  why  need  I  appeal  to  these  invidious  facts  ?  Turn  over 
the  pages  of  history,  and  seek  for  a  single  instance  of  a  revo- 
lution having  been  effected  without  the  concurrence  of  either 
the  nobles,  or  the  ecclesiastics,  or  the  moneyed  classes,  in  any 
country  in  which  the  influences  of  property  had  ever  been 
predominant,  and  where  the  interests  of  the  proprietors  were 
interlinked  !  Examine  the  revolution  of  the  Belgic  provinces 
under  Philip  2d;  the  civil  wars  of  France  in  the  preceding 
generation  ;  the  history  of  the  American  revolution,  or  the 
yet  more  recent  events  in  Sweden  and  in  Spain;  and  it  will 
be  scarcely  possible  not  to  perceive,  that  in  England,  from 
1791  to  the  peace  of  Amiens,  there  were  neither  tendencies 
to  confederacy,  nor  actual  confederacies,  against  which  the 
existing  laws  had  not  provided  sufficient  safeguards  and  an 
ample  punishment.  But  alas '.  the  panic  of  property  had 
been  struck,  in  the  first  instance,  for  party  purposes;  and 
when  it  became  eeneral,  its  propagators  caught  it  themselves, 
and  ended  in  believing  their  own  lie  ;  even  as  our  bulls  in 
Borrowdale  sometimes  run  mad  with  the  echo  of  their  own 
bellowing.  The  consequences  were  most  injurious.  Our  at- 
tention was  concentrated  to  a  monster,  which  could  not  sur- 
vive the  convulsions  in  which  it  had  been  broughtforth  :  even 
the  enlightened  Burke  himself,  too  often  talking  and  reason- 
ing, as  if  a  perpetual  and  organized  anarchy  had  been  a  pos- 
sible thing !  Thus,  while  we  were  warring  against  French 
doctrines,  we  took  little  heed  whether  the  means,  by  which 
we  attempted  to  overthrow  them,  were  not  likely  to  aid  and 
auement  the  far  more  formidable  evil  of  French  ambition. 
Like  children,  we  ran  away  from  the  yelping  of  a  cur,  and 
took  shelter  at  the  heels  of  a  vicious  war-horse." 
289 


280 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


tion,  by  the  system  of  credit,  and  the  interdependence 
of  property. 

Be  this  as  it  may,  I  am  persuaded  that  the  Morning 
Post  proved  a  far  more  useful  ally  to  the  government 
in  its  most  important  objects,  in  consequence  of  its 
being  generally  considered  as  moderately  anti-minis- 
terial, than  if  it  had  been  the  avowed  eulogist  of  Mr. 
Pitt.  (The  few,  whose  curiosity  or  fancy  should  lead 
them  to  turn  over  the  Journals  of  thai  date,  may  find 
a  small  proof  of  this  in  the  frequent  charges  made  by 
the  Morning  Chronicle,  that  such  and  such  essays  or 
leading  paragraphs  had  been  sent  from  ihe  treasury.) 
The  rapid  and  unusual  increase  in  the  sale  of  the 
Morning  Post,  is  a  sufficient  pledge  that  genuine  im- 
partiality, with  a  respectable  portion  of  literary  talent, 
will  secure  the  success  of  a  newspaper,  without  the 
aid  of  party  or  ministerial  patronage.  But  by  impar- 
tiality I  mean  an  honest  and  enlightened  adherence 
to  a  code  of  intelligible  principles,  previously  an- 
nounced, and  faithfully  referred  to,  in  support  of  every 
judgment  on  men  and  events;  not  indiscriminate 
abuse,  not  the  indulgence  of  an  editor's  own  malig- 
nant passions ;  and  still  less,  if  that  be  possible,  a  de- 
termination to  make  money  by  flattering  the  envy 
and  cupidity,  the  vindictive  restlessness  and  self-con- 
ceit of  the  half-witted  vulgar;  a  determination  almost 
fiendish,  but  which,  I  have  been  informed,  has  been 
boastfully  avowed  by  one  man,  the  most  notorious  of 
these  nwb-sycophants !  From  the  commencement  of 
the  Addington  administration  to  the  present  day, 
whatever  I  have  written  in  the  Morning  Post,  or, 
(after  that  paper  was  transferred  to  other  proprietors,) 
in  the  Courier,  has  been  in  defence  or  furtherance 
of  the  measures  of  government. 

Things  of  this  nature  scarce  survive  the  night        « 
That  gives  them  birth  ;  they  perish  in  the  sight, 
Cast  by  so  far  from  after-life,  that  there 
Can  scarcely  aught  be  said,  but  that  they  were  ! 

CartwrighV  s  Prol.  to  the  Royal  Slave. 

Yet  in  these  labors  I  employed,  and,  in  the  belief 
of  partial  friends,  wasted,  the  prime  and  manhood  of 
my  intellect.  Most  assuredly,  they  added  nothing  to 
my  fortune  or  my  reputation.  The  industry  of  the 
week  supplied  the  necessities  of  the  week.  From 
Government  or  the  friends  of  Government  I  not  only 
never  received  remuneration,  or  even  expected  it; 
but  I  was  never  honored  with  a  single  acknowledg- 
ment, or  expression  of  satisfaction.  Yet  the  retrospect 
is  far  from  painful  or  matter  of  regret.  I  am  not  in- 
deed silly  enough  to  take,  as  any  thing  more  than  a 
violent  hyperbole  of  party  debate,  Mr.  Fox's  assertion, 
that  the  lale  war  (I  trust  that  the  epithet  is  not  pre- 
maturely applied)  was  a  war  produced  by  the  Morn- 
ing Post;  or  I  should  be  proud  to  have  the  words 
inscribed  on  my  tomb.  As  little  do  I  regard  the  cir- 
cumstance, that  I  was  a  specified  object  of  Bonaparte's 
resentment  during  my  residence  in  Italy,  in  con- 
sequence of  those  essays  in  the  Morning  Post,  during 
the  peace  of  Amiens.  (Of  this  I  was  warned,  directly, 
by  Baron  Von  Humboldt,  the  Prussian  Plenipoten- 
tiary, who  at  that  time  was  the  minister  of  the  Prus- 
sian court  at  Rome  ;  and  indirectly,  through  his  secre- 
tary, Cardinal   Fesch   himself)    Nor  do  I  lay  any 


greater  weight  on  the  confirming  fact,  that  an  order 
for  my  arrest  was  sent  from  Paris,  from  which  dan- 
ger I  was  rescued  by  the  kindness  of  a  noble  Bene- 
dictine, and  the  gracious  connivance  of  that  good  old 
man,  the  present  Pope.  For  the  late  tyrant's  vindic- 
tive appetite  was  omnivorous,  and  preyed  equally  on 
a  Duo  D'Enghien,*  and  the  writer  of  a  newspaper 
paragraph.  Like  a  true  vulture.t  Napoleon,  with  an 
eye  not  less  telescopic,  and  with  a  taste  equally  coarse 
in  his  ravin,  could  descend  from  the  most  dazzling 
heights  to  pounce  on  the  leveret  in  the  brake,  or  even 
on  the  field  mouse  amid  the  grass.  But  I  do  derive 
a  gratification  from  the  knowledge,  that  my  essays 
contributed  to  introduce  the  practice  of  placing  the 
questions  and  events  of  the  day  in  a  moral  point  of 
view;  in  giving  a  dignity  to  particular  measures,  by 
tracing  their  policy  or  impolicy  to  permanent  princi- 
ples; and  an  interest  to  principles  by  the  application 
of  them  to  individual  measures.  In  Mr.  Burke's  writ- 
ings, indeed,  the  germs  of  almost  all  political  truths 
may  be  found.  But  I  dare  assume  to  myself  the 
merit  of  having  first  explicitly  defined  and  analyzed 
the  nature  of  Jacobinism;  and  that  in  distinguishing 
the  jacobin  from  the  republican,  the  demociat  and 
the  mere  demagogue,  I  both  rescued  the  word  from 
remaining  a  mere  term  of  abuse,  and  put  on  their 
guard  many  honest  minds,  who  even  in  their  heat  of 
zeal  against  jacobinism,  admitted  or  supported  princi- 
ples from  which  the  worst  parts  of  that  system  may 
be  legitimately  deduced.  That  these  are  not  neces- 
sary practical  results  of  such  principles,  we  owe  to 
that  fortunate  inconsequence  of  our  nature,  which 
permits  the  heart  to  rectify  the  errors  of  the  under- 
standing. The  detailed  examination  of  the  consular 
government  and  its  pretended  constitution,  and  the 
proof  given  by  me,  that  it  was  a  consummate  despot- 
ism in  masquerade,  extorted  a  recantation  even  from 
the  Morning  Chronicle,  which  had  previously  extol- 
led this  constitution  as  the  perfection  of  a  wise  and 
regulated  liberty.  On  every  great  occurrence,  I 
endeavoured  to  discover  in  past  history  the  event  that 
most  nearly  resembled  it.  I  procured,  wherever  it 
was  possible,  the  contemporary  historians,  memorial- 
ists, and  pamphleteers.  Then  fairly  subtracting  the 
points  of  difference  from  those  of  likeness,  as  the  bal- 
ance favored  the  former  or  the  latter,  I  conjectured 
that  the  result  would  be  the  same  or  different.  In 
the  series  of  essays,!  entitled,  "  a  comparison  of  France 
under  Napoleon  with  Rome  under  the  first  Cresars," 
and  in  those  which  followed  "on  the  probable  final 

*  I  seldom  think  of  the  murder  of  this  illustrious  Prince 
without  recollecting  the  lines  of  Valerius  Flaccus  (Argonaut. 
Lib.  I.  30. 

Super  ipaius  ingens 

Instat  fama  viri.  virtusque  baud  lata  Tyranno  ; 
Ergo  ante  ire  metus,  juvenemciue  extinguere  pergit. 

t  6)jf»'i  hi  kui  roi  vijva  Kai  rf)v  Aopudia, 
Ktu  rbv  Aaycudi',  Kai  to  rutv  Tavpiav  yho?. 

Philc  de  animal,  propriet. 
t  A  small  selection  from  Ihe  numerous  articles  furnished  hy 
me  to  the  Morning  Post  and  Courier,  chiefly  as  they  regarded 
ihe  sources  and  effects  of  jacobinism,  and  the  connection  of 
certain  systems  of  political  economy  with  Jacobinical  des- 
potism, will  form  part  of  "  The  Friend,"  which  I  am  now 
290 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


281 


restoration  of  the  Bourbons,"  I  feel  myself  authorized 
to  affirm,  by  the  effect  produced  on  many  intelligent 
men,  that  were  the  dates  wanting,  it  might  have  been 
suspected  that  the  essays  had  been  written  within 
the  last  twelve  months.  The  same  plan  I  pursued  at 
the  commencement  of  the  Spanish  revolution,  and 
with  the  same  success,  taking  the  war  of  the  United 
Provinces  with  Philip  2d,  as  the  groundwork  of  the 
comparison.  I  have  mentioned  this  from  no  motives 
of  vanity,  nor  even  from  motives  of  self-defence, 
which  would  justify  a  certain  degree  of  egotism,  espe- 
cially if  it  be  considered  how  often  and  grossly  I  have 
been  attacked  for  sentiments  which  I  had  exerted  my 
best  powers  to  confute  and  expose,  and  how  griev- 
ously these  charges  acted  to  my  disadvantage  while 
I  was  in  Malta.  Or,  rather,  they  would  have  done 
so,  if  my  own  feelings  had  not  precluded  the  wish  of 
a  settled  establishment  in  that  island.  But  I  have 
mentioned  it  from  the  full  persuasion  that,  armed 
with  the  two-fold  knowledge  of  history  and  the  hu- 
man mind,  a  man  will  scarcely  err  in  his  judgment 
concerning  the  sum  total  of  any  future  national  event. 
if  he  have  been  able  to  procure  the  original  docu- 
ments of  the  past,  together  with  authentic  accounts 
of  the  present,  and  if  he  have  a  philosophic  tact  for 
what  is  truly  important  in  facts,  and  in  most  instances, 
therefore,  for  such  facts  as  the  dignity  of  history 
has  excluded  from  the  volumes  of  our  modern  com- 
pilers, by  the  courtesy  of  the  age,  entitled  historians. 

To  have  lived  in  vain  must  be  a  painful  thought  to 
any  man,  and  especially  so  to  him  who  has  made 
literature  his  profession.  I  should  therefore  rather 
condole  than  be  angry,  with  the  mind  which  could 
attribute  to  no  worthier  feelings  than  those  of  vanity 
or  self-love,  the  satisfaction  which  I  acknowledge 
to  have  enjoyed  from  the  re-publication  of  mv  politi- 
cal essays  (either  whole  or  as  extracts'!  not  onlv  in 
many  of  our  own  provincial  papers,  but  in  the  fede- 
ral journals  throughout  America.  I  resarded  it  as 
some  proof  of  my  not  having  labored  altogether  in 
vain,  that  from  the  articles  written  bv  me  shortlv 
before,  and  at  the  commencement  of  the  late  unhap- 
py war  with  America,  not  only  the  sentiments  were 
adopted,  but.  in  some  instances,  the  verv  language, 
in  several  of  the  Massachusetts  state-papers. 

But  no  one  of  these  motives,  nor  all  conjointly, 
would  have  impelled  me  to  a  statement  so  uncom- 
fortable to  my  own  feelings,  had  not  mv  character 
been  repeatedly  attacked,  by  an  unjustifiable  intru- 
sion on  private  life,  as  of  a  man  incorrigibly  idle,  and 
who.  intrusted  not  only  with  ample  talents,  but  favor- 
ed with  unusual  opportunities  of  improving  them, 
had  nevertheless  suffered  them  to  rust  away  without 
any  efficient  exertion  either  for  his  own  good  or  that 
of  his  fellow-creatures.  Even  if  the  compositions 
which  I  have  made  public,  and  that  loo  in  a  form  the 
most  certain  of  an  extensive  circulation,  though  the 
least  datteringto  an  author's  self-love,  had  been  pub- 


completing,  and  which  will  be  shortly  published,  for  I  can 
scarcely  say  re-published,  with  the  numbers  arranged  in 
Chapters  according  to  their  subjects. 

Accipe  principium  rursus,  corpusque  coaclam 
Desere ;  mulata  naclior  procede  figura. 


.  lished  in  books,  they  would  have  filled  a  respectable 
number  of  volumes,  though  every  passage  of  merely 
temporary  interest  were  omitted.    My  prose  writings 

,  have  been  charged  with  a  disproportionate  demand 
on  the  attention  :  with  an  excess  of  refinement  in 
the  mode  of  arriving  at  truths  ;   with  beating   the 

1  ground  for  that  which  might  have  been  run  down  by 
the  eye ;  with  the  length  and  laborious  construction 
of  my  [>eriods  :  in  short,  with  obscurity  and  the  lov> 
of  paradox.  But  my  severest  critics  have  not  pre- 
tended to  have  found  in  my  compositions  triviality, 
or  traces  of  a  mind  that  shrunk  from  the  toil  of  think- 
ing. Ao  one  has  charged  me  with  tricking  out  in 
other  words  the  thoughts  of  others,  or  with  hashing 
up  anew  the  crambe  jam  decies  coctam  of  Enslish 
literature  or  philosophy.     Seldom  have  I  written  that 

:  in  a  day,  the  acquisition  or  investigation  of  which 
had  not  cost  me  the  previous  labor  of  a  month. 

But  are  books  the  only  channel  through  which  the 
stream  of  intellectual  usefulness  can  flow  >  Is  the 
diffusion  of  truth  to  be  estimated  by  publications  ;  or 
publications  by  the  truth  which  they  diffuse,  or  at 
least  contain  -?  I  speak  it  in  the  excusable  warmth 
of  a  mind  stung  by  an  accusation  which  has  not  only 
been  advanced  in  reviews  of  the  widest  circulation, 

i  not  only  registered  in  the  bulkiest  works  of  periodi- 
cal literature,  but,  by  frequency  of  repetition,  has 
become  an  admitted  fact  in  private  literary- circ  !es, 

■  and  thoughtlessly  repeated  by  too  many  who  call 
themselves  my  friends,  and  whose  own  recollections 
ought  to  have  suggested  a  contrary  testimony.  Would 
that  the  criterion  of  a  scholar's  utility  were  the  num- 
ber and  moral  value  of  the  truths  which  he  has  been 
the  means  of  throwing  into  the  general  circulation  ; 
or  the  number  and  value  of  the  minds,  whom,  bv  his 
conversation  or  letters,  he  has  excited  into  activity, 
and  supplied  with  the  germs  of  their  aftergrowth ! 
A  distinguished  rank  might  not  indeed,  even  then, 
be  awarded  to  my  exertions,  but  I  should  dare  look 
forward  with  confidence  to  an  honorable  acquittal. 
I  should  dare  appeal  to  the  numerous  and  respectable 
audiences  which,  at  different  times,  and  in  different 
places,  honored  my  lecture-rooms  with  their  attend- 
ance, whether  the  points  of  view  from  which  the 

:  subjects  treated  of  were  surveyed,  whether  the 
grounds  of  my  reasoning  were  such  as  they  had 
heard  or  read  elsewhere,  or  have  since  found  in  pre- 
vious publications.  I  can  conscientiously  declare, 
that  the  complete  success  of  the  Remorse  on  the 
first  night  of  its  representation,  did  not  give  me  as 
great  or  as  heart-felt  a  pleasure,  as  the  observation 
that  the  pit  and  boxes  were  crowded  with  faces 
familiar  to  me,  though  of  individuals  whose  names  I 

'  did  not  know,  and  of  whom  I  knew  nothing,  but 
that  they  had  attended  one  or  other  of  my  courses  of 
lectures.  It  is  an  excellent,  though  somewhat  vulgar 
proverb,  that  there  are  cases  where  a  man  may  be 
a^  well  ••  in  for  a  pound  as  for  a  penny."  To  those, 
who  from  ignorance  of  the  serious  injury  I  have  re- 
ceived from  this  rumor  of  having  dreamt  away  my 
life  to  no  purpose,  injuries  which  I  unwillingly  re- 

I  member  at  all,  much  less  am  disposed  to  record  in  a 

.  sketch  of  my  literary  life ;   or  to  those,  who  from 

291 


282 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


their  own  feelings,  or  the  gratification  they  derive 
from  thinking  contemptuously  of  others,  would,  like 
Job's  comforters,  attribute  these  complaints,  extorted 
from  me  by  the  sense  of  wrong,  to  self-conceit  or 
presumptuous  vanity,  I  have  already  furnished  such 
ample  materials,  that  I  shall  gain  nothing  by  with- 
holding the  remainder.  I  will  not,  therefore,  hesi- 
tate to  ask  the  consciences  of  those,  who  from  their 
long  acquaintance  with  me  and  with  the  circum- 
stances, are  best  qualified  to  decide,  or  be  my  judges, 
whether  the  restitution  of  the  suum  cuique  would 
increase  or  detract  from  my  literary  reputation.  In 
this  exculpation,  I  hope  to  be  understood  as  speaking 
of  myself  comparatively,  and  in  proportion  to  the 
claims  which  others  are  entitled  to  make  on  my  time 
or  my  talents.  By  what  I  have  effected,  am  1  to  be 
judged  by  my  fellow-men;  what  I  could  have  done, 
is  a  question  for  my  own  conscience.  On  my  own 
account  I  may  perhaps  have  had  sufficient  reason  to 
lament  my  deficiency  in  self-control,  and  the  neglect 
of  concentrating  my  powers  to  the  realization  of 
some  permanent  work.  But  to  verse  rather  than 
to  prose,  if  to  either,  belongs  the  voice  of  mourning ; 
for 

Keen  pangs  of  love  awakening  as  a  babe, 

Turbulent,  with  an  outcry  in  the  heart, 

And  fears  self-will'd  that  ahunn'd  the  eye  of  hope. 

And  hope  that  scarce  would  know  itself  from  fear ; 

Sense  of  past  youth,  and  manhood  come  in  vain, 

And  genius  given  and  knowledge  won  in  vain. 

And  all  which  I  had  cull'd  in  wood-walks  wild, 

And  all  which  patient  toil  had  rear'd,  and  all 

Commune  with  thee  had  open'd  out— but  flowers 

Strew'd  on  my  corpse,  and  borne  upon  my  bier 

In  the  same  coffin,  for  the  selfsame  grave ! S.  T.  C. 

These  will  exist,  for  the  future,  I  trust,  only  in  the 
poetic  strains  which  the  feelings  at  the  time  called 
forth.    In  those  only,  gentle  reader, 

AiTectus  animi  varios,  bellumque  sequacis 
Perlegis  invidiam;   curasque  revolvis  inanes; 
Quae  humilis  tenero  stylus  olim  etTudit  in  apvo. 
Perlegis  et  lacrymas,  et  quod  pharetratus  acuta 
Ille  puer  puero  fecit  mihi  cuspide  vultius. 
Omnia  paulatim  consumit  longior  atas 
Vivcndoquc  Simul  morimur  rapimurque  manendo. 
Ipse  mihi  collatus  enim  non  ille  videbor; 
Frons  alia  est,  moresque  alii,  nova  mentis  imago, 
Vox  aliudque  sonat.    Jamque  observatio  vits 
Multa  dedit:— lugere  nihil,  ferte  omnia;  jamque 
Paulatim  lacrymas  rerum  experientia  tersit. 


CHAPTER  XI. 

An   affectionate  exhortation  to  those  who  in  early  life  feel 
themselves  disposed  to  become  authors. 

It  was  a  favorite  remark  of  the  late  Mr.  Whit- 
bread,  that  no  man  does  anything  from  a  single  mo- 
tive. The  separate  motives,  or,  rather,  moods  of 
mind,  which  produced  the  preceding  reflections  and 
unecdotes  have  been  laid  open  to  the  reader  in  each 
separate  instance.  But,  an  interest  in  the  welfare 
of  those  who,  at  the  present  time,  may  be  in  circum- 
stances not  dissimilar  to  my  own  at  my  first  entrance 


into  life,  has  been  the  constant  accompaniment,  and 
(as  it  were,)  the  under-song  of  all  my  feelings 
Whitehead,  exerting  the  prerogative  of  his  laureat- 
ship,  addressed  to  youthful  poets  a  poetic  charge, 
which  is  perhaps  the  best,  and  certainly  the  most  in- 
teresting of  his  works.  With  no  other  privilege  than 
that  of  sympathy  and  sincere  good  wishes,  I  would 
address  an  affectionate  exhortation  to  the  youthful  lite- 
rati, grounded  on  my  own  experience.  It  will  be  but 
short;  for  the  beginning,  middle,  and  end,  converge 
to  one  charge :  never  pursue  literature  as  a 
trade.  With  the  exception  of  one  extraordinary 
man,  I  have  never  known  an  individual,  least  of  all 
an  individual  of  genius,  healthy  or  happy  without  a 
profession,  i.  e.  some  regular  employment  which  does 
not  depend  on  the  will  of  the  moment,  and  which 
can  be  carried  on  so  far  mechanically,  that  an  average 
quantum  only  of  health,  spirits,  and  intellectual  ex- 
ertion, are  requisite  to  its  faithful  discharge.  Three 
hours  of  leisure,  unannoyed  by  any  alien  anxiety,  and 
looked  forward  to  with  delight  as  a  change  and  re- 
creation, will  suffice  to  realize  in  literature  a  larger 
product  of  what  is  truly  genial,  than  weeks  of  com- 
pulsion. Money  and  immediate  reputation,  form  only 
an  arbitrary  and  accidental  end  of  literary  labor. 
The  hope  of  increasing  them  by  any  given  exertion, 
will  often  prove  a  stimulant  to  industry;  but  the 
necessity  of  acquiring  them  will,  in  all  works  of  ge- 
nius, convert  the  stimulant  into  a  narcotic.  Motives 
by  excess  reverse  their  very  nature,  and,  instead  of 
exciting,  stun  and  stupify  the  mind.  For  it  is  one 
contradistinction  of  genius  from  talent,  that  its  pre- 
dominant end  is  always  compromised  in  the  means; 
and  this  is  one  of  the  many  points  which  establish 
an  analogy  between  genius  and  virtue.  JNow,  though 
talents  may  exist  without  genius,  yet  as  genius  cannot 
exist,  certainly  not  manifest  itself,  without  talents,  I 
would  advise  every  scholar  who  feels  the  genial 
power  working  within  htm,  so  far  to  make  a  division 
between  the  two,  that  he  should  devote  his  talents 
to  the  acquirement  of  competence  in  some  known 
trade  or  profession,  and  his  genius  to  objects  of  his 
tranquil  and  unbiassed  choice ;  while  the  conscious- 
ness of  being  actuated  in  both  alike  by  the  sincere 
desire  to  perform  his  duty,  will  alike  ennoble  both. 
My  dear  young  friend,  (I  would  say,)  "  suppose  your- 
self established  in  any  honorable  occupation.  From 
the  manufactory,  or  counting-house,  from  the  law 
court,  or  from  having  visited  your  last  patient,  you 
return  at  evening, 

'  Dear  tranquil  time,  when  the  sweet  sense  of  home 
Is  sweetest ' 

to  your  family,  prepared  for  its  social  enjoyments, 
with  the  very  countenances  of  your  wife  and  children 
brightened,  and  their  voice  of  welcome  made  doubly 
welcome  by  the  knowledge  that,  as  far  as  they  are 
concerned,  you  have  satisfied  the  demands  of  the 
day  by  the  labor  of  the  dajr.  Then,  when  you  retire 
into  your  study,  in  the  books  on  your  shelves,  you  re- 
visit so  many  \enerable  friends  with  whom  you  can 
converse.  Your  own  spirit,  scarcely  less  free  from 
personal  anxieties  than  the  great  minds  that,  in  those 
292 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITER  ARIA. 


•J  S3 


books,  are  still  living  for  you!  Even  your  writing 
desk,  with  its  blank  paper,  and  all  its  other  imple- 
ments, will  appear  as  a  chain  of  (lowers,  capable  of 
linking  your  feelings,  as  well  as  thoughts,  to  events 
and  characters  past  or  to  come  ;  not  a  chain  of  iron, 
which  binds  you  down  to  think  of  the  future,  and 
the  remote,  by  recalling  the  claims  and  feelings  of 
the  peremptory  present.  But  why  should  I  say  re- 
tire t  The  habits  of  active  life  and  dailv  intercourse 
with  the  stir  of  the  world,  will  tend  to  civc  yon  such 
self-command,  that  the  presence  of  your  family  will 
be  no  interruption.  Nay,  the  social  silence  or  undis- 
turbing  voices  of  a  wife  or  sister,  will  be  like  a  resto- 
rativo  atmosphere,  or  soft  music,  which  moulds  a 
dream  without  becoming  its  object.  If  facts  are  re- 
quired, to  prove  the  possibility  of  combinins  weighty 
performances  in  literature  with  full  and  independent 
employment,  the  works  of  Cicero  and  Xenophon 
among  the  ancients,  of  Sir  Thomas  Moore,  Bacon, 
Baxter,  or,  to  refer,  at  once,  to  later  and  contemporary 
instances.  Darwin  and  Roscoe,  are  at  once  decisive 
of  the  question. 

But  all  men  may  not  dare  promise  themselves  a 
sufficiency  of  self-control  for  the  imitation  of  those 
examples;  though  strict  scrutiny  should  always  be 
made,  whether  indolence,  restlessness,  or  a  vanity 
impatient  for  immediate  gratification,  have  not  tam- 
pered with  the  judgment,  and  assumed  the  vizard  of 
humility,  for  the  purposes  of  self-delusion.  Still  the 
church  presents  to  every  man  of  learning  and  genius 
a  profession,  in  which  he  may  cherish  a  rational  hope 
of  being  able  to  unite  the  widest  schemes  of  literary 
utility  with  the  strictest  performance  of  professional 
duties.  Among  the  numerous  blessings  of  Christian- 
ity, the  introduction  of  an  established  church  makes 
an  especial  claim  on  the  gratitude  of  scholars  and 
philosophers ;  in  England,  at  least,  where  the  princi- 
ples of  Protestantism  have  conspired  with  the  free- 
dom of  the  government,  to  double  all  its  salutary 
powers  by  the  removal  of  its  abuses. 

That  not  only  the  maxims,  but  the  grounds  of  a 
pure  morality  the  fragments  of  which, 

" the  lofty  grave  tragedians  taught 

In  chorus  or  iambic,  teachers  best 

Of  moral  prudence,  with  delight  received 

In  brief  sententious  precepts ;" 

Paradise  Regained. 

and  that  the  sublime  truths  of  the  divine  unity  and 
attributes,  which  a  Plato  found  most  hard  to  learn, 
and  deemed  it  still  more  difficult  to  reveal ;  that  these 
should  have  become  the  almost  hereditary  property 
of  childhood  and  poverty,  of  the  hovel  and  the  work- 
shop; that,  even  to  the  unlettered,  they  sound  as 
commonplace,  is  a  phenomenon,  which  must  with- 
hold all  but  minds  of  the  most  vulgar  cast  from  un- 
dervaluing the  services  even  of  the  pulpit  and  the 
reading  desk.  Yet  those  who  confine  the  efficiency 
of  an  established  church  to  its  public  offices,  can 
hardly  be  placed  in  a  much  higher  rank  of  intellect. 
That  to  every  parish  throughout  the  kingdom  there 
is  transplanted  a  germ  of  civilization  ;  that  in  the  re- 
motest villages  there  is  a  nucleus,  round  which  the 
Aa 


capabilities  of  the  place  may  crystallize  and  brighten  ; 
a  model,  sufficiently  superior  to  excite,  yet,  sufficiently 
near  to  encourage  and  facilitate  imitation ;  this,  the 
inobtrusive,  continuous  agency  of  a  Protestant  church 
establishment,  this  it  is,  which  the  patriot  and  the 
philanthropist,  who  would  fain  unite  the  love  of 
peace  with  the  faith  in  the  progressive  amelioration 
of  mankind,  cannot  estimate  at  too  high  a  price.  "  It 
cannot  be  valued  with  the  gold  of  Ophir,  with  the 
precious  onyx,  or  the  sapphire.  No  mention  shall  be 
made  of  coral  or  of  pearls,  for  the  price  of  wisdom  is 
above  rubies."  The  clergyman  is  with  his  parishion- 
ers, and  among  them;  he  is  neither  in  the  cloistered 
cell,  or  in  the  wilderness,  but  a  neighbor  and  a  lami- 
Iv-man,  whose  education  and  rank  admit  him  to  the 
mansion  of  the  rich  land-holder,  while  his  unties 
make  him  the  frequent  visiter  of  the  farm-house  and 
the  cottage.  He  is,  or  he  may  become,  connected 
with  the  families  of  his  parish,  or  its  vicinity,  by  mar- 
riage. And  among  the  instances  of  the  blindness,  or 
at  best,  of  the  short-sightedness,  which  it  is  the  na- 
ture of  cupidity  to  inflict,  I  know  few  more  striking 
than  the  clamors  of  the  farmers  against  church  pro- 
perty. Whatever  was  not  paid  to  the  clergymen, 
would  inevitably  at  the  next  lease  be  paid  to  the 
land-holder;  while,  as  the  case  at  present  stands,  the 
revenues  of  the  church  are,  in  some  sort,  the  rever- 
sionary property  of  even'  family,  that  may  have 
a  member  educated  for  the  church,  or  a  daughter 
that  may  marry  a  clergyman.  Instead  of  being/orc- 
closed  and  immoveable,  it  is  in  fact  the  only  species 
of  landed  property  that  is  essentially  moving  and  cir- 
culative.  That  there  exist  no  inconveniences,  who 
will  pretend  to  assert?  But  I  have  yet  to  expect  the 
proof,  that  the  inconveniences  are  greater  in  this  than 
in  any  other  species  ;  or,  that  either  the  formers  or  the 
clergy-  would  be  benefited  by  forcing  the  latter  to 
become  either  Trullibers  or  salaried  placemen.  Nay, 
I  do  not  hesitate  to  declare  my  firm  persuasion,  that 
whatever  reason  of  discontent  the  farmers  may  assign, 
the  true  cause  is  this ;  that  they  may  cheat  the  parson, 
but  cannot  cheat  the  steward ;  and  they  are  disappoint- 
ed, if  they  should  have  been  able  to  withhold  only  two 
pounds  less  than  the  legal  claim,  having  expected  to 
withhold  five.  At  all  events,  considered  relatively  to 
the  encouragement  of  learning  and  genius,  the  estab- 
lishment presents  a  patronage,  at  once  so  effective  and 
unburihensorne,  that  it  would  be  impossible  to  afford 
the  like,  or  equal,  in  any  but  a  Christian  and  Protest- 
ant country.  There  is  scarce  a  department  of  human 
knowledge,  without  some  bearing  on  the  various  cri- 
tical, historical,  philosophical,  and  moral  truths,  in 
which,  the  scholar  must  be  interested  as  a  clergy- 
man;  no  one  pursuit  worthy  of  a  man  of  genius, 
which  may  not  be  followed  without  incongruity.  To 
eive  the  history  of  the  bible  as  a  book,  would  be  little 
less  than  to  relate  the  origin,  or  first  excitement,  of  all 
the  literature  and  science  that  we  now  possess.  The 
very  decorum  which  the  profession  imposes,  is  favor- 
able to  the  best  purposes  of  genius,  and  tends  to 
counteract  its  most  frequent  defects.  Finally,  that 
man  must  be  deficient  in  sensibility,  who  would  not 
find  an  incentive  to  emulation  in  the  ereat  and  burn- 
293 


284 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


ing  lights,  which,  in  a  long  series,  have  illustrated  the 
church  of  England  ;  who  would  not  hear  from  with- 
in an  echo  to  the  voice  from  the  sacred  shrines, 

"  Et  Pater  ^Eneas  et  avunculus  excitat  Hector." 

But,  whatever  be  the  profession  or  trade  chosen, 
the  advantages  are  many  and  important,  compared 
with  the  state  of  a  mere  literary  man,  who,  in  any 
degree,  depends  on  the  sale  of  his  works  for  the 
necessaries  and  comforts  of  life.  In  the  former,  a 
man  lives  in  sympathy  with  the  world  in  which  he 
lives.  At  least,  he  acquires  a  better  and  quicker  tact 
for  the  knowledge  of  that  with  which  men  in  general 
can  sympathize.  He  learns  to  manage  his  genius 
more  prudently  and  efficaciously.  His  powers  and 
acquirements  gain  him  likewise  more  real  admiration, 
for  they  surpass  the  legitimate  expectation  of  others. 
He  is  sometimes  beside  an  author,  and  is  not  there- 
fore considered  merely  as  an  author.  The  hearts  of 
men  are  open  to  him,  as  to  one  of  their  own  class ; 
and  whether  he  exerts  himself  or  not  in  the  con- 
versational circles  of  his  acquaintance,  his  silence  is 
not  attributed  to  pride,  nor  his  communicativeness  to 
vanity.  To  these  advantages  I  will  venture  to  add 
a  superior  chance  of  happiness  in  domestic  life,  were 
it  only  that  it  is  as  natural  for  the  man  to  be  out  of 
the  circle  of  his  household  during  the  day,  as  it  is 
meritorious  for  the  woman  to  remain  for  the  most 
part  within  it.  But  this  subject  involves  points  of 
consideration  so  numerous  and  so  delicate,  and  would 
not  only  permit,  but  require  such  ample  documents 
from  the  biography  of  literary  men,  that  I  now  mere- 
ly allude  to  it  in  transitu.  When  the  same  circum- 
stance has  occurred  at  very  different  times  to  very 
different  persons,  all  of  whom  have  some  one  thing 
in  common,  there  is  reason  to  suppose  that  such  cir- 
cumstance is  not  merely  attributable  to  the  persons 
concerned,  but  is,  in  some  measure,  occasioned  by 
the  one  point  in  common  to  them  all.  Instead  of  the 
vehement  and  almost  slanderous  dehorlation  from 
marriage,  which  the  Misogi/ne  Boccaccio  ( Vita  e 
Cos'umi  di  Dante,  p.  12.  IG.)  addresses  to  literary 
men,  I  would  substitute  the  simple  advice;  be  not 
merely  a  man  of  letters !  Let  literature  be  an  honor- 
nble  augmentation  to  your  arms,  but  not  constitute 
the  coat,  or  fill  the  escutcheon ! 

To  objections  from  conscience  I  can  of  course 
answer  in  no  other  way,  than  by  requesting  the 
youthful  objector  (as  I  have  already  done  on  a  former 
occasion)  to  ascertain  with  strict  self-examination, 
whether  other  influences  may  not  be  at  work;  whe- 
ther spirits,  "not  of  health,"  and  with  whispers  "not 
from  heaven,"  may  not  be  walking  in  the  twilight  of 
his  consciousness.  Let  him  catalogue  his  scruples, 
and  reduce  them  to  a  distinct  intelligible  form;  let 
him  be  certain  that  he  has  read  with  a  docile  mind 
and  favorable  dispositions,  the  best  ami  most  funda- 
mental works  on  the  subject ;  that  he  has  both  mind 
and  heart  opened  to  the  great  and  illustrious  qualities 
of  the  many  renowned  characters,  who  had  doubled 
like  himself, and  whose  researches  had  ended  in  the 
clear  conviction,  that  their  doubts  had  been  ground- 


less, or  at  least  in  no  proportion  to  the  counier-w  eight, 
Happy  will  it  be  for  such  a  man,  if,  among  his  con- 
temporaries elder  than  himself,  he  should  meet  with 
one,  who  with  similar  powers  and  feelings  as  acute 
as  his  own,  had  entertained  the  same  scruples ;  had 
acted  upon  them  ;  and  who,  by  after-research  (when 
the  step  was,  alas!  irretrievable,  but  for  that  very 
reason  his  research  undeniably  disinterested)  had 
discovered  himself  to  have  quarrelled  with  received 
opinions  only  to  embrace  errors,  to  have  left  the  di- 
rections tracked  out  for  him  on  the  high  road  of 
honorable  exertion,  only  to  deviate  into  a  labyrinth, 
where,  when  he  had  wandered  till  his  head  was 
giddy,  his  best  good  fortune  was  finally  to  have  found 
his  way  out  again,  too  late  for  prudence,  though  not 
too  late  for  conscience  or  for  truth!  Time  spent  in 
such  delay  is  time  won ;  for  manhood  in  the  mean 
time  is  advancing,  and  with  it  increase  of  knowledge, 
strength  of  judgment,  and,  above  all,  temperance  of 
feelings.  And  even  if  these  should  effect  no  change, 
yet  the  delay  will  at  least  prevent  the  final  approval 
of  the  decision  from  being  alloyed  by  the  inward 
censure  of  the  rashness  and  vanity  by  which  it  had 
been  precipitated.  It  would  be  a  sort  of  irreligion, 
and  scarcely  less  than  a  libel  on  human  nature,  to 
believe  that  there  is  any  established  and  reputable 
profession  or  employment,  in  which  a  man  may  not 
continue  to  act  with  honesty  and  honor;  and,  doubt- 
less, there  is  likewise  none  which  may  not  at  times 
present  temptations  to  the  contrary.  But  wofully 
will  that  man  find  himself  mistaken,  who  imagines 
that  the  profession  of  literature,  or  (to  speak  more 
plainly)  the  trade  of  authorship,  besets  its  members 
with  fewer  or  with  less  insidious  temptations,  than 
the  church,  the  law,  or  the  different  branches  of 
commerce.  But  I  have  treated  sufficiently  on  this 
unpleasant  subject  in  an  early  chapter  of  this  volume. 
I  will  conclude  the  present,  therefore,  with  a  short 
extract  from  Herder.,  whose  name  I  might  have 
added  to  the  illustrious  list  of  those  who  have  com- 
bined the  successful  pursuit  of  the  muses,  not  only 
with  the  faithful  discharge,  but  with  the  highest 
honors  and  honorable  emoluments  of  an  established 
profession.  The  translation  the  reader  will  find  in  a 
note  below*  "  Am  sorgf  altigsten,  meiden,  sei  die 
Autorschaft.  Zu  fruh  oder  unmassig  gebraucht, 
macht  sieden  Kopf  wuste  und  das  Ilerz  leer;  wenn 
sie  auch  sonst  kcine  uble  Folgen  gabe.  Ein  Mensch, 
der  nur  licset  urn  zu  druceken,  lieset  wahrscheinlich 


*  Translation. — "  With  the  greatest  possible  solicitude 
avoid  authorship.  Too  early,  or  immoderately  employed,  if 
makes  the  head  xcastr  and  the  heart  empty;  even  were  there 
no  other  worse  consequences.  A  person  who  reads  only  to 
print,  in  all  probability  reads  amiss  ;  and  lie  who  sends  away 
thrnush  llf  pen  nod  the  press,  every  thought,  the  moment  it 
occurs  to  him,  will  in  a  short  lime  have  sent  all  away,  and 
wi  I  become  a  mere  journeyman  of  the  printing-ounce,  a  com- 
7)0.ei(or." 

To  which  T  may  add  from  myself,  that  what  medical  phy- 
siologists affirm  of  certain  secretions,  applies  equally  to  our 
thoughts  ;  they  too  must  be  taken  up  again  into  the  circula- 
tion, and  be  again  and  again  re-secreted,  in  order  to  ensure  a 
healthful  vigor,  both  to  the  mind  and  to  its  intellectual  off- 
spring. 

294 


BI0GRAPI1IA  LITERARIA. 


285 


ubel ;  und  wer  jeden  Gedanken,  der  ihm  aufstosst, 
durch  Feder  un  Presse  versendet,  hat  sie  in  kurzer 
Zeit  alle  versandt,  und  wird  bald  ein  blosser  Diener 

der  Druckerey,  ein  Buchstabensetzer  werden. 

Herder. 


CHAPTER  XII. 

A  Chapter  of  requests  and  premonitions  conecrning  the  peru- 
sal or  omission  of  the  chapter  that  follows. 

In  the  perusal  of  philosophical  works,  I  have  been 
greatly  benefited  by  a  resolve,  which,  in  the  antithet- 
ic form,  and  with  the  allowed  qnaintness  of  an  adage 
or  maxim,  I  have  been  accustomed  to  word  thus: 
"  until  you  understand  a  writer's  ignorance,  presume 
yourself  ignorant  of  Ids  understanding."  This  golden 
rule  of  mine  does,  I  own,  resemble  those  of  Pytha- 
goras, in  its  obscurity  rather  than  in  its  depth.  If 
however,  the  reader  will  permit  me  to  be  my  own 
Hierocles,  I  trust  that  he  will  find  its  meaning  fully 
explained  by  the  following  instances.  I  have  now 
before  me  a  treatise  of  a  religious  fanatic,  full  of 
dreams  and  supernatural  experiences.  I  see  clearly 
the  writer's  grounds,  and  their  hollowness.  I  have 
a  complete  insight  into  the  causes,  which,  through 
the  medium  of  his  body,  had  acted  on  his  mind  ;  and 
by  application  of  received  and  ascertained  laws,  I 
can  satisfactorily  explain  to  my  own  reason,  all  the 
strange  incidents  which  the  writer  records  of  himself 
And  this  I  can  do  without  suspecting  him  of  any  in- 
tentional falsehood.  As  when  in  broad  day-light  a 
man  tracks  the  steps  of  a  traveller,  who  had  lost  his 
way  in  a  fog,  or  by  treacherous  moonshine  ,•  even  so, 
and  with  the  same  tranquil  sense  of  certainty,  can  I 
follow  the  traces  of  this  bewildered  visionary.     I 

UNDERSTAND  HIS  IGNORANCE. 

On  the  other  hand,  I  have  been  re-perusing,  with 
the  best  energies  of  my  mind,  the  Timreus  of  Plato. 
Whatever  I  comprehend,  impresses  me  with  a  reve- 
rential sense  of  the  author's  genius ;  but  there  is  a 
considerable  portion  of  the  work  to  which  I  can  at- 
tach no  consistent  meaning.  In  other  treatises  of  the 
same  philosopher,  intended  for  the  average  compre- 
hensions of  men,  I  have  been  delighted  with  the 
masterly  good  sense,  with  the  perspicuity  of  the  lan- 
guage, and  the  aptness  of  the  inductions.  I  recol- 
lect, likewise,  that  numerous  passages  in  this  author, 
which  I  thoroughly  comprehend,  were  formerlv  no 
less  unintelligible  to  me,  than  the  passages  now  in 
question.  It  would,  I  am  aware,  be  quite  fashiona- 
ble to  dismiss  them  at  once  as  Platonic  jargon.  But 
this  I  cannot  do,  with  satisfaction  to  my  own  mir.d, 
because  I  have  sought  in  vain  for  causes  adequate  to 
the  solution  of  the  assumed  inconsistency.  I  have 
no  insight  into  the  possibility  of  a  man  so  eminently 
wise,  using  words  with  such  half-meanings  to  him- 
self, as  must  perforce  pass  into  no-meanings  to  his 
readers.  When,  in  addition  to  the  motives  thus  sug- 
gested by  my  own  reason,  I  bring  into  distinct  re- 
membrance the  number  and  the  series  of  great  men, 
who,  after  long  and  zealous  study  of  these  works, 


had  joined  in  honoring  the  name  of  Plato  with  epi- 
thets that  almost  transcend  humanity,  I  feel  that  a 
contemptuous  verdict  on  my  part  might  argue  want 
of  modesty,  but  would  hardly  be  received  by  the  ju- 
dicious, as  evidence  of  superior  penetration.  There- 
fore, utterly  baffled  in  all  my  attempts  to  understand 
the  ignorance  of  Plato,  I  conclude  myself  ignorant 

OF  HIS  UNDERSTANDING. 

In  lieu  of  the  various  requests,  which  the  anxiety  of 
authorship  addresses  to  the  unknown  reader,  I  advance 
but  this  one ;  that  he  will  either  pass  over  the  fol- 
lowing chapter  altogether,  or  read  the  whole  connect- 
edly. The  fairest  part  of  the  most  beautiful  body 
will  appear  deformed  and  monstrous,  if  dissevered 
from  its  place  in  the  organic  whole.  Nay,  on  deli- 
cate subjects,  where  a  seemingly  trifling  difference 
of  more  or  less  may  constitute  a  difference  in  kind, 
even  a  faithful  display  of  the  main  and  supporting 
ideas,  if  yet  they  are  separated  from  the  forms  by 
which  they  are  at  once  clothed  and  modified,  may 
perchance  present  a  skeleton  indeed  ;  but  a  skeleton 
to  alarm  and  deter.  Though  I  might  find  numerous 
precedents,  I  shall  not  desire  the  reader  to  strip  his 
mind  of  all  prejudices,  or  to  keep  all  prior  systems 
out  of  view  during  his  examination  of  the  present. 
For,  in  truth,  such  requests  appear  to  me  not  much 
unlike  the  advice  given  to  hypochondriacal  patients  in 
Dr.  Buchan's  domestic  medicine;  videlicit,  to  pre- 
serve themselves  uniformly  tranquil  and  in  good 
spirits.  Till  I  had  discovered  the  art  of  destroying 
the  memory  a  parte  post,  without  injury  to  its  future 
operations,  and  without  detriment  to  the  judgment,  I 
should  suppress  the  request  as  premature ;  and,  there- 
fore, however  much  I  may  wish  to  be  read  with  an 
unprejudiced  mind,  I  do  not  presume  to  state  it  as  a 
necessary  condition. 

The  extent  of  my  daring  is  to  suggest  one  criteri- 
on, by  which  it  may  be  rationally  conjectured  before- 
hand, whether  or  no  a  reader  would  lose  his  time, 
and  perhaps  his  temper,  in  the  perusal  of  this,  or  any 
other  treatise  constructed  on  similar  principles.  But 
it  would  be  cruelly  misinterpreted,  as  implying  the 
least  disrespect  either  for  the  moral  or  intellectual 
qualities  of  the  individuals  thereby  precluded.  The 
criterion  is  this  i  if  a  man  receives  as  fundamental 
facts,  and  therefore  of  course  indemonstrable,  and  in- 
capable of  further  analysis,  the  general  notions  of  mat- 
ter, soul,  body,  action,  passiveness,  time,  space,  cause 
and  effect,  consciousness,  perception,  memory,  and 
habit;  if  he  feels  his  mind  completely  at  rest  con- 
cerning all  these,  and  is  satisfied  if  only  he  can  ana- 
lyze all  other  notions  into  some  one  or  more  of  these 
supposed  elements,  with  plausible  subordination  and 
apt  arrangement:  to  such  a  mind  I  would  as  courte- 
ously as  possible  convey  the  hint,  that  for  him  the 
chapter  was  not  written. 

Vir  bonus  es,  doctus,  prudens  ;  ast  hand  tibi  spiro. 

For  these  terms  do,  in  truth,  include  all  the  diffi- 
culties which  the  human  mind  can  propose  for  solu- 
tion. Taking  them,  therefore,  in  mass,  and  unexam- 
ined, it  requires  only  a  decent  apprenticeship  in  logic, 
to  draw  forth  their  contents  in  all  forms  and  colors, 
295 


286 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


as  the  professors  of  legerdemain  at  our  village  fairs 
pull  out  ribbon  after  ribbon  from  their  mouths.  And 
not  more  difficult  is  it  to  reduce  them  back  again  to 
their  different  genera.  But  though  this  analysis  is 
Aighly  useful  in  rendering  our  knowledge  more  dis- 
tinct, it  does  not  really  add  to  it.  It  does  not  increase, 
though  it  gives  us  a  greater  mastery  over,  the  wealth 
which  we  before  possessed.  For  forensic  purposes, 
for  ail  the  established  professions  of  society,  this  is 
sufficient.  But  for  philosophy  in  its  highest  sense,  as 
the  science  of  ultimate  truths,  and  therefore  scientia 
scientiarum,  this  mere  analysis  of  terms  is  preparative 
only,  though,  as  a  preparative  discipline,  indispensa- 
ble. 

Still  less  dare  a  favorable  perusal  be  anticipated 
from  the  proselytes  of  that  compendious  philosophy, 
which  talking  of  mind  but  thinking  of  brick  and  mor- 
tar, or  other  images  equally  abstracted  from  body, 
contrives  a  theory  of  spirit  by  nicknaming  matter,  and 
in  a  few  hours  can  qualify  its  dullest  disciples  to  ex- 
plain the  omne  scibile  by  reducing  all  things  to  im- 
pressions, ideas,  and  sensations. 

But  it  is  time  to  tell  the  truth;  though  it  requires 
some  courage  to  avow  it  in  an  age  and  country,  in 
which  disquisitions  on  all  subjects,  not  privileged  to 
adopt  technical  terms  or  scientific  symbols,  must  be 
addressed  to  the  public.  I  say  then,  that  it  is  nei- 
ther possible  or  necessary  for  all  men,  or  for  many, 
to  be  philosophers.  There  is  a  jihilosophic  (and  in- 
asmuch as  it  is  actualized  by  an  effort  of  freedom,  an 
artificial)  consciousness,  which  lies  beneath,  or,  (as  it 
were,)  behind  the  spontaneous  consciousness  natural 
to  all  reflecting  beings.  As  the  elder  Romans  distin- 
guished their  northern  provinces  into  C'is-Alpine  and 
Trans-Alpine,  so  may  we  divide  all  the  objects  of 
human  knowledge  into  those  on  this  side,  and  those 
on  the  other  side  of  the  spontaneous  consciousness; 
citra  et  trans  conscientiam  communem.  The  latter 
is  exclusively  the  domain  of  pure  philosophy,  which 
is,  therefore,  properly  entitled  transcendental,  in  order 
to  discriminate  it  at  once,  both  from  mere  reflection 
and  representation  on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the  other 
from  those  flights  of  lawless  speculation,  which,  aban- 
doned by  all  distinct  consciousness,  because  trans- 
gressing the  bounds  and  purposes  of  our  intellectual 
faculties,  are    justly   condemned,   as    transcendent* 

*  This  distinction  between  tran9Cendenttil  and  transcendent, 
is  observed  by  our  elder  divines  and  philosophers,  whenever 
they  express  themselves  sckolastically.  Dr.  Johnson,  indeed, 
has  confounded  the  two  words  ;  but  his  own  authorities  do 
not  bear  him  out.  Of  this  celebrated  dictionary,  I  will  ven- 
ture to  remark,  once  for  all,  that  I  should  snsprct  the  man  of 
a  moro9e  disposition,  who  should  speak  of  it  without  respect 
and  gratitude,  as  a  most  instructive  and  entertaining  book,  and 
hitherto,  unfortunately,  an  indispensable  book  ;  but  t  con- 
fess, that  1  should  be  surprised  at  hearing  from  a  philosophic 
and  thorough  scholar,  any  but  very  qualified  praises  of  it,  as 
a  dictionary .  I  am  not  now  alluding  to  the  number  of  genu- 
ine words  omitted  ;  for  this  is  (and,  perhaps,  to  a  great  ex- 
tent) true,  as  Mr.  Wakefield  has  noticed,  of  our  best  Greek 
Lexicons  ;  and  this,  too,  after  the  successive  labors  of  so 
many  giants  in  learning.  1  refer,  at  present,  both  to  omissions 
and  commissions  of  a  more  important  nature.  What  these 
.are,  me  saltern  judice,  will  be  stated  at  full  in  The  Friend, 
re-published  and  completed. 

I  had  never  heard  of  the  correspondence  between  Wake- 
field and  Fox,  till  I  saw  the  account  of  it  this  morning,  (16th 


The  first  range  of  hills  that  encircle  the  scanty  rale 
of  human  life,  is  the  horizon  for  the  majority  of  its  in- 
habitants. On  its  ridges  the  common  sun  is  born  and 
departs.  From  them  the  stars  rise,  and  touching  them 
they  vanish.  By  the  many,  even  this  range,  the  na- 
tural limit  and  bulwark  of  the  vale,  is  but  imperfectly 
known.  Its  higher  ascents  are  too  often  hidden  by 
mists  and  clouds  from  uncultivated  swamps,  which 
few  have  courage  or  curiosity  to  penetrate.  To  the 
multitude  below  these  vapors  appear,  now,  as  the 
dark  haunts  of  terrific  agents,  on  which  none  may  in- 
trude with  impunity;  and  now  all  a-glow,  with  co- 
lors not  their  own,  they  are  gazed  at  as  the  splendid 
palaces  of  happiness  and  power.  But  in  all  ages  there 
have  been  a  few  who,  measuring  and  sounding  the 
rivers  of  the  vale  at  the  feet  of  their  furthest  inac- 
cessible falls,  have  learnt  that  the  sources  must  be  far 
higher  and  far  inward  ;  a  few,  who  even  in  the  level 
streams  have  detected  elements,  which  neither  the 
vale  itself  or  the  surrounding  mountains  contained  or 
could  supply.  How  and  whence  to  these  thoughts, 
these  strong  probabilities,  the  ascertaining  vision,  the 
intuitive  knowledge,  may  finally  supervene,  can  be 
learnt  only  by  the  fact.  I  might  oppose  to  the  ques- 
tion the  words  with  which  Plotinust  supposes  na- 

September,  1815,)  in  the  Monthly  Review.  I  was  not  a  little 
gratified  at  finding,  that  Mr.  Wakefield  had  proposed  to  him- 
self nearly  the  same  plan  for  a  Greek  and  English  Dictionary, 
which  I  had  formed,  and  began  to  execute,  now  ten  years 
ago.  Rut  far,  far  more  grieved  am  I,  that  he  did  not  live  to 
complete  it.  I  cannot  but  think  it  a  subject  of  most  serious 
regret,  that  the  same  heavy  expenditure  which  is  now  em- 
ploying in  the  re-publication  of  Stcphanus  augmented,  had 
not  been  applied  to  a  new  Lexicon,  on  a  more  philosophical 
plan,  with  the  English,  German,  and  French  synonymes,  as 
well  as  the  Latin.  In  almost  every  instance,  the  precise  indi- 
vidual meaning  might  be  given  in  an  English  or  German 
word  ;  whereas,  in  Latin,  we  must  too  often  be  contented 
with  a  mere  general  and  inclusive  term.  How,  indeed,  can 
it  be  otherwise,  when  we  attempt  to  render  the  most  copious 
language  of  the  world,  the  most  admirable  for  the  fineness  of 
its  distinctions,  into  one  of  the  poorest  and  most  vague  lan- 
guages'? Especially,  when  we  reflect  on  the  comparative 
number  of  the  works  still  extant,  written  while  the  Greek  and 
Latin  were  living  languages.  Were  I  asked,  what  I  deemed 
the  greatest  and  most  unmixt  benefit  which  a  wealthy  indi- 
vidual, or  an  association  of  wealthy  individuals,  could  bestow 
on  their  country  and  on  mankind,  I  should  not  hesitate  to 
answer,  "a  philosophical  English  dictionary,  with  the 
Greek,  Latin,  German,  French,  Spanish,  and  Italian  syno- 
nymes, and  with  corresponding  indexes."  That  the  learned 
languages  might  thereby  be  acquired  better,  in  half  the  time, 
is  but  a  part,  and  not  the  most  important  part,  of  the  advan- 
tages which  would  accrue  from  such  a  work.  O  !  if  it  should 
be  permitted  by  Providence,  that,  without  detriment  to  free- 
dom and  independence,  our  government  might  be  enabled  to 
become  more  than  a  committee  for  war  and  revenue  !  There 
was  a  time  when  every  thing  was  to  be  done  by  government. 
Have  we  not  flown  off  to  the  contrary  extreme  1 

t  Knnead  iii.  1.8.  c.  3.  The  force  of  the  Greek  ^vriivai 
is  imperfectly  expressed  by  "understand;"  our  own  idiomatic 
phrase,  "  to  go  along  with  vie,"  comes  nearest  to  it.  The 
passage  that  follows,  full  of  profound  sense,  appears  to  mo 
evidently  coriupt;  and,  in  fact,  no  writer  more  wants,  better 
deserves,  or  is  less  likely  to  obtain,  a  new  and  more  correct 
edition: — rl  Sv  $-vitivai ,  Sri  to  yevdpevov  £?<  Stapa 
i/ibv,  sturrrisis  (mallem,  S-iafta,  i/xS  j-itoirwsfjj,)  Kai 
(pvsci  yevdptvov  Sz&pnua,  Kai  uoi  yevouevn  ex  -Stw/i/us 
ri/s  iMi  rnv  (pvgtv  e^etv  (piXo&tdjiOva  inrapKti  (mallem. 
icai  ytot  'n  ytvofiivn  i<  Scfxpta;  dvrrjs  uioff.)  "  What 
then  are  we  to  understand  1  That  whatever  is  produced  is  an 
296 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


287 


TCRE  to  answer  a  similar  difficulty.  "  Should  any 
one  interrogate  her  how  she  works,  if  graciously  she 
vouchsafe  to  listen  and  speak,  she  will  reply,  it  be- 
hooves thee  not  to  disquiet  me  with  interrogatories, 
but  to  understand  in  silence,  even  as  I  am  silent,  and 
work  without  words." 

Likewise,  in  the  fifth  book  of  the  fifth  Ennead, 
speaking  of  the  highest  and  intuitive  knowledge  as 
distinguished  from  the  discursive,  or,  in  the  language 
of  Wordsworth, 

"  The  vision  and  the  faculty  divine  ;" 

he  says:  "it  is  not  lawful  to  inquire  from  whence  it 
sprang,  as  it'  it  were  a  thing  subject  to  place  and  mo- 
tion, for  it  neither  approached  hither,  nor  again  de- 
parts from  hence  to  some  other  place;  but  it  either 
appears  to  us,  or  it  does  not  appear.  So  that  we  ought 
not  to  pursue  it  with  a  view  of  detecting  its  secret 
source,  but  to  watch  in  quiet  till  it  suddenly  shines 
upon  us ;  preparing  ourselves  for  the  blessed  specta- 
cle, as  the  eye  waits  patiently  for  the  rising  sun." 
They,  and  they  only,  can  acquire  the  philosophic  im- 
agination, the  sacred  power  of  self  intuition,  who, 
within  themselves,  can  interpret  and  understand  the 
symbol,  that  the  wings  of  the  air-sylph  are  forming 
within  the  skin  of  the  caterpillar;  those  only,  who 
feel  in  their  own  spirits  the  same  instinct  which  im- 
pels the  crysalis  of  the  homed  fly  to  leave  room  in 
its  involucrum  for  antennae  yet  to  come.  They  know 
and  feel,  that  the  potential  works  in  them,  even  as  the 
actual  works  on  them !  In  short,  all  the  organs  of 
sense  are  framed  for  a  corresponding  world  of  sense  ; 
and  we  have  it.  All  the  organs  of  spirit  are  framed 
for  a  correspondent  world  of  spirit:  though  the  latter 
organs  are  not  developed  in  all  alike.  But  they  ex- 
ist in  all,  and  their  first  appearance  discloses  itself  in 
the  moral  being.  How  else  could  it  be.  that  even 
worldlings,  not  wholly  debased,  will  contemplate  the 
man  of  simple  and  disinterested  goodness  with  con- 
tradictory feelincrs  of  pity  and  respect !  "  Poor  man! 
he  is  not  made  for  this  world."  Oh!  herein  they  ut- 
ter a  prophecy  of  universal  fulfilment;  for  man  must 
either  rise  or  sink. 

It  is  the  essential  mark  of  the  true  philosopher  to 
rest  satisfied  with  no  imperfect  licrht.  as  long  as  the 
impossibility  of  attaining  a  fuller  knowledge  has  not 
been  demonstrated.  That  the  common  consciousness 
itself  will  furnish  proofs  by  its  own  direction,  that  it 
is  connected  with  master-currents  below  the  surface, 
I  shall  merely  assume  as  a  postulate  pro  tempore. 
This  having  been  granted,  though  but  in  expectation 
of  the  argument,  I  can  safely  deduce  from  it  the 
equal  truth  of  my  former  assertion,  that  philosophy 
cannot  be  intelligible  to  all,  even  of  the  most  learned 
and  cultivated  classes.  A  system,  the  first  principle 
of  which  it  is  to  render  the  mind  intuitive  of  the  spi- 


intuition,  I  silent;  and  that,  which  if  Ihus  generated,  is  by  iis 
nature  a  theorem,  or  fcrm  of  contemplation  :  and  the  birth, 
u'hich  results  to  me  from  this  contemplation,  attains  to  have  a 
'.ontemplative  nature."  So  Synesius ;  'iir'i'j  tan,  ALinra 
Yovn-  The  after  comparison  of  the  process  of  the  natura 
naiurans  with  that  of  the  geometrician  is  drawn  from  the 
very  heart  of  philosophy. 

20  Aa2 


ritual  in  man,  (i.  e.  of  that  which  lies  on  the  other  side 
of  our  natural  consciousness,)  must  needs  have  a 
great  obscurity  for  those  who  have  never  disciplined 
and  strengthened  this  ulterior  consciousness.  It 
must,  in  truth,  be  a  land  of  darkness,  a  perfect  Ante- 
Goshen,  for  men  to  whom  the  noblest  treasures  of 
their  being  are  reported  only  through  the  imperfect 
translation  of  lifeless  ami  sightless  ?iotions:  perhaps. 
in  trreat  part,  through  words  which  are  but  the  sha- 
dows of  notions;  even  as  the  notional  understanding 
itself  is  but  the  shadowy  abstraction  of  living  and 
actual  truth.  On  the  immediate;,  which  dwells  in 
evorv  man,  and  on  the  original  intuition,  or  absolute 
affirmation  of  it,  (which  is  likewise  in  every  man,  but 
does  not  in  every  man  rise  into  consciousness.)  all  the 
certainty  of  our  knowledge  depends;  and  this  be- 
comes intelligible  to  no  man  by  the  ministery  of  mere 
words  from  without.  The  medium  by  which  spirits 
understand  each  other,  is  not  the  surrounding  air; 
but  the  freedom  which  they  possess  in  common,  as 
the  common  ethereal  element  of  their  being,  the 
tremulous  reciprocations  of  which  propagate  them- 
selves even  to  the  inmost  of  the  soul.  Where  the 
spirit  of  a  man  is  not  filled  with  the  consciousness  of 
freedom,  (were  it  only  from  its  restlessness,  as  of  one 
still  struggling  in  bondage,)  all  spiritual  intercourse 
is  interrupted,  not  only  with  others,  but  even  with 
himself.  No  wonder,  then,  that  he  remains  incom- 
prehensible to  himself  as  well  as  to  others.  No 
wonder,  that  in  the  fearful  desert  of  his  conscious- 
ness, he  wearies  himself  out  with  empty  wort's,  to 
which  no  friendly  echo  answers,  either  from  his  own 
heart  or  the  heart  of  a  fellow-being ;  or  bewilders 
himself  in  the  pursuit  of  notional  phantoms,  the 
mere  refractions  from  unseen  and  distant  truths, 
through  the  distorting  medium  of  his  own  unenliven- 
ed and  stagnant  understanding!  To  remain  unintel- 
ligible to  such  a  mind,  exclaims  Schelling,  on  a  like- 
occasion,  is  honor  and  a  good  name  before  God  and 
man. 

The  history  of  philosophy,  (the  same  writer  ob- 
serves,) contains  instances  of  systems  which  for  suc- 
cessive generations,  have  remained  enigmatic.  Such 
he  deems  the  system  of  Leibnitz,  whom  another 
writer,  (rashly  1  think,  and  invidiously,)  extols  as  the 
oidi/  philosopher  who  was  himself  deeply  convinced 
of  his  own  doctrines.  As  hitherto  interpreted,  how- 
ever, they  have  not  produced  the  effect  which  Leib- 
nitz himself,  in  a  most  instructive  passage,  describes 
as  the  criterion  of  a  true  philosophy ;  namely,  that  it 
would  at  once  explain  and  collect  the  fragments  of 
truth  scattered  through  systems  apparently  the  most 
incongruous.  The  truth,  says  he,  is  diffused  more 
widely  than  is  commonly  believed;  but  it  is  often 
painted,  yet  oftener  masked,  and  is  sometimes  muti- 
lated, and  sometimes,  alas !  in  close  alliance  with 
mischievous  errors.  The  deeper,  however,  we  pene- 
trate into  the  ground  of  things,  the  more  truth  we 
discover  in  the  doctrines  of  the  greater  number  of  the 
philosophical  sects.  The  want  of  substantial  reality 
in  the  objects  of  the  senses,  according  to  the  scep- 
tics ;  the  harmonies  or  numbers,  the  prototypes  and 
ideas,  to  which  the  Pythagoreans  and  Piatonists  re- 
297 


288 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


duced  all  things;  the  one  and  all  of  Parmenides  and 
Ploiinus,  without  Spinozism;*  the  necessary  connec- 
tion of  things  according  to  the  Stoics,  reconcilable  with 
the  spontaneity  of  the  other  schools ;  the  vital  philo- 
sophy of  the  Cabalists  and  Hermetists,  who  assumed 
the  universality  of  sensation;  the  substantial  forms 
and  entelechies  of  Aristotle  and  the  schoolmen,  to- 
gether with  the  mechanical  solution  of  all  particular 
phenomena  according  to  Democritus  and  the  recent 
philosophers;  all  these  we  shall  find  united  in  one 
perspective  central  point,  which  shows  regularity 
and  a  coincidence  of  all  the  parts  in  the  very  object 
which,  from  every  point  of  view,  must  appear  con- 
fused and  distorted.  The  spirit  of  sectarianism  has 
been  hitherto  our  fault,  and  the  cause  of  our  failures. 
We  have  imprisoned  our  own  conceptions  by  the 
lines  which  we  have  drawn  in  order  to  exclude  the 
conceptions  of  others.  J'ai  trouve  que  la  plupartdes 
sectes  ont  raison  dans  une  bonne  partie  de  ce  qu'elles 
avancent,  mais  non  pas  en  ce  qu'elles  nient. 

A  system  which  aims  to  deduce  the  memory  with 
all  the  other  functions  of  intelligence,  must,  of  course 
place  its  first  position  from  beyond  the  memory,  and 
anterior  to  it,  otherwise  the  principle  of  solution 
would  be  itself  a  part  of  the  problem  to  be  solved. 
Such  a  position,  therefore,  must,  in  the  first  instance, 
be  demanded,  and  the  first  question  will  be,  by  what 
right  is  it  demanded  ?  On  this  account  I  think  it  ex- 
pedient  to  make  some  preliminary  remarks  on  the 

*  This  is  happily  effected  in  three  lineB  by  Synesius,  in  his 
Fourth  Hymn  : 

'  En  Kul  Udvra — (taken  by  itself)  is  Spinozism. 
1  Ev  5'  'AnavTuv — a  mere  anima  Mundi. 
'  Ev  re  rpd  itavnav — is  mechanical  Theism. 

But  unite  all  three,  and  the  result  is  the  Theism  of  St.  Paul 
and  Christianity. 

Synesius  was  censured  for  his  doctrine  of  the  pre-existence 
of  the  Soul ;  but  never,  that  I  can  find,  arraigned  or  deemed 
heretical  for  his  Pantheism,  though  neither  Giordano  Bruno, 
or  Jacob  Behmen,  ever  avowed  it  more  broadly. 

Mtfoj  Si  Tibos, 
Ta  re  Kai  rd  \iyti, 
"Bv&ov  dl>pr]Tov 
h.H$ivophiwv. 

Y.V    TO    TLKTOV    £$Df, 

T.v  rb  tikt6jicvov 
St)  rb  <po>Ti%iov, 
l.v  to  Xafi-ndjitvov 
2u  to  (paivofttvov, 
Yi)  rb  KpvtTTouevov 
\Siais  dvyai;. 
'Ev  Kai  Tzavra, 
Ev  Ka$"  iavTO, 
Kai  Sia  vavrtov. 

Par.theiem  is,  therefore,  not  necessarily  irreligious  or  here- 
tical :  though  it  may  be  taught  atheistically.  Thus,  Spinoza 
would  agree  with  Synesius  in  calling  God  "tufij  cv  Noepois, 
the  Nature  in  Intelligences ;  but  ho  could  not  subscribe  to 
the  preceding  Nduj  Kai  Notpof,  i.  e.  Himself  Intelligence 
and  intelligent. 

In  this  biographical  sketch  of  my  literary  life,  I  may  be  ex- 
cused, if  I  mention  here,  that  I  had  translated  the  eight 
Hymns  of  Synesius  from  the  Greek  into  English  Anacreontics 
before  my  15th  year. 


introduction  of  Postulates  in  philosophy.  The 
word  postulate,  is  borrowed  from  the  science  of  ma- 
thematics. (See  Schell.  abhandl  zur  Erlauter,  des  id 
der  Wissenschaftslehre.)  In  geometry  the  primary 
construction  is  not  demonstrated,  but  postulated. 
This  first  and  most  simple  construction  in  space,  is 
the  point  in  motion,  or  the  line.  Whether  the  point 
is  moved  in  one  and  the  same  direction,  or  whether  its 
direction  is  continually  changed,  remains  as  yet  un- 
determined. But  if  the  direction  of  the  point  have 
been  determined,  it  is  either  by  a  point  without  it, 
and  then  there  arises  the  straight  line  which  incloses 
no  space ;  or  the  direction  of  the  point  is  not  deter- 
mined by  a  point  without  it,  and  then  it  must  flow 
back  again  on  itself;  that  is,  there  arises  a  cyclical 
line,  which  does  inclose  a  space.  If  the  straight  line 
be  assumed  as  the  positive,  the  cyclical  is  then  the 
negation  of  the  straight.  It  is  a  line  which  at  no 
point  strikes  out  into  the  straight,  but  changes  its  di- 
rection continuously.  But  if  the  primary  line  be  con- 
ceived as  undetermined,  and  the  straight  line  as 
determined  throughout,  then  the  cyclical  is  the  third, 
compounded  of  both.  It  is  at  once  undetermined  and 
determined ;  undetermined  through  any  point  without, 
and  determined  through  itself.  Geometry,  therefore, 
supplies  philosophy  with  the  example  of  a  primary 
intuition,  from  which  every  science  that  lays  claim 
to  evidence  must  make  its  commencement.  The  ma- 
thematician does  not  begin  with  a  demonstrable  pro- 
position, but  with  an  intuition,  a  practical  idea. 

But  here  an  important  distinction  presents  itself. 
Philosophy  is  employed  on  objects  of  the  inner 
sense,  and  cannot,  like  geometry,  appropriate  to 
every  construction  a  correspondent  outward  intuition. 
Nevertheless,  philosophy,  if  it  is  to  arrive  at  evi- 
dence, must  proceed  from  the  most  original  construc- 
tion, and  the  question  then  is,  what  is  the  most 
original  construction  or  first  productive  act  for  the 
inner  sense?  The  answer  to  this  question  depends 
on  the  direction  which  is  given  to  the  inner  sense. 
But  in  philosophy,  the  inner  sense  cannot  have  its 
direction  determined  by  any  outward  object.  To 
the  original  construction  of  the  line,  I  can  be  com- 
pelled, by  a  line  drawn  before  me,  on  the  slate  or  on 
sand.  The  stroke  thus  drawn  is,  indeed,  not  the  line 
itself,  but  only  the  image  or  picture  of  the  line.  It  is 
not  from  it  that  we  first  leam  to  know  the  line  ;  but, 
on  the  contrary,  we  bring  this  stroke  to  the  original 
line,  generated  by  the  act  of  the  imagination ;  other- 
wise we  could  not  define  it  as  without  breadth  or 
thickness.  Still,  however,  this  stroke  is  the  sensuous 
image  of  the  original  or  ideal  line,  and  an  efficient 
mean  to  excite  every  imagination  to  the  intuition 
of  it. 

It  is  demanded,  then,  whether  there  be  found  any 
means  in  philosophy  to  determine  the  direction  of 
the  inner  sense,  as  in  mathematics  it  is  deter- 
minable by  its  specific  image,  or  outward  picture. 
Now,  the  inner  sense  has  its  direction  determined  for 
the  greater  part  only  by  an  act  of  freedom.  One 
man's  consciousness  extends  only  to  the  pleasant  or 
unpleasant  sensations  caused  in  him  by  external  im- 
pressions; another  enlarges  his  inner  sense  to  a  con 
298 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


289 


sciousness  of  forms  and  quantity;  a  third,  in  addition 
to  the  image,  is  conscious  of  the  conception  or  notion 
of  the  thing;  a  fourth  attains  to  a  notion  of  notions — 
he  reflects  on  his  own  reflections  ;  and  thus  we  may 
say,  without  impropriety,  that  the  one  possesses  more 
or  less  inner  sense  than  the  other.  This  more  or  less 
betravs  already  that  philosophy,  in  its  principles, 
must  have  a  practical  or  moral,  as  well  as  a  theoreti- 
cal or  speculative  side.  This  difference  in  degree 
does  not  exist  in  the  mathematics.  Socrates  in  Plato 
shows,  that  an  ignorant  slave  may  be  brought  to  un- 
derstand, and,  of  himself,  to  solve  the  most  geometri- 
cal problem.  Socrates  drew  the  fiuures  for  the  slave 
in  the  sand.  The  disciples  of  the  critical  philosophy 
could  likewise  (as  was  indeed  actually  done  by  La 
Forge  and  some  other  followers  of  Des  Cartes)  repre- 
sent the  origin  of  our  representations  in  copper-plates ; 
but  no  one  has  yet  attempted  it,  and  it  would  be  ut- 
terly useless.  To  an  Esquimaux  or  New  Zealander, 
our  most  popular  philosophy  would  be  wholly  unin- 
telligible; for  the  sense,  the  inward  organ,  is  not 
yet  born  in  hira.  So  is  there  many  a  one  among  us, 
yes,  and  some  who  think  themselves  philosophers, 
too,  to  whom  the  philosophic  organ  is  entirely  want- 
ing. To  such  a  man,  philosophy  is  a  mere  play  of 
words  and  notions,  like  a  theory  of  music  to  the  deaf, 
or  like  the  geometry  of  light  to  the  blind.  The  con- 
nection of  the  parts  and  their  logical  dependencies 
may  be  seen  and  remembered;  but  the  whole  is 
groundless  and  hollow;  unsustained  by  living  con- 
tact, unaccompanied  with  any  realizing  intuition 
which  exists  by,  and  in  the  act  that  affirms  its  exist- 
ence, which  is  known,  because  it  is,  and  is,  because 
it  is  known.  The  words  of  Plotinus.  in  the  assumed 
person  of  nature,  holds  true  of  the  philosophic  ener- 
gy. Id  S-cwpSv  fin  Sziipr^fia  vuili,  <S{77£p  ot  Teoifit^iai 
Sctoos'lcs  ynd6«siv,  aXX'  i/iS  ph  ypa<p6sis,  -?£ujo«?of  li, 
htpisavlai  at  twv  ;iajxd1uiv  ylaftfini.  W  1th  me  the  act 
of  contemplation  makes  the  thing  contemplated,  as 
the  geometricians  contemplating  describe  lines  cor- 
respondent ;  but  I  not  describing  lines,  but  simply 
contemplating,  the  representative  forms  of  things  rise 
up  into  existence. 

The  postulate  of  philosophy,  and,  at  the  same  time, 
the  test  of  philosophic  capacity,  is  no  other  than  the 
heaven-descended  know  thyself  !  E  ccelo  descen- 
ds, (IYwfli  icavlov,)  and  this  at  once  practically  and 
speculatively.  For,  as  philosophy  is  neither  a  science 
of  the  reason  or  understanding  only,  nor  merely  a 
science  of  morals,  but  the  science  of  being  altogether, 
its  primary  ground  can  be  neither  merely  speculative 
or  merely  practical,  but  both  in  one.  All  knowledge 
rests  on  the  coincidence  of  an  object  with  a  subject. 
(My  readers  have  been  warned  in  a  former  chapter, 
that  for  their  convenience  as  well  as  the  writer's,  the 
term  subject,  is  used  by  me  in  its  scholastic  sense,  as 
equivalent  to  mind  or  sentient  being,  and  as  the 
necessary  correlative  of  object  or  qukquid  objicitur 
menti.)  For  we  can  know  that  only  which  is  true  ; 
and  the  truth  is  universally  placed  in  the  coincidence 
of  the  thought  with  the  thing,  of  the  representation 
with  the  object  represented. 

Now  the  sum  of  all  that  is  merely  oejective,  we 


will  henceforth  call  nature,  confining  the  term  to  its 
passive  and  material  sense,  as  comprising  all  the  phe- 
nomena by  which  its  existence  is  made  known  to  us. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  sum  of  all  that  is  subjective, 
we  may  comprehend  in  the  name  of  self  or  intelli- 
gence. Both  conceptions  are  in  necessary  antithe- 
sis. Intelligence  is  conceived  of,  as  exclusively  re- 
presentative, nature  as  exclusively  represented  ;  the 
one  as  conscious,  the  other  as  without  consciousness. 
Now,  in  all  acts  of  positive  knowledge,  there  is  re- 
quired a  reciprocal  concurrence  of  both,  namely,  of 
the  conscious  being,  and  of  that  which  is,  in  itself, 
unconscious.  Our  problem  is  to  explain  this  concur- 
rence, its  possibility,  and  its  necessity. 

During  the  act  of  knowledge  itself,  the  objective 
and  subjective  are  so  instantly  united,  that  we  can- 
not determine  to  which  of  the  two  the  priority  be- 
longs. There  is  here  no  first,  and  no  second ;  both 
are  coinstantaneous  and  one.  While  I  am  attempt- 
ing to  explain  this  intimate  coalition,  I  must  suppose 
it  dissolved.  I  must  necessarily  set  out  from  the  one 
to  which,  therefore,  I  give  hypothetical  antecedence, 
in  order  to  arrive  at  the  other.  But,  as  thsrb  are  but 
two  factors  or  elements  in  the  prob~c/li,  subject  and 
object,  and  as  it  is  left  indeterminate  from  which  of 
them  I  should  commence,  there  are  two  cases  equally 
possible. 

1.  Either  i  he  Objective  is  taken  as  the  first, 
and  then  we  have  to  account  for  the  superven- 
TION of  the  Subjective,  which  coalesces  with  it. 

The  notion  of  the  subjective  is  not  contained  in  the 
notion  of  the  objective.  On  the  contrary,  they  mutu- 
ally exclude  each  other.  The  subjective,  therefore, 
must  supervene  to  the  objective.  The  conception  of 
nature  does  not  involve  the  co-presence  of  an  intelli- 
gence making  an  ideal  duplicate  of  it,  i.  e.  represent- 
ing it.  This  desk,  for  instance,  would  (according  to 
our  natural  notions)  be,  though  there  should  exist  no 
sentient  being  to  look  at  it.  This  then  is  the  problem 
of  natural  philosophy.  It  assumes  the  objective  or 
unconscious  nature  as  the  first,  and  has,  therefore,  to 
explain  how  intelligence  can  supervene  to  it,  or  how 
itself  can  grow  into  intelligence.  If  it  should  appear 
that  all  enlightened  naturalists,  without  having  dis- 
tinctly proposed  the  problem  to  themselves,  have  yet 
constantly  moved  in  the  line  of  its  solution,  it  must 
afford  a  strong  presumption  that  the  problem  itself  is 
founded  in  nature.  For  if  all  knowledge  has,  as  it 
were,  two  poles  reciprocally  required  and  presup- 
posed, all  sciences  must  proceed  from  the  one  or  the 
other,  and  must  tend  toward  the  opposite  as  far  as  the 
equatorial  point  in  which  both  are  reconciled,  and 
become  identical.  The  necessary  tendence,  there- 
fore, of  all  natural  philosophy,  is  from  nature  to  intel- 
ligence ;  and  this,  and  no  other,  is  the  true  ground 
and  occasion  of  the  instinctive  striving  to  introduce 
theory  into  our  views  of  natural  phenomena.  The 
highest  perfection  of  natural  philosophy  would  con- 
sist in  the  perfect  spiritualization  of  all  the  laws  of 
nature  into  laws  of  intuition  and  intellect.  The  phe- 
nomena ('he  material)  must  wholly  disappear,  and  the 
laws  alone  (the  formal)  must  remain.  Thence  it 
comes,  that  in  nature  itself,  the  more  the  principle  of 
299 


290 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


law  breaks  forth,  the  more  does  the  husk  drop  off  the 
phenomena  themselves  become  more  spiritual,  and  at 
length  cease  altogether  in  our  consciousness.  The 
optical  phenomena,  are  but  a  geometry,  the  lines  of 
which  are  drawn  by  light,  and  the  materiality  of  this 
light  itself  has  already  become  matter  of  doubt.  In 
the  appearances  of  magnetism,  all  trace  of  matter  is 
lost,  and,  of  the  phenomena  of  gravitation,  which,  not 
a  few  among  the  most  illustrious  Newtonians,  have 
declared  no  otherwise  comprehensible  than  as  an  im- 
mediate spiritual  influence,  there  remains  nothing  but 
its  law,  the  execution  of  which  on  a  vast  scale,  is  the 
mechanism  of  the  heavenly  motions.  The  theory  of 
natural  philosophy  would  then  be  completed  ;  when 
all  nature  was  demonstrated  to  be  identical  in  es- 
sence with  that  which,  in  its  highest  known  power, 
exists  in  man  as  an  intelligence,  and  self-conscious- 
ness ;  when  the  heavens  and  the  earth  shall  declare, 
not  only  the  power  of  their  Maker,  but  the  glory  and 
the  presence  of  their  God,  even  as  he  appeared  to  the 
great  prophet  during  the  vision  of  the  mount  in  the 
skirts  of  his  divinity. 

This  may  suffice  to  show,  that  even  natural  sci- 
ence, which  commences  with  the  material  phenome- 
non as  the  reality  and  substance  of  things  existing, 
does  yet,  by  the  necessity  of  theorizing,  unconsciously, 
and,  as  it  were,  instinctively,  end  in  nature  as  an  in- 
telligence ;  and  by  this  tendency,  the  science  of  na- 
ture becomes  finally  natural  philosophy,  the  one  of 
the  two  poles  of  fundamental  science. 

2.  Or  the  subjective  is  taken  as  the  first,  and 
the  problem  then  is,  how  there  supervenes  to 
it  a  coincident  objective. 

In  the  pursuit  of  these  sciences,  our  success  in 
each  depends  on  an  austere  and  faithful  adherence  to 
its  own  principles,  with  a  careful  separation  and  ex- 
clusion of  those  which  appertain  to  the  opposite  sci- 
ence. As  the  natural  philosopher,  who  directs  his 
views  to  the  objective,  avoids,  above  all  things,  the 
intermixture  of  the  subjective  in  his  knowledge,  as 
for  instance,  arbitrary  suppositions  or  rather  suffic- 
tions,  occult  qualities,  spiritual  agents,  and  the  substi- 
tution of  final  or  efficient  causes;  so  on  the  other 
hand,  the  transcendental  or  intelligential  philosopher, 
is  equally  anxious  to  preclude  all  interpolation  of  the 
objective  into  the  subjective  principles  of  his  science; 
as,  for  instance,  the  assumption  of  impresses  or  con- 
figurations in  the  brain,  correspondent  to  miniature 
pictures  on  the  retina  painted  by  rays  of  light  from 
supposed  originals,  which  are  not  the  immediate  and 
real  objects  of  vision,  but  deductions  from  it,  for  the 
purposes  of  explanation.  This  purification  of  the 
mind  is  effected  by  an  absolute  and  scientific  scepti- 
cism to  which  the  mind  voluntarily  determines  itself 
for  the  specific  purpose  of  future  certainty.  Des 
Cartes,  who  (in  his  meditations)  himself  first,  at  least 
of  the  moderns,  gave  a  beautiful  example  of  this  vo- 
luntary doubt,  this  self-determined  indetermination, 
happily  expresses  its  utter  difference  from  the  scepti- 
cism of  vanity  or  irreligion :  Nee  tamen  in  eo  seepticos 
imitabar,  qui  dubitant  tantum  ut  dubitent,  et  prefer  in- 
certitudinem  ipsam  nihil  quadrant.  Nam  conira  totus 
in  eo  eram  ut  aliquid  certi  reperirem. — Des  Cartes, 


de  Methodo.  Nor,  is  it  less  distinct  in  its  motives  and 
final  aim,  than  in  its  proper  objects,  which  are  not,  as 
in  ordinary  scepticism,  the  prejudices  of  education 
and  circumstance,  but  those  original  and  innate  pre- 
judices, which  nature  herself  has  planted  in  all  men, 
and  which,  to  all  but  the  philosopher,  are  the  first 
principles  of  knowledge,  and  the  final  test  of  truth. 

Now  these  essential  prejudices  are  all  reducible  to 
the  one  fundamental  presumption,  that  there  exist 
things  without  us.  As  this  on  the  one  hand  ori- 
ginates, neither  in  grounds  or  arguments,  and  yet  on 
the  other  hand  remains  proof  against  all  attempts  to 
remove  it  by  grounds  or  arguments,  (naturam  furca 
expellas  tamen  usque  redibit ;)  on  the  one  hand  lays 
claim  to  immediate  certainty  as  a  position  at  once 
indemonstrable  and  irresistible,  and  yet  on  the  other 
hand,  inasmuch  as  it  refers  to  something  essentially 
different  from  ourselves,  nay,  even  in  opposition  to 
ourselves,  leaves  it  inconceivable  how  it  could  possi- 
bly become  a  part  of  our  immediate  consciousness ; 
(in  other  words,  how  that,  which  ex  hypothesi  is  and 
continues  to  be  intrinsic  and  alien  to  our  being,)  the 
philosopher,  therefore,  compels  himself  to  treat  this 
faith  as  nothing  more  than  a  prejudice,  innate,  in- 
deed, and  connatural,  but  still  a  prejudice. 

The  other  position,  which  not  only  claims,  but  ne- 
cessitates the  admission  of  its  immediate  certainty, 
equally  for  the  scientific  reason  of  the  philosopher  as 
for  the  common  sense  of  mankind  at  large,  namely,  I 
am,  cannot  so  properly  be  entitled  a  prejudice.  It  is 
groundless,  indeed,  but  then  in  the  very  idea  it  pre- 
cludes all  ground,  and  separated  from  the  immediate 
consciousness,  loses  its  whole  sense  and  import.  It  is 
groundless ;  but  only  because  it  is  itself  the  ground  of 
all  other  certainty.  Now  the  apparent  contradiction, 
that  the  former  position,  namely,  the  existence  of 
things  without  us,  which  from  its  nature  cannot  be 
immediately  certain,  should  be  received  as  blindly 
and  as  independently  of  all  grounds  as  the  existence 
of  our  own  being,  the  transcendental  philosopher  can 
solve  only  by  the  supposition,  that  the  former  is  un- 
consciously involved  in  the  latter ;  that  it  is  not  only 
coherent,  but  identical,  and  one  and  the  same  thing 
with  our  own  immediate  self-consciousness.  To  de- 
monstrate this  identity,  is  the  office  and  object  of  his 
philosophy. 

If  it  be  said,  that  this  is  Idealism,  let  it  be  remem- 
bered that  it  is  only  so  far  idealism  as  it  is  at  the  same 
time,  and  on  that  very  account,  the  truest  and  most 
binding  realism.  For  wherein  does  the  realism  of 
mankind  properly  consist  ?  In  the  assertion,  that  there 
exists  a  something  without  them,  what,  or  how,  or 
where,  they  know  not,  which  occasions  the  objects  of 
their  perception  >.  Oh  no !  This  is  neither  connatu- 
ral or  universal.  It  is  what  a  few  have  taught  and 
learnt  in  the  schools,  and  which  the  many  repeat 
without  asking  themselves  concerning  their  own 
meaning.  The  realism  common  to  all  mankind  is 
far  elder,  and  lies  infinitely  deeper  than  this  hypo- 
thetical explanation  of  the  origin  of  our  perceptions, 
an  explanation  skimmed  from  the  mere  surface  of 
mechanical  philosophy.  It  is  the  table  itself,  which 
the  man  of  common  sense  believes  himself  to  see, 
300 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


-    . 


does  not  see.  If  to  destroy  the  reality  of  that  we  ac- 
tually bekotd.be  i-kalinii.  what  can  be  note  egre- 
gnous-y  so  than  the  system  of  aodem  me-aphysKs, 
which  hanimes  as  to  a  tend  of  shadows,  surrounds  as 

-  _-  :.  -_-  -.-.;  -..-_  z  .  -  .-  -..-  .:■.  :.-. :.-.  ... .5. . :. 
:-  v     .    ::  -  m    -.'-■;  .:"  n   .-.  -■<■        ..--:-.-.   :       f.i~- 

■ 
r_aimrrt  poor  Lee,  -and  the  world  aid  that  I  was 
mad.  and,  uifo—l  them,  they  outvoted  me." 

It  is  r»  the  trae  and  original  realism,  that  I  would 
i  ..-T-  •  '  .-    _  liii  r_      7  .  -    -    f  -:-r   ■.:..  :-         _~  :-■ 

Hi.  :.   -r  ..  •  .--   ■    -.r.  :-  .:  :  .i        i;:  -. .  _ :   if- 

__..i-     "  ;:.-f     -.--:-:..-  .--  _.  _:._  .  r.-y  .  .  f  r 

In  ::.__   --:..-.     .       -.  t:  :-a;:.  iT-'j-.-.r  :.-.     - 

__-  w  e  are  all  colkcti  veiy  born  ideafcta,  and  there- 
tore,  and  only  therefore,  are  we  at  the  same  time 
rfi-.-f      I.:.:   ._-  :if  :  __.>■     if.-f   ::"  ■:;  -.':. 
know  nothing,  or  despise  the  faith  as  the  prejudice 
::  Hi  .—  ..r__i:  v...--.-    if  :i  -ff  :  .f.  ..-.  i  n.i  :_..-. 

—  i  :.-:".-._  ::  :  ._-i-i~  m  i : i  :  s  :i.  —  vt  r_  i  iimi. 
rii-if  ii_  .:  -  _i  •■--_..-:  ; .-.  --i  ■.-.--  --.  i.--i  r 
yourselves,  and  walk  humbly  with  the  divinity  in 
your  own  hearts,  ye  are  worthy  of  a  better  philoao- 
:i7  If.  : if  irii  :  __-/  _r._  ifii  -  _:  i.  .  .  .  :  .-— 
£.:  t  -  .:  i  _.:____-.  niri.-r.  Hf  :;.::.;  "1.;^:- 
never  yet  fithomcd  by  a  philosophy  made  op  of 
__•_■_.;_--  -:. :  :_..f  ..z. :__  ei:.UrS. 

J-  iif  :_.-;  :ifi -.-;  ::"  r. .  7  _-  •  :"-...-  _zzz.:  :r.  :_-i 
if   _■:■ . :.   "..:     -   i-i__fif-i    I  _:.__.!  i.-.r    :e:  -i.ii.i 

Hf  lr_l.i_f_.-i -  ni  :.r_i_r_:: . .  :.-     :  lii  Fyi_i_.: 

P___:s-::iy  _...;- __i   -_y   i-rii-if-i      I:  i_    i::-:t.—z 
::  -j  :::■.:•.::.  i:  ..if:  1111.  :  .-  f.fiii  ::"  :.:::• 
ii.-if  ni  ::'  F.ii.  :i '..    i:  in  :  ,.-.:.r:  :>;-  .- .  _.. 
-___::-.  if      Fi  mil  if:  i::  m:  .  _-  — -.  -  ■-.  -----  -"--  -- 

"■'^::  -  ;  T    -.  -  .  -. :    r     :   :-  :  . -   ,  -..  :  ..-.  -its 

z^\zs.:n   :_i:  i  -..f  ":y  :•;  ^-ff_.  .'    ;-i:-_;:il  i> 

;L:il:-    ^^1  :::  ±r   ::ir ._:  :  ..-:■  >r  rzzy  :•;  ?^:^ 

L:.i^::.  -.^r:.-.  i.io  :;.  --  r-^J.:.  :•;; "_rf  .:  Lis 
imelf  been  fhDy  demonstrated.  It  is  enoosfa,  if  only 
.:  --t  T^:.ir:~z  ,ir..r.;.T  T~  •--..'.  ~.  ..-  :.:■; 
keen  eflpeifd  in  the  following  Tbeses,for  those  of 
ny  r;iii.-s  -.'...:  ist  ~  ...  :_-  .  :  :-:~:czy  l:^  r  -  . 
the  following  Chapter,  in  which  the  results  will  be 
apphed  to  the  dednrtinn  of  the  imagination,  and  with 
::  \z.~  _:.-..-. ...  .is  .:"  :.-:•_.._:-  iz. ;  .:'  .r.  i.  ,r.  ..  -  „ 
.^  ::.t  :  :.t  i.-§. 

7  :i-  5  '  — Tr.-j.  j  :-:.-^e.::vr  ::  'v.::       F":.    -- 

ledge,  withoni  a  correspondent  reality,  k  no  know- 

T.zr     .:'    -  r  .•_-.   -.v    :_i.-T  :_  _-:  :e  - .  :;.t -;-:.i-  -:z       :. 

by  as.    To  know  h  m  is  Terr  essence  a  verb  aehTe. 

Thesis  II. — All  troth  k  either  mediate,  that  is. 
if.*.-  rr-  :r  ~  ~  ~  f  ..i.:  :t -ii  : :  ::-:_-  : :  i_ri  i  f 
_i.F-"f.-  7  r  .1  --;:  .i  us  '__■-  m  .  ;  i.Ti-.i 
A.  A. :  the  former  is  of  indeppnilent  or  ««<liiii»i«i 
:---_i:  i-i  -f  ..•f-fiif-i  .1  :if  :"..--.  i  F  A  7i; 
Cfl — i     v.  i lf.-f=  _i  A    ..-  ll-.I -U.f  :;  B. 

Scsount.  A  chain  wiihont  a  ample,  fiom  which 
all  the  links  derived  their  stabQiiy.  or  a  series  witb- 
i--  i  iLrs:  :.i-  .-ffi  :.::  .  ni.y  i._  -i-:  is  i 
>--—-  ::  i_ii  It'.  fi:i  i  7.11  ::.:  ;■_::  ::'  :;: 
n_.   it:.:i  i  .     i:i i  :_-  .-:   ;:    ;  eii    :.:    i.. 


j  . :    -    -    .-_j:    ifv.nii.  .:.   :ie   -:i  ;..: 

there  was  a  guide  at  the  bend  of  the  file :  what  if 
it  were  answered — No!   sir.  the  men  are  without 

-.-   i;  .  _  .    :    —  j-i  :_f-  :i.r  .  i.;  .: 

ajght! 

-     -_ ..;.-  :-  ■     -    . .    -     •   i   --.     r   ::"  f-iy-i.   :.- .    _= 

-.».-.  -..  .:  -  -n-i.i  -    i   :i--.-..  i-.-.     ;.  f  -  w  i  .:■;- 

scribes  to  each  its  proper  sphere  in  the  system  of 

science.    That  the  ahsnidhy  does  not  so  i—i  ilianly 

smke  os.  that  it  does  not  seem  equally  i 

b  owing  to  a  surreptitious  act  of  the 

■■■■■  i-i   li-sii-.  ::.-f.y    n.  -   v.  -;.._:    ;■_•    i.i      j    :i-f 

ri.-.-.r    i. "    ...      :"..  -   v.  i:.t        -:■■  f:_-.r   -: ;     -     — i 

fonlpmplatfy  the  cyde,    of  R  C.  D.  E 

1  mntiminsB  ctrde,  (A.)  giving  to  all,  coDecnveiy,  the 

'  unity  of  their  «— «—  orbit ;  but  likewise  supplies, 

--.-:     :;•_.-::."".-.-.-    :if    :i-    :fi:.-S-    i-  ':  f." 

.  iri.f.i  u  i  —.-■  ;-;i:  in:: =   n  -  :v...- 

caL 

■  _  -  -  .    .  -         . 

^tianlnte  troth,  capable  of  eommnincanhg  to  other 

:.i. _:.-_;   .  irr_i-r.IT   ~i.:i  .:  _____  :::  :__e7  -.•.  rriw- 

:F   -  :;        -  .11     -  ir-i.  ii::i__.'.  :.:.  iii.-Li:.-- 

:  -.%a  light.     In  short,  we  have  to  find  a  some- 

'  what,  which  is,  amply,  becaose  it  if.    In  older  to  be 

-  .    -    .:  r.i .;:     -r   ..if  -■■  i_:i  :f    if   :~-~  :.--fi.i_.:.    =-: 

:"::    n  !ri_-:  i.i:   i..   .if  i:rr  n    i.-f-i.ii.f.   ii-ii 

r  i    .iff  in  •-:■::.'.   if  ::'  .-f .:'     iif  __.__:__!:_    .:•.. 

-if.  iff-   i  if  :    :r  :._if  'if  i' >f.i..:iv  ::'    if  !-__■- 

tDg  a  canse,  or  antecedent,  witboot  an  ab___adity. 

Thesis  IV. — That  there  can  be  bat  one  such 

principle,  may  be  proved  a  priori ;  for  were  there 

:-.-      ::  -i-f   fir-:  rf-f-  ::  _■:-■=  :_if.    iy  ~-  __:i 

':  is  equality  is  affinned ;  consequently,  npithfr  would 

:  hf»  «f-K1*--fc»M'_h"l,  y-  fiw-  Kypnrtw-_ja  rfw—mk      And 

a  pa___e____ri,  it  will  be  proved  by  the  principle  itself; 

T-.-.f-   ::   ..    .  -        t-tI     if   ..-.'•..viz    -i-.vfrf__   ulr- 
f  in-    i    if  -•  -r    iiiifiim- 

ictl    If  we  affirm  of  a  bond  that  it  is  blue, 

Hi  :  _-ei    if    i. if     f  i.irii   rii::  _i:_f.  :i 

the  safaject.  board.    If  we  affirm  of  a  aide,  that  it 

-    -:_--...   i_    :-r    .  .r-i.nif    niff-i   .=  iniLri   :.-. 

if  if.  j.   .::.  -i  iif  ;-"-.f :::  "n:  Hf  ei-fifiif  rue 

:;-.::-.:    :  .  . :  -     ;::.-    n. :  f  -ii-if-ff  :•:  ..  i  :i  -ff 

n:  i  if..:     :         Fif  -   -  f  .--.--• .:  -'.:  "  —  iii  y  '■'- 

:if   ir.ifii.ir   i_i.  •--    .:    fri-.-i   ::.lf-_:::_f :.-_.':-.= 

:r-if    Tii::;:  ii:  r.    if   iriiii.e  _i;.-:-_:i  :i  :ii- 

.  -   ii  ffiriii    "if   iii-iif    Ef  :::.f     mi 

_:  ...   f.:.:-fi:    n_  i   :  :i .:.   ;..-.:".  -  -    _._    ri- 

-i-.-f     ::.  -  .-     :.  r-.  iff    :i  :if  iir:  :.f  -  i  ii--. ,  iy  ■ 

.  :".-  ...,rff  _--  i    -  "■-  .  --:  I  .  :..;■-  :ii:  .:  if  if  rw  :-::.i 

function  of  philosophy  to  reconcile  reason  with  com- 

7i  i  ff  if  -    i_.-  ::  -.  f-  :.:f  :    r  -_: :.  —:_.f  _r.-.  r_? . - 

!•::       —  -  :i        :  if  n.y  :..:.'•  i- 

or  object.    Each  thing  is  what  it  is  in  consequence 

of  some  other  dung.  An  mfiniip,  independent  (_o__g.* 

:..  ..ff  i  ..:.:-__        i     in  in  riiirf  :.::.f    .;  i 


292 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


sideless  triangle.  Besides,  a  thing  is  that  which  is 
capable  of  being  an  object,  of  which  itself  is  not  the 
sole  percipient.  But  an  object  is  inconceivable  with- 
out a  subject  as  its  antithesis.  Omne  perceptum 
percipientem  supponit. 

But  neither  can  the  principle  be  found  in  a  subject, 
as  a  subject,  contra-distinguished  from  an  object ;  for 
unicuique  percipienti  aliquid  objicitur  perceptum. 
It  is  to  be  found,  therefore,  in  neither  object  or  sub- 
ject, taken  separately  ;  and,  consequently,  as  no  other 
third  is  conceivable,  it  must  be  found  in  that  which 
is  neither  subject  nor  object  exclusively,  but  which 
is  the  identity  of  both. 

Thesis  VI. — This  principle,  and  so  characterised, 
manifests  itself  in  the  Sum  or  I  am;  which  I  shall 
hereafter  indiscriminately  express  by  the  words  spirit, 
self,  and  self-consciousness.  In  this,  and  in  this  alone, 
object  and  subject,  being  and  knowing,  are  identical, 
each  involving  and  supposing  the  other.  In  other 
words,  it  is  a  subject  which  becomes  a  subject  by 
the  act  of  constructing  itself  objectively  to  itself; 
but  which  never  is  an  object  except  for  itself,  and 
only  so  far  as  by  the  very  same  act  it  becomes  a 
subject.  It  may  be  described,  therefore,  as  a  per- 
petual self-duplication  of  one  and  the  same  power, 
into  object  and  subject,  which  pre-supposes  each 
other,  and  can  exist  only  as  antithesis. 

Scholium.  If  a  man  be  asked  how  he  k?ioivs 
that  he  is  ?  he  can  only  answer,  sum  quia  sum.  But 
if  (the  absoluteness  of  this  certainty  having  been  ad- 
mitted) he  be  again  asked,  how  he,  the  individual 
person,  came  to  be,  then,  in  relation  to  the  ground  of 
his  existence,  not  to  the  ground  of  his  knowledge  of 
that  existence?  he  might  reply,  sum  quia  deus  est, 
or  still  more  philosophically,  sum  quia  in  deo  sum. 

But  if  we  elevate  our  conception  to  the  absolute 
self,  to  the  great  eternal  I  am,  then  the  principle  of 
being,  and  of  knowledge,  of  idea,  and  of  reality  ;  the 
ground  of  existence,  and  the  ground  of  the  knowledge 
of  existence,  are  absolutely  identical.  Sum  quia 
sum  ;  I  am,  because  I  affirm  myself  to  be  ;  I  affirm 
myself  to  be,  because  I  am.* 

*  It  is  most  worthy  of  notice,  that  in  the  first  revelation  of 
himself,  not  confined  to  individuals  ;  indeed,  in  the  very  first 
revelation  of  his  absolute  being,  Jehovah  at  the  same  time 
revealed  the  fundamental  truth  of  all  philosophy,  which  must 
cither  commence  with  the  absolute,  or  have  no  fixed  com- 
mencement ;  i.  e.  cease  to  be  philosophy.  I  cannot  but  ex- 
press my  regret,  that  in  the  equivocal  use  of  the  word  that, 
for  in  that,  or  brcause,  our  admirable  version  has  rendered 
the  passage  susceptible  of  a  degraded  interpretation  in  the 
mind  of  common  readers  or  hearers,  as  if  it  were  a  mere  re- 
proof to  an  impertinent  question,  I  am  what  I  am,  which 
might  be  equally  affirmed  of  himself  by  any  existent  being. 

The  Cartesian  Cogito,  ergo  sum,  is  objectionable,  because 
either  the  Cogito  is  used  extra  Gradum,  and  then  it  is  involved 
in  the  sum  and  is  tautological,  or  it  is  taken  as  a  particular 
mode  or  dignity,  and  then  it  is  subordinated  to  the  sum  as  the 
species  to  the  genus  ;  or,  rather,  as  a  particular  modification 
to  the  subject  modified;  and  not  pre-ordinated,  as  the  argu- 
ments seem  to  require.  For  Cogito  is  Sum  Cogitans.  This 
is  clear  by  the  inevidence  of  the  converse.  Cogitat  ergo  est, 
is  true,  because  it  is  a  mere  application  of  the  logical  rule  : 
Quicquid  in  genere  est,  est  et  in  specie.  Est  (cogitans)  ergo 
est.  It  is  a  cherry  tree  ;  therefore  it  is  a  tree.  But,  est  ergo 
cogitat,  is  illogical :  for  quod  est  in  specie,  non  neccssario  in 
genere  est.    It  may  be  true.    I  hold  it  to  be  true,  that  quic- 


Thesis  VII. — If  then  I  know  myself  only  through 
myself,  it  is  contradictory  to  require  any  other  predicate 
of  self,  but  that  of  self-consciousness.  Only  in  the  self- 
consciousness  of  a  spirit  is  there  the  required  identity  of 
object  and  of  representation ;  for  herein  consists  the  es- 
senceof  a  spirit,  that  it  is  self-representative.  If,  there- 
fore, this  be  the  one  only  immediate  truth,  in  the  cer- 
tainty of  which  the  reality  of  our  collective  knowledge 
is  grounded,  it  must  follow  that  the  spirit,  in  all  the  ob- 
jects which  it  views,  views  only  itself.  If  this  could 
be  proved,  the  immediate  reality  of  all  intuitive  know- 
ledge would  be  assured.  It  has  been  shown,  that  a 
spirit  is  that  which  is  its  own  object,  yet  not  origin- 
ally an  object,  but  an  absolute  subject  for  which  all, 
itself  included,  may  become  an  object.  It  must,  there- 
fore, be  an  act  ;  for  every  object  is,  as  an  object,  dead, 
fixed,  incapable  in  itself  of  an  action,  and  necessarily 
finite.  Again :  the  spirit,  (originally  the  identity  of 
object  and  subject,)  must,  in  some  sense,  dissolve  this 
identity,  in  order  to  be  conscious  of  it:  fit  alter  et 
idem.  But  this  implies  an  act,  and  it  follows,  there- 
fore, that  intelligence  or  self-consciousness  is  impos- 
sible, except  by  and  in  a  will.  The  self-conscious 
spirit,  therefore,  is  a  will ;  and  freedom  must  be  as- 
sumed as  a  ground  of  philosophy,  and  can  never  be 
deduced  from  it. 

Thesis  VIII. — Whatever  in  its  origin  is  objective. 
is  likewise,  as  such,  necessarily  infinite.  Therefore, 
since  the  spirit  is  not  originally  an  object,  and  as  the 
subject  exists  in  antithesis  to  an  object,  the  spirit  can- 
not originally  be  finite.  But  neither  can  it  be  a  sub- 
ject without  becoming  an  object,  and  as  it  is  origin- 
ally the  identity  of  both,  it  can  be  conceived  neither 
as  infinite  or  finite,  exclusively,  but  as  the  most  ori- 
ginal union  of  both.  In  the  existence,  in  the  recon- 
ciling, and  the  recurrence  of  this  contradiction,  con- 
sists the  process  and  mystery  of  production  and  life. 

Thesis  IX. — Thisprincipium  commune  essendi  et 
cognoscendi,  as  subsisting  in  a  will,  or  primary  act 
of  self-duplication,  is  the  mediate  or  indirect  principle 
of  every  science  ;  but  it  is  the  immediate  and  direct 
principle  of  the  ultimate  science  alone,  i.  e.  of  trans- 
cendental philosophy  alone.  For  it  must  be  remem- 
bered, that  all  these  Theses  refer  solely  to  one  of  the 
two  Polar  Sciences,  namely,  to  that  which  commences 
with,  and  rigidly  confines  itself  within  the  subjective, 
leaving  the  objective,  (as  far  as  it  is  exclusively  ob- 
jective,) to  natural  philosophy,  which  is  its  opposite 
pole.  In  its  very  idea,  therefore,  as  a  systematic 
knowledge  of  our  collective  knowing,  (scientia  sci- 
entas,)  it  involves  the  necessity  of  some  one  highest 
principle  of  knowing,  as  at  once  the  source  and  the 

quid  vere  est,  est  per  veram  sui  aflirmationem  ;  but  it  is  a 
derivative,  not  an  immediate  truth.  Here,  then,  we  have,  by 
anticipation,  the  distinction  between  tha  conditional  finite  I, 
(which,  as  known  in  distinct  consciousness  by  occasion  of 
experience,  is  called,  by  Kant's  followers,  the  empirical  I,) 
and  the  absolute  1  am,  and  likewise  the  dependence,  or  rather 
the  inherence  of  the  former  in  the  latter  ;  in  whom  "  we 
live,  and  move,  and  have  our  being,"  as  St.  Paul  divinely 
asserts,  differing  widely  from  the  Theista  of  the  mechanic 
school,  (as  Sir  J.  Newton,  Locke,  &c.)  who  must  say  from 
■whom  we  had  our  being,  and  with  it,  life  and  the  powers  of 
life. 

302 


BI0GRAPI1IA  LITERARIA. 


293 


accompanying  form  in  all  particular  acts  of  intellect 
and  perception.  This,  it  has  been  shown,  can  be 
found  only  in  the  act  and  evolution  of  self-conscious- 
ness. We  are  not  investigating  an  absolute  principi- 
um  essendi ;  for  then,  I  admit,  many  valid  objections 
might  be  started  against  our  theory ;  but  an  absolute 
principium  cognoscendi.  The  result  of  both  the  sci- 
ences, or  their  equatorial  pint,  would  be  the  princi- 
ple of  a  total  and  undivided  philosophy,  as,  for  pru- 
dential reasons,  1  have  chosen  to  anticipate  in  the 
Scholium  to  Thesis  VI.  and  the  note  subjoined.  In 
other  words,  philosophy  would  pass  into  religion,  and 
religion  become  inclusive  of  philosophy.  We  begin 
with  the  I  know  myseijf,  in  order  to  end  with  the 
absolute  I  am.  We  proceed  from  the  self,  in  order 
to  lose  and  find  all  self  in  God. 

Thesis  X. — The  transcendental  philosopher  does 
not  inquire,  what  ultimate  ground  of  our  knowledge 
there  may  lie  out  of  our  knowing,  but  what  is  the 
last  in  our  knowing  itself,  beyond  which  we  cannot 
pass.  The  principle  of  our  knowing  is  sought  within 
the  sphere  of  our  knowing.  It  must  be  something, 
therefore,  which  can  itself  be  known.  It  is  asserted, 
only,  that  the  act  of  self-consciousness  is  for  vs  the 
source  and  principle  of  all  our  possible  knowledge. 
Whether,  abstracted  from  us,  there  exists  any  thing 
higher  and  beyond  this  primary  self-knowing,  which 
is  for  us  the  form  of  all  our  knowing,  must  be  decided 
by  the  result. 

That  the  self-consciousness  is  the  fixt  point,  to 
which  for  us  all  is  morticed  and  annexed,  needs  no 
further  proof.  But  that  the  self-consciousness  may 
be  the  modification  of  a  higher  form  of  being,  per- 
haps of  a  higher  consciousness,  and  this  again  of  a 
yet  higher,  and  so  on  in  an  infinite  regressus;  in 
6hort,  that  self-consciousness  may  be  itself  something 
explicable  into  something,  which  must  lie  beyond  the 
possibility  of  our  knowledge,  because  the  whole  syn- 
thesis of  our  intelligence  is  first  formed  in  and  through 
the  self-consciousness,  does  not  at  all  concern  us  as 
transcendental  philosophers.  For  to  us  the  self-con- 
sciousness is  not  a  kind  of  being,  but  a  kind  of  know- 
ing, and  that,  too,  the  highest  and  farthest  that  exists 
for  us.  It  may  however  be  shown,  and  has  in  part 
already  been  shown,  in  a  preceding  page,  that  even 
when  the  objective  is  assumed  as  the  first,  we  yet  can 
never  pass  beyond  the  principle  of  self-consciousness. 
Should  we  attempt  it,  we  must  be  driven  back  from 
ground  to  ground,  each  of  which  would  cease  to  be 
ground  the  moment  we  pressed  on  it.  We  must  be 
whirled  down  the  gulf  of  an  infinite  series.  But  this 
would  make  our  reason  baffle  the  end  and  purpose  of 
all  reason,  namely,  unity  and  system.  Or  we  must 
break  off"  the  system  arbitrarily,  and  affirm  an  abso- 
lute something  that  is  in  and  of  itself  at  once  cause 
and  effect,  (causa  sui,)  subject  and  object,  or,  rather, 
the  absolute  identity  of  both.  But  as  this  is  incon- 
ceivable, except  in  a  self-consciousness,  it  follows, 
that  even  as  natural  philosophers  we  must  arrive  at 
the  same  principle  from  which,  as  transcendental  phi- 
losophers, we  set  out;  that  is,  in  a  self-consciousness 
in  which  the  principium  essendi  does  not  stand  to  the 
principium  cognoscendi  in  the  relation  of  cause  to  ef- 


fect, but  both  the  one  and  the  other  are  co-inherent 
and  identical.  Thus  the  true  system  of  natural  phi- 
losophy places  the  sole  reality  of  things  in  an  abso- 
lute, which  is  at  once  causa  sui  et  effectus,  italnp 
avl-Ka]u>p,  Yioj  tavlu— in  the  absolute  identity  of  sub- 
ject and  object,  which  it  calls  nature,  and  which  in 
its  highest  power  is  nothing  else  but  self-conscious 
will  or  intelligence.  In  this  sense  the  position  of 
Malbranche,  that  we  see  all  things  in  God,  is  a  strict 
philosophical  truth;  and  equally  true  is  the  assertion 
of  Hobbs,  of  Hartley,  and  of  their  masters  in  an- 
cient Greece,  that  all  real  knowledge  supposes  a 
prior  sensation.  For  sensation  itself  is  but  vision 
nascent,  not  the  cause  of  intelligence,  but  intelligence 
itself  revealed  as  an  earlier  power  in  the  process  of 
self-construction. 

Ma/cap,  TXaOi  /tot ! 
Xldjip,  t\aQl  jiot 
Ei  trapa  k6(jioi>, 
Ei  irapii  jjiotpav 
Tui1  ?<2i>  idiyov  ! 

Bearing  then  this  in  mind,  that  intelligence  is  a 
self-development,  not  a  quality  supervening  to  a  sub- 
stance, we  may  abstract  from  all  degree,  and  for  the 
purpose  of  philosophic  construction,  reduce  it  to  kind, 
under  the  idea  of  an  indestructible  power,  with  two 
opposite  and  counteracting  forces,  which  by  a  meta- 
phor borrowed  from  astronomy,  we  may  call  the  cen- 
trifugal and  centripedal  forces.  The  intelligence  in 
the  one  tends  to  objectize  itself,  and  in  the  other  to 
know  itself  in  the  object.  It  will  be  hereafter  my 
business  to  construct,  by  a  series  of  intuitions,  the 
progressive  schemes  that  must  follow  from  such  a 
power  with  such  forces,  till  I  arrive  at  the  fulness  of 
the  human  intelligence.  For  my  present  purpose,  I 
assume  such  a  power  as  my  principle,  in  order  to  de- 
duce from  it  a  faculty,  the  generation,  agency,  and 
application  of  which  form  the  contents  of  the  ensuing 
chapter. 

In  a  preceding  page  I  have  justified  the  use  of 
technical  terms  in  philosophy,  whenever  they  tend 
to  preclude  confusion  of  thought,  and  when  they  as- 
sist the  memory  by  the  exclusive  singleness  of  their 
meaning  more  than  they  may,  for  a  short  time,  be- 
wilder the  attention  by  their  strangeness.  I  trust, 
that  I  have  not  extended  this  privilege  beyond  the 
grounds  on  which  I  have  claimed  it;  namely,  the 
conveniency  of  the  scholastic  phrase  to  distinguish 
the  kind  from  all  degrees,  or  Tather  to  express  the 
kind  with  the  abstraction  of  degree,  as,  for  instance, 
multeity  instead  of  multitude ;  or,  secondly,  for  the 
sake  of  correspondence  in  sound  and  interdependent 
or  antithetical  terms,  as  subject  and  object;  or,  last- 
ly, to  avoid  the  wearying  recurrence  of  circumlocu- 
tions and  definitions.  Thus  I  shall  venture  to  use 
potence,  in  order  to  express  a  specific  degree  of 
power,  in  imitation  of  the  algebraists.  I  have  even 
hazarded  the  new  verb  potenziate,  with  its  deriva- 
tives, in  order  to  express  the  combination  or  transfer 
of  powers.  It  is  with  new  or  unusual  terms,  as  with 
privileges  in  courts  of  justice  or  legislature;  there 
can  be  no  legitimate  privilege,  where  there  already 
303 


294 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


eiiste  a  positive  law  adequate  to  the  purpose;  and 
when  there  is  no  law  in  existence,  the  privilege  is  to 
be  justified  by  its  accordance  with  the  end,  or  final 
cause  of  all  law.  Unusual  and  new-coined  words 
are  doubtless  an  evil ;  but  vagueness,  confusion,  and 
imperfect  conveyance  of  our  thoughts,  are  a  far 
greater.  Every  system,  which  is  under  the  necessity 
of  using  terms  not  familiarized  by  the  metaphysics  in 
fashion,  will  be  described  as  written  in  an  unintelli- 
gible style,  and  the  author  must  expect  the  charge  of 
having  substituted  learned  jargon  for  clear  concep- 
tion; while,  according  to  the  creed  of  our  modern 
philosophers,  nothing  is  deemed  a  clear  conception, 
but  what  is  representable  by  a  distinct  image.  Thus 
the  conceivable  is  reduced  within  the  bounds  of  the 
picturable.  Hinc  patet,  qui  fiat  ut,  cum  irreprcesent- 
able  et  impossibile  vulgo  ejusdem  significatus  habean- 
tur,  conceptus  tam  Conlinui,  quam  infiniti,  a  plurimis 
rejeciantur,  quippe  quorum,  secundum  leges  cogni- 
tionis  inluitiva,  reprcesentatio  est  impossibilis.  Quan- 
quam  autem  harum  e  non  paueis  scholis  explosarum 
notionem,  praesertim  prioris,  causam  hie  non  gero, 
maximi  tamen  momenti  erit  monuisse :  gravissimo 
illos  errore  labi,  qui  tam  perversa  argumentandi  ra- 
tione  utuntur.  Quicquid  enim  repugnat  legibus  in- 
tellectus  et  rationis,  utique  est  impossibile;  quod 
autem,  cum  ralionis  purs  sit  objectum,  legibus  cog- 
nitionis  intuitivse  tantummodo  non  subest,  non  item. 
Nam  hinc  dissensus  inter  facultatem  sensilivam  et 
intelleclualem,  (quarem  indolem  mox  exponam)  nihil 
indigitat,  nisi,  quas  mens  ab  inlellectu  accerptas  ferl 
ideas  abstractas,  illas  in  concrelo  exequi,  el  i?i  I/ituitus 
commutare  sapenumero  non  posse.  Heec  autem  reluc- 
tantia  subjecliva  mentitur,  ut  plurimum,  repugnantiam 
aliquam  objectivam,  et  incautos  facile  fallit,  limitibus, 
quibus  mens  humana  circuscribitur,  pro  iis  habitis, 
quibus  ipsa  rerum  essentia  continent!-.*  —  Kant  de 


*  Translation. — "  Hence  it  is  clear,  from  what  cause  many 
reject  the  notion  of  the  continuous  and  the  infinite.  They 
take,  namely,  the  words  irrepresentable  and  impossible,  in 
one  and  the  same  meaning;  and,  according  to  the  forms  of 
sensuous  evidence,  the  notion  of  the  continuous  and  the 
infinite  is  doubtless  impossible.  I  am  not  now  pleading  the 
cause  of  these  laws,  which  not  a  few  schools  have  thought 
proper  to  explode,  especially  the  former  (the  law  of  con- 
tinuity.) But  it  is  of  the  highest  importance  to  admonish  the 
reader,  that  those  who  adopt  so  perverted  a  mode  of  reason- 
ing, are  under  a  grievous  error.  Whatever  opposes  the  for- 
mal principles  of  the  understanding  and  the  reason,  is  con- 
fessedly impossible  ;  but  not,  therefore,  that  which  is  therefore 
not  amenable  to  the  forms  of  sensuous  evidence,  because  it 
is  exclusively  an  object  of  pure  intellect.  For  this  non  coinci- 
dence of  the  sensuous  and  the  intellectual,  (the  nature  of 
which  I  shall  present'y  lay  open,)  proves  nothing  more  but 
that  the  mind  cannot  always  adequately  represent  in  the  con- 
crete, and  transform  into  distinct  image*,  abstract  notions 
derived  from  the  pure  intellect.  But  this  contradict  ion,  which 
is  in  itself  merely  subjective,  (i.  e.  an  incapacity  in  the  nature 
of  man,)  too  often  passes  for  an  incongruity  or  impossibility 
in  the  object,  (i.e.  the  notions  themselves,)  and  seduce  the 
incautious  to  mistake  the  limitations  of  the  human  faculties 
for  the  limits  of  things,  as  they  really  exist." 

I  take  this  occasion  to  observe,  that  here  and  elsewhere, 
Kant  uses  the  terms  intuition,  and  the  verb  active  intueri, 
(Germanice  anschauen)  for  which  we  have  unfortunately  no 
correspondent  word,  exclusively  for  that  which  can  lie  repre- 
sented in  space  and  time.  He  therefore  consistently,  and 
rightly,  denies  the  possibility  of  intellectual  intuitions.    But 


Mundi  Sensibilis  atque  Intelligibilit  forma  et  princi- 
piis,  1770. 

Critics,  who  are  most  ready  to  bring  this  charge  of 
pedantry  and  unintelligibility,  are  the  most  apt  to 
overlook  the  important  fact,  that  beside  the  language 
of  words,  there  is  a  language  of  spirits,  (sermo  inte- 
rior,) and  that  the  former  is  only  the  vehicle  of  the 
latter.  Consequently,  their  assurance,  that  they  do 
not  understand  the  philosophic  writer,  instead  of 
proving  any  thing  against  the  philosophy,  may  fur- 
nish an  equal  and  (cseteris  paribus)  even  a  stronger 
presumption  against  their  own  philosophic  talent. 

Great  indeed  are  the  obstacles  which  an  English 
metaphysician  has  to  encounter.  Amongst  his  most 
respectable  and  intelligent  judges,  there  will  be  many 
who  have  devoted  their  attention  exclusively  to  the 
concerns  and  interests  of  human  life,  and  who  bring 
with  them  to  the  perusal  of  a  philosophic  system  an 
habitual  aversion  to  all  speculations,  the  utility  and 
application  of  which  are  not  evident  and  immediate. 
To  these  I  would,  in  the  first  instance,  merely  oppose 
an  authority  which  they  themselves  hold  venerable, 
that  of  Lord  Bacon  :  non  inutile  scientiae  existimande 
sunt,  quarum  in  se  nullus  est  usus,  si  ingenia  acuant 
et  ordinent. 

There  are  others,  whose  prejudices  are  still  more 
formidable,  inasmuch  as  they  are  grounded  in  their 
moral  feelings  and  religious  principles,  which  had 
been  alarmed  and  shocked  by  the  impious  and  per- 
nicious tenets  defended  by  Hume,  Priestley,  and  the 
French  fatalists  or  necessitarians ;  some  of  whom  had 
perverted  metaphysical  reasonings  to  the  denial  of 
the  mysteries,  and,  indeed,  of  all  the  peculiar  doc- 
trines of  Christianity ;  and  others  even  to  the  subver- 
sion of  all  distinction  between  right  and  wrong.  I 
would  request  such  men  to  consider  what  an  eminent 
and  successful  defender  of  the  Christian  faith  has 
observed,  that  true  metaphysics  are  nothing  else  but 
true  divinity,  and  that  in  fact  the  writers  who  have 
given  them  such  just  offence,  were  sophists,  who  had 
taken  advantage  of  the  general  neglect  into  which 
the  science  of  logic  has  unhappily  fallen,  rather  than 
metaphysicians,  a  name,  indeed,  which  those  writers 
were  the  first  to  explode  as  unmeaning.  Secondly,  I 
would  remind  them,  that  as  long  as  there  are  men 
in  the  world  to  whom  the  TvuiS-t  siavrov  is  an  instinct 
and  a  command  from  their  own  nature,  so  long  will 
there  be  metaphysicians  and  metaphysical  specula- 
tions ;  that  false  metaphysics  can  be  effectually  coun- 
teracted by  true  metaphysics  alone ;  and  that  if  the 
reasoning  be  clear,  solid,  and  pertinent,  the  truth  de- 
duced can  never  be  the  less  valuable  on  account  of 
the  depth  from  which  it  may  have  been  drawn. 

A  third  class  profess  themselves  friendly  to  meta- 
physics, and  believe  that  they  are  themselves  meta- 
physicians. They  have  no  objection  to  system  or 
terminology,  provided  it  be  the  method  and  the  no- 
menclature to  which  they  have  been  familiarized  in 


as  I  see  no  adequate  reason  for  this  exclusive  sense  of  the 
term,  I  have  reverted  to  its  wider  signification  authorized  by 
our  elder  theologians  nnd  metaphysicians,  according  to  whom 
the   term   comprehends   all   truths   known   to  us   without 

medium. 

304 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


205 


the  writings  of  Locke,  Hume,  Hartley,  Condillac,  or 
perhaps  Dr  Reid  and  Professor  Stewart.  To  objec- 
tions from  this  cause,  it  is  a  sufficient  answer,  that 
one  main  object  of  my  attempt  was  to  demonstrate 
the  vagueness  or  insufficiency  of  the  terms  used  in 
>  the  metaphysical  schools  of  France  and  Great  Britain 
since  the  revolution,  and  that  the  errors  which  I  pro- 
pose  to  attack  cannot  subsist,  except  as  they  are  con- 
cealed behind  the  mask  of  a  plausible  and  indefinite 
nomenclature. 

But  the  worst  and  widest  impediment  still  remains. 
It  is  the  predominance  of  a  popular  philosophy,  at 
once  the  counterfeit  and  the  mortal  enemy  of  all  true 
and  manly  metaphysical  research.  It  is  that  cor- 
ruption, introduced  by  certain  unmethodical  aphor- 
isming  Eclectics,  who,  dismissing:,  not  only  all  system, 
but  all  logical  connexion,  pick  and  choose  whatever 
is  most  plausible  and  showy;  who  select  whatever 
words  can  have  some  semblance  of  sense  attached 
to  them  without  the  least  expenditure  of  thought :  in 
short,  whatever  may  enable  them  to  talk  of  what 
they  do  not  understand,  with  a  careful  avoidance  of 
every  thing  that  might  awaken  them  to  a  moment's 
suspicion  of  their  ignorance.  This,  alas !  is  an  ir- 
remediable disease,  for  it  brings  with  it,  not  so  much 
an  indisposition  to  any  particular  system,  but  an  utter 
loss  of  taste  and  faculty  for  all  system  and  for  all 
philosophy.  Like  echoes,  that  beget  each  other 
amongst  the  mountains,  the  praise  or  blame  of  such 
men  rolls  in  volleys  long  after  the  report  from  the 
original  blunderbuss.  Sequacitus  est  potius  et  coitio 
quam  consensus:  el  tamen  (quod  pessimum  est)  pu- 
sillanimitas  ista  non  sine  arrogantia  et  fastidio  si 
offert.     Novum  Organum. 

I  shall  now  proceed  to  the  nature  and  genesis  of  the 
imagination :  but  I  must  first  take  leave  to  notice, 
that  after  a  more  accurate  perusal  of  Mr.  Words- 
worth's remarks  on  the  imagination,  in  his  preface  to 
the  new  edition  of  his  poems,  1  find  that  my  con- 
clusions are  not  so  consentient  with  his,  as,  I  confess, 
I  had  taken  for  granted.  In  an  article  contributed 
by  me  to  Mr.  Southey's  Omniana,  on  the  soul  and  its 
organs  of  sense,  are  the  following  sentences:  "  These 
(the  human  faculties)  I  would  arrange  under  the 
different  senses  and  powers ;  as  the  eye,  the  ear,  the 
touch,  &c. ;  the  imitative  power,  voluntary  and  auto- 
matic ;  the  imagination,  or  shaping  and  modifying 
power;  the  fancy,  or  the  aggregative  and  associative 
power;  the  understanding,  or  the  regulative,  sub- 
stantiating and  realizing  power ;  the  speculative  rea- 
son— vis  theoretica  et  scientifica,  or  the  power  by 
which  we  produce,  or  aim  to  produce,  unity,  necessity, 
and  universality  in  all  our  knowledge,  by  means  of 
principles  a  priori;*  the  will,  or  practical  reason; 


the  facility  of  choice  (Germanice,  Willkuhr  and  dis- 
tinct both  from  the  moral  will  and  the  choice)  the 
n  nsation  of  volition,  which  I  have  found  reason  to 
include  under  the  head  of  single  and  double  touch." 
To  this,  as  far  as  it  relates  to  the  subject  in  question, 
namely,  the  words  (the  aggregative  and  associative 
power)  Mr.  Wordsworth's  "  only  objection  is,  that  the 
definition  is  too  general.  To  aggregate  and  associate, 
to  evoke  and  combine,  belongs  as  well  to  the  im- 
agination as  the  fancy."  I  reply,  that  if  by  the 
power  of  evoking  and  combining,  Mr.  \V.  means 
the  same  as,  and  no  more  than,  I  meant  by  the  ag- 
gregative and  associative,  I  continue  to  deny,  that  it 
belongs  at  all  to  the  imagination  ;  and  I  am  di 
to  conjecture,  that  he  has  mistaken  the  co-pre-ence 
of  fancy  with  imagination  for  the  operation  of  the 
latter  singly.  A  man  may  work  with  two  very  dif- 
ferent tools  at  the  same  moment;  each  has  its  share 
in  the  work,  but  the  work  effected  by  each  is  distinct 
and  different.  But  it  will  probably  appear  in  the 
next  chapter,  that  deeming  it  necessary  to  go  back 
much  further  than  Mr.  Wordsworth's  subject  re- 
quired or  permitted,  I  have  attached  a  meaning  to 
both  fancy  and  imagination,  which  he  had  not  in 
view,  at  least  while  he  was  writing  that  preface. 
He  will  judge.  Would  to  heaven,  1  might  meet  with 
many  such  readers.  I  will  conclude  with  the  words 
of  Bishop  Jeremy  Taylor :  he  to  whom  all  things  are 
one,  who  draweth  all  things  to  one,  and  seeth  all 
things  in  one,  may  enjoy  true  peace  and  rest  of  spirit 
J.  Juylor's  Via  Pacis.) 


*  This  phrase,  a  priori,  is  in  common  most  erossiy  misun- 
derstood, and  an  absurdity  burlhened'on  it,  which  it  dues  not 
deserve!  By  knowledge,  a  priori,  we  do  not  mean  tbal  we 
can  know  any  thin;;  previously  to  experience,  which  would 
be  a  contradiction  in  terms  ;  but,  that  havimr  once  known  it  by 
occasion  of  experience,  (i.  e.  something  acting  upon  us  from 
without,)  we  then  know,  that  it  must  have  pre-existed,  or  the 
experience  itself  would  have  been  impossible.  By  experience 
only,  I  know  that  I  have  eyes;  but,  then  my  reason  con- 
that  I  must  have  iiad  eyes  in  orderto  the  experience. 
Bb 


CHAPTER  XIII. 

On  the  imagination,  or  esemplastic  power. 

O  Adam  !  one  Almighty  is,  from  whom 

All  things  proceed,  and  up  to  him  return, 

If  not  depraved  from  good  :   created  all 

Such  to  perfection,  one  first  nature  all 

Indued  with  various  forms,  various  degrees 

Of  substance,  and  in  things  that  live,  of  life  ; 

But  more  refined,  more  spirituous  and  pure, 

As  nearer  to  him  placed  or  nearer  tending, 

Each  in  their  several  active  spheres  assign'd, 

Till  hody  up  to  spirit  work,  in  bounds 

Prnportion'd  to  each  kind.    So  from  the  root 

Springs  lighter  the  green  stalk  :  from  thence  the  leaves 

Mure  airy:  last,  the  bright  consummate  flower 

Spirits  odorous  breathes.    Flowers  and  their  fruit. 

Man's  nourishment,  by  gradual  scale  sublimed. 

To  vital  spirits  aspire'  to  animal . 

To  intellectual! — give  both  life  and  sense, 

Fancy  and  understanding:  whence  the  soul 

Reason  receives.    And  reason  is  her  being, 

Discursive  or  intuitive. 

Par.  Lost.  b.  r 

"  Pane  si  res  corpora'es  nil  nisi  materiaJe  continerent,  vens- 
time  dicerentur  in  rluxu  consistere  neque  habere  substantiate 
qui'-ouam,  (luemadmodum  et  Platonici  olim  recte  agnovere. — 
Hmc  igitur,  prwer  pure  mathematica  et  phantasia'  subjecta. 
collegi  quaedam  metaphysica  solaque  mente  perceptibilia,  esse 
admittenda  :  et  massre  materiali  principium  quoddam  supenus 
et,  ut  sic  dicam,  formate  addendum  :  quandnquidem  omnes 
veritates  rerum  corporearum  ex  solis  axiomatibus  logisticis  et 
geometricis,  nempo  de  magno  et  parvo,  toto  et  parte,  figura  et 
situ,  colhgi  non  possint ;  sed  alia  de  causa  et  effectn,  actitnu- 

305 


296 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  .WORKS. 


Que  et  passiortc,  accedere  debcant,  quibns  ordini9  rerum  ra- 
tiones  salventur.  Id  principium  rerum,  an  ct'lcXt^iiav  an 
vim  appelemus,  non  rerert,  modo  meminerimus,  per  solam 
Vinum  notionem  intelligibililer  explicari." 

Leibnitz ;  Op.  T.  II.  P.  II.  p.  53.— T.  III.  p.  321. 

'ZiSoftai   Nocpwv 
Kpvtplav  tq|iv 
Xqpu  Tl   MESON 
Ov  Ka]axyQiv. 

Suncsii,  Hymn  III.  1.  231. 

Des  Cartes,  speaking  as  a  naturalist,  and  in  imi- 
tation of  Archimedes,  said,  give  me  matter  and  mo- 
tion, and  I  will  construct  you  the  universe.  We 
must  of  course  understand  him  to  have  meant :  I 
will  render  the  construction  of  the  universe  intelli- 
gible. In  the  same  sense  the  transcendental  philoso- 
pher says,  grant  me  a  nature  having  two  contrary 
forces,  the  one  of  which  tends  to  expand  infinitely, 
while  the  other  strives  to  apprehend  or  find  itself  in 
this  infinity,  and  I  will  cause  the  world  of  intelli- 
gences, with  the  whole  system  of  their  representa- 
tions, to  rise  up  before  you.  Every  other  science 
pre-supposes  intelligence  as  already  existing  and  com- 
plete: the  philosopher  contemplates  it  in  its  growth, 
and,  as  it  were,  represents  its  history  to  the  mind 
from  its  birth  to  its  maturity. 

The  venerable  Sage  of  Koenigsberg  has  preceded 
the  march  of  this  master-thought  as  an  effective 
pioneer  in  his  essay  on  the  introduction  of  negative 
quantities  into  philosophy,  published  1763.  In  this, 
he  has  shown,  that  instead  of  assailing  the  science 
of  mathematics  by  metaphysics,  as  Berkeley  did  in  his 
Analyst,  or  of  sophisticating  it,  as  Wolff  did,  by  the 
vain  attempt  of  deducing  the  first  principles  of  ge- 
ometry from  supposed  deeper  grounds  of  ontology,  it 
behooved  the  metaphysician  rather  to  examine  whe- 
ther the  only  province  of  knowledge,  which  man 
has  succeeded  in  erecting  into  a  pure  science,  might 
not  furnish  materials,  or  at  least  hints  for  establishing 
and  pacifying  the  unsettled,  warring,  and  embroiled 
domain  of  philosophy.  An  imitation  of  the  mathe- 
matical method,  had  indeed  been  attempted  with  no 
better  success  than  attended  the  essay  of  David  to 
wear  the  armor  of  Saul.  Another  use,  however,  is 
possible,  and  of  far  greater  promise,  namely,  the  ac- 
tual application  of  the  positions  which  had  so  won- 
derfully enlarged  the  discoveries  of  geometry,  mutatis 
mutandis,  to  philosophical  subjects.  Kant,  having 
briefly  illustrated  the  utility  of  such  an  attempt  in 
the  questions  of  space,  motion,  and  infinitely  small 
qnantities,  as  employed  by  the  mathematician,  pro- 
ceeds to  the  idea  of  negative  quantities  and  the 
transfer  of  them  to  metaphysical  investigation.  Op- 
posite?, he  well  observes,  are  of  two  kinds,  either 
logical,  i.  e.  such  as  are  absolutely  incompatible  ;  or 
real,  without  being  contradictory.  The  former,  he 
denominates  Nihil  negativum  irrepraesentabile,  the 
connexion  of  which  produces  nonsense.  A  body  in 
motion  is  something — Aliquid  cogitabile;  but  a  body, 
at  one  and  the  same  time  in  motion  and  not  in  motion, 
is  nothing,  or,  at  most,  air  articulated  into  nonsense. 
Hut  a  motary  force  of  a  body  in  one  direction,  and  an 
equal  force  of  the  same  body  in  an  opposite  direction 


is  not  incompatible,  and  the  result,  namely,  rest,  i» 
real  and  representable.  For  the  purposes  of  mathe- 
matical  calculus,  it  is  indifferent  which  force  we 
term  negative,  and  which  positive,  and  consequently, 
we  appropriate  the  latter  to  that  which  happens  to  be 
the  principal  object  in  our  thoughts.  Thus,  if  a  man's 
capital  be  ten  and  his  debts  eight,  the  subtraction 
will  be  the  same,  whether  we  call  the  capital  nega- 
tive debt,  or  the  debt  negative  capital.  But  in  as 
much  as  the  latter  stands  practically  in  reference  to 
the  former,  we  of  course  represent  the  sum  as  10 — & 
It  is  equally  clear,  that  two  equal  forces  acting  in 
opposite  directions,  both  being  finite,  and  each  dis- 
tinguished from  the  other  by  its  direction  only,  must 
neutralize  or  reduce  each  other  to  inaction.  Now 
the  transcendental  philosophy  demands,  first,  that 
two  forces  should  be  conceived  which  counteract 
each  other  by  their  essential  nature  ;  not  only  in  con- 
sequence of  the  accidental  direction  of  each,  but  as 
prior  to  all  direction,  nay,  as  the  primary  forces  from 
which  the  conditions  of  all  possible  directions  are 
derivative  and  deducible:  secondly,  that  these  forces 
should  be  assumed  to  be  both  alike  infinite,  both 
alike  indestructible.  The  problem  will  then  be  to 
discover  the  result  or  product  of  two  such  forces,  as 
distinguished  from  the  result  of  those  forces  which 
are  finite,  and  derive  their  difference  solely  from  the 
circumstance  of  their  direction.  When  we  have 
formed  a  scheme  or  outline  of  these  two  different 
kinds  of  force,  and  of  their  different  results  by  the 
process  of  discursive  reasoning,  it  will  then  remain 
for  us  to  elevate  the  Thesis  from  notional  to  actual, 
by  contemplating  intuitively  this  one  power  with  its 
two  inherent,  indestructible,  yet  counteracting  forces, 
and  the  results  or  generations  to  which  their  inter- 
penetration  gives  existence,  in  the  living  principle, 
and  in  the  process  of  our  own  self-consciousness.  By 
what  instrument  this  is  possible,  the  solution  itself 
will  discover,  at  the  same  time  that  it  will  reveal  to, 
and  for  whom  it  is  possible.  Non  omnia  possumes 
omnes.  There  is  a  philosophic,  no  less  than  a  poetic 
genius,  which  is  differenced  from  the  highest  perfec- 
tion of  talent,  not  by  degree,  but  by  kind. 

The  counteraction,  then,  of  the  two  assumed 
forces,  does  not  depend  on  their  meeting  from  oppo- 
site directions;  the  power  which  acts  in  them  is 
indestructible;  it  is,  therefore,  inexhaustibly  re-ebul- 
lient; and  as  something  must  be  the  result  of  these 
two  forces,  both  alike  infinite,  and  both  alike  inde- 
structible; and,  as  rest  or  neutralization  cannot  be 
this  result,  no  other  conception  is  possible,  but  that 
the  product  must  be  a  tertium  aliquid,  or  finite  gene- 
ration. Consequently,  this  conception  is  necessary. 
Now  this  tertium  aliquid  can  be  no  other  than  an  in- 
terpenetration  of  the  counteracting  powers  partaking 
of  both. 

********* 

Thus  far  had  the  work  been  transcribed  for  the 
press,  when  I  received  the  following  letter  from  a 
friend,  whose  practical  judgment  I  have  had  ample 
reason  to  estimate  and  revere,  and  whose  taste  and 
sensibility  preclude  all  the  excuses  which  my  self- 
love  might  possibly  have  prompted  me  to  set  up  in 
3G6 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


297 


plea  against  the  decision  of  advisers  of  equal  good 
sense,  but  with  less  tact  and  feeling. 

"Dear  C— 

"You  ask  my  opinion  concerning  your  chapter  on  the 
imagination,  both  as  to  the  impressions  it  made  on  myself, 
and  as  to  those  which  I  think  it  will  make  on  the  public,  i.  e. 
that  part  of  the  public  who,  from  the  title  of  the  work,  and 
from  its  forming  a  sort  of  introduction  to  a  volume  of  poems, 
are  likely  to  constitute  the  great  majority  of  your  readers. 

"  As  to  myself,  and  6tating,  in  the  first  place,  the  effect  on 
my  understanding,  your  opinions,  and  method  of  argument, 
were  not  only  so  new  to  me,  but  so  directly  the  reverse  of  all 
I  had  ever  been  accustomed  to  consider  as  truth,  that,  even 
if  1  had  comprehended  your  premises  sufficiently  to  have  ad- 
mitted them,  and  had  seen  the  necessity  of  your  conclusions, 
1  should  still  have  been  in  that  state  of  mind,  which,  in  your 
note,  p. "251,  you  have  so  ingeniously  evolved,  as  the  antithesis 
to  that  in  which  a  man  is  when  ho  mukes  a  bull.  In  your 
own  words,  I  should  have  felt  as  if  I  had  been  standing  on 
my  head. 

"The  effect  on  my  feelings,  on  the  other  hand,  I  cannot 
better  represent,  than  by  supposing  myself  to  have  known 
only  our  light,  airy,  modern  chapels  of  ease,  and  then,  for  the 
first  time,  to  have  been  placed,  and  left  alone,  in  one  of  our 
largest  Gothic  cathedrals,  in  a  gusty  moonlight  night  of  au- 
tumn. '  Now  in  glimmer,  now  in  gloom  ;'  often  in  palpable 
darkness,  not  without  a  chilly  sensation  of  terror;  then  sud- 
denly emerging  into  broad,  yet  visionary  lights,  with  colored 
shadows  of  fantastic  shapes,  yet  all  decked  with  holy  insignia 
and  mystic  symbols;  and,  ever  and  anon,  coming  out  full 
upon  pictures,  and  stone-work  images  and  great  men,  with 
whose  names  I  was  familiar,  but  which  looked  upon  me  with 
countenances  and  an  expression,  the  most  dissimilar  to  all  I 
had  been  in  the  habit  of  connecting  with  those  names.  Those 
whom  I  had  been  taught  to  venerate  as  almost  super-human 
in  magnitude  of  intellect,  I  found  perched  in  little  fret-work 
niches,  as  grotesque  dwarfs;  while  the  grotesques,  in  my 
hitherto  belief,  stood  guarding  the  high  altar  with  all  the  cha- 
racters of  Apotheosis.  In  short,  what  I  had  supposed  sub- 
stances, were  thinned  away  into  shadows,  while,  everywhere, 
shadows  were  deepened  into  substances: 

If  substance  may  be  call'd  what  shadow  seem'd. 

For  each  seem'd  either  !  Jtilton. 

"Yet,  after  all,  I  could  not  but  repeat  the  lines  which  you 
had  quoted  from  a  MS.  poem  of  your  own  in  the  Friend,  and 
applied  to  a  work  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's,  though  with  a  few 
of  the  words  altered  : 

" An  orphic  tale  indeed, 

A  tale  obscure,  of  high  and  passionate  thoughts 
To  a  strange  music  chaunted  !" 

"  Be  assured,  however,  that  I  look  forward  anxiously  to 
your  great  book  on  the  constructive  philosophy,  which  you 
have  promised  and  announced  ;  and  that  I  will  do  my  best  to 
understand  it.  Only.  I  will  not  promise  to  descend  into  the 
dark  cave  of  Trophonius  with  you,  there  to  rub  my  own  eyes, 
in  order  to  make  the  sparks  and  figured  flashes  which  I  am 
required  to  see. 

"  So  much  for  myself.  But,  as  for  the  public,  I  do  not 
hesitate  a  moment  in  advising  and  urging  you  to  withdraw 
the  chapter  from  the  present  work,  and  to  reserve  it  for  your 
announced  treatises  on  the  Logos  or  communicative  intellect 
in  Man  and  Deity.  First,  because,  imperfectly  as  I  understand 
the  present  chapter,  I  see  clearly  that  you  have  done  too 
much,  and  yet  not  enough.  You  have  been  obliged  to  nmit 
so  many  links  from  the  necessity  of  compression,  that  what 
remains,  looks,  (if  I  may  recur  to  my  former  illustration.)  like 
the  fragments  of  the  winding  steps  of  an  old  ruined  tower. 
Secondly,  a  still  stronger  argument,  (at  least,  one  that  I  am 
sure  will  be  more  forcible  with  you,)  is,  that  your  readers  will 
have  both  right  and  reason  to  complain  of  you.  This  chap- 
ter, which  cannot,  when  it  is  printed,  amount  to  so  little  as 
an  hundred  pages,  will,  of  necessity,  greatly  increase  the  ex- 
pense of  the  work  ;  and  every  reader  who,  like  myself,  is  nei- 
ther prepared,  or,  perhaps,  calculated  fur  the  study  of  so  ab- 
struse a  subject  so  abstrusely  treated,  will,  as  I  have  before 
hinted,  be  almost  entitled  to  accuse  you  of  a  sort  of  imposi- 


tion on  him.  For  who,  he  might  truly  observe,  could,  from 
your  title-page,  viz:  "MY  LITERARY  LIFE  AND  OP1 
NIONS,"  published,  too,  as  introductory  to  a  volume  of 
miscellaneous  poems,  have  anticipated,  or  even  conjectured, 
a  long  treatise  on  ideal  Realism,  which  holds  the  same  rela- 
tion, in  abstruseness,  to  Plotinus,  as  Plotinus  does  to  Plato 
It  will  be  well  if,  already,  you  have  not  too  much  of  meta- 
physical disquisition  in  your  work,  though,  as  the  larger  part 
of  the  disquisition  is  historical,  it  will,  doubtless,  be  both  in- 
teresting and  instructive  to  many,  to  whose  unprepared  minds 
your  speculations  on  the  esemplastic  power  would  be  utterly 
unintelligible.  Be  assured,  if  you  do  publish  this  chapter  in 
the  present  work,  you  will  be  reminded  of  Bishop  Berkeley's 
Siris,  announced  as  an  Essay  on  Tar-water,  which,  beginning 
with  tur,  ends  with  the  Trinity,  the  omne  scibile  forming  the 
interspace.  I  say  in  the  present  work.  In  that  greater  work 
to  which  you  have  devoted  so  many  years,  and  study  so  in- 
tense and  various,  it  will  be  in  its  proper  place.  Your  pros- 
pectus will  have  described  and  announced  both  its  contents 
and  their  nature  ;  and  if  any  persons  purchase  it,  who  feel 
no  interest  in  the  subjects  of  which  it  treats,  they  will  have 
themselves  only  to  blame. 

"  I  could  add,  to  these  arguments,  one  derived  from  pecu- 
niary motives,  and  particularly  from  the  probable  effects  on 
the  sale  of  your  present  publication  ;  but  they  would  weigh 
little  with  you,  compared  with  the  preceding.  Besides,  I  have 
long  observed,  that  arguments  drawn  from  your  own  person- 
al interests,  more  often  act  on  you  as  narcotics,  than  as  stim- 
ulants, and  that,  in  money  concerns,  you  have  some  small 
portion  of  pig-nature  in  your  moral  idiosyncrasy,  and,  like 
these  amiable  creatures,  must,  occasionally,  be  pulled  back- 
ward from  the  boat  in  order  to  make  you  enter  it.  All  suc- 
cess attend  you,  for  if  hard  thinking  and  hard  reading  are 
merits,  you  have  deserved  it. 

Your  affectionate,  &c. 

In  consequence  of  this  very  judicious  letter,  which 
produced  complete  conviction  on  my  mind,  I  shall 
content  myself  for  the  present  with  stating  the  main 
result  of  the  chapter,  which  I  have  reserved  for  that 
future  publication,  a  detailed  prospectus  of  which  the 
reader  will  find  at  the  close  of  the  second  volume. 

The  imagination,  then,  I  consider  either  as  pri- 
mary or  secondary.  The  primary  imagination  I 
hold  to  be  the  living  Power  and  prime  Agent  of  all 
human  Perception,  and  as  a  repetition  in  the  finite 
mind  of  the  eternal  act  of  creation  in  the  infinite  I 
am.  The  secondary  I  consider  as  an  echo  of  the 
former,  co-existing  with  the  conscious  will,  yet  still 
as  identical  with  the  primary  in  the  kind  of  its  agen- 
cy, and  differing  only  in  degree,  and  in  the  mode  of 
its  operation.  It  dissolves,  diffuses,  dissipates,  in  order 
to  re-create  ;  or,  where  this  process  is  rendered  im- 
possible, yet  still,  at  all  events,  it  struggles  to  idealize 
and  to  unify.  It  is  essentially  vital,  even  as  all  ob- 
jects {as  objects)  are  essentially  fixed  and  dead. 

Fancy,  on  the  contrary,  has  no  other  counters  to 
play  with,  but  fixities  and  definities.  The  Fancy  is, 
indeed,  no  other  than  a  mode  of  Memory  emancipated 
from  the  order  of  time  and  space,  and  blended  with, 
and  modified  by,  that  empirical  phenomenon  of  the 
will  which  we  express  by  the  word  choice.  But, 
equally  with  the  ordinary  memory,  it  must  receive 
all  its  materials  ready  made  from  the  law  of  association. 

Whatever,  more  than  this,  I  shall  think  it  fit  to  de- 
clare, concerning  the  powers  and  privileges  of  the 
imagination,  in  the  present  work,  will  be  found  in 
the  critical  essay  on  the  uses  of  the  supernatural  in 
poetry,  and  the  principles  that  regulate  its  introduc- 
tion ;  which  the  reader  will  find  prefixed  to  the  poem 
of  Ji)e  Hncient  SJRarmer. 

307 


29  S 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


CHAPTER  XIV. 

Occasion  or  the  Lyrical  Ballads,  and  the  objects  originally 
proposed — Preface  to  the  second  edition — The  ensuing  con- 
troveisy,  its  causes  and  acrimony — Philosophic  definitions 
of  a  poem,  and  poetry  with  scholia. 

During  the  first  year  that  Mr.  Wordsworth  ami  I 
were  neighbors,  our  conversation  turned  frequently 
on  the  two  cardinal  points  of  poetry,  the  power  of 
exciting  the  sympathy  of  the  reader  by  a  faithful  ad- 
herence to  the  truth  of  nature,  and  the  power  of  giv- 
ing the  interest  of  novelty,  by  the  modifying  colors 
of  imagination.  The  sudden  charm,  which  accidents 
of  light  and  shade,  which  moon-light  or  sunset,  dif- 
fused over  a  known  and  familiar  landscape,  appeared 
to  represent  ihe  practicability  of  combining  both. 
These  are  the  poetry  of  nature.  The  thought  sug- 
gested itself,  (to  which  of  us  1  do  not  recollect,)  that 
a  series  of  poems  might  be  composed  of  two  sorts. 
In  the  one,  the  incidents  and  agents  were  to  be,  in 
part  at  least, supernatural;  and  the  excellence  aimed 
at,  was  to  consist  in  the  interesting  of  the  affections 
by  the  dramatic  truth  of  such  emotions,  as  would 
naturally  accompany  such  situations,  supposing  them 
real.  And  real  in  this  sense  they  have  been  to  every 
human  being  who,  from  whatever  source  of  delusion, 
has  at  any  time  believed  himself  under  supernatural 
agency.  For  the  second  class,  subjects  were  to  be 
chosen  from  ordinary  life ;  the  characters  and  inci- 
dents were  to  be  such  as  will  be  found  in  every  vil- 
lage and  its  vicinity,  where  there  is  a  meditative  and 
feeling  mind  to  seek  after  them,  or  to  notice  them, 
when  they  present  themselves. 

In  this  idea  originated  the  plan  of  the  "Lyrical 
Ballads  ;"  in  which  it  was  agreed  that  my  endeavors 
should  be  directed  to  persons  and  characters  super- 
natural, or  at  least  romantic;  yet  so  as  to  transfer 
from  our  inward  nature  a  human  interest,  and  a 
semblance  of  truth  sufficient  to  procure  for  these 
shadows  of  imagination  that  willing  suspension  of 
disbelief  for  the  moment,  which  constitutes  poetic 
faith.  Mr.  Wordsworth,  on  the  other  hand,  was  to 
propose  to  himself,  as  his  object,  to  give  the  charm 
of  novelty  to  things  of  every  day.  and  to  excite  a  feel- 
ing analogous  to  the  supernatural,  by  awakening  the 
mind's  attention  from  the  lethargy  of  custom,  and 
directing  it  to  the  loveliness  and  the  wonders  of  the 
world  before  us;  an  inexhaustible  treasure,  but  for 
which,  in  consequence  of  the  film  of  familiarity  and 
selfish  solicitude,  we  have  eyes,  yet  see  not,  ears 
that  hear  not,  and  hearts  that  neither  feel  nor  under- 
stand. 

With  this  view,  I  wrote  the  "  Ancient  Mariner," 
and  was  preparing,  among  other  poems,  the  "  Dark 
Ladie,"  and  the  "Christabel,"  in  which  I  should  have 
more  nearly  realized  my  ideal,  than  I  had  done  in 
my  first  attempt.  But  Mr.  Wordsworth's  industry, 
had  proved  so  much  more  successful,  and  the  num- 
ber of  his  poems  so  much  greater,  that  my  composi- 
tions, instead  of  forming  a  balance,  appeared  rather 
an  interpolation  of  heterogeneous  matter.  Mr.  Words- 
worth added  two  or  three  poems  written  in  his  own 
character,  in  the  impassioned,  lofty,  and  sustained 


diction,  which  is  characteristic  of  his  genius.  In  this 
form  the  "Lyrical  Ballads"  were  published;  and 
were  presented  by  him,  as  an  experiment,  whether 
subjects,  which,  from  their  nature,  rejected  the  usual 
ornaments  and  extra-colloquial  style  of  poems  in 
general,  might  not  be  so  managed  in  the  language  of 
ordinary, life,  as  to  produce  the  pleasurable  interest 
which  it  is  the  peculiar  business  of  poetry  to  impart. 
To  the  second  edition  he  added  a  preface  of  consider- 
able length  ;  in  which,  notwithstanding  some  pas- 
sages of  apparently  a  contrary  import,  he  was  under- 
stood to  contend  for  the  extension  of  this  style  to 
poetry  of  all  kinds,  and  to  reject  as  vicious  and  inde- 
fensible all  phrases  and  forms  of  style  that  were  not 
included  in  what  he  (unfortunately,  I  think,  adopting 
an  equivocal  expression,)  called  the  language  of  real 
life.  From  this  preface,  prefixed  to  poems  in  which 
it  was  impossible  to  deny  the  presence  of  original 
genius,  however  mistaken  its  direction  might  be 
deemed,  arose  the  whole  long  continued  controversy. 
For  from  the  conjunction  of  perceived  power  with 
supposed  heresy,  I  explain  the  inveteracy,  and  in 
some  instances,  I  grieve  to  say,  the  acrimonious  pas- 
sions, with  which  the  controversy  has  been  conduct- 
ed by  the  assailants. 

Had  Mr.  Wordsworth's  poems  been  the  silly,  the 
childish  things,  which  they  were  for  a  long  time 
described  as  being  ;  had  they  been  really  distinguish- 
ed from  the  compositions  of  other  poets,  merely  by 
meanness  of  language  and  inanity  of  thought ;  had 
they,  indeed,  contained  nothing  more  than  what  is 
found  in  the  parodies,  and  pretended  imitations  of 
them  ;  they  must  have  sunk  at  once,  a  dead  weight, 
into  the  slough  of  oblivion,  and  have  dragged  the 
preface  along  with  them.  But  year  after  year  in- 
creased the  number  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  admirers. 
They  were  found,  loo,  not  in  the  lower  classes  of  the 
reading  public,  but  chiefly  among  young  men  of 
slrong  sensibility  and  meditative  minds  ;  and  their 
admiration  (inflamed,  perhaps,  in  some  degree  by  op- 
position) was  distinguished  by  its  intensity,  I  might 
almost  say  by  its  religious  fervor.  These  facts,  and 
the  intellectual  energy  of  the  author,  which  was 
more  or  less  consciously  felt,  where  it  was  outwardly 
and  even  boisterously  denied  ;  meeting  with  senti- 
ments of  aversion  to  his  opinions,  and  of  alarm  at 
their  consequences,  produced  an  eddy  of  criticism, 
which  would,  of  itself,  have  borne  up  the  poems  by 
the  violence  with  which  it  whirled  them  round  and 
round.  With  many  parts  of  this  preface,  in  the  sense 
attributed  to  them,  and  which  the  words  undoubtedly 
seem  to  authorize,  I  never  concurred;  but,  on  the 
contrary,  objected  to  them  as  erroneous  in  principle, 
and  as  contradictory  (in  appearance  at  least)  both  to 
other  parts  of  the  same  preface,  and  to  the  author's 
own  practice  in  the  greater  number  of  the  poems 
themselves.  Mr.  Wordsworth,  in  his  recent  collec- 
tion, has,  I  find,  degraded  this  prefatory  disquisition 
to  the  end  of  his  second  volume,  to  be  read  or  not  at 
the  reader's  choice.  But  he  has  not,  as  far  as  I  can 
discover,  announced  any  change  in  his  poetic  creed. 
At  all  events,  considering  it  as  the  source  of  a  con- 
troversy, in  which  I  have  been  honored  more  than  I 
308 


BIOGRAPHIA 

-% — — — 


LITER  ARIA. 


299 


deserve,  by  the  frequent  conjunction  of  my  name 
with  his,  I  think  it  expedient  to  declare,  once  for  all. 
in  what  points  I  coincide  with  his  opinions,  and  in 
what  points  I  altogether  differ.  But  in  order  to  ren- 
der myself  intelligible,  I  must  previously,  in  as  few 
words  as  possible,  explain  my  ideas,  first,  of  a  I'^em  : 
and  secondly,  of  Poetry  itself,  in  kind,  and  in  essence. 

The  office  of  philosophical  disquisition  a 
just  distinction  ;  while  it  is  the  privilege  of  the  phi- 
losopher to  preserve  himself  constantly  awar*  that 
distinction  is  not  division.  In  order  to  obtain  adequate 
notions  of  any  truth,  we  must  intellectually  separate 
its  distinguishable  pans  :  and  this  is  the  technical 
process  of  philosophy.  But  having  so  done,  we  must 
then  restore  them  in  our  conceptions  to  the  unity  in 
which  they  actually  co-exist;  and  this  is  the  result 
of  philosophy.  A  poem  contains  the  same  elements 
as  a  prose  composition  ;  the  difference,  therefore. 
must  consist  in  a  different  combination  of  them,  in 
consequence  of  a  different  object  proposed.  Accord- 
ing to  the  difference  of  the  object  will  be  the  differ- 
ence of  the  combination.  It  is  possible,  that  the 
object  mav  be  merely  to  facilitate  the  recollection 
of  any  given  facts  or  observations,  by  artificial  ar- 
rangement ;  and  the  composition  will  be  a  poem, 
merely  because  it  is  distinguished  from  prose  by 
metre,  or  by  rhyme,  or  by  both  conjointly.  In  this, 
the  lowest  sense,  a  man  might  attribute  the  name  of 
a  poem  to  the  well-known  enumeration  of  the  days 
in  the  several  months  : 

"  Thirty  days  hath  September, 
April,  Juiie,  and  November,"  &c. 

and  others  of  the  same  class  and  purpose.  And  as  a 
particular  pleasure^  found  in  anticipating  the  recur- 
rence of  sounds  and  quantities,  all  compositions  that 
have  this  charm  superadded,  whatever  be  their  con- 
tents, may  be  entitled  poems. 

So  much  for  the  superficial  form.  A  difference  of 
object  and  contents  supplies  an  additional  ground  of 
distinction.  The  immediate  purpose  may  l>e  the 
communication  of  truths :  either  of  truth  absolute  and 
demonstrable,  as  in  works  of  science  ;  or  of  facts  ex- 
perienced and  recorded,  as  in  history.  Pleasure,  and 
that  of  the  highest  and  most  permanent  kind,  may 
result  from  the  attainment  of  the  end :  but  it  is  not 
itself  the  immediate  end.  In  other  works  the  com- 
munication of  pleasure  mav  be,  the  immediate  pur- 
pose: and  though  truth,  either  moral  or  intellectual, 
ought  to  be  the  uUimalc  end.  yet  this  will  distinguish 
the  character  of  the  author,  not  the  class  to  which 
the  work  belongs.  Blest,  indeed,  is  that  state  of  so- 
ciety, in  which  the  immediate  purpose  would  be  baf- 
fled by  the  perversion  of  the  proper  ultimate  end ;  in 
which  no  charm  of  diction  or  imagery  could  exempt 
the  Balhyllus  even  of  an  Anacreon,  or  the  Alexis  of 
Virgil,  from  disgust  and  aversion! 

But  the  communication  of  pleasure  may  be  the  im- 
mediate object  of  a  work  not  metrically  composed  ; 
and  that  object  may  have  been  in  a  high  degree  at- 
tained, as  in  novels  and  romances.  Would  then  the 
mere  superaddition  of  metre,  with  or  without  rhyme, 
entitle  these  to  the  name  of  poems  '  The  answer  is. 
Bb2 


that  nothing  can  permanently  please,  which  does  not 
contain  in  itself  the  reason  why  it  is  so.  and  not  other- 
wise. If  metre  be  superadded,  all  other  parts  must 
be  made  consonant  w  ith  it.  They  must  be  such  as  to 
justify  the  perpetual  and  distinct  attention  to  each 
part,  which  an  exact  correspondent  recurrence  of  ac- 
cent and  sound  is  calculated  to  excite.  The  final 
definition,  then,  so  deduced,  may  be  thus  worded :  A 
poem  is  that  species  of  composition,  which  is  opposed 
to  works  of  science,  by  proposing  for  its  immediate 
object  pleasure,  not  truth ;  and  from  all  other  species. 
[having  this  object  in  common  with  it.v  it  is  discrimi- 
nated by  proposing  to  itself  such  delight  from  the 
whole,  as  is  compatible  with  a  distinct  gratification 

i  from  each  component  part. 

Controversy  is  not  seldom  excited,  in  consequence 
of  the  disputants  attaching  each  a  different  meaning 
to  the  same  word  :  and  in  lew  instances  has  this  been 
more  striking  than  in  disputes  concerning  the  present 

j  subject.     If  a  man  chooses  to  call  every  composition 

j  a  poem  which  is  rhyme,  or  measure,  or  both,  I  must 
leave  his  opinion  uncontroverted.     The  distinction  is 

,  at  least  competent  to  characterize  the  writer's  inten- 
tion.   If  it  were  subjoined,  that  the  whole  is  likewise 

i  entertaining  or  affecting,  as  a  tale,  or  as  a  series  of 
interesting  reflections,  I  of  course  admit  this  as  ano- 
ther fit  ingredient  of  a  poem,  and  an  additional  merit. 
But  if  the  definition  sought  for  be  that  of  a  legi!ima!( 
poem,  I  answer,  it  must  be  one,  the  parts  of  which 
mutually  support  and  explain  each  other;  all  in  their 

:  proportion  harmonizing  with,  and  supporting  the  pur- 

'  pose  and  known  influences  of  metrical  arrangement. 

j  The  philosophic  critics  of  all  ages  coincide  with  the 
ultimate  judgment  of  all  countries,  in  equally  deny- 
ing the  praises  of  a  just  poem,  on  the  one  hand,  to  a 
series  of  striking  lines  or  distichs.  each  of  which,  ab- 

:  sorbing  the  whole  attention  of  the  reader  to  itself, 
disjoins  it  from  its  context,  and  makes  it  a  separate 
whole,  instead  of  an  harmonizing  part ;  and  on  the 
other  hand,  to  an  unsustained  composition,  from 
which  the  reaper  collects  rapidly  the  general  result, 
unattracted  by  the  component  parts.  The  reader 
should  be  carried  forward,  not  merely,  or  chiefly,  by 
the  mechanical  impulse  of  curiosity,  or  by  a  restless 
desire  to  arrive  at  the  final  solution ;  but  by  the  plea- 
surable activity  of  mind,  excited  by  the  attractions  of 
irney  itself.  Like  the  motion  of  a  serpent, 
which  the  Egyptians  made  the  emblem  of  intellec- 

!  tual  power:  or  like  the  path  of  sound  through  the 
air;  at  every  step  he  pauses,  and  half  recedes,  and, 
from  the  retrogressive  movement,  collects  the  force 

I  which  asain  carries  him  onward.  Precipitandus  est 
liber  spiritus,  says  Petrositis  Arbiter,  most  happily. 

!  The  epithet,  liber,  here  balances  the  preceding  verb  : 
and  it  is  not  easy  to  conceive  more  meaning,  con- 
densed in  fewer  words. 

But  if  this  should  be  admitted  as  a  satisfactory 
character  of  a  poem,  we  have  still  to  seek  for  a  def. 
nition  of  poetry-  The  writings  of  Plato,  and  Eisho; 
Taylor,  and  the  Theoria  Sacra  of  Bcrxet,  furnish 
undeniable  proofs  that  poetry  of  the  highest  kind  may 
e\:>t  without  metre,  and  even  without  the  conira-dis- 

:  tinsuishine  objects  of  a  poem.    The  first  chapter  of 

309 


300 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Isaiah,  (indeed  a  very  large  portion  of  the  whole 
book,)  is  poetry  in  the  most  emphatic  sense ;  yet  it 
would  be  not  less  irrational  than  strange  to  assert, 
thai  |.!rasure,  and  not  truth,  was  the  immediate  object 
of  the  jirophet.  In  short,  whatever  specific  import  we 
attach  to  the  word  poetry,  there  will  be  found  in- 
volved in  it,  as  a  necessary  consequence,  that  a  poem 
of  any  length  neither  can  be,  or  ought  to  be  all  poe- 
try. Yet  if  an  harmonious  whole  is  to  be  produced, 
the  remaining  parts  must  be  preserved  in  keeping 
with  the  poetry;  and  this  can  be  no  otherwise  effect- 
ed than  by  such  a  studied  selection  and  artificial  ar- 
rangement as  will  partake  of  one,  though  not  a  pecu- 
liar, property  of  poetry.  And  this,  again,  can  be  no 
other  than  the  property  of  exciting  a  more  continuous 
and  equal  attention,  than  the  language  of  prose  aims 
tit,  whether  colloquial  or  written. 

My  own  conclusions  on  the  nature  of  poetry,  in  the 
strictest  use  of  the  word,  have  been,  in  part,  antici- 
pated in  the  preceding  disquisition  on  the  fancy  and 
imagination.  What  is  poetry  ?  is  so  nearly  the  same 
question  with,  what  is  a  poet  ?  that  the  answer  to  the 
one  is  involved  in  the  solution  of  the  other.  For  it 
is  a  distinction  resulting  from  the  poetic  genius  itself, 
which  sustains  and  modifies  the  images,  thoughts  and 
emotions  of  the  poet's  own  mind.  The  poet,  de- 
scribed in  ideal  perfection,  brings  the  whole  soul  of 
man  into  activity,  with  the  subordination  of  its  facul- 
ties to  each  other,  according  to  their  relative  worth 
and  dignity.  He  diffuses  a  tone  and  spirit  of  unity, 
that  blends,  and,  (as  it  were,)  fuses,  each  into  each, 
by  that  synthetic  and  magical  power,  to  which  we 
have  exclusively  appropriated  the  name  of  imagina- 
tion. This  power,  first  put  in  action  by  the  will  and 
understanding,  and  retained  under  their  irremissive, 
though  gentle  and  unnoticed,  control,  [taxis  effertur 
habenis,)  reveals  itself  in  the  balance  or  reconciliation 
of  opposite  or  discordant  qualities  ;  of  sameness,  with 
difference;  of  the  general,  with  the  concrete;  the 
idea,  with  the  image;  the  individual,  with  the  repre- 
sentative ;  the  sense  of  novelty  and  freshness,  with 
old  and  familiar  objects;  a  more  than  usual  state  of  j  not  music  in  his1  soul,"  can,  indeed,  never  be  a  genu- 


Finally,  good  sense  is  the  body  of  poetic  genius, 

FANCY  its  DRAPERY,  MOTION  its  LIFE,  and  IMAGINA- 
TION the  soul,  that  is  every  where,  and  in  each ;  and 
forms  all  into  one  graceful  and  intelligent  whole. 


CHAPTER  XV. 

The  ^ecific  symptoms  of  poetic  power  elucidated  in  a  critical 
analysis  of  ShaKspcare's  Venus  and  Adonis,  and  Lucrece. 

In  the  application  of  these  principles  to  purposes  of 
practical  criticism,  as  employed  in  the  appraisal  of 
works  more  or  less  imperfect,  I  have  endeavored  to 
discover  what  the  qualities  in  a  poem  are,  which  may 
be  deemed  promises  and  specific  symptoms  of  poetic 
power,  as  distinguished  from  general  talent  deter- 
mined to  poetic  composition  by  accidental  motives, 
by  an  act  of  the  will,  rather  than  by  the  inspiration  of 
a  genial  and  productive  nature.  In  this  investigation, 
I  could  not,  I  thought,  do  better  than  keep  before  me 
the  earliest  work  of  the  greatest  genius  that,  perhaps, 
human  nature  has  yet  produced,  our  myriad-minded* 
Shakspeare.  I  mean  the  "  Venus  and  Adonis,"  and 
the  "  Lucrece ;"  works  which  give  at  once  strong 
promises  of  the  strength,  and  yet  obvious  proofs  of  the 
immaturity  of  his  genius.  From  these  I  abstracted 
the  following  marks,  as  characteristics  of  original  po- 
etic genius  in  general. 

1.  In  the  "Venus  and  Adonis,"  the  first  and  most 
obvious  excellence,  is  the  perfect  sweetness  of  the 
versification ;  its  adaptation  to  the  subject ;  and  the 
power  displayed  in  varying  the  march  of  the  words 
without  passing  into  a  loftier  and  more  majestic 
rhythm  than  was  demanded  by^ie  thoughts,  or  per- 
mitted by  the  propriety  of  preserving  a  sense  of  mel- 
ody predominant.  The  delight  in  richness  and  sweet- 
ness of  sound,  even  to  a  faulty  excess,  if  it  be  evidently 
original,  and  not  the  result  of  an  easily  imitable  me- 
chanism, I  regard  as  a  highly  favorable  promise  in  the 
compositions  of  a  young  man.     "  The  man  that  hath 


emotion,  with  more  than  usual  order ;  judgment,  ever 
awake,  and  steady  self-possession,  with  enthusiasm 
and  feeling  profound  or  vehement ;  and  while  it 
blends  and  harmonizes  the  natural  and  the  artificial, 
still  subordinates  art  to  nature;  the  manner  to  the 


ine  poet.  Imagery  (even  taken  from  nature,  much 
more  when  transplanted  from  books,  as  travels,  voy- 
ages, and  works  of  natural  history)  affecting  incidents  ; 
just  thoughts;  interesting  personal  or  domestic  feel- 
ings; and  with  these  the  art  of  their  combination  or 


matter:  and  our  admiration  of  the  poet  to  our  sym-  j  intertexture  in  the  form  of  a  poem  ;  may  all,  by  inces- 


pathy  with  the  poetry.  "  Doubtless,"  as  Sir  John 
Davies  observes  of  the  soul,  (and  his  words  may,  with 
slight  alteration,  be  applied,  and  even  more  appropri- 
ately, to  the  poetic  imagination:) 

"  Doubtless  this  could  not  be,  but  that  she  turns 
Bodies  to  spirit  by  sublimation  strange, 
As  fire  converts  to  fire  the  things  it  burns. 
As  we  our  food  into  our  nature  change. 

From  their  gross  matter  she  abstracts  their  forms, 
And  draws  a  kind  of  quintessence  from  things  : 
Which  to  her  proper  nature  she  transforms, 
To  bear  them  light  on  her  celestial  wings. 

Thus  does  she,  when  from  individual  states 
She  doth  abstract  the  universal  kinds; 
Which  then,  rp- clothed  in  divers  names  and  fates, 
Steal  access  through  our  senses  to  our  minds." 


sant  effort,  be  acquired  as  a  trade,  by  a  man  of  talents 
and  much  reading,  who,  as  I  once  before  observed, 
has  mistaken  an  intense  desire  of  poetic  reputation 
for  a  natural  poetic  genius;  the  love  of  the  arbitrary 
end  for  a  ]x>ssession  of  the  peculiar  means.  But  the 
sense  of  musical  delight,  with  the  power  of  producing 
it,  is  a  gift  of  imagination ;  and  this,  together  with  the 
power  of  reducing  multitude  into  unity  of  effect,  and 
modifying  a  series  of  thoughts  by  some  one  predomi- 
nant thought  or  feeling,  may  be  cultivated  and  im- 

*  ''Avrip  pvpiovSs;  a  phrase  which  I  have  borrowed  from 
a  Greek  monk,  who  applies  it  to  a  patriarch  of  Constantino- 
ple.   1  might  have  said,  that  I  have  reclaimed,  rather  than 
borrowed  it;  for  it  seems  to  In-long  to  Shakspeare,  de  jure 
,  singular!,  el  ex  privilegio  naturre. 

310 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


301 


proved,  but  ran  never  be  learnt.    It  is  in  these  that 
"Poeta  nascitur  non  fit." 

2.  A  seconil  promise  of  genius  is  the  choice  of  sub- 
jects very  remote  from  the  private  interests  and  cir- 
cumstances of  the  writer  himself.  At  least  I  have 
(bund,  that  where  the  subject  is  taken  immediately 
from  the  author's  personal  sensations  and  experiences, 
the  excellence  of  a  particular  poem  is  but  an  equivo- 
cal mark,  ami  often  a  fallacious  pledge,  of  genuine 
poetic  power.  We  may,  perhaps,  remember  the  tale 
of  the  statuary,  who  had  acquired  considerable  repu- 
tation for  the  legs  of  his  goddesses,  though  the  rest 
of  the  statue  accorded  but  indifferently  with  the  ideal 
beauty,  till  bis  wife,  elated  with  the  husband's  praises, 
modestly  acknowledged,  that  she  herself  had  been 
his  constant  model.  In  the  Venus  and  Adonis,  this 
proof  of  poetic  power  exists  even  to  excess.  It  is 
throughout  as  if  a  superior  spirit,  more  intuitive,  more 
intimately  conscious,  even  than  the  characters  them- 
selves, not  only  of  every  outward  look  and  act,  but 
of  the  (lux  and  reflux  of  the  mind  in  all  its  subtlest 
thoughts  and  feelings,  were  placing  the  whole  before 
our  view;  himself,  meanwhile,  unparticipating  in  the 
passions,  and  actuated  only  by  that  pleasurable  ex- 
citement, which  had  resulted  from  the  energetic  fer- 
vor of  his  own  spirit,  in  so  vividly  exhibiting  what  it 
had  so  accurately  and  profoundly  contemplated.  I 
think  I  should  have  conjectured  from  these  poems, 
that  even  the  great  instinct,  which  impelled  the  poet 
to  the  drama,  was  secretly  working  in  him,  prompt- 
ing him  by  a  series  and  never-broken  chain  of  im- 
agery, always  vivid,  and  because  unbroken,  often  mi- 
nute; by  the  highest  effort  of  the  picturesque  in 
words,  of  which  words  are  capable,  higher,  perhaps, 
than  was  ever  realized  by  any  other  poet,  even  Dante 
not  excepted ;  to  provide  a  substitute  for  that  visual 
language,  that  constant  intervention  and  running  com- 
ment, by  tone,  look  and  gesture,  which  in  his  dra- 
matic works  he  was  entitled  to  expect  from  the  play- 
ers. His  "Venus  and  Adonis*'  seem  at  once  the 
characters  themselves,  and  the  whole  representation 
of  those  characters  by  the  most  consummate  actors. 
You  seem  to  be  told  nothing,  but  to  see  and  hear 
every  thing.  Hence  it  is,  that  from  the  perpetual  ac- 
tivity of  attention  required  on  the  part  of  the  reader; 
from  the  rapid  flow,  the  quick  change,  and  the  play- 
ful nature  of  the  thoughts  and  images;  and,  above 
all,  from  the  alienation,  and,  if  I  may  hazard  such  an 
expression,  the  utter  aloofness  of  the  poet's  own  feel- 
ing*, from  those  of  which  he  is  at  once  the  painter 
and  the  analyst;  that  though  the  very  subject  cannot 
but  detract  from  the  pleasure  of  a  delicate  mind,  yet 
never  was  poem  less  dangerous  on  a  moral  account. 
Instead  of  doing  a*  Ariosto,  and  as,  still  more  offen- 
sively, Weiland  lias  done;  instead  of  degrading  and 
deforming  passion  into  appetite,  the  trials  of  love  into 
the  struggles  of  concupiscence,  Shakspeare  has  here 
represented  the  animal  impulse  itself,  so  as  to  pre- 
clude all  sympathy  with  it.  by  dissipating  the  reader's 
notice  among  the  thousand  outward  images,  and  now 
beautiful,  now  fanciful  circumstances,  which  ibrm 
its  dresses  and  its  scenery;  or  by  diverting  our  atten- 
tion from  the  main  subject  by  those  frequent  witty  or 


profound  reflections,  which  the  poet's  ever  active 
mind  has  deduced  from,  or  connected  with,  the  im- 
agery  and  the  incidents.  The  reader  is  forced  into 
too  much  action  to  sympathize  with  the  merely  pas- 
sive of  our  nature.  As  little  can  a  mind  thus  roused 
and  awakened  be  brooded  on  by  mean  and  indistinct 
emotion,  as  the  low,  lazy  mist  can  creep  upon  the 
surface  of  a  lake,  while  a  strong  gale  is  driving  it  on- 
ward in  waves  and  billows. 

3.  It  has  been  before  observed,  that  images,  how- 
ever beautiful,  though  faithfully  copied  from  nature, 
and  as  accurately  represented  in  words,  do  not  of 
themselves  characterize  the  poet.  They  become 
proofs  of  original  genius,  only  as  far  as  they  are  mod- 
ified by  a  predominant  passion  ;  or  by  associated 
thoughts  or  images  awakened  by  that  passion;  or, 
when  they  have  the  effect  of  reducing  multitude  to 
unity,  or  succession  to  an  instant;  or,  lastly,  when  a 
human  and  intellectual  life  is  transferred  to  them 
from  the  poet's  own  spirit, 

"  Which  shoots  its  being  through  earth,  sea,  and  air." 
In  the  two  following  lines,  for  instance,  there  is 
nothing  objectionable,  nothing  which  would  preclude 
them  from  forming,  in  their  proper  place,  part  of  a 
descriptive  poem: 

"  Behold  yon  row  of  pines,  that,  shorn  and  bow'd, 
Bend  from  the  sea-blast,  seen  at  twilight  eve." 

But  with  the  small  alteration  of  rhythm,  the  same 
words  would  be  equally  in  their  place  in  a  book  of 
topography,  or  in  a  descriptive  tour.  The  same 
image  will  rise  into  a  semblance  of  poetry  if  thus 
conveyed : 

"  Yon  row  of  bleak  and  visionary  pines, 
By  twilight-glimpse  discerned,  mark  !  how  they  flee 
From  the  fierce  sea-blast,  all  their  tresses  wild 
Streaming  before  them." 

I  have  given  this  as  an  illustration,  by  no  means 
as  an  instance  of  that  particular  excellence  which  I 
had  in  view,  and  in  which  Shakspeare,  even  in  his 
earliest,  as  in  his  latest  works,  surpasses  all  other 
poets.  It  is  by  this,  that  he  still  gives  a  dignity  and 
a  passion  to  the  objects  which  he  presents.  Unaided 
by  any  previous  excitement,  they  burst  upon  us  at 
once  in  life  and  in  power. 

"Full  many  a  glorious  morning  have  I  seen 
Flatter  the  mountain  tops  with  sovereign  eye." 

Shakspeare' s  Sonnet  33. 

"  Nut  mine  own  fears,  nor  the  prophetic  soul 
Of  the  swde  world  dreaming  on  things  to  come — 


The  mortal  moon  hath  her  eclipse  endured, 
And  the  Bad  ausurs  mock  their  own  presage ; 
Incertainlies  now  crown  themselves  assured. 
And  pr.ice  proclaims  (dives  of  endless  age. 
Now  wiih  the  drops  of  this  most  balmy  time 
My  love  looks  fresh  :   and  Death  to  me  subscribes  ! 
Since  spite  of  him  I  'II  live  in  this  poor  rhyme, 
While  lie  insults  o'er  dull  and  speechless  tribes. 
And  thou  in  this  shall  find  thy  monument. 
When  tyrants'  crests,  and  tombs  of  brass  are  spent." 

Soiinet  107. 

As  of  higher  worth,  so  doubtless  still  more  charac- 
teristic of  poetic  genius  does  the  imagery  become, 
311 


302 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


when  it  moulds  and  colors  itself  to  the  circumstances, 
passion,  or  character,  present  and  foremost  in  the 
mind.  For  unrivalled  instances  in  this  excellence, 
the  reader's  own  memory  will  refer  him  to  the  Lear, 
Othello,  in  short,  to  which  not  of  the  "great,  ever- 
living,  dead  man's"  dramatic  works?  Inopem  me 
copia  fecit.  How  true  it  is  to  nature,  he  has  himself 
finely  expressed  in  the  instance  of  love,  in  Sonnet  98. 

"  From  you  have  1  been  absent  in  the  spring, 
When  proud  pied  April,  dresl  in  all  its  trim, 
Hath  put  a  spirit  of  youth  in  every  thing  ; 
That  heavy  Saturn  laugh'd  and  leap'd  with  him. 
Yet  nor  the  lays  of  birds,  nor  the  sweet  smell 
Of  different  flowers  in  odour  and  in  hue, 
Could  make  me  any  summer's  story  tell, 
Or  from  their  proud  lap  pluck  them,  where  they  grew  ; 
Nor  did  I  wonder  at  the  lilies  white, 
Nor  praise  the  deep  vermilion  in  the  rose  ; 
They  were,  tho'  sweet,  but  figures  of  delight, 
Drawn  after  you,  you  pattern  of  all  those. 
Yet  seem'd  it  winter  still,  and  you  away, 
.is  -with  your  shodow  I  with  these  did  play! 

Scarcely  less  sure,  or  if  a  less  valuable,  not  less 
indispensable  mark 

rovl/xs  jlh  Hoi'irs- 


-'051J  prifia  ycvvaiov  \aK01, 

will  the  image  supply,  when,  with  more  than  the 
power  of  the  painter,  the  poet  gives  us  the  liveliest 
image  of  succession  with  the  feeling  of  simultaneous- 
ness! 

With  this  he  breaketh  from  the  sweet  embrace 
Of  those  fair  arms,  that  held  him  to  her  heart. 
And  homeward  through  the  dark  lawns  runs  apace  : 
Look  how  a  bright  star  shooteth  from  the  sky ! 
So  glides  he  through  the  night  from  Menus'  eye. 

4.  The  last  character  I  shall  mention,  which  would 
prove  indeed  but  little,  except  as  taken  conjointly 
with  the  former ;  yet,  without  which  the  former  could 
scarce  exist  in  a  high  degree,  and  (even  if  this  were 
possible)  would  give  promises  only  of  transitory 
flashes  and  a  meteoric  power,  is  depth,  and  energy 
of  thought.  No  man  was  ever  yet  a  great  poet, 
without  being  at  the  same  time  a  profound  philoso- 
pher. For  poetry  is  the  blossom  and  the  fragrancy 
of  all  human  knowledge,  human  thoughts,  human 
passions,  emotions,  language.  In  Shakspeare's  poems, 
the  creative  power,  and  the  intellectual  energy, 
wrestle  as  in  a  war  embrace.  Each  in  its  excess  of 
strength  seems  to  threaten  the  extinction  of  the  other. 
At  length,  in  the  drama  they  were  reconciled,  and 
fought  each  with  its  shield  before  the  breast  of  the 
other.  Or,  like  two  rapid  streams,  that  at  their  first 
meeting  within  narrow  and  rocky  banks,  mutually 
strive  to  repel  each  other,  and  intermix  reluctantly 
and  in  tumult;  but  soon  finding  a  wider  channel  and 
more  yielding  shores,  blend,  and  dilate,  and  flow  on 
in  one  current  and  with  one  voice.  The  Venus  and 
Adonis  did  not,  perhaps,  allow  the  display  of  the 
deeper  passions.  But  the  story  of  Lucretia  seems  to 
favor,  and  even  demand  their  intensest  workings. 
And  yet  we  find  in  Shakspeare' s  management  of  the 
tale,  neither  pathos,  nor  any  other  dramatic  quality. 
There  is  the  same  minute  and  faithful  imagery  as  in 
the  former  poem,  in  the  same  vivid  colors,  inspirited 


by  the  same  impetuous  vigor  of  thought,  and  diverg- 
ing and  contracting  with  the  same  activity  of  the 
assimilative  and  of  the  modifying  faculties;  and  with 
a  yet  larger  display,  a  yet  wider  range  of  know- 
ledge and  reflection ;  and,  lastly,  with  the  same  per- 
fect dominion,  often  domination,  over  the  whole 
world  of  language.  What  then  shall  we  say  ?  even 
this :  that  Shakspeare,  no  mere  child  of  nature ;  no 
automaton  of  genius  ;  no  passive  vehicle  of  inspira- 
tion possessed  by  the  spirit,  not  possessing  it;  first 
studied  patiently,  meditated  deeply,  understood  mi- 
nutely, till  knowledge,  become  habitual  and  intuitive, 
wedded  itself  to  his  habitual  feelings,  and  at  length 
gave  birth  to  that  stupendous  power,  by  which  he 
stands  alone,  with  no  equal  or  second  in  his  own 
class  ;  to  that  power,  which  seated  him  on  one  of  the 
two  glory-smitten  summits  of  the  poetic  mountain, 
with  Milton  as  his  compeer,  not  rival.  While  the 
former  daris  himself  forth,  and  passes  into  all  the 
forms  of  human  character  and  passion,  the  one  Pro- 
teus of  the  fire  and  the  flood ;  the  other  attracts  all 
forms  and  things  to  himself,  in  the  unity  of  his  own 
ideal.  All  things  and  modes  of  action  shape  them- 
selves anew  in  the  being  of  Milton  ;  while  Shak- 
speare becomes  all  things,  yet  for  ever  remaining 
himself  O  what  great  men  hast  thou  not  produced, 
England  !  my  country !  truly  indeed — 

Must  we  be  free  or  die,  who  speak  the  tongue 
Which  Shakspeare  spake  ;  the  faith  and  morals  hold 
Which  Milton  held.    In  everything  we  are  sprung 
Of  earth's  first  blood,  have  titles  manifold  ! 

Wordsworth. 


CHAPTER  XVI. 

Striking  points  of  difference  between  the  Poets  of  the  present 
age,  and  those  of  the  15th  and  16th  centuries — Wish  ex- 
pressed for  the  union  of  the  characteristic  merits  of  both. 

Christendom,  from  its  first  settlement  on  feudal 
rights,  has  been  so  far  one  great  body,  however  im- 
perfectly organized,  that  a  similar  spirit  will  be  found 
in  each  period  to  have  been  acting  in  all  its  members. 
The  study  of  Shakspeare's  poems  (I  do  not  include 
his  dramatic  works,  eminently  as  they  too  deserve 
that  title)  led  me  to  a  more  careful  examination  of 
the  contemporary  poets  both  in  this  and  in  other  coun- 
tries. But  my  attention  was  especially  fixed  on  those 
of  Italy,  from  the  birth  to  the  death  of  Shakspeare  ; 
that  being  the  country  in  which  the  fine  arts  had 
been  most  sedulously,  and,  hitherto,  most  successfully 
cultivated.  Abstracted  from  the  degrees  and  pecu- 
liarities of  individual  genius,  the  properties  common 
to  the  good  writers  of  each  period  seem  to  establish 
one  striking  point  of  difference  between  the  poetry 
of  the  fifteenth  and  sixteenth  centuries,  and  that  of 
the  present  age.  The  remark  may,  perhaps,  be  ex- 
tended to  the  sister  art  of  painting.  At  least,  the 
latter  will  serve  to  illustrate  the  former.  In  the 
present  age,  the  poet  (I  would  wish  to  be  understood 
as  speaking  generallv,  and  without  allusion  to  indi- 
vidual names)  seems  to  propose  to  himself  as  his 
312 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


303 


main  object,  and  as  that  which  is  the  most  character- 
istic of  his  art.  new  and  striking  imm.es,  with  inci- 
dents that  interest  the  affections  or  excite  the  curi- 
osity. Both  his  characters  and  his  descriptions  he 
renders,  as  much  as  possible,  specific  and  individual. 
even  to  a  degree  of  portraiture.  In  his  diction  and 
metre,  on  the  other  hand,  lie  is  comparatively  care- 
less. The  measure  is  either  constructed  on  no  pre- 
vious system,  and  acknowledges  no  justifying  princi- 
ple but  that  of  the  writer's  convenience ;  or  else 
some  mechanical  movement  is  adopted,  of  which  one 
couplet  or  stanza  is  so  far  an  adequate  specimen,  as 
that  the  occasional  differences  appear  evidently  to 
arise  from  accident,  or  the  qualities  of  the  language 
itself,  not  from  meditation  and  an  intelligent  purpose. 
And  the  language,  from  "  Pope's  translation  of  Ho- 
mer," to  "  Darwin's  Temple  of  Nature,"  may.  not- 
withstanding some  illustrious  exceptions,  be  too 
faithfully  characterized,  as  claiming  to  be  poetical 
for  no  better  reason  than  that  it  would  be  intolerable 
in  conversation  or  in  prose.  Though  alas  .'  even  our 
prose  writings,  nay,  even  the  style  of  our  more  set 
discourses,  strive  to  be  in  the  fashion,  and  trick  them- 
selves out  in  the  soiled  and  over-worn  finery  of  the 
meretricious  muse.  It  is  true,  that  of  late  a  great 
improvement  in  this  respect  is  observable  in  our  most 
popular  writers.  But  it  is  equally  true,  that  this 
recurrence  to  plain  sense,  and  genuine  mother  En- 
glish, is  far  from  being  general ;  and  that  the  com- 
position of  our  novels,  magazines,  public  harangues, 
6cc.  is  commonly  as  trivial  in  thought,  and  enigmatic 
in  expression,  as  if  Echo  and  Sphinx  had  laid  their 
heads  together  to  construct  it  Nay,  even  of  those 
who  have  most  rescued  themselves  from  this  conta- 
gion. I  should  plead  inwardly  guiltv  to  the  charge  of 
duplicity  or  cowardice,  if  I  withheld  my  conviction, 
that  few  have  guarded  the  purity  of  their  native 
tongue  with  that  jealous  care  which  the  sublime 
Dante,  in  his  tract  •'  De  la  nobile  volgare  eloquenza," 
declares  to  be  the  first  duty  of  a  poet.  For  language 
is  the  armory  of  the  human  mind  ;  and  at  once  con- 
tains the  trophies  of  its  past,  and  the  weapons  of  its 
future  conquests.  "  Animadverte,  quam  sit  ab  im- 
proprietate  verborum  pronum  hominibus  prolabi  in 
errores  circa  res  !"  Hobdes  :  Exam,  et  Exmend.  hod. 
Math. — -Sat  vero,  in  hac  vita?  brevitate  et  natura? 
obscuritate,  rerum  est,  quibus  cognoscendis  tempus  , 
impendatur,  ut  confusis  et  multivocis  sermonibus 
intelligendis  illud  consumere  non  opus  est.  Eheu  ! 
quantas  strages  paravere  verba  nubila,  qua?  tot  dicunt, 
ut  nihil  dicunt — nubes  poiius,  e  quibes  et  in  rebus 
politicis  et  in  ecclesia  turbines  et  tomtrua  erumpunt! 
Et  proinde  recte  dictum  putamus  a  Platone  in  Gorgia : 

'oj  av  to.  ovojxara  ficti,  istrai  Kat  ra  Tpayfiara  :  et 
ab  EpictetO,  ap^n  :ra«5tt'j£<jf  'n  ruv  oiOfiaruv  cstfKf 
Vis  =  et  prudentissime  Galenus  scribit,  'n  tuv  ovopa- 
Ttav  XPVS'S  -apa^cnga  km  tj}v  toiv  -payparuv  t-ira- 
parru  j/iuku.  Egregne  vero  J.  C.  Scaliger,  in  Lib. 
1.  de  Planus:  Est  primum,  inquit,  sapientis  oificittm,' 
bene  senlire.  ut  sibi  rival :  prorimum,  bene  hqui,  ut 
patricE  vivat."     SEXNERTUS  de  Puis :   Diferenlia. 

Something  analogous  to  the  materials  and  structure  ; 
of  modern  poetry  I  seem  to  have  noticed  (but  here  I 
21 


tie  understood  as  speaking  with  the  utmost 
diffidence)  in  our  common  landscape  painters.  Their 
foregrounds  and  intermediate  distances  are  compara- 
tively unattractive:  while  the  main  interest  of  the 
I  landscape  is  thrown  into  the  back  ground,  where 
mountains  and  torrents  and  castles  forbid  the  eye  to 
proceed,  and  nothing  tempts  it  to  trace  its  way  back 
again.  But  in  the  works  of  the  great  Italian  and 
Flemish  masters,  the  front  and  middle  objects  of  the 
landscape  are  the  most  obvious  and  determinate,  the 
interest  gradually  dies  away  in  the  back-ground,  and 
the  charm  and  peculiar  worth  of  the  picture  consists, 
not  so  much  in  the  specific  objects  which  it  conveys 
to  the  understanding  in  a  visual  language  formed  by 
the  substitution  of  figures  for  words,  as  in  the  beauty 
and  harmony  of  the  colors,  lines,  and  expression, 
with  which  the  objects  are  represented.  Hence, 
novelty  of  subject  was  rather  avoided  than  sought 
for.  Superior  excellence,  in  the  manner  of  treating 
the  same  subjects,  was  the  trial  and  test  of  the  artist's 
merit. 

Mot  otherwise  is  it  with  the  more  polished  poets  of 
the  15th  and  16th  centuries,  especially  with  those  of 
Italy.  The  imagery  is  almost  always  general :  sun, 
moon,  flowers,  breezes,  murmuring  streams,  warbling 
songsters,  delicious  shades,  lovely  damsels,  cruel  as 
fair,  nymphs,  naiads  and  goddesses,  are  the  materials 
which  are  common  to  all,  and  which  each  shaped 
and  arranged  according  to  his  judgment  or  fancy, 
little  solicitous  to  add  or  to  particularize.  If  we  make 
an  honorable  exception  in  favor  of  some  English 
poets,  the  thoughts  too  are  as  little  novel  as  the 
images ;  and  the  fable  of  their  narrative  poems,  for 
the  most  part  drawn  from  mythology,  or  sources  of 
equal  notoriety,  derive  their  chief  attractions  from 
their  manner  of  treating  them  j  from  impassioned 
flow,  or  picturesque  arrangement.  In  opposition  to 
the  present  age.  and  perhaps  in  as  faulty  an  extreme, 
they  placed  the  essence  of  poetry  in  the  art.  The 
excellence  at  which  they  aimed  consisted  in  the  ex- 
quisite polish  of  the  diction,  combined  with  perfect 
simplicity.  This,  their  prime  object,  they  attained  by 
the  avoidance  of  every  word  which  a  gentleman 
would  not  use  in  dignified  conversation,  and  of  every 
word  and  phrase,  which  none  but  a  learned  man 
would  use ;  by  the  studied  position  of  words  and 
phrases,  so  that  not  only  each  part  should  be  melodi- 
ous in  itself,  but  contribute  tu  the  harmony  of  the 
whole,  each  note  referring  and  conducing  to  the  me- 
lody of  all  the  foregoing  and  following  words  of  the 
same  period  or  stanza ;  and,  lastly,  with  equal  labor, 
the  greater  because  unbetrayed.  by  the  variation  and 
various  harmonies  of  their  metrical  movement.  Their 
measures,  however,  were  not  indebted  for  their  vari- 
ety to  the  introduction  of  new  metres,  such  as  have 
been  attempted  of  late  in  the  "  Alonzoand  Imogen," 
and  others  borrowed  from  the  German,  having  in 
their  very  mechanism  a  specific  overpowering  tune. 
to  which  the  generous  reader  humors  his  voice  and 
emphasis,  with  more  indulgence  to  the  author  than 
attention  to  the  meaning  or  quantity  of  the  words; 
but  which  to  an  ear  familiar  with  the  numerous 
sounds  of  the  Greek  and  Roman  poets,  has  an  effect 
313 


304 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


not  unlike  that  of  galloping  over  a  paved  road  in  a 
German  stage-wagon  without  springs.  On  the  con- 
trary, our  elder  bards,  both  of  Italy  and  England, 
produced  a  far  greater,  as  well  as  more  charming  va- 
riety, by  countless  modifications,  and  subtle  balances 
of  sound,  in  the  common  metres  of  their  country.  A 
lasting  and  enviable  reputation  awaits  the  men  of  ge- 
nius, who  should  attempt  and  realize  a  union ;  who 
should  recall  the  high  finish;  the  appropriativeness; 
the  facility;  the  delicate  proportion;  and,  above  all, 
the  perfusive  and  omnipresent  grace,  which  have  pre- 
served, as  in  a  shrine  of  precious  amber,  the  "  Spar- 
row" of  Catullus,  the  "Swallow,"  the  "  Grasshopper," 
and  all  the  other  little  loves  of  Anacreon :  and  which 
with  bright,  though  diminished  glories,  revisited  the 
youth  and  early  manhood  of  Christian  Europe,  in  the 
vales  of  Arno,*  and  the  groves  of  Isis  and  of  Cam ;  and 

*  These  thoughts  were  suggested  to  me  during  the  perusal 
of  the  Madrigals  of  Giovambatisla  Strozzi,  published  in 
Florence  (nella  Stamperia  del  Sermartelli)  Jst  May,  1593,  by 
his  sons  Lorenzo  and  Filippo  Strozzi,  with  a  dedication  to 
their  deceased  paternal  uncle,  "  Signor  Leone  Strozzi,  Gen- 
erale  delle  battaligie  di  Santa  Chiesa."  As  I  do  not  remem- 
ber to  have  seen  either  the  poems  or  their  author  mentioned 
in  any  English  work,  or  have  found  them  in  any  of  the  com- 
mon collections  of  Italian  poetry,  and  as  the  little  work  is  of 
rare'  occurrence,  I  will  transcribe  a  few  specimens.  I  have 
seldom  met  with  compositions  that  possessed,  to  my  feelings, 
more  of  that  satisfying  entircness,  that  complete  adequate- 
ness  of  the  manner  to  the  matter  which  so  charms  us  in 
Anacreon,  joined  with  the  tenderness,  and  more  than  the 
delicacy  of  Catullus.  Trifles  as  they  are.  they  were  probably 
elaborated  with  great  care  ;  yet  in  the  perusal  we  refer  them 
to  a  spontaneous  energy  rather  than  to  voluntary  effort.  To 
a  cultivated  taste,  there  is  a  delight  in  perfection  for  its  own 
sake,  independent  of  the  materia!  in  which  it  is  manifested, 
that  none  but  a  cultivated  taste  can  understand  or  appre- 
ciate. 

After  what  1  have  advanced,  it  would  appear  presumption 
to  offer  a  translation  ;  even  if  the  attempt  was  not  dis- 
couraged by  the  different  genius  of  the  English  mind  and  lan- 
guage, which  demands  a  denser  body  of  thought  a9  the  con- 
dition of  a  high  polish,  than  the  Italian.  I  cannot  but  deem 
it  likewise  an  advantage  in  the  Italian  tongue,  in  many  other 
respects  inferior  to  our  own,  that  the  language  of  poetry  is 
more  distinct  from  that  of  prose  than  with  us.  From  the 
earlier  appearance  and  established  primacy  of  the  Tuscan 
poets,  concurring  with  the  number  of  independent  states,  and 
the  diversity  of  written  dialects,  the  Italians  have  gained  a 
poetic  idiom,  as  the  Greeks  before  them  had  obtained  from 
the  same  causes,  with  greater  and  more  various  discrimi- 
nations— ex.  gr.  the  ionic  for  their  heroic  verses  ;  the  attic  for 
their  iambic ;  and  ihe  two  modes  of  the  doric,  the  lyric  or 
sacerdotal,  and  the  pastoral,  the  distinctions  of  which  were 
doubtless  more  obvious  to  the  Greeks  themselves  than  they 
are  to  us. 

I  will  venture  to  add  one  other  observation  before  I  pro- 
ceed to  the  transcription.  I  am  aware,  that  the  sentiments 
which  I  have  avowed  concerning  the  points  of  difference  be- 
tween the  poetry  of  the  present  age,  and  that  of  the  period 
between  1500  and  1650,  are  the  reverse  of  the  opinion  com- 
monly entertained.  I  was  conversing  on  this  subject  with  a 
friend,  when  the  servant,  a  worthy  and  sensible  woman, 
coming  in,  I  placed  before  her  two  engravings,  the  one  a 
pinky-colored  plate  of  the  day,  the  other  a  masterly  etching 
by  Salvator  Rosa,  from  one  of  his  own  pictures.  On  pres- 
sing her  to  tell  us  which  she  preferred,  after  a  little  blushing 
and  flutter  of  feeling,  she  replied — why,  that,  Sir!  to  be  sure! 
(pointing  to  the  ware  from  the  Fleet  etreet  print  shops,)  it  's 
60  neat  and  elegant.  T'  other  is  such  a  scratchy  slovenly 
thing."  An  artist,  whose  writings  are  scarcely  less  valuable 
than  his  works,  and  to  whose  authority  more  deference  will 
be  willingly  paid,  than  I  could  even  wish  should  be  shown  to 
mine,  has  told  us,  and  from  his  own  experience  too,  that 


who  with  these  should  combine  the  keener  interest, 
deeper  pathos,  manlier  reflection,  and  the  fresher  and 
more  various  imagery,  which  give  a  value  and  a 
name  that  will  not  pass  away,  to  the  poets  who  have 
done  honor  to  our  own  times,  and  to  those  of  our 
immediate  predecessors. 

good  taste  must  be  acquired,  and  like  all  other  good  things, 
is  the  result  of  thought,  and  the  submissive  study  of  the  best 
models.  If  it  be  asked — "  But  what  shall  1  deem  Buch  V 
the  answer  is  :  presume  these  to  be  the  best,  the  reputation 
of  which  has  been  matured  into  fame  by  the  consent  of  ages. 
For  wisdom  always  has  a  final  majority,  if  not  by  conviction, 
yet  by  acquiescence.  In  addition  to  Sir  J.  Reynolds,  I  may 
mention  Harris  of  Salisbury,  who,  in  one  of  his  philosophical 
disquisitions,  has  written  on  the  means  of  acquiring  a  just 
taste  with  the  precision  of  Aristotle,  and  the  elegance  of 
Uuintillian. 

MADRIGALE. 

Gelido  suo  ruscel  chiaro,  e  tranquillo 
M'insegno  Amor,  di  state  a  mezzo'l  giomo  : 
Ardean  le  selve,  ardean  le  piagge,  e  i  colli. 
Ond  'io,  ch'  al  piu  gran  gielo  ardo  e  sfavillo, 
Subito  corsi ;  ma  si  puro  adorno 
Girsene  il  vidi,  che  turbar  no'l  volli : 
Sol  mi  specchiava,  e'n  dolce  ombrosa  sponda 
Mi  stava  intento  al  mormorar  dell'  onda. 

MADRIGALE. 

Aure  dell'  angoscioso  viver  mio 

Refrigerio  soave, 

E  dolce  si,  che  piu  non  mi  par  grave 

Ne'l  arder,  ne'l  morir,  anz'  il  desio  ; 

Deh  voi'l  ghiaccio,  e  le  nubi,  e'l  tempo  rio 

Discacciatene  omai,  che  l'onde  chiara, 

E  I'  ombra  non  men  cara 

A  scherzare,  e  cantar  per  suoi  hoschetti 

E  prali  Festa  ed  Allegrezza  alletti. 

MADRIGALE. 

Pacifiche,  ma  spesso  in  amorosa 

Guerra  co'fiori,  e  l'erba 

Alia  stagione  acerba 

Verde  Insegne  del  giglio  e  della  rosa 

Movetc,  Aure,  pian  pian :  che  tregna  o  posa, 

Se  non  pace,  io  ritrovo  : 

E  so  ben  dove— Oh  vago,  mansueto. 

MADRIGALE. 

Sguardo,  labbra  d'ambrosia,  oh  rider  lieto  ! 

Hor  come  un  Scoglio  stassi, 

Hor  come  un  Rio  se'n  fugge 

Ed  hor  crud'  Orsa  rugge, 

Hor  canta  Angelo  pio  :  ma  che  non  fassi 

E  che  non  fammi,  O  Sassi, 

O  Rivi,  o  belve,  o  Dii,  questa  mia  vaga 

Non  so,  se  Ninfa,  o  Maga, 

Non  so,  se  Donna,  o  Dea, 

Non  so,  se  dolce  o  rea? 

MADRIGALE. 

Piangendo  mi  baciaste, 
E  ridendo  il  negaste  : 
Indoglia  hebbivi  pia. 
In  festa  hebbivi  ria : 
Nacque  Gioia  di  pianti. 
Dolor  di  riso :  O  amanti 
Miseri,  habbiate  insieme 
Ognor  Paura  e  Speme. 

MADRIGALE. 

Bel  Fior.  tu  mi  rimembri 
La  rugiadosa  guancia  del  bel  viso; 
E  si  vera  1'assembri, 
Che'n  te  eovente,  come  in  lei  m'affiso  : 
314 


BIOGRAPHIA  L1TERARIA. 


305 


CHAPTER  XVn. 

Examination  of  the  tenets  peculiar  to  Mr.  Wordsworth  — 
Rustic  life  'above  all.  loit  and  rustic  life,'/  especially  unfa- 
vorable to  the  formation  of  a  human  diction — The  best  parts 
of  language  the  product  of  philosophers,  not  clown?  or 
shepherds — Poetry  essentially  ideal  and  generic — The  lan- 
guage of  Milton  as  much  the  language  of  real  life,  yea,  in- 
comparably more  so  than  that  of  the  cottager. 

As  far,  then,  as  Mr.  Wordsworth  in  his  preface 
contended,  and  most  ably  contended,  for  a  reforma- 
tion in  our  poetic  diction,  as  far  as  he  has  evinced  the 
truth  of  passion,  and  the  dramatic  propriety  of  those 
figures  and  metaphors  in  the  original  poets,  which, 
stript  of  their  justifying  reasons,  and  converted  into 
mere  artifices  of  connection  or  ornament,  constitute 
the  characteristic  falsity  in  the  poetic  style  of  the  mo- 
derns :  and,  as  far  as  he  has,  with  equal  acuteness 
and  clearness,  pointed  out  the  process  in  which  this 
change  was  effected,  and  the  resemblances  between 
that  state  into  which  the  reader*s  mind  is  throwTi  by 
the  pleasurable  confusion  of  thought,  from  an  unac- 
customed train  of  words  and  images;  and  that  state 
which  is  induced  by  the  natural  language  of  impas- 
sioned feeling :  he  undertook  a  useful  task,  and  de- 
serves all  praise,  both  for  the  attempt,  and  for  the 
execution.  The  provocations  to  this  remonstrance,  in 
behalf  of  truth  and  nature,  were  still  of  perpetual 
recurrence,  before  and  after  the  publication  of  this 
preface.  I  cannot,  likewise,  but  add,  that  the  com- 
parison of  such  poems  of  merit,  as  have  been  given 
to  the  public  within  the  last  ten  or  twelve  years,  with 


Ed  bor  dell  vago  riso, 

Hor  dell  sereno  sguardo 

Io  pur  cieco  risguardo.    Ma  qua]  fugge, 

O  Rosa,  U  mattin  here  ? 

£  chi  te,  come  neve. 

El  mio  cor  teco,  e  la  mia  vita  surugge. 

MADRIGALE. 

Anna  mia,  Anna  dolce,  oh  sempre  nuovo 

E  piu  chiaro  concento, 

Quanta  dolcezza  sento 

In  sol  Anna  d:cendo  ?    Io  mi  par  pruovo, 

Ne  qui  tra  noi  ritruovo, 

Ne  tra  cieli  armonia, 

Cbe  del  bel  nome  suo  piu  dolce  sia : 

Altro  il  Cielo,  altro  Amore, 

Altto  non  suona  l'Eco  del  mio  core. 

MADRIGALE. 

Hor  che'l  prato,  e  la  selva  si  ecolora, 

Al  too  Sereno  ombroso 

Muovine,  alto  Riposo '. 

Den  ch  'io  riposi  una  sol  notte,  un  hora  ! 

Han  le  fere,  e  gli  augelli.  ognun  talora 

Ha  qualche  pace ;   io  quaxido, 

Lasso !  non  vonne  errando, 

E  non  piango,  e  non  erido  ?  e  qual  pur  forte  t 

Ma  poicbe  non  seme  egli,  odine,  Morte  ! 

MADRIGALE. 

Risi  e  piansi  d'Amor;  ne  pero  mai 

Se  non  in  Gamma,  o  'n  onda  o  'n  vento  scrissi : 

Speeso  merce  trovai 

Crudel :  seinpre  in  me  morto.  in  altri  vissi ! 

Hor  da'  piu  scuri  abyssi  al  Ciel  m'alzai, 

Hor  ne  pur  caddi  giuso ; 

Stanco  al  fin  qui  son  chiuso ! 


the  majority  of  those  produced  previously  to  the  ap- 
pearance of  that  preface,  leave  no  doubt  on  my  mind, 
that  Mr.  Wordsworth  is  fully  justified  in  believing 
his  efforts  to  have  been  by  no  means  ineffectual.  Not 
only  in  the  verses  of  those  who  professed  their  admi- 
ration of  his  genius,  but  even  of  those  who  have  dis- 
tinguished themselves  by  hostility  to  his  theory,  and 
depreciation  of  his  writings,  are  the  impressions  of  his 
principles  plainly  visible.  It  is  possible,  that  with 
these  principles  others  may  have  been  blended, 
which  are  not  equally  evident :  and  some  which  are 
unsteady  and  subvertible  from  the  narrowneeB  or 
imperfection  of  their  basis.  But  it  is  more  than  pos- 
sible, that  these  errors  of  defect  or  exaggeration,  by 
kindling  and  feeding  the  controversy,  may  have  con- 
duced, not  onlv  to  the  wider  propagation  of  the  ac- 
companying truths,  but  that,  by  their  frequent  pre- 
sentation to  the  mind  in  an  excited  state,  thev  mav 
have  won  for  them  a  more  permanent  and  practical 
result.  A  man  will  borrow  a  part  from  his  opponent, 
the  more  easily,  if  he  feels  himself  justified  in  con- 
tinuing to  reject  a  part.  While  there  remain  import- 
ant points,  in  which  he  can  still  feel  himself  in  the 
right,  in  which  he  still  finds  firm  footing  for  continued 
resistance,  he  will  gradually  adopt  those  opinions 
which  were  the  least  remote  from  his  own  convic- 
tions, as  not  less  congruous  with  his  own  theory  than 
with  that  which  he  reprobates.  In  like  manner, 
with  a  kind  of  instinctive  prudence,  he  will  abandon 
bv  little  and  little  his  weakest  posts,  till  at  length  he 
seems  to  forget  that  they  had  ever  belonged  to  him, 
or  affects  to  consider  them,  at  most,  as  accidental  and 
"  petty  annexments,"  the  removal  of  which  leaves 
the  citadel  unhurt  and  unendangered. 

My  own  differences,  from  certain  supposed  parts  of 
Mr.  Wordsworth's  theory,  ground  themselves  on  the 
assumption,  that  his  words  had  been  rightly  interpret- 
ed, as  purporting  that  the  proper  diction  for  poetry  in 
general  consists  altogether  in  a  language  taken,  with 
due  exceptions,  from  the  mouths  of  men  in  real  life, 
a  language  which  actually  constitutes  the  natural 
conversation  of  men  under  the  influence  of  natural 
feelings.  My  objection  is.  first,  that  in  any  sense,  this 
rule  is  applicable  only  to  certain  classes  of  poetry ; 
secondly,  that  even  to  these  classes  it  is  not  applica- 
ble, except  in  such  a  sense  as  hath  never,  by  any  one, 
(as  far  as  I  know  or  have  read,  been  denied  or  doubt- 
ed .;  and,  lastly,  that  as  far  as,  and  in  that  degree  in 
which  it  is  practicable :  yet  as  a  rule  it  is  useless,  if 
not  injurious,  and  therefore,  either  need  not,  or  ought 
not  to  be  practised.  The  poet  informs  his  reader,  that 
he  had  generallv  chosen  low  and  rustic  life:  but  not 
as  low  and  rustic,  or  in  order  to  repeat  that  pleasure 
of  doubtful  moral  effect,  which  persons  of  elevated 
rank  and  of  superior  refinement  oftentimes  derive 
from  a  happy  imitation  of  the  rude,  unpolished  man- 
ners, and  discourse  of  their  inferiors.  For  the  plea- 
sure so  derived  may  be  traced  to  three  exciting  causes. 
The  first  is  the  naturalness,  in  fact,  of  the  things  re- 
presented. The  second  is  the  apparent  naturalness 
of  the  representation,  as  raised  and  qualified  by  an 
imperceptible  infusion  of  the  author's  own  knowledge 
and  talent,  which  infusion  does,  indeed,  constitute  it 
315 


306 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


an  imitation  as  distinguished  from  a  mere  copy.  The 
third  cause  may  be  found  in  the  reader's  conscious 
feeling  of  his  superiority,  awakened  by  the  contrast 
presented  to  him;  even  as,  for  the  same  purpose,  the 
kings  and  great  barons  of  yore  retained,  sometimes, 
actual  clowns  and  fools,  but  more  frequently  shrewd 
and  witty  fellows  in  that  character.  These,  however, 
were  not  Mr.  Wordsworth's  objects.  He  chose  low 
and  rustic  life,  "because  in  that  condition  the  essen- 
tial passions  of  the  heart  find  a  better  soil,  in  which 
,  they  can  attain  their  maturity,  are  less  under  restraint, 
and  speak  a  plainer  and  more  emphatic  language; 
because  in  that  condition  of  life  our  elementary  feel- 
ings co-exist  in  a  state  of  greater  simplicity,  and,  con- 
sequently, may  be  accurately  contemplated,  and  more 
forcibly  communicated  ;  because  the  manners  of  ru- 
ral life  germinate  from  those  elementary  feelings, 
and,  from  the  necessary  character  of  rural  occupa- 
tions, are  more  easily  comprehended,  and  are  more 
durable ;  and,  lastly,  because  in  that  condition  the 
passions  of  men  are  incorporated  with  the  beautiful 
and  permanent  forms  of  nature." 

Now  it  is  clear  to  me,  that  in  the  most  interesting 
of  the  poems,  in  which  the  author  is  more  or  less  dra- 
matic, as  the  "  Brothers,"  "  Michael,"  "  Ruth,"  the 
"  Mad  Mother,"  &c,  the  persons  introduced  are  by  no 
means  taken  from  low  or  rustic  life,  in  the  common 
acceptation  of  those  words ;  and  it  is  not  less  clear, 
that  the  sentiments  and  language,  as  far  as  they  can 
be  conceived  to  have  been  really  transferred  from 
the  minds  and  conversation  of  such  persons,  are  at- 
tributable to  causes  and  circumstances  not  necessarily 
connected  with  "  their  occupations  and  abode."  The 
thoughts,  feelings,  language,  and  manners  of  the  shep- 
herd-farmers in  the  vales  of  Cumberland  and  West- 
moreland, as  far  as  they  are  actually  adopted  in  those 
poems,  may  be  accounted  for  from  causes  which  will, 
and  do  produce  the  same  results  in  every  state  of  life, 
whether  in  town  or  country.  As  the  two  principal, 
I  rank  that  independence,  which  raises  a  man  above 
servitude,  or  daily  toil,  for  the  profit  of  others,  yet  not 
above  the  necessity  of  industry,  and  a  frugal  simpli- 
city of  domestic  life;  and  the  accompanying  unambi- 
tious, but  solid  and  religious  education,  which  has 
rendered  few  books  familiar  but  the  Bible,  and  the 
liturgy  or  hymn-book.  To  this  latter  cause,  indeed, 
which  is  so  far  accidental,  that  it  is  the  blessing  of 
particular  countries,  and  a  particular  age,  not  the 
product  of  particular  places  or  employments,  the  poet 
owes  the  show  of  probability,  that  his  personages 
might  really  feel,  think,  and  talk,  with  any  tolerable 
resemblance  to  his  representation.  It  is  an  excellent 
remark  of  Dr.  Henry  More's,  (Enthusiasmus  triumph- 
atus,  sec.  xxxv.)  that  "  a  man  of  confined  education, 
but  of  good  parts,  by  constant  reading  of  the  Bible, 
will  naturally  form  a  more  winning  and  commanding 
rhetoric  than  those  that  are  learned  ;  the  intermixture 
of  tongues  and  of  artificial  phrases  debasing  their 
style." 

It  is,  moreover,  to  be  considered,  that  to  the  forma- 
tion of  healthy  feelings,  and  a  reflecting  mind,  nega- 
tions involve  impediments,  not  less  formidable  than 
sophistication  and  vicious  intermixture.    I  am  con- 


vinced, that  for  the  human  soul  to  prosper  in  rustic 
life,  a  certain  vantage-ground  is  pre-requisite.  It  is 
not  every  man  that  is  likely  to  be  improved  by  a 
country  life,  or  by  country  labors.  Education,  or 
original  sensibility,  or  both,  must  pre-exist,  if  the 
changes,  forms,  and  incidents  of  nature  are  to  prove 
a  sufficient  stimulant.  And  where  these  are  not 
Sufficient,  the  mind  contracts  and  hardens  by  want 
of  stimulants  ;  and  the  man  becomes  selfish,  sensual, 
gross,  and  hard-hearted.  Let  the  management  of  the 
Poor  Laws  in  Liverpool,  Manchester,  or  Bristol,  be 
compared  with  the  ordinary  dispensation  of  the  poor 
rates  in  agricultural  villages,  where  the  farmers  are 
the  overseers  and  guardians  of  the  poor.  If  my  own 
experience  have  not  been  particularly  unfortunate, 
as  well  as  that  of  the  many  respectable  country  cler- 
gymen with  whom  I  have  conversed  on  the  subject, 
the  result  would  engender  more  than  scepticism, 
concerning  the  desirable  influences  of  low  and  rustic 
life  in  and  for  itself.  Whatever  may  be  concluded 
on  the  other  side,  from  the  stronger  local  attachments 
and  enterprising  spirit  of  Swiss,  and  other  moun- 
taineers, applies  to  a  particular  mode  of  pastoral  life, 
under  forms  of  property,  that  permit  and  beget  man- 
ners truly  republican,  not  to  rustic  life  in  general,  or 
to  the  absence  of  artificial  cultivation.  On  the  con- 
trary, the  mountaineers,  whose  manners  have  been 
so  often  eulogized,  are,  in  general,  better  educated, 
and  greater  readers  than  men  of  equal  rank  else- 
where. But  where  this  is  not  the  case,  as  among  the 
peasantry  of  North  Wales,  the  ancient  mountains, 
with  all  their  terrors  and  all  their  glories,  are  pictures 
to  the  blind,  and  music  to  the  deaf. 

I  should  not  have  entered  so  much  into  detail  upon 
this  passage,  but,  here  seems  to  be  the  point  to  which 
all  the  lines  of  difference  converge  as  to  their  source 
and  centre.  (I  mean,  as  far  as,  and  in  whatever  re- 
spect, my  poetic  creed  does  differ  from  the  doctrines 
promulged  in  this  preface.)  I  adopt,  with  full  faith, 
the  principle  of  Aristotle,  that  poetry,  as  poetry,  is 
essentially  ideal;*  that  it  avoids  and  excludes  all  ac- 
cident ;  that  its  apparent  individualities  of  rank,  cha- 
racter, or  occupation,  must  be  representative  of  a 
class  ;  and  that  the  persons  of  poetry  must  be  clothed 

*  Say  not  that  lam  recommending  abstractions;  for  these 
class-characteristics,  which  constitute  the  instructiveness  of  a 
character,  are  so  modified  and  particularized  in  each  person 
of  the  Shaksperian  Drama,  that  life  itself  does  not  exci'e 
more  distinctly  that  sense  of  individuality  which  belongs  to 
real  existence.  Paradoxical  as  it  may  sound,  one  of  the  es- 
sential properties  of  geometry  is  not  less  essential  to  dramatic 
excellence;  and  Aristotle  has,  accordingly,  required  of  the 
poet  an  involution  of  the  universal  in  the  individual.  The 
chief  differences  are,  that  in  geometry,  it  is  the  universal 
truth  which  is  uppermost  in  the  consciousness;  in  poetry,  the 
individual  form,  in  which  the  truth  is  clothed.  With  the  an- 
cients, and  not  less  with  the  elder  dramatists  of  England  and 
France,  both  comedy  and  tragedy  weie  considered  as  kim!s 
of  poetry.  They  neither  sought,  in  comedy,  to  make  us 
laugh  merrily:  much  less  to  make  us  laugh  by  wry  faces,  ac- 
cident! of  .jargon,  start?  phrases  for  the  day,  or  the  clothing 
of  commonplace  morals  in  metaphors  drawn  from  the  shops, 
or  mechanic  occupations  of  their  characters.  IVor  did  they 
condescend,  in  tragedy,  to  wheedle  away  the  applause  of  Iho 
spectators,  by  representing  before  them  facsimiles  of  their 
own  mean  selves  in  all  their  existing  meanness,  or  to  work  OD 
their  sluggish  sympathies  by  a  pathos  not  a  whit  more  re- 
31G 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


307 


with  generic  attributes,  with  the  common  attributes 
of  the  class ;  not  with  such  as  one  gifted  individual 
might  }>ossiUy  possess,  but  such  as  from  his  situation, 
it  is  most  probable  beforehand,  that  he  would 
If -nay  premises  are  right,  and  my  deductions  legiti- 
mate, it  follows  that  there  can  be  no  poetic  medium 
between  the  swains  of  Theocritus  and  those  of  an 
imaginary  golden  age. 

The  characters  of  the  vicar  and  the  shepherd-ma- 
riner, in  the  poem  of  the  "  Brothers,"  those  of  the 
shepherd  of  Green-head  Gill  in  the  ".Michael," 
have  all  the  verisimilitude  and  representative  qual- 
ity that  the  purposes  of  poetry  can  require.  They 
are  persons  of  a  known  and  abiding  class,  and  their 
manners  and  sentiments  the  natural  product  of  cir- 
cumstances common  to  the  class.  Take  "  Michael," 
for  instance : 

An  old  man  stout  of  heart,  and  strong  of  limb : 

His  bodily  frame  bad  been  from  youth  to  age 

Of  an  unusual  strength  :  his  mind  was  keerj. 

Intense  and  frugal,  apt  for  all  affairs. 

And  in  his  shepherd's  calling  he  was  prompt 

And  watchful  more  than  ordinary  men. 

Hence,  he  had  learnt  the  meaning  of  all  winds, 

Of  blasts  of  every  tone,  and  oftentimes 

When  olhera  heeded  not,  he  heard  the  south 

Make  subterraneous  music,  like  the  noise 

Of  bagpipers  on  distant  highland  hills. 

The  shepherd,  at  such  warning,  of  his  flock 

Bethought  him,  and  he  to  himself  would  say, 

The  winds  are  now  devising  work  for  me  ! 

And  truly  at  all  times  the  storm,  that  drives 

The  traveller  to  a  shelter,  summon'd  him 

LTp  to  the  mountains.    He  had  been  alone 

Amid  (he  heart  of  many  thousand  mists, 

That  came  to  him  and  left  him  on  the  heights. 

So  lived  he,  till  his  eightieth  year  was  pass'd. 

And  grossly  that  man  errs,  who  should  suppose 

That  the  green  valleys,  and  the  streams  and  rocks, 

Were  things  indifferent  to  the  shepherd's  thoughts. 

Fields,  where  with  cheerful  spirits  he  had  brealhed 

The  common  air :  the  hills  which  he  so  oft 

Had  climb'd  with  vigorous  steps  ;  which  had  impress'd 

So  many  incidents  upon  his  mind 

Of  hardship,  skill,  or  courage,  joy  or  fear ; 

Which,  like  a  book,  preserved  the  memory 

Of  the  dumb  animate  whom  he  had  saved, 

Had  fed,  or  shelter'd,  linking  to  such  acts. 

So  grateful  in  themselves,  the  certainty 

Of  honorable  gains ;  these  fields,  these  hills. 

Which  were  his  living  being,  even  more 

Than  his  own  blood — what  could  they  less  ?— had  laid 

Strong  hold  on  his  affections — were  to  him 

A  pleasurable  feeling  of  blind  love. 

The  pleasure  which  there  is  in  life  itself. 

On  the  other  hand,  in  the  poems  which  are  pitched 
at  a  lower  note,  as  the  "  Harry  Gill,"  "  Idiot  Boy," 
&.c,  the  fedings  are  those  of  human  nature  in  gene- 
ral, though  the  poet  has  judiciously  laid  the  seme  in 
the  country,  in  order  to  place  himself  in  the  vicinity 
of  interesting  images,  without  the  necessity  of  ascrib- 

spectable  than  the  maudlin  tears  of  drunkenness.  Thi  ir  tra- 
gic scenes  were  meant  to  affect  us  indeed ;  but  yet  within  the 
bounds  of  pleasure,  and  in  union  with  the  activity  both  of  our 
understanding  and  imagination.  They  wished  to  transport 
the  mind  to  a  sense  of  its  possible  greatness,  and  to  implant 
the  germs  of  that  greatness,  during  the  temporary  oblivion  of 
the  worthless  "  thing  we  are,"  and  of  the  peculiar  state  in 
which  each  man  havpens  to  be,  suspending  our  individual 
recollections,  and  lulling  them  to  sleep  amid  the  music  of  no- 
bler thoughts. Friend,  Pages  ial  and  253, 

Cc 


ing  a  sentimental  perception  of  their  beauty  to  the 
persons  of  his  drama.  In  the  "Idiot  Boy,"  indeed, 
the  mother's  character  is  not  so  much  a  real  and  na- 
tive product  of  a  "  situation  where  the  essential  pas- 
sions of  the  heart  find  a  better  soil,  in  which  they  can 
attain  their  maturity,  and  speak  a  plainer  and  more 
emphatic  language,"  as  it  is  an  impersonation  of  an 
instinct  abandonment  by  judgment.  Hence,  the  two 
following  charges  seem  to  me  not  wholly  groundless ; 
at  least,  they  are  the  only  plausible  objections  which 
I  have  heard  to  that  fine  poem.  The  one  is,  that  the 
author  has  not,  in  the  poem  itself,  taken  sufficient 
care  to  preclude  from  the  reader's  fancy  the  disgust- 
ing images  of  ordinary,  morbid  idiocy,  which  yet  it 
was  by  no  means  his  intention  to  represent.  lie  has 
even  by  the  "  burr,  burr,  burr,"  uneounteraeiol  bv 
any  preceding  description  of  the  boy's  beautv. 
in  recalling  them.  The  other  is,  that  the  idiocy  of 
the  boy  is  so  evenly  balanced  by  the  folly  of  I  he  mo- 
ther, as  to  present  to  the  general  reader  rather  a 
laughable  burlesque  on  the  blindness  of  anile  dotage, 
than  an  analytic  display  of  maternal  affection  in  its 
ordinary  workings. 

In  the  "  Thorn,"  the  poet  himself  acknowledges. 
in  a  note,  the  necessity  of  an  introductory  poem,  in 
which  he  should  have  portrayed  the  character  of  the 
person  from  whom  the  words  of  the  poem  are  sup- 
posed to  proceed :  a  superstitious  man,  moderately 
imaginative,  of  slow  faculties,  and  deep  feelings;  "a 
captain  of  a  small  trading  vessel,  for  example,  who, 
being  past  the  middle  age  of  life,  had  retired  upon 
an  annuity,  or  small  independent  income,  to  some 
village  or  country  town,  of  which  he  was  not  a  native. 
or  in  which  he  had  not  been  accustomed  to  live. 
Such  men,  having  nothing  to  do,  become  credulous 
and  talkative  from  indolence."  But  in  a  poem,  still 
more  in  a  lyric  poem,  (and  the  nurse  in  Shakspeare's 
Romeo  and  Juliet  alone  prevents  me  from  extending 
the  remark  even  to  dramatic  poetry,  if  indeed  the 
i\urse  itself  can  be  deemed  altogether  a  case  in 
point,)  it  is  not  possible  to  imitate  truly  a  dull  and 
garrulous  discourser,  without  repeating  the  effects  of 
dullness  arid  garrulity.  However  this  may  be,  I  dare 
assert,  that  the  parts,  (and  these  form  the  far  larger 
portion  of  the  whole.)  which  might  as  well,  or  still 
better,  have  proceeded  from  the  poet's  own  imagina- 
tion, and  have  been  spoken  in  his  own  character,  are 
those  which  have  given,  and  which  will  continue  to 
give,  universal  delight;  and  that  the  passages  exclu- 
sively appropriate  to  the  supposed  narrator,  such  as 
the  last  couplet  of  the  third  stanza  r*  the  seven  last 
lines  of  the  tenth  ;t  and  the  five  following  stanzas. 


*  "  I ' ve  measured  it  from  side  to  side : 
'T  is  three  feet  long,  and  two  feet  wide.' 

t  "  Nay.  rack  your  brain — " t  is  all  in  vain, 
I'll  tell  you  every  thing  1  know  ; 
But  to  the  Thorn,  and  to  the  Pond, 
Which  is  a  little  step  beyond, 
I  wish  that  you  would  go : 
Perhaps,  when  you  are  at  the  place, 
You  something  of  her  tale  may  trace. 

I  'II  give  you  the  best  help  I  can  : 
Before  you  up  the  mountain  go, 

317 


308 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


with  the  exception  of  the  four  admirable  lines  at  the 
commencement  of  the  fourteenth,  are  felt  by  many 
unprejudiced  and  unsophisticated  hearts,  as  sudden 
and  unpleasant  sinkings  from  the  height  to  which 
the  poet  had  previously  lifted  them,  and  to  which  he 
again  re-elevates  both  himself  and  his  reader. 

If  then  I  am  compelled  to  doubt  the  theory  by 
which  the  choice  of  characters  was  to  be  directed, 
not  only  a  priori,  from  grounds  of  reason,  but  both 
from  the  few  instances  in  which  the  poet  himself 
need  be  supposed  to  have  been  governed  by  it,  and 
from  tho  comparative  inferiority  of  those  instances; 
still  more  must  I  hesitate  in  my  assent  to  the  sen- 
tence which  immediately  follows  the  former  citation  ; 
and  which  I  can  neither  admit  as  particular  fact,  or 
as  general  rule.  "  The  language,  too,  of  these  men, 
is  adopted,  (purified,  indeed,  from  what  appears  to  be 
its  real  defects,  from  all  lasting  and  rational  causes 


Up  to  the  dreary  mountain- top, 
I  'II  tell  you  all  I  know. 
"Tis  now  some  two-and-twenty  years 
Since  she  (her  name  is  Martha  Ray) 
Gave,  with  a  maiden's  true  good  will, 
Her  company  to  Stephen  Hill  ; 
And  she  was  blithe  and  gay, 
And  she  was  happy,  happy  still. 
Whene'er  she  thought  of  Stephen  Hill. 

And  they  had  fix'd  the  wedding-day. 

The  morning  that  must  wed  them  both  ; 

But  Stephen  to  another  maid 

Had  sworn  another  oath  ; 

And  with  this  other  maid  to  church 

Unthinking  Stephen  went — 

Poor  Martha  !  on  that  woful  day 

A  pang  of  pitiless  dismay 

Into  her  soul  was  sent  ; 

A  fire  was  kindled  in  her  breast, 

Which  might  not  burn  itself  to  rest. 

They  say,  full  six  months  after  this, 

While  yet  the  summer  leaves  were  green. 

She  to  the  mountain-top  would  go, 

And  there  was  often  seen. 

'T  is  said  a  child  was  in  her  womb, 

As  now  to  any  eye  was  plain  ; 

She  was  with  child,  and  she  was  mad  : 

Yet  often  she  was  sober  sad 

From  her  exceeding  pain. 

Oh  me  !  ten  thousand  times  I  'd  rather 

That  he  had  died,  that  cruel  father : 


Laet.  Christmas,  when  we  talk'd  of  this. 
Old  farmer  Simpson  did  maintain. 
That  in  her  womb  the  infant  wrought 
About  its  mother's  heart,  and  brought 
Her  senses  back  again  : 
And  when  at  last  her  time  drew  near, 
Her  looks  were  calm,  her  senses  clear. 

No  more  I  know,  I  wish  I  did, 

And  I  would  tell  it  all  to  you  ; 

For  what  became  of  this  poor  child 

There  's  none  that  ever  knew  : 

And  if  a  child  was  born  or  no. 

There  's  no  one  that  could  ever  tell  : 

And  if  'twas  born  alive  or  dead, 

There  's  no  one  knows,  as  I  have  said  ; 

But  some  remember  well. 

That  Martha  Ray,  about  this  time, 

Would  up  the  mountain  often  dim:)." 


of  dislike  or  disgust,)  because  such  men  hourly  com 
municate  with  the  best  object*  from  which  the  best 
part  of  language  is  originally  derived ;  and,  because, 
from  their  rank  in  society,  and  the  sameness  and  nar- 
row circle  of  their  intercourse,  being  less  under  the 
action  of  social  vanity,  they  convey  their  feelings 
and  notions  in  simple  and  unelaborated  expressions. 
To  this  1  reply,  that  a  rustic's  language,  purified 
from  all  provincialism  and  grossness,  and  so  far  re- 
constructed as  to  be  made  consistent  with  the  rules 
of  grammar,  (which  are,  in  essence,  no  other  than 
the  laws  of  universal  logic  applied  to  Psychological 
materials,)  will  not  differ  from  the  language  of  any 
other  man  of  common  sense,  however  learned  or 
refined  he  may  be,  except  as  far  as  the  notions  which 
the  rustic  has  to  convey  are  fewer  and  more  indis- 
criminate. This  will  become  still  clearer  if  we  add 
the  consideration,  (equally  important,  though  less  ob- 
vious,) that  the  rustic,  from  the  more  imperfect  de- 
velopment of  his  faculties,  and  from  the  lower  state 
of  their  cultivation,  aims  almost  solely  to  convey  in- 
sulated  facts,  either  those  of  his  scanty  experience, 
or  his  traditional  belief;  while  the  educated  man 
chiefly  seeks  to  discover  and  express  those  connections 
of  things,  or  those  relative  bearings  of  fact  to  fact, 
from  which  some  more  or  less  general  law  is  deduci- 
ble.  For  facts  are  valuable  to  a  wise  man,  chiefly 
as  they  lead  to  the  discovery  of  the  in-dwelling  law, 
which  is  the  true  being  of  things,  the  sole  solution 
of  their  modes  of  existence,  and  in  the  knowledge 
of  which  consists  our  dignity  and  our  power. 

As  little  can  I  agree  with  the  assertion,  that  from 
the  objects  with  which  the  rustic  hourly  communi- 
cates, the  best  part  of  language  is  formed.  For,  first, 
if  to  communicate  with  an  object  implies  such  an 
acquaintance  with  it  as  renders  it  capable  of  being 
discriminately  reflected  on,  the  distinct  knowledge 
of  an  uneducated  rustic  would  furnish  a  very  scanty 
vocabulary.  The  few  things  and  modes  of  action, 
requisite  for  his  bodily  conveniences,  would  alone  be 
individualized,  while  all  the  rest  of  nature  would  be 
expressed  by  a  small  number  of  confused,  general 
terms.  Secondly,  I  deny  that  the  words,  and  combi- 
nations of  words  derived  from  the  objects  with  which 
the  rustic  is  familiar,  whether  with  distinct  or  con- 
fused knowledge,  can  be  justly  said  to  form  the  best 
part  of  language.  It  is  more  than  probable,  that 
many  classes  of  the  brute  creation  possess  discrimi- 
nating sound?,  by  which  they  can  convey  to  each 
other  notices  of  such  objects  as  concern  their  food, 
shelter,  or  safety-  Yet  we  hesitate  to  call  the  aggre- 
gaie  of  such  sounds  a  language,  otherwise  than  meta- 
phorically. The  best  part  of  human  language,  pro- 
perly so  called,  is  derived  from  reflection  on  the  actu 
of  the  mind  itself.  It  is  formed  by  a  voluntary  ap- 
propriation of  lived  symbols  to  internal  acts,  to  pro- 
cesses and  results  of  imagination,  the  greater  part  of 
which  have  no  place  in  the  consciousness  of  unedu- 
cated man  ;  though,  in  civilized  society,  by  imitation 
and  passive  remembrance  of  what  ihey  hear  from 
their  religious  instructors  and  other  superiors,  the 
most  uneducated  share  in  the  harvest,  which  they 
neither    sowed   or    reaped.     If  the   history  of  the 

318 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


301) 


phrases  in  hourly  currency  among  our  peasants  were 
traced,  a  person  not  previously  aware  of  the  iact 
would  be  surprised  at  finding  so  large  a  number, 
which,  three  or  four  centuries  ago,  were  the  exclu- 
sive property  of  the  universiues  and  the  schools; 
and,  at  the  commencement  of  the  Reformation,  had 
been  transferred  from  the  school  to  the  pulpit,  and 
thus  gradually  passed  into  common  life.  The  ex- 
treme difficulty,  and  often  the  impossibility,  of  find- 
ing words  for  the  simplest  moral  and  intellectual  pro- 
cesses in  the  languages  of  uncivilized  tribes  has 
proved,  perhaps,  the  weightiest  obstacle  to  the  pro- 
gress of  our  most  zealous  and  adroit  missionaries. 
Yet  these  tribes  are  surrounded  by  the  same  nature 
as  our  peasants  are;  but  in  still  more  impressive 
forms :  and  they  are,  moreover,  obliged  to  particu- 
larize many  more  of  them.  When,  therefore,  Mr. 
Wordsworth  adds,  •'  accordingly,  such  a  language," 
(meaning,  as  before,  the  language  of  rustic  life,  puri- 
fied from  provincialism.;  -  arising  out  of  repeated  ex- 
perience and  regular  feelings,  is  a  more  permanent, 
and  a  far  more  philosophical  language,  than  that 
which  is  frequently  substituted  for  it  by  poets,  who 
think  they  are  conferring  honor  upon  themselves  and 
their  art,  in  proportion  as  they  indulge  in  arbitrary 
and  capricious  habits  of  expression ;"  it  may  be  an- 
swered, that  the  language  which  he  has  in  view  can 
be  attributed  to  rustics  with  no  greater  right  than  the  ! 
style  of  Hooker  or  Bacon  to  Tom  Brown  or  Sir  Roger  : 
L'Estrange.  Doubtless,  if  what  is  peculiar  to  each  j 
were  omitted  in  each,  the  result  must  needs  be  the 
same.  Further,  that  the  poet,  who  uses  an  illogical  ] 
diction,  or  a  style  fitted  to  excite  only  the  low  and 
changeable  pleasure  of  wonder,  by  means  of  ground- 
less novelty,  substitutes  a  language  off  My  and  vanity, 
not  for  that  of  the  rustic,  but  for  that  of  good  sense 
and  natural  feeling. 

Here  let  me  be  permitted  to  remind  the  reader,  ' 
that  the  positions,  which  I  controvert,  are  contained 
in  the  sentences — ••  a  selection  of  the  real,  language 
of  men  ;" — "  the  language  of  these  men,  (i.  e.  men  in 
low  and  rustic  life.)  I  propose  to  myself  to  imitate, 
and,  as  far  as  possible,  to  adopt  the  very  language  of  . 
men."     •'  Between  the  language  of  prose  and  that  of 
metrical  composition,  there  neither  is.  nor  can  be,  any 
essential  difference.''    It  is  against  these  exclusively  , 
that  my  opposition  is  directed. 

I  object,  in  the  very  first  instance,  to  an  equivo- 
cation in  the  use  of  the  word  '•  real."  Everv  man's 
language  varies  according  to  the  extent  of  his  know- 
ledge, the  activity  of  his  faculties,  and  the  depth  or 
quickness  of  his  feelings.  Every  man's  language 
has,  first,  its  individualities ;  secondly,  the  common 
properties  of  the  class  to  which  he  belongs;  and 
thirdly,  words  and  phrases  of  universal  use.  The 
language  of  Hooker,  Bacon,  Bishop  Taylor,  and 
Burke,  differs  from  the  common  language  of  the 
learned  class  only  by  the  superior  number  and  novel- 
ty of  the  thoughts  and  relations  which  they  had  to 
convey.  The  language  of  Algernon  Sidnev  differs 
not  at  all  from  that  which  even-  well-educated  gen- 
tleman would  wish  to  write,  and  with  due  allow- 
ances for  the  ur.ieliben-teness  anected 


train  of  thinking  natural  and  proper  to  conver- 
such  he  would  wish  to  talk.  Neither  one  or  the 
other  differs  half  as  much  from  the  general  language 
of  cultivated  society,  as  the  language  of  Mr.  \\  ords- 
worth's  homeliest  composition  differs  from  that  of  a 
common  peasant.  For  "real,"  therefore,  we  must 
substitute  ordinary  or  lingua  communis.  And  this. 
we  have  proved,  is  no  more  to  be  found  in  the 
phraseology  of  low  and  rustic  life,  than  in  that  of 
any  other  class.  Omit  the  peculiarities  of  each,  and 
the  result,  of  course,  must  be  common  to  all.  And, 
assuredly,  the  omissions  and  changes  to  be  made  in 
the  language  of  rustics,  before  it  could  be  transferred 
to  any  species  of  poem,  except  the  drama  or  other 
professed  imitation,  are  at  least  as  numerous  and 
weighty  as  would  be  required  in  adapting  to  the 
same  purpose  the  ordinary  language  of  tradesmen 
and  manufacturers.  Not  to  mention,  that  the  lan- 
guage so  highly  extolled  by  Mr.  Wordsworth  varies 
in  every  county,  nay,  in  every  village,  according  to 
the  accidental  character  of  the  clergymen ;  the  ex- 
istence or  non-existence  of  schools ;  or  even,  perhaps, 
as  the  exciseman,  publican,  or  barber  happen  to  be. 
or  not  to  be,  zealous  politicians,  and  readers  of  the 
weekly  newspaper  pro  bono  publico.  Anterior  to 
cultivarren,  the  lingua  communis  of  every  country, 
as  Dante  has  well  observed,  exists  every  where  in 
parts,  and  no  where  as  a  whole. 

Neither  is  the  case  rendered  at  all  more  tenable 
by  the  addition  of  the  words,  "  in  a  state  of  excite- 
ment." For  the  nature  of  a  man's  words,  when  he 
is  strongly  affected  by  joy,  grief,  or  anger,  must  ne- 
cessarily depend  on  the  number  and  quality  of  the 
general  truths,  conceptions,  and  images,  and  of  the 
words  expressing  them,  with  which  his  mind  has 
been  previously  stored.  For  the  property  of  passion 
is  not  to  create,  but  to  set  in  increased  activity.  At 
least,  whatever  new  connections  of  thought  or  im- 
ages, or  which  is  equallv,  if  not  more  than  equally, 
the  appropriate  effect  of  strong  excitement  whatever 
generalizations  of  truth  or  experience  the  heat  of 
passion  may  produce,  yet,  the  terms  of  their  convey- 
ance must  have  pre-existed  in  his  former  conversa- 
tions, and  are  only  collected  and  crowded  together 
bv  the  unusual  stimulation.  It  is,  indeed,  very  pos- 
sible to  adopt  in  a  poem  the  unmeaning  repetitions, 
habitual  phrases,  and  other  blank  counters,  which  an 
unfurnished  or  confused  understanding  interposes  at 
short  intervals,  in  order  to  keep  hold  of  his  subject. 
which  is  still  slippinz  from  him,  and  to  give  him 
time  for  recollection :  or,  in  mere  aid  of  vacancy,  as 
in  the  scanty  companies  of  a  country  stage,  the  same 
plaver  pops  backwards  and  forwards,  in  order  to 
prevent  the  appearance  of  empty  spaces  in  the  pro- 
cession of  Macbeth,  or  Henry  Vlllth.  But  what 
assistance  to  the  poet,  or  ornament  to  the  poem,  these 
can  supplv.  I  am  at  a  loss  to  conjecture.  Nothing, 
assuredlv.  can  differ  either  in  origin  or  in  mode  more 
widely  from  the  apparent  tautologies  of  intense  and 
turbulent  feeling,  in  which  the  passion  is  greater, 
and  of  longer  endurance,  than  to  be  exhausted  or 
satisfied  by  a  single  representation  of  the  image  or 
incident  excitins  it.  Such  repetitions  I  admi*  *»  be 
319 


310 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


a  beauty  of  the  highest  kind,  as  illustrated  by  Mr. 
Wordsworth  himself  from  the  song  of  Deborah.  "At 
Iter  feet  he  bowed,  he  fell,  he  lay  down  ;  at  her  feet  he 
bowed,  he  fell  ;  where  he  bowed,  there  fie  fell  down 
dead" 


CHAPTER  XVIII. 

Language  of  metrical  composition,  why  and  wherein  essen- 
tially different  from  that  of  prose — Origin  and  elements  of 
metre — Its  necessary  consequences,  and  the  conditions 
thereby  imposed  on  the  metrical  writer  in  the  choice  of  his 
diction. 

I  conclude,  therefore,  that  the  attempt  is  imprac- 
ticable; and  that,  were  it  not  impracticable,  it  would 
still  be  useless.  For  the  very  power  of  making  the 
selection  implies  the  previous  possession  of  the  lan- 
guage selected.  Or  where  can  the  poet  have  lived  ? 
And  by  what  rules  could  he  direct  his  choice,  which 
would  not  have  enabled  htm  to  select  and  arrange 
his  words  by  the  light  of  his  own  judgment  ?  We  do 
not  adopt  the  language  of  a  class  by  the  mere  adop- 
tion of  such  words  exclusively,  as  that  class  would 
use,  or  at  least  understand  ;  but,  likewise,  by  follow- 
ing the  order  in  which  the  words  of  such  men  are 
wont  to  succeed  each  other.  Now,  this  order,  in  the 
intercourse  of  uneducated  men,  is  distinguished  from 
the  diction  of  their  superiors  in  knowledge  and  power, 
by  the  greater  disjunction  and  separation  in  the  com- 
ponent parts  of  that,  whatever  it  be,  which  they  wish 
to  communicate.  There  is  a  want  of  that  prospec- 
tiveness  of  mind,  that  survievj,  which  enables  a  raan 
to  foresee  the  whole  of  what  he  is  to  convey,  apper- 
taining to  any  one  point;  and,  by  this  means,  so  to 
subordinate  and  arrange  the  different  parts  according 
to  their  relative  importance,  as  to  convey  it  at  once, 
and  as  an  organized  whole. 

Now  I  will  take  the  first  stanza  on  which  I  have 
chanced  to  open,  in  the  Lyrical  Ballads.  It  is  one  of 
the  most  simple  and  least  peculiar  in  its  language. 

"  In  distant  countries  I  have  been. 
And  yet  I  have  not  often  seen 
A  healthy  man,  a  man  full  grown, 
Weep  in  the  public  road  alone. 
But  such  a  one,  on  English  ground. 
And  in  the  broad  highway,  I  met ; 
Along  the  broad  highway  he  came, 
His  cheeks  with  tears  were  wel. 
Sturdy  he  seem'd,  though  he  was  sad, 
And  in  his  arms  a  lamb  he  had." 

The  words  here  are  doubtless  such  as  are  current 
in  all  ranks  of  life ;  and,  of  course,  not  less  so  in  the 
hamlet  and  cottage,  than  in  the  shop,  manufactory, 
college,  or  palace.  But  is  this  the  order  in  which  the 
rustic  would  have  placed  the  words  ?  1  am  grievously 
deceived,  if  the  following  less  compact  mode  of  com- 
mencing the  same  tale  be  not  a  far  more  faithful 
copy.  "  I  have  been  in  a  many  parts,  far  and  near, 
and  I  don't  know  that  I  ever  saw  before,  a  man  cry- 
ing by  himself  in  the  public  road  ;  a  grown  man  I 
mean,  that  was  neither  sick  nor  hurt,"  &c.  <fcc.  But 
when  I  turn  to  the  following  stanza  in  "  The  Thorn :" 


"  At  all  times  of  the  day  and  night, 
This  wretched  woman  thither  goes. 
And  she  is  known  to  every  star, 
And  every  wind  that  blows  : 
And  there  beside  the  thorn  she  sits, 
When  the  blue  day-light's  in  the  skies  ; 
And  whpn  the  whirlwind's  on  the  hill. 
Or  frosty  air  is  keen  and  still ; 
And  to  herself  she  cries, 
Oh  misery  !  Oh  misery  ! 
Oh  wo  is  me !  Oh  misery  !" 

And  compare  this  with  the  language  of  ordinary  men; 
or  with  that  which  I  can  conceive  at  all  likely  to  pro- 
ceed, in  real  life,  from  such  a  narrator  as  is  supposed 
in  the  note  to  the  poem;  compare  it  either  in  the  suc- 
cession of  the  images  or  of  the  sentences,  I  am  re- 
minded of  the  sublime  prayer  and  hymn  of  praise, 
which  Milton,  in  opposition  to  an  established  litur- 
gy, presents  as  a  lair  specimen  of  common  cotempo- 
rary  devotion,  and  such  as  we  might  expect  to  hear 
from  every  self-inspired  minister  of  a  conventicle! 
And  I  reflect  with  delight,  how  little  a  mere  theory, 
though  of  his  own  workmanship,  interferes  with  the 
processes  of  genuine  imagination  in  a  man  of  true  po- 
etic genius,  who  possesses,  as  Mr.  Wordsworth,  if 
ever  man  did,  most  assuredly  does  possess, 

"The  Vision  and  the  Faculty  divine." 

One  point,  then,  alone  remains,  but  the  most  im- 
portant; its  examination  having  been,  indeed,  my 
chief  inducement  for  the  preceding  inquisition, 
"  There  neither  is,  nor  can  be,  any  essential  difference 
between  the  language  of  prose  and  metrical  composi- 
tion." Such  is  Mr.  Wordsworth's  assertion.  Now, 
prose  itself,  at  least,  in  all  argumentative  and  conse- 
cutive works,  differs,  and  ought  to  differ,  from  the 
language  of  conversation  ;  even  as  reading  ought  to 
differ  from  talking.*  Unless,  therefore,  the  difference 
denied  be  that  of  the  mere  words,  as  materials  com- 

*  It  is  no  less  an  error  in  teachers,  than  a  torment  to  the 
poor  children,  to  enforce  the  necessity  of  reading  as  they 
would  talk.  In  order  to  cure  them  of  singing,  as  it  is  called, 
that  is,  of  too  great  a  difference,  the  child  is  made  to  repeat 
the  words  wilh  bis  eyes  from  off  the  book ;  and  then,  indeed, 
his  tones  resemble  talking,  as  far  as  his  fears,  tears,  and  trem- 
bling will  permit.  But,  as  soon  as  the  eye  is  again  directed 
to  the  printed  page,  the  spell  begins  anew  ;  for  an  instinctive 
sense  tells  the  child's  feelings,  that  to  utler  its  own  momen- 
tary thoughts,  and  to  recite  the  written  thoughts  of  another, 
as  of  another,  and  n  far  wiser  than  himself,  are  two  widely 
different  things;  and,  as  the  two  acts  are  accompanied  with 
widely  different  feelings,  so  must  they  justify  different  motles 
of  enunciation.  Joseph  Lancaster,  among  his  other  sophisti- 
cations  of  the  excellent  Dr.  Bell's  invaluable  system,  cures 
this  fault  of  sivging,  by  hanging  fetters  and  chains  on  the 
child,  10  the  music  of  which  one  of  his  school-fellows,  who 
walks  before,  dolefully  chaunts  out  the  child's  last  speech 
and  confession,  birth,  parentage,  and  education.  And  this 
toul-henumbing  ignominy,  this  unholy  and  heart-hardening 
burlesque  on  the  last  fearful  infliction  of  outraged  law.  in 

pr, Slicing  the  sentence  at  which  the  stern  and  familiarized 

judge  not  seldom  bursts  into  tears,  has  been  extolled  as  a 
happy  and  ingenious  method  or  remedying — what  ?  and  how"! 

why,  one  extreme  in  order  to  introduce  another,  scarce  less 

distant  from  good  sense,  and  certainly  likely  to  have  worse 
moral  effects,  by  enforcing  a  semblance  of  petulant  ease  and 
self-sufficiency,  in  repression,  and  possible  after-perversion  ot 
the  natural  feeling--.  1  have  to  beg  Dr.  Bell's  pardon  for  this 
connexion  of  the  two  names,  but  he  knows  that  contrast  is 
no  lees  powerful  a  cause  of  association  than  likeness. 
320 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITER  ARIA. 


311 


mon  to  all  styles  of  writing,  and  not  of  the  style  itself, 
in  the  universally  admitted  sense  of  the  term.it  might 
be  naturally  presumed  that  there  must  exist  a  still 
ereater  between  the  ordonnance  of  poetic  composi- 
tion, and  that  of  prose,  than  is  expected  to  distinguish 
prose  from  ordinary  conversation. 

There  are  not,  indeed,  examples  wanting  in  the 
history  of  literature,  of  apparent  paradoxes  that  have 
summoned  the  public  wonder,  as  new  and  startling 
truths,  but  which,  on  examination,  have  shrunk  into 
tame  and  harmless  truisms:  as  the  eyes  of  a  cat,  seen 
in  the  dark,  have  been  mistaken  for  llames  of  fire. 
But  Mr.  Wordsworth  is  among  the  last  men.  to  whom 
a  delusion  of  this  kind  would  be  attributed  by  any 
one  who  had  enjoved  the  slightest  opportunity  of  un- 
derstanding his  mind  and  character.  Where  an  ob- 
jection has  been  anticipated  by  such  an  author  as 
natural,  his  answer  to  it  must  needs  be  interpreted  in 
some  sense,  which  either  is,  or  has  been,  or  is  capable 
of  being,  contro%"erted.  My  object  then,  must  be  to 
discover  some  other  meaning  for  the  term  ■•essential 
difference"  in  this  place,  exclusive  of  the  indistinc- 
tion  and  community  of  the  words  themselves.  For 
whether  there  ought  to  exist  a  class  of  words  in  the 
English,  in  any  degree  resembling  the  poetic  dialect 
of  the  Greek  and  Italian,  is  a  question  of  very  subor- 
dinate importance.  The  number  of  such  words 
would  be  small  indeed,  in  our  language,  and  even  in 
the  Italian  and  Greek :  they  consist  not  so  much  of 
different  words,  as  of  slight  differences  in  the  forms 
of  declining  and  conjugating  the  same  words:  forms, 
doubtless,  which  having  been,  at  some  period  more 
or  less  remote,  the  common  grammatic  flexions  of 
some  tribe  or  province,  had  been  accidentally  appro- 
priated to  poetry  by  the  general  admiration  of  certain 
master  intellects,  the  first  established  lights  of  inspi- 
ration, to  whom  that  dialect  happened  to  be  native. 

E^ence,  in  its  primary  signification,  means  the 
principle  of  individuation,  the  inmost  principle  of  the 
possibility  of  any  thing,  as  that  particular  thing.  It 
is  equivalent  to  the  ideaofa.  thing,  whenever  we  use 
the  word  idea  with  philosophic  precision.  Existence, 
on  the  other  hand,  is  distinguished  from  essence,  bv 
the  superinduction  of  reality.  Thus  we  speak  of  the 
essence,  and  essential  properties  of  a  circle;  but  we 
do  not  therefore  assert,  that  any  thing  which  really 
estate  is  mathematically  circular.  Thus  too,  without 
any  tautology,  we  contend  for  the  existence  of  the  Su- 
preme Being;  that  is,  for  a  reality  corresponding  to 
the  idea.  There  is,  next,  a  secondary  use  of  the  word 
essence,  in  which  it  signifies  the  point  or  ground  of 
contra-distinction  between  two  modifications  of  the 
same  substance  or  subject.  Thus  we  should  be  al- 
lowed to  say.  that  the  style  of  architecture  of  West- 
minister Abbey  is  essentially  different  from  that  of 
Saint  Paul,  even  though  both  had  been  built  with 
blocks  cut  into  the  same  form,  and  from  the  same 
quarry.  Only  in  this  latter  sense  of  the  term  must  it 
have  been  denied  by  Mr.  Wordsworth  ffor  in  this 
sense  alone  is  it  ajfirmed  by  the  general  opinion  that 
the  language  of  poetry  'i.  e.  the  formal  construction, 
or  architecture  of  the  words  and  phrases  is  essentially 
different  from  that  of  prose.  Now  the  burthen  of  the 
Cc2 


proof  lies  with  the  oppugner.  not  with  the  supporters 
of  the  common  belief.  Mr.  Wordsworth,  in  conse- 
quence, assigns,  as  the  proof  of  his  position.  "  that  not 
only  the  language  of  a  large  portion  of  every  good 
poem,  even  of  the  most  elevated  character,  must  ne- 
cessarily, except  with  reference  to  the  metre,  in  no 
respect  differ  from  that  of  good  prose;  but  likewise 
that  some  of  the  most  interesting  parts  of  the  best 
poems  will  be  strictly  the  language  of  prose,  when 
prose  is  well  written.  The  truth  of  this  assertion 
might  be  demonstrated  by  innumerable  passages  from 
almost  all  the  poetical  writings  even  of  Milton  him- 
self."    He  then  quotes  Gray's  sonnet — 

"  In  vain  to  me  the  smiling  mornings  shine. 
And  reddening  Phoebus  lifts  hi9  golden  fire; 
The  birds  in  vain  their  amorous  descant  join, 
Or  cheerful  fields  resume  their  green  attire  ; 
These  ears,  alas  '.  for  other  notes  repine  ; 
.i  different  object  do  these  eyes  require  ; 
Mm  lonely  anguish  melts  no  heart  but  mine, 
~ind  in  my  breast  the  imperfect  joys  expire! 
Yft  morning  smiles,  the  busy  race  to  cheer. 
And  newborn  pleasure  brings  to  happier  men  : 
The  fields  to  all  their  wonted  tributes  bear, 
To  warm  their  little  loves  the  birds  complain. 
I  fruitless  mourn  to  him  that  cannot  hear, 
Jind  weep  the  more,  because  I  izeep  in  vain." 

and  adds  the  following  remark  : — "  It  will  easily  be 
perceived,  that  the  only  part  of  this  Sonnet  which  is 
uf  any  value,  is  the  lines  printed  in  italics.  It  is 
equally  obvious,  that  except  in  the  rhyme,  and  in  the 
use  of  the  single  word  '-fruitless"  for  fruitlessly 
which  is  ■so  far  a  defect,  the  language  of  these  lines 
does  in  no  respect  differ  from  that  of  prose" 

An  idealist  defending  his  system  by  the  fact,  that 
when  asleep  we  often  believe  ourselves  awake,  was 
well  answered  by  his  plain  neighbor,  "  Ah.  but  when 
awake  do  we  ever  believe  ourselves  asleep  ?"  Things 
identical  must  be  convertible.  The  preceding  pas- 
sage seems  to  rest  on  a  similar  sophism.  For  the 
question  is  not,  whether  there  may  not  occur  in  prose 
an  order  of  words,  which  would  be  equally  proper  in 
a  poem;  nor  whether  there  are  not  beautiful  lines 
and  sentences  of  frequent  occurrence  in  good  poems, 
which  would  be  equally  becoming,  as  well  as  beau- 
tiful, in  good  prose ;  for  neither  the  one  or  the  other 
has  ever  been  either  denied  or  doubted  by  any  one. 
The  true  question  must  be,  whether  there  are  not 
modes  of  expression,  a  construction,  and  an  order  of 
sentences,  which  are  in  their  fit  and  natural  place  in 
a  serious  prose  composition,  but  would  be  dispropor- 
tionate and  heterogeneous  in  metrical  poetry ;  and. 
vice  versa,  whether  in  the  language  of  a  serious  poem 
there  may  not  be  an  arrangement  both  of  words  and 
sentences,  and  a  use  and  selection  of  (what  are  called 
figures  of  speech,  both  as  to  their  kind,  their  frequency, 
and  their  occasions,  which,  on  a  subject  of  equal 
weight,  would  be  vicious  and  alien  in  correct  and 
maiilv  prose.  I  contend,  that  in  both  cases,  this  un- 
fitness of  each  for  the  place  of  the  other  frequently 
will  and  ought  to  exist. 

And,  first,  from  the  origin  of  metre.  This  I  wou'J 
trace  to  the  balance  in  the  mind  effected  by  that  spon- 
taneous effort  which  strives  to  hold  in  check  the 
workings  of  passion.  It  might  be  easily  explained 
321 


312 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


likewise,  in  what  manner  this  salutary  antagonism  is 
assisted  by  the  very  state  which  it  counteracts,  and 
how  this  balance  of  antagonists  became  organized  into 
metre,  tin  the  usual  acceptation  of  that  term,)  by  a  su- 
pervening act  of  the  will  and  judgment,  consciously, 
and  fir  the  foreseen  purpose  of  pleasure.  Assuming 
these  principles  as  the  data  of  our  argument,  we  de- 
duce from  them  two  legitimate  conditions,  which  the 
critic  is  entitled  to  expect  in  every  metrical  work. 
First:  that  as  the  elements  of  metre  owe  their  exist- 
ence to  a  state  of  increased  excitement,  so  the  metre 
itself  should  be  accompanied  by  the  natural  language 
of  excitement.  Secondly:  that  as  these  elements  are 
formed  into  metre  artificially,  by  a  voluntary  act,  with 
the  design,  and  for  the  purpose  of  blending  delight 
with  emotion,  so  the  traces  of  present  volition  should, 
throughout  the  metrical  language,  be  proportionally 
discernible.  Now,  these  two  conditions  must  be  re- 
conciled and  co-present.  There  must  be,  not  only  a 
partnership,  but  a  union ;  an  interpenetration  of  pas- 
sion and  will,  of  spontaneous  impulse  and  of  voluntary 
purpose.  Again:  this  union  can  be  manifested  only 
in  a  frequency  of  forms  and  figures  of  speech,  (origin- 
ally the  offspring  of  passion,  but  now  the  adopted 
children  of  power,)  greater  than  would  be  desired  or 
endured  where  the  emotion  is  not  voluntarily  en- 
couraged, and  kept  up  for  the  sake  of  that  pleasure 
which  such  emotion,  so  tempered  and  mastered  by 
the  will,  is  found  capable  of  communicating.  It  not 
only  dictates,  but  of  itself  tends  to  produce  a  more 
frequent  employment  of  picturesque  and  vivifying 
language,  than  would  be  natural  in  any  other  case  in 
which  there  did  not  exist,  as  there  does  in  the  present, 
a  previous  and  well  understood,  though  tacit,  compact 
between  the  poet  and  his  reader,  that  the  latter  is  en- 
titled to  expect,  and  the  former  bound  to  supply  this 
species  and  degree  of  pleasurable  excitement.  We 
may,  in  some  measure,  apply  to  this  union,  the  an- 
swer of  Polixexes,  in  the  Winter's  Tale,  to  Perdi- 
ta's  neglect  of  the  streaked  gilly-flowers,  because 
she  had  heard  it  said, 

"There  is  an  art  which  iu  their  piedness  shares 
"  With  great  creating  nature. 

Pol.    Say  there  be: 
"  Yet  nature  is  made  better  by  no  mean, 
"  But  nature  makes  that  mean.    So  ev'n  that  art, 
"  Which  you  say  adds  to  nature,  is  an  art 
' '  That  nature  makes  !    You  see,  sweet  maid,  we  marry 
"  A  gentler  scion  to  the  wildest  stock: 
"  And  make  conceive  a  bark  of  ruder  kind 
"  By  bud  of  nobler  race.    This  is  an  art, 
"  Which  does  mend  nature — change  it  rather  ;  but 
"The  art  itself  is  nature." 

Secondly,  I  argue  from  the  effects  of  metre.  As 
far  as  metre  acts  in  and  for  itself,  it  fends  to  increase 
the  vivacity  and  susceptibility  both  of  the  general 
feelings  and  of  the  attention.  This  effect  it  produces 
by  the  continued  excitement  of  surprise,  and  by  the 
quick  reciprocations  of  curiosity,  still  gratified  and 
still  re-excited,  which  are  too  slight,  indeed,  to  be  at 
any  one  moment  objects  of  distinct  consciousness, 
yet  become  considerable  in  their  aggregate  influence. 
As  a  medicated  atmosphere,  or  as  wine,  during  an- 1 
imated    conversation,  they   act    powerfully,   though  [ 


themselves  unnoticed.  Where,  therefore,  corres- 
pondent food  and  appropriate  matter  are  not  provided 
for  the  attention  and  feelings,  thus  roused,  there  must 
needs  be  a  disappointment  felt ;  like  that  of  leaping 
in  the  dark  from  the  last  step  of  a  stair-case,  when 
we  had  prepared  our  muscles  for  a  leap  of  three  or 
four. 

The  discussion  on  the  powers  of  metre  in  the 
preface  is  highly  ingenious,  and  touches  at  all  points 
on  truth.  Hut  I  cannot  find  any  statement  of  its 
powers  considered  abstractly  and  separately.  On 
the  contrary,  Mr.  Wordsworth  seems  always  to  esti- 
mate metre  by  the  powers  which  it  exerts  during, 
(and,  as  I  think,  in  consequence  of)  its  combination 
with  other  elements  of  poetry.  Thus,  the  previous 
difficulty  is  left  unanswered,  what  the  elements  are 
with  which  it  must  be  combined,  in  order  to  produce 
its  own  effects  to  any  pleasurable  purpose.  Double 
and  trisyllable  rhymes,  indeed,  form  a  lower  species 
of  wit,  and  attended  to,  exclusively  for  their  own 
sake,  may  become  a  source  of  momentary  amuse- 
ment ;  as  in  poor  Smart's  distich  to  the  Welsh  'Squire. 
who  had  promised  him  a  hare  : 

"Tell  me,  thou  son  of  great  Cadwallader 
Hast  sent  the  hare,  or  hast  thou  swallow'd  her? 

But,  for  any  poetic  purposes,  metre  resembles  (if 
the  aptness  of  the  simile  may  excuse  its  meanness) 
yest,  worthless  or  disagreeable  by  itself,  but  giving 
vivacity  and  spirit  to  the  liquor  with  which  it  is  pro- 
portionally combined. 

The  reference  to  the  "  Children  of  the  Wood,"  by 
no  means  satisfies  my  judgment.  We  all  willingly 
throw  ourselves  back  for  a  while  into  the  feelings  of 
our  childhood.  This  ballad,  therefore,  we  read  un- 
der such  recollections  of  our  own  childish  feelings, 
as  would  equally  endear  us  to  poems  which  Mr. 
Wordsworth  himself  would  regard  as  faulty  in  the 
opposite  extreme  of  gaudy  and  technical  ornament- 
Before  the  invention  of  printing,  and  in  a  still  greater 
degree  before  the  introduction  of  writing,  metre, 
especially  alliterative  metre,  (whether  alliterative  at 
the  beginning  of  the  words,  as  in  "  Pierce  Plouman," 
or  at  the  end,  as  in  rhymes)  possessed  an  independent 
value,  as  assisting  the  recollection,  and,  consequently, 
the  preservation  of  any  series  of  truths  or  incidents. 
But  I  am  not  convinced  by  the  collation  of  facts, 
that  the  "  Children  in  the  Wood,"  owes  either  its  pre- 
servation or  its  popularity  to  its  metrical  form.  Mr. 
Marshal's  repository  affords  a  number  of  tales  in 
prose,  inferior  in  pathos  and  general  merit.  Some  of 
as  old  a  date,  and  many  as  widely  popular.    Tom 

HlCKATHRIFT,     JACK     THE     GlANT-KILLER,    GOODY 

Two-shoes,  and  Little  Red  Riding-hood,  are 
formidable  rivals.  And  that  they  have  continued  in 
prose,  cannot  be  fairly  explained  by  the  assumption, 
that  the  comparative  meanness  of  their  thoughts  and 
images  precluded  even  the  humblest  forms  of  metre. 
The  scene  of  Goody  Two-shoes  in  the  church 
is  perfectly  susceptible  of  metrical  narration ;  and 
among  the  Bavnara  Savixasorara,  even  of  the  present 
age,  1  do  not  recollect  a  more  astonishing  image  than 
that  of  the  "  whole  rookery,  thai  flew  out  of  the  giant' s 

322 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


313 


beard."  scared  bv  the  tremendous  voice  with  which 
this  monger  answered  the  challenge  of  the  heroic 
kathrift! 

If  from  these  we  turn  to  compositions,  universally, 
and  independently  of  all  early  associations,  beloved 
and  admired,  would  the  Maria,  The  Monk,  or  The 
;ne.  be  read  with  more de- 
licht,  or  have  a  better  chance  of  immortality,  had 
thev.  without  any  change  in  the  taction,  been  com- 
posed in  rhyme,  than  in  the  present  state  ?  If  I  am 
not  grossly  mistaken,  the  general  reply  would  be  in 
the  negative.  Nay,  I  will  confess,  that  in  Mr. 
Wordsworth's  own  volumes,  the  Anecdote  for 
Fathers.  Simon  Lee.  Acile  Fell,  The  Beggars, 
and  The  Sailor's  Mother,  notwithstanding  the 
beauties  which  are  to  be  found  in  each  of  them, 
where  the  poet  interposes  the  music  of  his  own 
thoughts,  would  have  been  more  delightful  to  me  in 
prose,  told  and  managed,  as  by  Mr.  Wordsworth 
they  would  have  been,  in  a  moral  essay,  or  pedes- 
trian tour. 

Metre  in  itself  is  simply  a  stimulant  of  the  atten- 
tion, and  therefore  excites  the  question — Why  is  the 
attention  to  be  thus  stimulated  !  Mow  the  question 
cannot  be  answered  by  the  pleasure  of  the  metre  it- 
self; for  this  we  have  shown  to  be  conditional,  and 
dependent  on  the  appropriateness  of  the  thoughts  and 
expressions,  to  which  the  metrical  form-is  superadded. 
Neither  can  I  conceive  any  other  answer  that  can  be 
rationally  given,  short  of  this  :  I  write  in  metre,  be- 
cause I  am  about  to  use  a  language  different  from 
that  of  prose.  Besides,  where  the  language  is  not 
such,  how  interesting  soever  the  reflections  are  that 
are  capable  of  being  drawn  by  a  philosophic  mind 
from  the  thoughts  or  incidents  of  the  poem,  the  metre 
itself  must  often  become  feeble.  Take  the  three  last 
stanzas  of  the  Saii  ..  for  instance.    If  I 

could  for  a  moment  abstract  from  the  effect  produced 
on  the  aulhor*s  feelings,  as  a  man,  bv  the  incident  at 
the  time  of  its  real  occurrence,  I  would  dare  appeal 
to  his  own  judgment,  whether  in  the  me're  itself  he 
found  a  sufficient  reason  for  their  being  written  met- 
rically 1 

"  And  thus  continuing,  she  said, 
I  had  a  son,  who  many  a  day 
Sailed  op  the  seas  ;  bui  he  is  dead  ; 
In  Denmark  he  was  cast  aw 
And  1  have  travelled  far  as  Hull,  to  see 
What  clothes  he  might  have  left,  or  other  property. 

The  bird  and  case,  they  both  were  his  : 

"T  was  my  son's  bird  ;  and  neat  and  trim 

He  kept  it ;  many  v 

This  singing  bird  hath  goae  with  him  : 

When  last  he  sailed  he  left  the  bird  behind  ; 

As  it  might  be,  perhaps,  from  bodings  of  his  mind. 

He  to  a  fellow- lodger's  care 

Had  left  it.  to  be  watched  and  fed. 

Till  he  came  back  again  ;  and  there 

I  found  it  when  my  son  was  dead  : 

And  now,  God  help  me  for  my  little  wit ; 

I  trail  it  with  me,  Sir !  he  took  so  much  delight  in  it." 

If  disproportioning  the  emphasis  we  read  these 
stanzas  so  as  to  make  the  rhymes  perceptible,  even 
trisyllable  rhymes  could  scarcely  produce  an  equal 
sense  of  oddity  and  strangeness,  as  we  feel  here  in 


finding  rhymes  at  all  in  sentences  so  exclusively  col- 
loquial. I  would  further  ask  whether,  but  for  that 
visionary  state,  into  which  the  figure  of  the  woman 
and  the  susceptibility  of  his  own  genius  had  placed 
the  poet's  imagination,  a  state,  which  spreads  its  in- 
fluence and  coloring  over  all  that  co-exists  with  the 
exciting  cause,  and  in  which 

"The  simplest,  and  the  most  familiar  things 
Gain  a  strange  power  of  spreading  awe  around  them  ;"*) 

I  would  ask  the  poet  whether  he  would  not  have  felt 
an  abrupt  downfall  in  these  verses  from  the  preceding 
stanza  ? 

"  The  ancient  spirit  is  not  dead  ; 
Old  times,  thought  I,  are  breathing  there  ! 
Proud  was  I.  that  my  country  bred 
Such  strength,  a  dignity  so  fair  ! 
She  begged  an  alms,  like  one  in  poor  estate  ; 
I  looked  at  her  again,  nor  did  my  pride  abate." 

It  must  not  be  omitted,  and  is,  besides,  worthy  of 
notice,  that  those  stanzas  furnish  the  onlv  fair  instance 
that  I  have  been  able  to  discover  in  all  Mr.  Words- 
worth's writings,  of  an  actual  adoption,  or  true  imita- 
tion, of  the  real  and  very  language  of  low  and  rustic 
ed  from  provincialisms. 

Thirdly,  I  deduce  the  position  from  all  the  causes 
elsewhere  assigned,  which  render  metre  the  proper 
form  of  poetry,  and  poetry  imperfect  and  defective 
without  metre.  Metre,  therefore,  having  been  con- 
nected with  poetry  most  often  and  by  a  peculiar  fit- 
ness, whatever  else  is  combined  with  metre  must, 
though  it  be  not  itself  essentially  poetic,  have  never- 
theless some  property  in  common  with  poetry,  as  an 
intermedium  of  affinity,  a  sort  (if  I  may  dare  borrow 
a  well-known  phrase  from  technical  chemistry  of 
mordaunt  between  it  and  the  superadded  metre. 
Now,  poetry-.  Mr.  Wordsworth  truly  affirms,  does 
always  imply  passion,  which  word  must  be  here 
understood  in  its  most  general  sense,  as  an  excited 
state  of  the  feelings  and  faculties.  And  as  even- 
passion  has  its  proper  pulse,  so  will  it  likewise  have 
its  characteristic  modes  of  expression.  But  where 
there  exists  that  degree  of  genius  and  talent  which 
entitles  a  writer  to  aim  at  the  honors  of  a  poet,  the 
very  act  of  poetic  composition  itself  is,  and  is  allowed 
to  imply  and  to  produce,  an  unusual  state  of  excite- 
ment, which,  of  course,  justifies  and  demands  a  cor- 
respondent difference  of  language,  as  truly,  though 
not  perhaps  in  as  marked  a  degree,  as  the  excitement 
of  love,  fear.  rage,  or  jealousy.  The  vividness  of  the 
description  or  declamations  in  Donne,  or  Drvden.  is 
as  much  and  as  often  derived  from  the  force  and  fer- 
vor of  the  describer,  as  from  the  reflections,  forms,  or 

rd  from  the  description  of  Night-Mare  in  the  Re- 
morse : 

ven  !  'I  was  fripbtTal  !  Xow  run  down  and  stared  at 
By  hideous  shapes  that  cannot  be  remembered  ; 
Now  seeing  nothing,  and  imaging  nothing  ; 
But  only  being  afraid — stifled  with  fear! 
While  evry  goodly  or  familiar  form 
Had  a  strange  power  of  spreading  terror  round  me  :" 

N.  B.  Though  Shakspeare  has,  for  his  own  all-juftifymg 
purposes,  introduced  the  Night-.Vars  with  her  own  foals,  yet 
Mair  means  a  Sister,  or  perhaps  a  Hag. 

323 


314 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


incidents,  which  constitute  their  subject  and  mate- 
rials. The  wheels  take  fire  from  the  mere  rapidity 
of  their  motion.  To  what  extent,  and  under  what 
modifications,  this  may  be  admitted  to  act,  I  shall  at- 
tempt to  define  in  an  after  remark  on  Mr.  Words- 
worth's reply  to  this  objection,  or  rather  on  his  objec- 
tion to  this  reply,  as  already  anticipated  in  his  preface. 

Fourthly,  and  as  intimately  connected  with  this,  if 
not  the  same  argument  in  a  more  general  ibrm,  I  ad- 
duce the  high  spiritual  instinct  of  the  human  being, 
impelling  us  to  seek  unity  by  harmonious  adjustment, 
and  thus  establishing  the  principle,  that  all  the  parts 
of  an  organized  whole  must  be  assimilated  to  the 
more  important  and  essential  parts.  This  and  the 
preceding  arguments  may  be  strengthened  by  the  re- 
flection, that  the  composition  of  a  poem  is  among  the 
imitative  arts,  and  that  imitation,  as  opposed  to  copy- 
ing, consists  either  in  the  interfusion  of  the  same, 
throughout  the  radically  different,  or  of  the  differ- 
ent throughout  a  base  radically  the  same. 

Lastly,  I  appeal  to  the  practice  of  the  best  poets  of 
all  countries  and  in  all  ages,  as  authorizing  the  opin- 
ion, (deduced  from  all  the  foregoing,)  that  in  every 
import  of  the  word  essential,  which  would  not  here 
involve  a  mere  truism,  there  may  be,  is,  and  ought  to 
be,  an  essential  difference  between  the  language  of 
prose  and  of  metrical  composition. 

In  Mr.  Wordsworth's  criticism  of  Gray's  Sonnet, 
the  reader's  sympathy  with  his  praise  or  blame  of  the 
different  parts  is  taken  for  granted,  rather  perhaps  too 
easily.  He  has  not,  at  least,  attempted  to  win  or  com- 
pel it  by  argumentative  analysis.  In  my  conception, 
at  least,  the  lines  rejected,  as  of  no  value,  do,  with 
the  exception  of  the  two  first,  differ  as  much  and  as 
little  from  the  language  of  common  life,  as  those 
which  he  has  printed  in  italics,  as  possessing  genuine 
excellence.  Of  the  five  lines  thus  honorably  distin- 
guished, two  of  them  differ  from  prose  even  more 
widely  than  the  lines  which  either  precede  or  follow, 
in  the  position  of  the  words : 

"'  A  different  object  do  these  eyes  require  ; 
My  lonely  anguish  melts  no  heart  but  mine; 
And  in  my  breast  the  imperfect  joys  expire." 

But  were  it  otherwise,  what  would  this  prove,  but 
a  truth,  of  which  no  man  ever  doubted  ?  videlicet, 
that  there  are  sentences  which  would  be  equally  in 
their  place,  both  in  verse  and  prose.  Assuredly,  it 
does  not  prove  the  point,  which  alone  requires  proof, 
namely,  that  there  are  not  passages  which  would  suit 
the  one,  and  not  suit  the  other.  The  first  line  of  this 
sonnet  is  distinguished  from  the  ordinary  language  of 
men  by  the  epithet  to  morning.  (For  we  will  set 
aside,  at  present,  the  consideration  that  the  particular 
word  "smiling"  is  hackneyed,  and,  (as  it  involves  a 
sort  oT  personification,)  not  quite  congruous  with  the 
common  and  material  attribute  of  shi?ii?ig.)  And, 
doubtless,  this  adjunction  of  epithets,  for  the  purpose 
of  additional  description,  where  no  particular  atten- 
tion is  demanded  for  the  quality  of  the  thing,  would 
be  noticed  as  giving  a  poetic  cast  to  a  man's  conver- 
sation. Should  the  sportsman  exclaim,  "come,  boys! 
the  rosy  morn  calls  you  up,"  he  will  be  supposed  to 


have  some  song  in  his  head.  But  no  one  suspects 
this,  when  he  says,  "  a  wet  morning  shall  not  confine 
us  to  our  beds."  This,  then,  is  either  a  defect  in 
poetry,  or  it  is  not.  Whoever  should  decide  in  the 
affirmative,  I  would  request  him  to  re-peruse  any  one 
poem,  of  any  confessedly  great  poet,  from  Homer  to 
Milton,  or  from  Fschylus  to  Shakspeare,  and  to  strike 
out  (in  thought  I  mean)  every  instance  of  this  kind. 
If  the  number  of  these  fancied  erasures  did  not  star- 
tle him,  or  if  he  continued  to  deem  the  work  im- 
proved by  their  total  omission,  he  must  advance  rea- 
sons of  no  ordinary  strength  and  evidence — reasons 
grounded  in  the  essence  of  human  nature;  otherwise 
I  should  not  hesitate  to  consider  him  as  a  man  not  so 
much  proof  against  all  authority,  as  dead  to  it.  The 
second  line, 

"  And  reddening  Phoebus  lifts  his  golden  fire ;" 
has  indeed  almost  as  many  faults  as  words.  But  then 
it  is  a  bad  line,  not  because  the  language  is  distinct 
from  that  of  prose,  but  because  it  conveys  incongru- 
ous images ;  because  it  confounds  the  cause  and  the 
effect,  the  real  thing  with  the  personified  representa- 
tive of  the  thing;  in  short,  because  it  differs  from 
the  language  of  good  sense  !  That  the  "  Phoebus  " 
is  hackneyed,  and  a  school-boy  image,  is  an  accidental 
fault,  dependent  on  the  age  in  which  the  author 
wrote,  and  not  deduced  from  the  nature  of  the 
thing.  That  it  is  part  of  an  exploded  mythology, 
is  an  objection  more  deeply  grounded.  Yet  when 
the  torch  of  ancient  learning  was  re-kindled,  so 
cheering  were  its  beams,  that  our  eldest  poets,  cut 
off  by  Christianity  from  all  accredited  machinery, 
and  deprived  of  all  acknowledged  guardians  and  sym- 
bols of  the  great  objects  of  nature,  were  naturally 
induced  to  adopt,  as  a  poetic  language,  those  fabulous 
personages,  those  forms  of  the  supernatural  in  nature,* 
which  had  given  them  such  dear  delight  in  the 
poems  of  their  great  masters.  Nay,  even  at  this  day, 
what  scholar  of  genial  taste  will  not  so  far  sympa- 
thise with  them,  as  to  read  with  pleasure  in  Pe- 
trarch, Chaucer,  or  Spenser,  what  he  would 
perhaps  condemn  as  puerile  in  a  modern  poet? 

I  remember  no  poet  whose  writings  would  safe- 
lier  stand  the  test  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  theory,  than 
Spenser.  Yet  will  Mr.  Wordsworth  say,  that  the 
style  of  the  following  stanzas  is  either  undistinguish- 
ed from  prose,  and  the  language  of  ordinary  life,  or, 
that  it  is  vicious,  and  that  the  stanzas  are  blots  in  the 
Faery  Queen  ? 

"  By  this  the  northern  wagoner  had  set 
His  sevenfold  teme  behind  the  steadfast  starre, 
That  was  in  ocean  waves  yet  never  wet, 
But  firm  is  lixt  and  aendeth  light  from  farre 
To  all  that  in  the  wild  deep  wandering  are. 
And  cheerful  chanticleer  with  his  note  shrill 
Had  warned  once  that  Phcebus'e  fiery  carre 
In  haste  was  climbing  up  the  eastern  hill. 
Full  envious  that  night  so  long  his  room  did  fill." 
Book  I.  Can.  2.  St.  2. 

*  But  still  more  by  the  mechanical  system  of  philosophy 
which  has  needlessly  infected  our  theological  opinions :  and 
teaching  us  to  consider  the  world  in  its  relation  to  God,  as  of 
a  building  to  its  mason,  leaves  the  idea  of  omnipresence  a 
mere  abstract  notion  in  the  state-room  of  our  reason. 

324 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA 


315 


st  bearen  can  to  open  fayre. 


Cll".    -     I'.;-          -'    :'■"■      :-:>.,-..■ 
• 

awie  hayre. 
eh  gloomy  ayre 

He  started  up.  ud  d  J  aim  «Jf« 
. .  that  pagan  proud  he 

.  Cat. : 

On  the  contrary,  to  how  many  passages,  both  in 
hymn  books  and  in  blank  verse  poems,  could  I  \\  ere 
it  not   .  -  rect  the   rea 

f  which  is  most  unpoetic   because,  and   only 
because,  it  is  the  - 

pose  me  capable  of  having  in  my  mind  such  verses. 
■ 

"  I  put  my  bat  npoa  my  bead, 
:  walk'd  into  the  Mm 
there  I  met  another  mas. 
Whose  bat  was  m  his  ha 

:h  specimens  it  would  indeed  be  a  : 
fall  reply,  that  these  lines  are  not  bad,  beea  . 
are   unpoetic :  bat   because   they  are   empty  of  all 
sense  and  fee 

to  prove  that  an  ape  is  not  a  Newton,  when  it  is 
evident  that  he  is  not  a  man.  But  the  sense  shall  be 
good  and  weighty,  the  language  correct  and  dignified. 

~ct  interesting,  and  trea:- 
yet  the  style  shall,  notwithstanding  all  these  merits. 
be  justly  b'arneable  as  prosaic,  and  solely  because 
the  words  and  the  order  of  tb 
their  appropriate  place  in  prose,  but  are  not  - 
to  metrical  composition.  T..  us  "  of  Daniel. 

is  an  instructive,  and  even  interesting  work;  bat 
take  the  following  stanzas.  ;and  from  the  hundred 
instances  which  abound,  I  might  probably  have  se- 
lected others  far  more  sir. h     . 

■  the  end  we  may  with  better  eaae 
en  the  true  discourse,  vouchsafe  to  show 
: :  ing  near  to  these. 
That  these  we  may  w  r  profit  inow. 

■     E 

And  how  so  great  distemperarar?  c . :   . 

So  shall  we  see  with  what  decrees  ■ 

Bow  things  at  full  do  soon  wax  oat  of  frame." 

"  Ten  kings  had  from  the  Norman  eonqu'ror  reign'd 
- 
■  England  to  her  etc  i 
Of  power,  dominion,  glorj  .-..ite  ; 

After  it  had  with  much  ado  snstaia'd 
The  violence  of  princes  with  debate 
For  titles,  and  the  often  mutinies 

"  For  first  the  Xorman,  conqa'ring  a!l  by  might. 
By  might  was  forced  to  keep  what  he  had  got ; 
Mixing  ear  cnstouw  sod  the  form  of  right 
-.  foreign  coagritatiaas,  he  had  broci 
Mastering  the  mighty,  bombling  the  poorer  wight. 
By  all  severest  me  ins  that  cooid  be  wro  ■ ! 
And  making  the  soccccnioa  doabtful.  rent 
EGs  new-got  sate,  acd  fefl  h  tarta 

B.  1.  Si.  7.  8.  9. 

.'.  be  contended,  on  the  oae  side,  that  these 

•  e  mean  and  senseless  ?    Or,  on  the  other,  that 

they  are  not  prosaic,  and  tor  that  reason  unpoetic  ? 

This  poet's  well-merited  epithet  is  that  of  the  "  trefl- 


langvased  Daniel :"  but  likewise,  and  by  the  consent 
of  his  contemporaries  no  less  than  of  all  succeeding 
critics,  the  -  prosaic  DanieL"  Yet  those,  who  thus 
designate  this  wise  and  amiable  writer,  from  the  fre- 
quent incorrespondency  of  his  diction  to  his  metre  in 
the  majority  of  his  compositions,  not  only  deem  them 

-1  and  interesting  on  other  accounts,  bat  will- 

:  mit.  that  there  are  to  be  found  throughout  his 
poems,  and  especially  in  his  Epistles,  and  in  his  Hy- 
men's Triumph,  many  and  exquisite  specimens  of  that 
style  which,  as  the  neutral  ground  of  prose  and  verse, 
is  common  to  both.  A  fine,  and  almost  faultless  ex- 
tract, eminent  as  for  other  beauties,  so  tor  its  perfec- 

•  lis  species  of  diction,  may  be  seen  in  Lamb's 
mens.  ic.  a  work  of  various  interests 
from  the  nature  of  the  selections  themse'. 
from  the  plays  of  Shakspeare*s  contemporan 
I  deriving  a  high  additional  value  from  the  notes. 
-t  and  original  criticism,  express- 
ed with  all  the  freshness  of  originality. 

Among  the  possible  effects  of  practical  adherence 
to  a  theory,  that  aims  to  identify  the  style  of  prose 
and  verse,  (if  it  does,  indeed,  claim  for  the  latter  a 
yet  nearer  resemblance  to  the  average  style  of  men 
in  the  viva  voce  intercourse  of  real  life,  we  might 
anticipate  the  following,  as  not  the  least  likely  to  oc- 
cur. It  will  happen,  as  I  have  indeed  before  ob- 
served, that  the  metre  itself,  the  sole  acknowledged 
difference,  aril .  f  become  metre  to  the  eye 

only.  The  existence  of  prosaisms,  and  that  they  de- 
tract from  the  merit  of  a  poem,  must  at  length  be 
conceded,  when  a  number  of  successive  lines  can  be 
ted,  even  to  the  most  delicate  ear.  unrecogniz- 
-  verse,  or  as  having  even  been  intended  for 
verse,  by  simply  transcribing  them  as  prose  . 
if  the  poem  be  in  blank  verse,  this  can  be  effected 
without  any  alteration,  or  at  most  by  merely  net 
one  or  two  words  to  their  proper  places,  from  which 

1  been  transplanted*  for  no  assignable  cause 

e  ingenious  gentleman,  under  the  iuflarm)1  of  the 
I  to  dislocate,  "  1  wish  yoa  a  good 
7  taak  yoa.  Sir,  and  I  wish  yoa  the  same." 
into  two  blank  verse  heroics  : 

To  yon  a  morning  good,  good  Sir  '.  I  wish. 
'.  '.hank  :  to  yoa  the  same  wish  I. 
In  those  parts  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  works  which  I  have 
thorough  -  nstances  in  which  this  would 

ne  met  in  many  poems,  where  an  ap- 
prorimihon  of  prose  has  been  sedulously,  and   or 

.  tepting  the   stanzas    already 
quoted  from  the  bar,  I  can  recollect  but  one  in- 

:^s  in  T\e  Bro- 
thers, that  model  of  English  pastoral,  which  I  never  yet  read 
with  unclouded  eye. — "James,  pointing  to  its  surr. 
|  which  they  had  all   purposed   to   return  together,  informed 
I  them  that  he  w    -  m  there.    They  parted,  and 

I  his  comrades  past  none  two  hours  after,  bat  tbey 

did  not  find  him  at  th-  appointed  place,  a  crrcum$t*ne»   of 
I  ir.iicA  tkt'j  took  no  heed ;  bat  oae  of  them  going  by  chance 
into  the  house,  winch  at  this  time  was  James's  house,  learnt 
;  then  that  nobody  had  seen  him  all  that  day."    The  only 
!  change  which  baa  beea  made  is  in  the  position  of  the  little 
word  t\ert  in  two  instances,  the  noairiaa  in  the  original  being 
.  dearly  such  as  is  no  t  adopted  in  ordinary  conversation.    The 
other  words  printed   in  italic*,   were   so   marked    because. 
though  good  aad  genuine  English,  tbey  are  not  the  phrase- 
ology of  rnaiM/m  coaversaaoc  either  in  the  ward  put  in  op- 
2.: 


316 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


or  reason,  but  that  of  the  author's  convenience ;  but 
if  it  be  in  rhyme,  by  the  mere  exchange  of  the  final 
word  of  each  line  for  some  other  of  the  same  mean- 
ing, equally  appropriate,  dignified  and  euphonic. 

The  answer  or  objection  in  the  preface  to  the  an- 
ticipated remark,  "  that  metre  paves  the  way  to  other 
distinctions,"  is  contained  in  the  following  words  : 
"The  distinction  of  rhyme  and  metre  is  voluntary 
and  uniform,  and  not  like  that  produced  by  (what  is 
called)  poetic  diction,  arbitrary,  and  subject  to  infinite 
caprices,  upon  which  no  calculation  whatever  can  be 
made.  In  the  one  case,  the  reader  is  utterly  at  the 
mercy  of  the  poet  respecting  what  imagery  or  diction 
he  may  choose  to  connect  with  the  passion."  But  is 
this  a  poet,  of  whom  a  poet  is  speaking  ?  I\'o,  surely ! 
rather  of  a  fool  or  madman  ;  or,  at  best,  of  a  vain  or 
ignorant  phantast!  And  might  not  brains  so  wild 
and  so  deficient  make  just  the  same  havoc  with 
rhymes  and  metres,  as  they  are  supposed  to  effect 
with  modes  and  figures  of  speech  ?  How  is  the 
reader  at  the  mercy  of  such  men  ?  If  he  continue  to 
read  their  nonsense,  is  it  not  his  own  fault  ?  The 
ultimate  end  of  criticism  is  much  more  to  establish 
the  principles  of  writing,  than  to  furnish  rules  how  to 
pass  judgment  on  what  has  been  written  by  others ; 
if  indeed  it  were  possible  that  the  two  could  be 
separated.  But  if  it  be  asked,  by  what  principles  the 
poet  is  to  regulate  his  own  style,  if  he  do  not  adhere 
closely  to  the  sort  and  order  of  words  which  he  hears 
in  the  market,  wake,  high-road,  or  plough-field?  I 
reply:  by  principles,  the  ignorance  or  neglect  of 
which  would  convict  him  of  being  no  poet,  but  a 
silly  or  presumptuous  usurper  of  the  name !  By  the 
principles  of  grammar,  logic,  psychology!  In  one 
word,  by  such  a  knowledge  of  the  facts,  material  and 
spiritual,  that  most  appertain  to  his  art,  as,  if  it  have 
been  governed  and  applied  by  good  sense,  and  ren- 
dered instinctive  by  habit,  becomes  the  representative 
and  reward  of  our  past  conscious  reasonings,  insights, 
and  conclusions,  and  acquires  the  name  of  taste. 
By  what  rule  that  does  not  leave  the  reader  at  the 
poet's  mercy,  and  the  poet  at  his  own,  is  the  latter  to 
distinguish  between  the  language  suitable  to  sup- 
pressed, and  the  language  which  is  characteristic  of 
indidged,  anger?  Or  between  that  of  rage  and  that 
of  jealousy?  Is  it  obtained  by  wandering  about  in 
search  of  angry  or  jealous  people  in  uncultivated 
society,  in  order  to  copy  their  words  ?  Or  not  far 
rather  by  the  power  of  imagination  proceeding  upon 
the  all  in  each  of  human  nature?  By  meditation, 
rather  than  by  observation  ?  And  by  the  latter  in 
consequence  only  of  the  former  ?  As  eyes,  for 
which  the  former  has  pre-determined  their  field  of 
vision,  and  to  which,  as  to  its  organ,  it  communicates 
a  microscopic  power?  There  is  not,  I  firmly  believe, 
a  man  now  living,  who  has  from  his  own  inward  ex- 
perience, a  clearer  intuition  than   Mr.  Wordsworth 

position,  or  in  the  connection  by  the  genitive  pronoun.  Men 
in  general  would  have  said,  "  but  that  was  a  circumstance 
they  paid  no  attention  to,  or  took  no  notice  of,"  and  the  lan- 
guage is,  on  the  theory  of  the  preface,  justified  only  by  the 
narrator's  being  the  Vicar.  Yet  if  any  ear  could  suspect  that 
these  sentences  were  ever  printed  as  metre,  on  tho60  very 
words  alone  could  the  suspicion  have  been  grounded. 


himself,  that  the  last  mentioned  are  the  true  sources 
of  genial  discrimination.  Through  the  same  process, 
and  by  the  same  creative  agency,  will  the  poet  dis- 
tinguish the  degree  and  kind  of  the  excitement  pro- 
duced by  the  very  act  of  poetic  composition.  As  in- 
tuitively will  he  know,  what  differences  of  style  it 
at  once  inspires  and  justifies;  what  intermixture  of 
conscious  volition  is  natural  to  that  state;  and  in 
what  instances  such  figures  and  colors  of  speech  de- 
generate into  mere  creatures  of  an  arbitrary  purpose, 
cold  technical  artifices  of  ornament  or  connection. 
For  even  as  truth  is  its  own  light  and  evidence,  dis- 
covering at  once  itself  and  falsehood,  so  is  it  the  pre- 
rogative of  poetic  genius  to  distinguish,  by  parental 
instinct,  its  proper  offspring  from  the  changelings 
which  the  gnomes  of  vanity  or  the  fairies  of  fashion 
may  have  laid  in  its  cradle,  or  called  by  its  names. 
Could  a  rule  be  given  from  without,  poetry  would 
cease  to  be  poetry,  and  sink  into  a  mechanical  art. 
It  would  be  [iofxpusis  not  Troinsi;.  The  rules  of  the 
imagination  are  themselves  the  very  powers  of 
growth  and  production.  The  words  to  which  they 
are  deducible  present  only  the  outlines  and  external 
appearance  of  the  fruit.  A  deceptive  counterfeit  of 
the  superficial  form  and  colors  may  be  elaborated  ; 
but  the  marble  peach  feels  cold  and  heavy,  and 
children  only  put  it  to  their  mouths.  We  find  no  dif- 
ficulty in  admitting  as  excellent,  and  the  legitimate 
language  of  poetic  fervor  self-impassioned,  Donne's 
apostrophe  to  the  Sun  in  the  second  stanza  of  his 
"  Progress  of  the  Soul." 

"  Thee,  eye  of  heaven  !  this  great  soul  envies  not: 
By  thy  male  force  is  all  we  have,  begot. 
In  the  first  East  thou  now  beginn'st  to  shine, 
Suck'st  early  balm  and  island  spices  there  ; 
And  wilt  anon  in  thy  loose-rein'd  career 
At  Tagus,  Po,  Seine,  Thames,  and  Danow  dine. 
And  see  at  night  this  western  world  of  mine  : 
Yet  hast  thou  not  more  nations  seen,  than  she. 
Who  before  thee  one  day  began  to  be, 
And,  thy  frail  light  being  quench'd,  shall  long,  long  out-live 
thee  !" 

Or  the  next  stanza  but  one  : 

"  Great  destiny,  the  commissary  of  God, 
That  hast  marked  out  a  path  and  period 
For  ev'ry  thing  !    Who,  where  we  offspring  took. 
Our  ways  and  ends  see'st  at  one  instant  :  thou 
Knot  of  all  causes  :    Thou,  whose  changeless  brow 
Ne'er  smiles  or  frowns  !    O  vouchsafe  thou  to  look 
And  show  my  story  in  thy  eternal  book,"  &c. 

As  little  difficulty  do  we  find  in  excluding  from 
the  honors  of  unaffected  warmth  and  elevation  the 
madness  prepense  of  Pseudo-poesy,  or  the  startling 
hysteric  of  weakness  over-exerting  itself,  which  bursts 
on  the  unprepared  reader  in  sundry  odes  and  apos- 
trophes to  abstract  terms.  Such  are  the  Odes  to 
Jealousy,  to  Hope,  to  Oblivion,  and  the  like  in  Dods- 
ley's  collection,  and  the  magazines  of  that  day,  which 
seldom  fail  to  remind  me  of  an  Oxford  copy  of  verses 
on  the  two  Suttons,  commencing  with 

"  Inoculation,  heavenly  maid!  descend  !" 

It  is  not  to  be  denied  that  men  of  undoubted 
talents,  and  even  poets  of  true,  though  not  of  first- 
rate  genius,  have,  from  a  mistaken  theory,  deluded 
both  themselves  and  others  in  the  opposite  extreme. 
32G 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


317 


t  once  read,  to  a  company  of  sensible  and  well-edu- 
cated women,  the  introductory  period  of  Cowley's 
preface  to  his  "  Pindaric  Odea,  writ/en  in  imitation 
of  the  style  and  manner  of  the  Odes  of  Pindar."  "  If 
(says  Cowley)  a  man  should  undertake  to  translate 
Pindar,  word  for  word,  it  would  be  thought  that  one 
madman  had  translated  another:  as  may  appear, 
when  he,  that  understands  not  the  original,  reads  the 
verbal  traduction  of  him  into  Latin  prose,  than  which 
nothing  seems  more  raving."  I  then  proceeded  with 
his  own  free  version  of  the  second  Olympic,  composed 
for  the  charitable  purpose  of  rationalizing  the  Theban 
Eagle. 

"  Queen  of  all  harmonious  things, 

Dancing:  words  and  speaking  strings, 

What  God,  what  hero,  wilt  thou  sing  % 

What  happy  man  to  equal  glories  bring  1 

Begin,  begin  thy  noble  choice. 

And  let  the  hills  aiound  reflect  the  image  of  thy  voice. 

Pisa  does  to  Jove  belong, 

Jove  and  Pisa  claim  thy  song. 

The  fair  first-fruits  of  war,  th'  Olympic  games, 

Alcides  offer'd  up  to  Jove  ; 

Alcides  to  thy  strings  may  move ! 

But  oh  !  what  man  to  join  with  these  can  worthy  prove  7 

Join  Theron  boldly  to  their  sacred  names  ; 

Theron  the  next  honor  claims; 

Theron  to  no  man  gives  place; 

Is  first  in  Pisa's  and  in  Virtue's  race; 

Theron  there,  and  he  alone, 

E'en  his  own  swift  forefathers  has  outgone.' ' 

One  of  the  company  exclaimed,  with  the  full  assent 
of  the  rest,  that  if  the  original  were  madder  than  this, 
it  must  be  incurably  mad.  I  then  translated  the  ode 
from  the  Greek,  and,  as  nearly  as  possible,  word  for 
word ;  and  the  impression  was,  that  in  the  general 
movement  of  the  periods,  in  the  form  of  the  connec- 
tions and  transitions,  and  in  the  sober  majesty  of  lofty 
sense,  it  appeared  to  them  to  approach  more  nearly 
than  any  other  poetry  they  had  heard,  to  the  style  of 
our  bible  in  the  prophetic  books.  The  first  strophe 
will  suffice  as  a  specimen : 

"Ye  harp-controlling  hymns  '.  (or)  ye  hymns  the  sovereigns 
of  harps ! 

What  God  1  what  Hero  1 

What  man  shall  we  celebrate  1 

Truly  Pisa  is  of  Jove, 

But  the  Olympiad  (or  the  Olympic  games)  did  Hercules  es- 
tablish, 

The  first  fruits  of  the  spoils  of  war. 

But  Theron  for  the  four-horsed  car. 

That  bore  victory  to  him. 

It  behooves  us  now  to  voice  aloud ; 

The  Just,  the  Hospitable, 

The  bulwark  of  Agrigentum, 

Of  renowned  fathers 

The  Flower,  even  htm 

Who  preserves  his  native  city  erect  and  safe." 

But  are  such  rhetorical  caprices  condemnable  only 
for  their  deviation  from  the  language  of  real  life  ? 
and  are  they  by  no  other  means  to  be  precluded,  but 
by  the  rejection  of  all  distinctions  between  prose  and 
verse,  save  that  of  metre?    Surely,  good  sense,  and  a  ' 
moderate  insight  into  the  constitution  of  the  human 
mind,  would  be  amply  sufficient  to  prove,  that  such  ' 
language  and  such  combinations  are  the  native  pro-  I 
duce  neither  of  the  fancy  nor  of  the  imagination ;  that  ! 
their  operation  consists  in  the  excitement  of  surprise 


by  the  juxta-position  and  apparent  reconciliation  of 
widely  different  or  incompatible  things.  As  when, 
for  instance,  the  hills  are  made  to  reflect  the  image 
of  a  voice.  Surely,  no  unusual  taste  is  requisite  to 
see  clearly,  that  this  compulsory  juxta-position  is 
not  produced  by  the  presentation  of  impressive  or  de- 
lightful forms  to  the  inward  vision,  nor  by  any  sym- 
pathy with  the  modifying  powers  with  which  the 
genius  of  the  poet  had  united  and  inspirited  all  the 
objects  of  his  thought ;  that  it  is  therefore  a  species 
of  wit,  a  pure  work  of  the  will,  and  implies  a  leisure 
and  self-possession  both  of  thought  and  of  feeling,  in- 
compatible with  the  steady  fervor  of  a  mind  pos- 
sessed and  filled  with  the  grandeur  of  its  subject.  To 
sum  up  the  whole  in  one  sentence;  When  a  poem, 
or  a  part  of  a  poem,  shall  be  adduced,  which  is  evi- 
dently vicious  in  the  figures  and  contexture  of  its 
style,  yet  for  the  condemnation  of  which  no  reason 
can  be  assigned,  except  that  it  differs  from  the  style 
in  which  men  actually  converse ;  then,  and  not  till 
then,  can  I  hold  this  theory  to  be  either  plausible  or 
practicable,  or  capable  of  furnishing  either  rule,  guid- 
ance, or  precaution,  that  might  not,  more  easily  and 
more  safely,  as  well  as  more  naturally,  have  been 
deduced  in  the  author's  own  mind,  from  considera- 
tions of  grammar,  logic,  and  the  truth  and  nature  of 
things,  confirmed  by  the  authority  of  works,  whose 
fame  is  not  of  one  country,  nor  of  one  age. 


CHAPTER  XIX. 

Continuation — Concerning  the  real  object  which,  it  is  proba- 
ble, Mr.  Wordsworth  had  before  him  in  his  critical  preface- 
Elucidation  and  application  of  this. 

It  might  appear  from  some  passages  in  the  former 
part  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  preface,  that  he  meant  to 
confine  his  theory  of  style,  and  the  necessity  of  a 
close  accordance  with  the  actual  language  of  men,  to 
those  particular  subjects  from  low  and  rustic  life, 
which,  by  way  of  experiment,  he  had  purposed  to 
naturalize  as  a  new  species  in  our  English  poetry. 
But  from  the  train  of  argument  that  follows ;  from 
the  reference  to  Milton ;  and  from  the  spirit  of  his 
critique  on  Gray's  sonnet,  those  sentences  appear  to 
have  been  rather  courtesies  of  modesty  than  actual 
limitations  of  his  system.  Yet  so  groundless  does 
this  system  appear  on  a  close  examination ;  and  so 
strange  and  overwhelming  in  its  consequences,*  that 
I  cannot,  and  I  do  not,  believe  that  the  poet  did  ever 
himself  adopt  it  in  the  unqualified  sense  in  which  his 
expressions   have   been   understood   by  others,  and 

*  I  had  in  my  mind  the  striking  but  untranslatable  epithet, 
which  the  celebrated  Mendelossohn  applied  to  the  great 
founder  of  the  Critical  Philosophy,  "  Dcr  alleszcrmalmende 
Kant,"  i.  e.  the  all-becrushing,  or  rather  the  all-to-nothing- 
crushing  Kant.  In  the  facility  and  force  of  compound  epi- 
thets, the  German,  from  the  number  of  its  cases  and  inflections, 
approaches  to  the  Greek  :  that  language  so 

"  Bless'd  in  the  happy  marriage  of  sweet  words." 

It  is  in  the  woful  harshness  of  its  sounds  alone  that  the 
German  need  shrink  from  the  comparison. 

327 


318 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


which,  indeed,  according  to  all  the  common  laws  of 
interpretation,  they  seem  to  bear.  What  then  did  he 
mean?  I  apprehend,  that  in  the  clear  perception, 
not  unaccompanied  with  disgust  or  contempt,  to  the 
gaudy  affectations  of  a  style  which  passed  too  current 
with  too  many  for  poetic  diction,  (though  in  truth,  it 
had  as  little  pretensions  to  poetry  as  to  logic  or  com- 
mon sense,)  he  narrowed  his  view  for  the  time  j  and 
feeling  a  justifiable  preference  for  the  language  of 
nature  and  of  good  sense,  even  in  its  humblest  and 
least  ornamented  forms,  he  suffered  himself  to  ex- 
press, in  terms  at  once  too  large  and  too  exclusive,  his 
predilection  for  a  style  the  most  remote  possible  from 
the  false  and  showy  splendor  which  he  wished  to  ex- 
plode. It  is  possible,  that  this  predilection,  at.  first 
merely  comparative,  deviated  for  a  time  into  direct 
partiality.  But  the  real  object  which  he  had  in  view 
was,  I  doubt  not,  a  species  of  excellence  which  had 
been  long  before  most  happily  characterized  by  the 
judicious  and  amiable  Carve,  whose  works  are  so 
justly  beloved  and  esteemed  by  the  Germans,  in  his 
remarks  on  Gellert,  (see  Sammlung  Einiger  Ab- 
handlunged  von  Christian  Garve)  from  which  the 
following  is  literally  translated.  "  The  talent  that  is 
required  in  order  to  make  excellent  verses,  is  perhaps 
greater  than  the  philosopher  is  ready  to  admit,  or 
would  find  it  in  his  power  to  acquire:  the  talent  to 
seek  only  the  apt  expression  of  the  thought,  and  yet 
to  find  at  the  same  time  with  it  the  rhyme  and  the 
metre.  Gellert  possessed  this  happy  gift,  if  ever  any 
one  of  our  poets  possessed  it ;  and  nothing  perhaps  con- 
tributed more  to  the  great  and  universal  impression 
which  his  fables  made  on  their  first  publication,  or 
conduces  more  to  their  continued  popularity.  It  was 
a  strange  and  curious  phenomenon,  and  such  as,  in 
Germany,  had  been  previously  unheard  of,  to  read 
verses  in  which  every  thing  was  expressed,  just  as 
one  would  wish  to  talk,  and  yet  all  dignified,  attract- 
ive and  interesting;  and  all  at  the  same  time  per- 
fectly correct  as  to  the  measure  of  the  syllables  and 
the  rhyme.  It  is  certain  that  poetry,  when  it  has  at- 
tained this  excellence,  makes  a  far  greater  impression 
than  prose.  So  much  so,  indeed,  that  even  the  grati- 
fication which  the  very  rhymes  afford,  becomes  then 
no  longer  a  contemptible  or  trifling  gratification." 

However  novel  this  phenomenon  may  have  been 
in  Germany  at  the  time  of  Gellert,  it  is  by  no  means 
new,  nor  yet  of  recent  existence  in  our  language. 
Spite  of  the  licentiousness  with  which  Spenser  occa- 
sionally compels  the  orthography  of  his  words  into  a 
subservience  to  his  rhymes,  the  whole  Fairy  Queen 
is  an  almost  continued  instance  of  this  beauty.  Wal- 
ler's song,  "  Go,  lovely  Hose,"  &c,  is  doubtless  fami- 
liar to  most  of  my  readers ;  but  if  I  had  happened  to 
have  had  by  me  the  Poems  of  Cotton*,  more,  but  far 
less  deservedly,  celebrated  as  ihe  author  of  Virgil  tra- 
vestied, I  should  have  indulged  myself,  and,  1  think, 
have  gratified  many  who  are  not  acquainted  with  his 
serious  works,  hv  selecting  some  admirable  specimens 
of  this  style.  There  are  not  a  few  poems  in  that  vo- 
lume, replete  with  every  excellence  of  thought,  im- 
age, and  passion,  which  we  expect  or  desire  in  the 
poetry  of  the  milder  muse;  and  yet  so  worded,  that 


the  reader  sees  no  one  reason  either  in  the  selection 
or  the  order  of  the  words,  why  he  might  not  ha*"« 
said  the  very  same  in  an  appropriate  conversation, 
and  cannot  conceive  how  indeed  he  could  have  ex- 
pressed such  thoughts  otherwise,  without  loss  or  in- 
jury to  his  meaning. 

But,  in  truth,  our  language  is,  and,  from  the  first 
dawn  of  poetry,  ever  has  been,  particularly  rich  in 
compositions  distinguished  by  this  excellence.  The 
final  e,  which  is  now  mute,  in  Chaucer's  age  was 
either  sounded  or  dropt  indifferently.  We  ourselves 
still  use  either  beloved  or  beluv'd,  according  as  the 
rhyme,  or  measure,  or  the  purpose  of  more  or  less  so- 
lemnity may  require.  Let  the  reader,  then,  only 
adopt  the  pronunciation  of  the  poet,  and  of  the  court 
at  which  he  lived,  both  with_  respect  to  the  final  t 
and  to  the  accentuation  of  the  last  syllable,  I  would 
then  venture  to  ask  what,  even  in  the  colloquial  lan- 
guage of  elegant  and  unaffected  women,  (who  are  the 
peculiar  mistresses  of"  pure  English,  and  undefiled,") 
what  could  we  hear  more  natural,  or  seemingly  more 
unstudied,  than  the  following  stanzas  from  Chaucer's 
Troilus  and  Creseide. 

"  And  after  this  forth  to  the  gate  he  went. 
Ther  as  Creseide  out  rode  a  full  gode  paas : 
And  up  and  doun  there  made  he  many  a  wente, 
And  to  himself  full  oft  he  said,  Alas! 
Fro  hennis  rode  my  blisae  and  my  solas : 
As  would  blissful  God  now  for  his  joie, 
I  might  her  sene  agen  come  into  Troie  ! 
And  to  the  yonder  hill  I  gan  her  guide, 
Alas!  and  there  1  took  of  her  my  leave: 
And  yond  I  saw  her  to  her  fathir  ride ; 
For  sorrow  of  which  my  hcarte  shall  to-cleve ; 
And  hithir  home  I  came  when  it  was  eve  ; 
And  here  I  dwell  ;  out-cast  from  alle  joie, 
And  shall,  til  I  maie  seen  her  efte  in  Troie. 
And  of  himselfe  imaginid  he  ofte 
To  ben  defaitid,  pale  and  waxen  less 
Than  he  was  wonte,  and  that  men  saidin  softe, 
What  may  it  be  1    Who  can  the  sothe  guess, 
Why  Troilus  hath  all  this  heaviness  1 
And  al  this  n'  as  but  his  melancholie. 
That  he  had  of  himselfe  such  phantasie. 
Another  time  imaginin  he  would 
That  every  wight,  that  passed  him  by  the  wey 
Had  of  him  roulhe,  and  that  they  saien  should, 
I  am  right  sorry,  Troiius  will  die  ! 
And  thus  he  drove  a  daie  yet  forth  or  twey. 
As  ye  have  herde  :  suche  life  gan  he  to  lede 
As  he  thai  strove  betwi.xin  hope  and  drede  : 

For  which  him  likid  in  his  songis  shewe 
Th'  eucheson  of  his  wo  as  he  best  might. 
And  made  a  songe  of  wordis  but  a  fewe, 
Somewhat  his  woefull  herle  for  to  light. 
And  when  he  was  from  every  mann'is  sight 
Willi  softe  voice  he  of  his  lady  dere, 
That  absent  was,  gan  sing  as  ye  may  hear  : 
*  *  *  *  *         *         * 

This  song  when  he  thus  sonsin  had,  full  soon 
He  fell  again  into  his  sighis  olde  : 
And  every  night,  as  was  his  wonte  to  done, 
He  stode  the  bright  moone  to  beholde. 
And  all  his  sorrowc  lo  the  moone  ho  tolde, 
And  said  :   1  wis,  when  thou  art  hornid  newe, 
1  shall  be  glad,  if  al  the  world  be  trewe!" 

Another  exquisite  master  of  this  species  of  style, 

where  the  scholar  and  the  poet  supplies  the  material, 

but  the  perfect  well-bred  gentleman  the  expressions 

and  the  arrangement,  is  George  Herbert.    As  from 

328 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


319 


the  nature  of  the  subject,  and  the  too  frequent  quaint, 
ness  of  the  thoughts,  his  "  Temple,  or  Sacred  Poems 
and  Private  Ejaculations,"  ire  comparatively  hut  lit- 
tle known.  1  shall  extract  two  poems.  The  first  is  a 
sonnet,  equally  admirable  for  the  weight,  number, 
and  expression  of  the  thoughts,  and  fir  the  simple  dig- 
nity of  the  language.  (Unless,  indeed,  a  fastidious 
taste  >hould  object  to  the  latter  half  of  the  sixth  line.) 
The  second  is  a  poem  of  greater  length,  which  1  have 
chosen  not  only  for  the  present  purpose,  but,  likewise, 
as  a  Btriking  example  and  illustration  of  an  assertion 
hazarded  in  a  former  page  of  these  sketches  :  namely, 
Jhat  the  characteristic  fault  of  our  elder  poets  is  the 
reverse  of  that  which  distinguishes  too  many  of  our 
more  recent  versifiers;  the  one  conveying  the  most 
fantastic  thoughts  in  the  most  correct  and  natural  lan- 
guage ;  the  other  in  the  most  fantastic  language  con- 
veying the  most  trivial  thoughts.  The  latter  is  a  rid- 
dle of  words;  the  former  an  enigma  of  thoughts.  The 
one  reminds  me  of  an  odd  passage  in  Drayton's  Ideas  : 

SONNET  IX. 

As  other  men,  so  I  myself  do  muse, 
Why  in  this  sort  I  wrest  invention  so  ; 
And  why  these  giddy  metaphors  I  use, 
Leaving  the  path  the  greater  part  do  go? 
I  will  resolve  you  :  /  am  lunatic! 

The  other  recalls  a  still  odder  passage  in  the  "  Syn- 
agogue; or  the  Shadow  of  the  Temple,"  a  connected 
series  of  poems  in  imitation  of  Herbert's  "Temple," 
and  in  some  editions  annexed  to  it. 

O  how  my  mind 
Is  gravell'd ! 

Not  a  thought, 
That  I  can  find, 

But 's  ravell'd 

All  to  nought ! 
Short  ends  of  threds. 

And  narrow  shreds 

Of  lists ; 
Knot's  snarled  ruffs, 

Loose  broken  tufts 
Of  twists; 
Are  my  torn  meditation's  ragged  clothing, 
Which,  wound   and  woven,  shape  a  sute  for  nothing: 
One  while  I  think,  and  then  I  am  in  pain 
To  think  how  to  unthink  that  thought  again  ! 
Immediately  after  these  burlesque  passages,  I  can- 
not proceed  to  the  extracts  promised,  without  chang- 
ing the  ludicrous  tone  of  feeling  by  the  interposition 
of  the  three  following  stanzas  of  Herbert's: 

VIRTUE. 
Sweet  day,  so  cool,  so  calm,  so  bright. 
The  bridal  of  the  earth  and  sky : 
The  dew  shall  weep  thy  fall  to-night, 

For  thou  must  dye  ! 
Sweet  rose,  whose  hue  angry  and  brave 
Bids  the  rash  gazer  wipo  his  eye : 
Thy  root  is  ever  in  its  grave. 

And  thou  must  dye! 
Sweet  sprinff,  full  of  sweet  days  and  roses, 
A  nest,   where  sweets  compacted   lie  : 
My  music  shows  ye  have  your  closes, 

And  all  must  dye  ! 

THE    BOSOM-SIX. 

A  Sonnet,  by  George  Herbert. 
Lord,  with  what  care  hast  thou  begirt  us  round  1 
Parents  first  season  us  ;  then  schoolmasters 

22  Dd 


Deliver  us  to  laws ;  they  send  us  hound 

To  rules  of  reason,  holy  messengers, 
Pulpits  and  Sundays,  sorrow  dogging  sin, 

Afflictions  sorted,  anguish  of  all  6izes. 

Fine  nets  and  stratagems  to  catch  us  in, 
Bibles  laid  open,  millions  of  surprises; 
Blessings  before  hand,  ties  of  gratefulness, 

The  sound  of  glory  ringing  in  our  ears  : 

Without,  our  shame  ;  within,  our  consciences  ; 
Angels  and  grace,  eternal  hopes  and  fears  ! 

Yet  all  these  fences,  and  their  whole  array, 

One  cunning  bosom-sin  blows  quite  away. 

LOVE   UNKNOWN. 

Dear  friend,  sit  down,  the  tale  is  long  and  sad  ; 

And  in  my  fiiutings,  I  presume,  your  love 

Will  more  comply  than  help.    A  Lord  I  had, 

And  have,  of  whom  some  grounds,  which  may  improve, 

I  hold  for  two  lives,  and  both  lives  in  me. 

To  him  I  brought  a  dish  of  fruit  one  day 

And  in  the  middle  placed  my  heart.    But  he 

(I  sigh  to  say) 
Lookt  on  a  servant  who  did  know  his  eye, 
Better  than  you  knew  me,  or  (which  is  one) 
Than  I  myself.    The  servant  instantly, 
Quitting  the  fruit,  seiz'd  on  my  heart  alone. 
And  threw  it  in  a  font,  wherein  did  fall 
A  stream  of  blood,  which  issued  from  the  side 
Of  a  great  rock  :  I  well  remember  all. 
And  have  good  cause :  there  it  was  dipt  and  dy'd, 
And  washt,  and  wrung  !   the  very  ringing  yet 
Enforcoth  tears.     Your  heart  was  foul,  I  fear. 
Indeed  'tis  true.    1  did  and  do  commit 
Many  a  fault,  more  than  my  lease  will  bear ; 
Yet  still  ask'd  pardon,  and  was  not  deny'd. 
But  you  shall  hear.    After  my  heart  was  well, 
And  clean  and  fair,  as  I  one  eventide, 

(I  sigh  to  tell.) 
Walkt  by  myself  abroad,  I  saw  a  large 
And  spacious  furnace  flaming,  and  thereon 
A  boiling  caldron,  round  about  whose  verge 
Was  in  great  letters  set  AFFLICTION. 
The  greatness  show'd  the  owner.    So  I  went 
To  fetch  a  sacrifice  out  of  my  fold. 
Thinking  with  that,  which  I  did  thus  present. 
To  warm  his  love,  which,  I  did  fear,  grew  cold. 
But  as  my  heart  did  tender  it,  the  man 
Who  was  to  take  it  from  me,  slip!  his  hand, 
And  threw  my  heart  into  the  scalding  pan  ; 
My  heart  that  brought  it  (do  you  understand  ?) 
The  offerer's  heart.     Your  heart  was  hard,  J  fear. 
Indeed  'tis  true.    I  found  a  callous  matter 
Began  to  spread  and  to  expatiate  there : 
But  with  a  richer  blood  than  scalding  water 
I  bathed  it  often,  e  en  with  holy  blood, 
Which  at  a  board,  while  many  drank  bare  wine, 
A  friend  did  steal  into  my  cup  for  good, 
E'en  taken  inwardly,  and  most  divine 
To  supple  hardnesses.    But  at  the  length 
Out  of  the  caldron  getting,  soon  I  tied 
Unto  my  house,  where  to  repair  the  strength 
Which  I  had  lost,  I  hasted  to  my  bed  ; 
But  when  I  thought  to  sleep  out  all  these  faults, 

(I  sigh  to  speak.) 
I  found  that  some  had  stuff  d  the  bed  with  thoughts, 
I  would  say  thorns.    Dear,  could  my  heart  not  break, 
When  with  my  pleasures  even  my  rest  was  gone  ? 
Full  well  I  understood  who  had  been  there  ; 
For  I  had  given  the  key  to  none  but  one  : 
It  must  be  he.     Your  heart  was  dull,  I  fear. 
Indeed  a  slack  and  sleepy  state  of  mind 
Did  oft  possess  me  ;  so  that  when  I  pray'd, 
Though  my  lips  went,  my  heart  did  Btay  behind. 
But  all  my  scores  were  by  another  paid, 
Who  tocik  my  guilt  upon  him.     Truly ,  friend ; 
For  ought  I  hear,  your  master  shows  to  you 
More  favor  than  you  wot  of.    Marie  the  end! 
The  font  did  only  what  was  old  renew  : 
The  caldron  mppled  what  was  grown  too  hard : 
The  thorn*  did  Quieten  what  was  grown  too  dull : 
329 


G20 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


All  did  but  strive  to  mend  what  you  had  marr'd. 
Wherefore  be  cheer' d  and  praise  him  to  the  full 
Kach  day.  each  hour,  each  moment  of  the  week, 
IV ho  fain  would  have  you  be  new,  tender,  quick ! 


CHAPTER  XX. 

The  former  subject  continued — The  neutral  style,  or  that 
common  to  Prose  and  Poetry,  exemplified  by  specimens 
from  Chaucer,  Herbert,  &.c. 

I  have  no  fear  in  declaring  my  conviction,  that  the 
excellence  defined  and  exemplified  in  the  preceding 
(Jhapter  is  not  the  characteristic  excellence  of  Mr. 
Wordsworth's  style ;  because  I  can  add  with  equal 
sincerity,  that  it  is  precluded  by  higher  powers.  The 
praise  of  uniform  adherence  to  genuine,  logical  Eng- 
lish, is  undoubtedly  his ;  nay,  laying  the  main  em- 
phasis on  the  word  uniform,  I  will  dare  add,  that  of 
all  contemporary  poets,  it  is  his  alone.  For  in  a  less 
absolute  sense  of  the  word,  I  should  certainly  include 
Mr.  Bowles,  Lord  Byron,  and,  as  to  all  his  later 
writings,  Mr.  Soutiiey,  the  exceptions  in  their  works 
being  so  few  and  unimportant.  But  of  the  specific 
excellence  described  in  the  quotation  from  Garve,  I 
appear  to  find  more  and  more  undoubted  specimens 
in  the  work  of  others;  for  instance,  among  the  minor 
poems  of  Mr.  Thomas  Moore,  and  of  our  illustrious 
Laureate.  To  me  it  will  always  remain  a  singular 
and  noticeable  fact,  that  a  theory  which  would  estab- 
lish this  lingua  communis,  not  only  as  the  best,  but  as 
the  only  commendable  style,  should  have  proceeded 
from  a  poet  whose  diction,  next  to  that  of  Shakspeare 
and  Milton,  appears  to  me  of  all  others  the  most  indi- 
vidualized and  characteristic.  And  let  it  be  remem- 
bered, too,  that  I  am  now  interpreting  the  controvert- 
ed passages  of  Mr.  W.'s  critical  preface  by  the  pur- 
pose and  object  which  he  may  be  supposed  to  have 
intended,  rather  than  by  the  sense  which  the  words 
themselves  must  convey,  if  they  are  taken  without 
this  allowance. 

A  person  of  any  taste,  who  had  but  studied  three 
or  four  of  Shakspeare's  principal  plays,  would,  with- 
out the  name  affixed,  scarcely  fail  to  recognize  as 
Shakspeare's,  a  quotation  from  any  other  play,  though 
but  of  a  few  lines.  A  similar  peculiarity,  though  in 
a  less  degree,  attends  Mr.  Wordsworth's  style,  when- 
ever he  speaks  in  his  own  person;  or  whenever, 
though  under  a  feigned  name,  it  is  clear  that  he  him- 
self is  still  speaking,  as  in  the  different  dramatis  per- 
sona? of  the  "  Reci.use."  Even  in  the  other  poems 
in  which  he  purposes  to  be  most  dramatic,  there  are 
few  in  which  it  does  not  occasionally  burst  forth. 
The  reader  might  often  address  the  poet  in  his  own 
words  with  reference  to  the  persons  introduced: 

"  It  seems,  as  1  retrace  the  ballad  line  by  line, 
Thai  but  half  of  it  U  theirs,  and  the  better  half  is  thine." 

Who,  having  been  previously  acquainted  with  any 
considerable  portion  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  publica- 
tions, and  having  studied  them  with  a  full  feeling  of 
the  author's  genius,  would  not  at  once  claim  as 
Wordsworthian,  the  little  poem  on  the  rainbow  ? 

"The  child  is  father  of  the  m^n,  &c." 


Or  in  the  "  Lucy  Gray  ?" 

"  No  mate,  no  comrade  Lucy  knew ; 
She  dwelt  on  a  wide  moor; 
The  sweetest  thin/;  that  ever  grew 
Beside  a  human  door" 

Or  in  the  "  Idle  Shepherd-boys?" 

"  Along  the  river's  stony  marge 
The  sand-lark  chants  a  joyous  song  ; 
The  thrush  is  busy  in  the  wood. 
And  carols  loud  and  strong. 
A  thousand  lambs  are  on  the  rock. 
All  newly  born  !  both  earth  and  sky 
Keep  jubilee,  and  more  than  all. 
Those  boys  with  their  green  corona), 
They  never  hear  the  cry, 
That  plaintive  cry  which  up  the  hill 
Comes  frum  the  depth  of  Dungeon  GUI." 

Need  I  mention  the  exquisite  description  of  the  Sea 
Lock  in  the  "  Blind  Highland  Boy."  Who  but  a  poet 
tells  a  tale  in  such  language  to  the  little  ones  by  the 
fireside  as — 

"Yet  had  he  many  a  restless  dream, 
Both  when  he  heard  the  eagle's  scream. 
And  when  he  heard  the  torrent's  roar, 
And  heard  the  water  beat  the  shore 

Near  where  their  cottage  Etood. 

Reside  a  lake  their  cottage  stood, 
Not  small  like  ours  a  peaceful  flood; 
But  one  of  mighty  size,  and  strange 
That  rough  or  smooth  is  full  of  change 
And  stirring  in  its  bed. 

For  to  this  lake  by  niirht  and  day. 
The  great  sea-water  finds  its  way 
Through  long,  long  windings  of  the  hills, 
And  drinks  up  all  the  pretty  rills ; 

And  rivers  large  and  strong  : 

Then  hurries  back  the  road  it  came — 
Returns  on  errand  still  the  same  ; 
This  did  it  when  the  earth  was  new ; 
And  this  fur  evermore  will  do, 

As  long  as  earth  shall  last. 

And  with  the  coming  of  the  tide, 
Come  boats  and  ships  that  sweetly  ride. 
Between  the  woods  and  lofty  rocks  ; 
And  to  the  shepherd  with  their  flocks 
Bring  tales  of  distant  lands." 

I  might  quote  almost  the  whole  of  his  "  Ruth,' 
but  take  the  following  stanzas : 

"  But  as  you  have  before  been  told, 
This  stripling,  sportive,  gay  and  bold, 
And  with  his  dancing  crest, 
Po  beautiful,  through  savage  lands 
Had  roam'd  about  with  vagrant  bands 
Of  Indians  in  the  West. 

The  wind,  the  tempest  roaring  high. 
The  tumult  of  n  tropic  sky, 
Blight  well  be  dangerous  food 
For  him,  a  youth  to  whom  was  given 
So  much  of  earth,  so  much  of  heaven. 
And  such  impetuous  blood. 

Whatever  in  those  climes  he  found 

Irresular  in  sielit  or  sound, 

Did  to  his  mind  imparl 

A  kindred  impulse;  seem'd  allied 

To  his  own  powers,  and  justified 

The  workings  of  his  heart. 

Nor  less  to  feed  voluptuous  thought 
The  beauteous  forms  of  nature  wrought, 
330 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


32  i 


Fair  trees  and  lovely  flowers ; 
The  breeze?  their  own  languor  lent. 
The  stars  had  feelings,  which  they  sent 
Into  those  magic  bowers. 

Yet  in  his  worst  pursuits,  I  ween. 
That  sometimes  there  did  intervene 
Pure  hopes  of  high  intent. 
For  passions,  linked  to  forms  so  fair 
And  stately,  needs  must  have  their  share 
Of  noble  sentiment." 

But  from  Mr.  Wordsworth's  more  elevated  compo- 
sitions, which  already  form  three-fourths  of  his  works ; 
and  will,  I  trust,  constitute  hereafter  a  still  larger 
proportion; — from  these,  whether  in  rhyme. or  blank 
verse,  it  would  be  difficult,  and  almost  superfluous, 
to  select  instances  of  a  diction  peculiarly  his  own;  of 
a  style  which  cannot  be  imitated  without  its  being 
at  once  recognized,  as  originating  in  Mr.  Words- 
worth. It  would  not  be  easy  to  open  on  any  one  of 
his  loftier  strains,  that  does  not  contain  examples  of 
this;  and  more  in  proportion  as  the  lines  are  more 
excellent,  and  most  like  the  author.  For  those  who 
may  happen  to  have  been  less  familiar  with  his 
writings,  I  will  give  three  specimens  taken  with  little 
choice.  The  first  from  the  lines  on  the  "  Boy  of 
Winander-Mere," — who 

"  Blew  mimic  hootings  to  the  silent  owls, 
That  they  might  answer  him.    And  they  would  shout, 
Across  the  watery  vale  and  shout  again 
With  long  halloos,  and  screams,  and  echoes  loud 
Redoubled  and  redoubled,  concourse  wild 
Of  mirth,  and  jocund  din.    And  when  it  chane'd. 
That  pauses  of  deep  silence  mock'd  his  skill, 
Then  sometimes  in  that  silence,  while  he  hung 
Listening,  a  gentle  shock  of  mild  surprise 
Has  carried  far  into  his  heart  the  voice 
Of  mountain  torrents  ;  or  the  visible  scene* 
Would  enter  unawares  into  his  mind 
With  all  its  solemn  imagery,  its  rocks. 
Its  woods,  and  that  uncertain  heaven,  received 
Into  the  bosom  of  the  steady  lake." 

*  Mr.  Wordworlh's  having  judiciously  adopted  "  concourse 
wild"  in  this  passage  for  "  a  wild  scene"  as  it  stood  in  the 
former  edition,  encourages  me  to  hazard  a  remark,  which  I 
certainly  should  not  have  mode  in  the  works  of  a  poet  less 
austerely  accurate  in  the  use  of  words,  than  he  is,  to  his  own 
great  honor.  It  respects  the  propriety  of  the  word  "  scene" 
even  in  the  sentence  in  which  it  is  retained.  Dryden,  and  he 
only  in  his  more  careless  verses,  was  the  first,  as  far  as  my 
researches  have  discovered,  who  for  the  convenience  of  rhyme 
used  this  word  in  the  vague  sense,  which  has  been  since  too 
current,  even  in  our  best  writers,  and  which  (unfortunately,  1 
think)  is  given  as  its  first  explanation  in  Dr.  Johnson's  Dic- 
tionary, and  therefore  would  be  taken  by  an  incautious  reader 
as  its  proper  sense.  In  Shakspeare  and  Milton,  the  word  is 
never  used  without  some  clear  reference,  proper  or  meta- 
phorical, to  the  theatre.    Thus  Milton  ; 

• 

"Cedar  and  pine,  and  fir,  and  branching  palm, 
A  sylvan  scene ;  and  as  the  ranks  ascend 
Shade  above  shade,  a  woody  theatre 
Of  stateliest  view." 

I  object  to  any  extension  of  its  meaning,  because  the  word 
is  already  more  equivocal  than  might  be  wished  ;  inasmuch 
as  in  the  limited  use  which  1  recommend,  it  may  still  signify 
two  different  things  ;  namely,  the  6cenery,  and  the  characters 
and  actions  presented  on  (he  stage  during  the  presence  of 
particular  scenes.  It  can  therefore  be  preserved  from  ob- 
scurity only  by  keeping  the  original  signification  full  in  the 
mind.    Thus  Milton  again  ; 

"  Prepare  thou  for  another  scene." 


The  second  shall  be  that  noble  imitation  of  Dray- 
tont  (if  it  was  not  rather  a  coincidence)  in  the  "Jo- 
anna." 

"  When  I  had  gazed  perhaps  two  minutes'  space, 
Jonnna,  looking  in  my  eyes,  beheld 
That  ravishment  of  mine,  and  laugh'd  aloud. 
The  rock,  like  something  starting  from  a  sleep, 
Took  up  the  lady's  voice,  and  laugh'd  again  ! 
That  ancient  woman  seated  on  Helm-crag 
Was  ready  with  her  cavern  !    Hammar-scar, 
And  the  tall  steep  of  Silver-How,  sent  forth 
A  noise  of  laughter :  southern  Loughrigg  heard. 
And  Fairfield  ahswered  with  a  mountain  tone. 
Helvillon  far  into  the  clear  blue  sky 
Carried  the  lady's  voice  ! — old  Skiddaw  blew 
His  speaking  trumpet ! — back  out  of  the  clouds 
From  Glaramara  southward  came  the  voice  : 
And  Kirkstonc  tossed  it  from  his  misty  head  !" 

The  third,  which  is  in  rhyme,  I  take  from  the 
"  Song  at  the  feast  of  Brougham  Castle  upon  the  re- 
storation of  Lord  Clifford,  the  shepherd  to  the  estates 
of  his  ancestors." 

"  Now  another  day  is  come 
Fitter  hopes,  and  nobler  doom: 
He  hath  thrown  aside  his  crook. 
And  hath  buried  deep  his  book  ; 
Armour  rusting  in  the  halls 
On  the  blood  of  Clifford  calls  ; 
Quell  the  Scot,  exclaims  the  lance ! 
Bear  me  to  the  heart  of  France, 
Is  the  longing  of  the  shield — 
Tell  thy  name,  thou  trembling  field! 
Field  of  death,  where'er  thou  be, 
Groan  thou  with  our  victory! 
Happy  day,  and  mighty  hour, 
When  our  shepherd,  in  his  power, 
Mailed  and  horsed  with  lance  and  sword, 
To  his  ancestors  restored. 
Like  a  re-appearing  star, 
Like  a  glory  from  afar, 
First  shall  head  the  flock  of  war  .'" 

Alas  !  the  fervent  harper  did  not  know, 
That  for  a  tranquil  soul  the  lay  was  framed, 
Who,  long  compelled  in  humble  walks  to  go, 
Was  softened  into  feeling,  soothed,  and  tamed. 
Love  had  he  found  in  huts  where  poor  men  lie  - 
His  daily  teachers  had  been  woods  and  rdls, 
The  silciice  that  is  in  the  starry  sky. 
The  sleep  that  is  among  the  lonely  hills." 

The  words  themselves  in  the  foregoing  extracts 
are,  no  doubt,  sufficiently  common,  for  the  greater 
part.  (But  in  what  poem  are  they  not  so?  if  we  ex- 
cept a  few  misad venturous  attempts  to  translate  the 
arts  and  sciences  into  verse  ?)  In  the  "  Excursion," 
the  number  of  polysyllabic  (or  what  the  common 
people  call,  dicliovar;/)  words  is  more  than  usually 
great.  (And  so  must  it  needs  be,  in  proportion  to  the 
number  and  variety  of  an  author's  conception,  and 
his  solicitude  to  express  them  with  precision.)    But 


t  Which  Copland  scarce  had  spoke,  but  quickly  every  hill 
Upon  her  verge  that  stands,  the  neighboring  valleys  fill : 
Helvillon  from  his  height,  it  through  the  mountains  threw, 
From  whom  as  soon  again,  the  sound  Dunbalrase  drew, 
From  whose  stone-trophied  head,  it  on  the  Wtndross  went. 
Which,  tow'rde  the  sea  again,  icsuunded  it  to  Dent  : 
That  Broadwater,  therewith  within  her  banks  astound, 
In  sailing  to  the  sea  told  it  to  Egremound, 
Whose  buildings,  walks,  and  streets,  with  echoes  loud  and 

long, 
Did  mightily  commend  old  Copland  for  her  song  ! 

Drayton's  Polyolbion  :  Song  XXX. 
331 


322 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


are  those  words  in  those  places,  commonly  employed 
in  real  life  to  express  the  same  thought  or  outward 
thing  ?  Are  they  the  style  used  in  the  ordinary  in- 
tercourse of  spoken  words  ?  No !  nor  are  the  modes 
of  connexions  :  and  still  less  the  breaks  and  transi- 
tions. Would  any  but  a  poet — at  least  could  anyone 
without  being  conscious  that  he  had  expressed  him- 
self with  noticeable  vivacity — have  described  a  bird 
singing  loud,  by  "  The  thrush  is  busy  in  the  wood  ?" 
Or  have  spoken  of  boys  with  a  string  of  club-moss 
round  their  rusty  hats,  as  the  boys  "  with  their  green 
coronal  V  Or  have  translated  a  beautiful  Mayday, 
into  "Both  earth  and  sky  keep  jubilee?"  Or  have 
brought  all  the  different  marks  and  circumstances  of 
a  sea-lock  before  the  mind,  as  the  actions  of  a  living 
and  acting  power  ?  Or  have  represented  the  reflec- 
tion of  the  sky  in  the  water,  as  "  That  uncertain  hea- 
ven received  into  the  bosom  of  the  steady  lake  ?"  Even 
the  grammatical  construction  is  not  unfrequently  pe- 
culiar ;  as  "  The  wind,  the  tempest  roaring  high,  the 
tumult  of  a  tropic  sky,  might  well  be  dangerous  food 
to  him,  a  youth  to  whom  was  given,  &c."  There  is 
a  peculiarity  in  the  frequent  use  of  the  aswapr/jdv 
(i.  e.  the  omission  of  the  connective  particle  before 
the  last  of  several  words,  or  several  sentences,  used 
grammatically  as  single  words,  all  being  in  the  same 
case,  and  governing  or  governed  by  the  same  verb) 
and  not  less  in  the  construction  of  words  by  apposi- 
tion (to  him  a  youth.)  In  short,  were  there  excluded 
from  Mr.  Wordsworth's  poetic  compositions  all  that  a 
literal  adherence  to  the  theory  of  his  preface  would 
exclude,  two-thirds  at  least,  of  the  marked  beauties 
of  his  poetry  must  be  erased.  For  a  far  greater 
number  of  lines  would  be  sacrificed,  than  in  any 
other  recent  poet;  because  the  pleasure  received 
from  Wordsworth's  poems  being  less  derived  either 
from  excitement  of  curiosity,  or  the  rapid  flow  of 
narration,  the  striking  passages  form  a  larger  propor- 
tion of  their  value.  I  do  not  adduce  it  as  a  fair  crite- 
rion of  comparative  excellence,  nor  do  I  even  think 
it  such  ;  but  merely  as  matter  of  fact.  I  affirm,  that 
from  no  contemporary  writer  could  so  many  lines  be 
quoted,  without  reference  to  the  poem  in  which  they 
are  found,  for  their  own  independent  weight  or 
beauty.  From  the  sphere  of  my  own  experience  I 
can  bring  to  my  recollection  three  persons  of  no  every 
day  powers  and  acquirements,  who  had  read  the 
poems  of  others  with  more  and  more  nnallayed  plea- 
sure, and  had  thought  more  highly  of  their  authors, 
as  poets ;  who  yet  have  confessed  to  me,  that  from 
no  modern  work  had  so  many  passages  started  up 
anew  in  their  minds  at  different  times,  and  as  differ- 
ent occasions  had  awakened  a  meditative  mood. 


CHAPTER  XXI. 

Remarks  on  the  present  mode  of  conducting  critical  journals. 

Long  have  I  wished  to  see  a  fair  and  philosophical 
'nquisition  into  the  character  of  Wordsworth,  as  a 
poet,  on  the  evidence  of  his  published  works ;  and  a 
positive,  not  a  comparative,  appreciation  of  their 


characteristic  excellences,  deficiencies,  and  defects. 
I  know  no  claim,  that  the  mere  opinion  of  any  indi- 
vidual can  have  to  weigh  down  the  opinion  of  the 
author  himself;  against  the  probability  of  whose  pa- 
rental partiality  we  ought  to  set  that  of  his  having 
thought  longer  and  more  deeply  on  the  subject.  But 
I  should  call  that  investigation  fair  and  philosophical, 
in  which  the  critic  announces  and  endeavors  to  es- 
tablish the  principles,  which  he  holds  for  the  founda- 
tion of  poetry  in  general,  with  the  specification  of 
these  in  their  application  to  the  different  classes  of 
poetry.  Having  thus  prepared  his  canons  of  criticism 
for  praise  and  condemnation,  he  would  proceed  to 
particularize  the  most  striking  passages  to  which  he 
deems  them  applicable,  faithfully  noticing  the  fre- 
quent or  infrequent  recurrence  of  similar  merits  or 
defects,  and  as  faithfully  distinguishing  what  is  cha- 
racteristic from  what  is  accidental,  or  a  mere  flag- 
ging of  the  wing.  Then,  if  his  premises  be  rational, 
his  deductions  legitimate,  and  his  conclusions  justly 
applied,  the  reader,  and  possibly  the  poet  himself, 
may  adopt  his  judgment  in  the  light  of  judgment,  and 
in  the  independence  of  free  agency.  If  he  has  erred, 
he  presents  his  errors  in  a  definite  place  and  tangible 
form,  and  holds  the  torch  and  guides  the  way  to  their 
detection. 

I  most  willingly  admit,  and  estimate  at  a  high  value, 
the  services  which  the  Edinburgh  Review,  and 
others  formed  afterwards  on  the  same  plan,  have 
rendered  to  society  in  the  diffusion  of  knowledge.  I 
think  the  commencement  of  the  Edinburgh  Review, 
an  important  epoch  in  periodical  criticism;  and  that 
it  has  a  claim  upon  the  gratitude  of  the  literary  re- 
public, and,  indeed,  of  the  reading  public  at  large,  for 
having  originated  the  scheme  of  reviewing  those 
books  only  which  are  susceptible  and  deserving  of 
argumentative  criticism.  Not  less  meritorious,  and 
far  more  faithfully,  and,  in  general,  far  more  ably 
executed,  is  their  plan  of  supplying  the  vacant  place 
of  the  trash  of  mediocrity,  wisely  left  to  sink  into  ob- 
livion by  their  own  weight,  with  original  essays  on 
the  most  interesting  subjects  of  the  time,  religious  or 
political ;  in  which  the  titles  of  the  books  or  pam- 
phlets prefixed  furnish  only  the  name  and  occasion 
of  the  disquisition.  I  do  not  arraign  the  keenness  or 
asperity  of  its  damnatory  style,  in  and  for  itself,  as 
long  as  the  author  is  addressed  or  treated  as  the  mere 
impersonation  of  the  work  then  under  trial.  I  have 
no  quarrel  with  them  on  this  account,  so  long  as  no 
personal  allusions  are  admitted,  and  no  recommit- 
ment (for  new  trial)  of  juvenile  performances,  that 
wet%  published,  perhaps  forgotten,  many  years  before 
the  commencement  of  the  review :  since  for  the 
forcing  back  of  such  works  to  public  notice  no  mo- 
tives are  easily  assignable,  but  such  as  are  furnished 
to  the  critic  by  his  own  personal  malignity;  or  what 
is  still  worse,  by  a  habit  of  malignity  in  the  form  of 
mere  wantonness. 

"  No  private  grmlsre  they  need,  no  personal  spite 
The  viva  sectio  is  its  own  delight! 
All  enmity,  all  envy,  they  disclaim. 
Disinterested  thieves  of  our  good  name: 
Cool,  sober  murderers  of  their  neighbor's  fame  !" 

S.  T.  C. 
332 


BIOGRAPIHA  LITERARIA. 


323 


Every  censure,  even-  sarcasm  respecting  a  publi- 
cation which  the  cntic,  with  the  criticised  work 
before  him.  can  make  good,  is  the  critic's  right.  The 
writer  is  authorized  to  reply,  but  not  to  complain. 
rVeither  can  any  one  prescribe  to  the  cntic.  how  soft 
or  how  hard  ;  how  friendly  or  how  bitter,  shall  be 
the  phrases  which  he  is  to  select  for  the  expression 
of  such  reprehension  or  ridicule.  The  critic  must 
know  what  effect  it  is  his  object  to  produce:  and 
with  a  view  to  this  effect  must  he  weigh  his  words. 
But  as  soon  as  the  critic  betrays  that  he  knows  more 
of  his  author  than  the  author's  publications  could 
have  told  him:  as  soon  as  from  this  more  intimate 
knowledge,  elsewhere  obiained.  he  avails  himself  of 
the  slightest  trait  against  the  author,  his  censure  in- 
stantly becomes  jtrsonal  injury,  his  sarcasms  person- 
al insults.  He  ceases  to  be  a  critic,  and  takes  upon 
him  the  most  contemptible  character  to  which  a 
rational  creature  can  be  degraded,  that  of  a  gossip, 
backbiter,  and  pasquillant :  but  with  this  heavy  ag- 
gravation, that  he  steals  the  unquiet,  the  deforming 
passions  of  the  World  into  the  Museum  :  into  the 
verv  place,  which,  nest  to  the  chapel  or  oratory, 
should  be  our  sanctuarv.  and  secure  place  of  refuge; 
offers  abominations  on  the  altar  of  the  muses :  and 
makes  its  sacred  paling  the  very  circle  in  which  he 
conjures  up  the  lying  and  profane  spirit. 

This  determination  of  unlicensed  personality,  and 
of  permitted  and  legitimate  censure  which  I  owe  in 
part  to  the  illustrious  Lessing,  himself  a  model  of 
acute,  spirited,  sometimes  stinging,  but  always  argu- 
mentative and  honorable  criticism  is  beyond  contro- 
versv,  the  true  one  :  and  though  I  would  not  myself 
exercise  all  the  rights  of  the  latter,  yet,  let  but  the 
former  be  excluded.  I  submit  myself  to  its  exercise 
in  the  hands  of  others,  without  complaint  and  with- 
out resentment. 

Let  a  communication  be  formed  between  any  num- 
ber of  learned  men  in  the  various  branches  of  sci- 
ence and  literature;  and  whether  the  President  and 
central  committee  be  in  London  or  Edinburgh,  if  only 
they  previously  lay  aside  their  individuality,  and 
pledge  themselves  inwardly,  as  well  as  ostensibly, 
to  administer  judgment  according  to  a  constitution 
and  code  of  laws  :  and  if  by  grounding  this  code  on 
the  two-fold  basis  of  universal  morals  and  philosophic 
reason,  independent  of  all  foreseen  application  to 
particular  works  and  authors,  they  obtain  the  right 
to  speak  each  as  the  representative  of  their  body 
corporate:  thev  shall  have  honor  and  good  wishes 
from  me,  and  1  shall  accord  to  them  their  fair  digni- 
ties, though  self  assumed,  not  less  cheerfully,  than  if 
I  could  inquire  concerning  them  in  the  herald's 
office,  or  turn  to  them  in  the  book  of  peerag- 
ever  loud  mav  be  the  outcries  for  prevented  or  sub- 
verted reputation,  however  numerous  and  impatient 
the  complaints  of  merciless  seventy  and  insupport- 
able despotism.  I  shall  neither  feel  nor  utter  aught 
but  to  the  defence  and  justification  of  the  critical 
machine.  Should  anv  literary  Quixote  find 
provoked  bv  its  sounds  and  regular  movements.  I 
should  admonish  him  with  Sancho  Panza,  that  it  is 
no  giant,  but  a  windmill :  there  it  stands  on  its  own 
DdS 


place,  and  its  own  hillock,  never  goes  out  of  its  way 
to  attack  any  one,  and  to  none  and  from  none  either 
gives  or  asks  assistance.  When  the  public  press  has 
poured  in  any  part  of  its  produce  between  its  mill- 
stones, it  grinds  it  off  one  man's  sack  the  same  as 
another,  and  w  ith  whatever  wind  may  happen  to  be 
then  blowing.  All  the  two  and  thirty  winds  are 
alike  its  friends.  Of  the  whole  wide  atmosphere  it 
does  not  desire  a  single  fintrer  breadth  more  than 
what  is  necessary  for  its  sails  to  turn  round  in.  But 
this  space  must  be  left  free  and  unimpeded.  Gnats, 
beetles,  wasps,  butterflies,  and  the  whole  tribe  of 
ephemerals  and  insignificants.  may  flit  in  and  out  and 
between;  may  hum,  and  buzz,  and  jarr;  may  shrill 
their  tiny  pipes,  and  wind  their  puny  horns  unchas- 
tised  and  unnoticed.  But  idlers  and  bravadoes  of  a 
hrger  size  and  prouder  show  must  beware  how  thev 
place  themselves  within  its  sweep.  Much  less  may 
they  presume  to  lav  hands  on  the  sails,  the  strength 
of  which  is  neither  greater  or  less  than  as  the  wind 
is.  which  drives  them  round.  Whomsoever  the  re- 
morseless arm  siings  aloft,  or  whirls  along  with  it 
in  the  air.  he  has  himself  alone  to  blame :  though 
when  the  same  arm  throws  him  from  it.  it  will  more 
often  double  than  break  the  force  of  his  fall. 

Puttins  aside  the  too  manifest  and  too  frequent 
interference  of  national  tarty,  and  even  person- 
al predilection  or  aversion  :  and  reserving  for  deeper 
feelings  those  worse  and  more  criminal  intrusions  in- 
to the  sacredness  of  private  life,  which  not  seldom 
merit  legal  rather  than  literary  chastisement,  the  two 
principal  objects  and  occasions  which  I  find  for 
blame  and  regret  in  the  conduct  of  the  review  in 
question  are  :  first,  its  unfaithfulness  to  its  own  an- 
nounced and  excellent  plan,  by  subjecting  to  criticism 
works  neither  indecent  or  immoral,  yet  of  such  tn- 
ortance  even  in  point  of  size  and  according 
to  the  critic's  own  verdict,  so  devoid  of  all  merit,  as 
must  excite  in  the  most  candid  mind  the  suspicion, 
either  that  dislike  or  vindictive  feelings  were  at  work, 
or  that  there  was  a  cold  prudential  pre-determination 
to  increase  the  sale  of  the  review,  by  flattering  the 
malignant  passions  of  human  nature.  That  I  may 
not  ravself  become  subject  to  the  charge  which  I  am 
brineing  against  others  by  an  accusation  without 
proof.  1  refer  to  the  article  on  Dr.  Rennell's  sermon. 
.  er  of  the  Edinburgh  Review  as 
-ration  of  mv  meaning.  Ifin  looking  through 
all  the  -  volumes  the  reader  should  find 

this  a  solitary  instance.  I  must  submit  to  that  painful 
forfeiture  of  esteem,  which  awaits  a  groundless  or 
'ed  charce. 

The  second  point  of  objection  belongs  to  thus  re- 
view onlv  in  common  with  all  other  works  of  period- 
".  ~i>m  :  nr  least,  it  applies  in  common  to  the 
eeneral  svstem  of  all.  whatever  exception  there  may 
be  in  favor  of  particular  articles.  Or  if  it  attaches 
to  the  Edinburgh  Review,  and  to  its  only  co-riva' 
Li  with  any  peculiar  force;  this  re 
suits  from  the  superiority  of  talent,  acquirement  and 
information,  which  both  have  so  undeniably  display- 
ed ;  and  which  doubtless  deepens  the  regret,  though 
-•lame  I  am  referrins  to  the  substitution  of 
333 


CO'LERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


assertion  for  argument ;  to  the  frequency  of  arbi- 
tration and  sometimes  petulant  verdicts,  not  seldom 
unsupported  even  by  a  single  quotation  from  the 
work  condemned,  which  might  at  least  have  explain- 
ed the  critic's  meaning,  if  it  did  not  prove  the  justice 
of  his  sentence.  Even  where  this  is  not  the  case, 
the  exiracts  are  too  often  made,  without  reference  to 
any  general  grounds  or  rules,  from  which  the  faulti- 
ness  or  inadmissibility  of  the  qualities  attributed, 
may  be  deduced  ;  and  without  any  attempt  to  show, 
that  the  qualities  are  attributable  to  the  passage  ex- 
tracted. I  have  met  with  such  extracts  from  Mr. 
Wordsworth's  poems,  annexed  to  such  assertions,  as 
led  me  to  imagine  that  the  reviewer,  having  written 
his  critique  before  he  had  read  the  work,  had  then 
pricked  with  a  pin  for  passages,  wherewith  to  illus- 
trate the  various  branches  of  his  preconceived  opin- 
ions. By  what  principle  of  rational  choice  can  we 
suppose  a  critic  to  have  been  directed  (at  least  in  a 
Christian  country,  and  himself,  we  hope,  a  Christian) 
who  gives  the  following  lines,  portraying  the  fervor 
of  solitary  devotion  excited  by  the  magnificent  dis- 
play of  the  Almighty's  w:orks,  as  a  proof  and  ex- 
ample of  an  author's  tendency  to  downright  ravings 
and  absolute  unintelligibility. 


"O  then  what  soul  was  his,  when  on  the  tops 
Of  thn  high  mountains  he  beheld  the  sun 
Rise  up,  and  bathe  the  world  in  light '.    He  looked — 
Ocean  and  earth,  the  solid  frame  of  earth, 
And  ocean's  liquid  mass,  beneath  him  lay 
In  gladness  and  deep  joy.    Tin:  clouds  were  touched, 
And  ia  their  silent  faces  did  be  read 
Unutterable  love  !  Sound  needed  none. 
Nor  any  voice  of  joy  :   his  spirit  drank 
The  spectacle !  sensation,  soul,  and  form, 
All  melted  into  him.    They  swallowed  up 
Hia  animal  being  ;  in  them  did  he  live. 
And  by  them  did  he  live:  they  were  his  life." 

(Excursion.) 


Can  it  be  expected,  that  either  the  author  or  his 
admirers,  should  be  induced  to  pay  any  serious  atten- 
tion to  decisions  which  prove  nothing  but  the  pitiable 
state  of  the  critic's  own  taste  and  sensibility?  On 
opening  the  Review  they  see  a  favorite  passage,  of 
the  force  and  truth  of  which  they  had  an  intuitive 
certainty  in  their  own  inward  experience,  confirmed, 
if  confirmation  it  could  receive,  by  the  sympathy  of 
their  most  enlightened  friends ;  some  of  whom,  per- 
haps, even  in  the  world's  opinion,  hold  a  higher 
intellectual  rank  than  the  critic  himself  would  pre- 
sume to  claim.  And  this  very  passage  they  find 
selected  as  the  characteristic  effusion  of  a  mind 
deserted  by  reason :  as  furnishing  evidence  that  the 
writer  was  raving,  or  he  could  not  have  thus  strung 
words  together  without  sense  or  purpose !  No  di- 
versity of  taste  seems  capable  of  explaining  such  a 
contrast  in  judgment. 

That  I  had  over-rated  the  merit  of  a  passage  or 
poem ;  that  I  had  erred  concerning  the  degree  of  its 
excellence,  I  might  be  easily  induced  to  believe  or 
apprehend.  But  that  lines,  the  sense  of  which  I  had 
analysed  and  found  consonant  with  all  the  best  con- 


victions of  my  understanding ;  and  the  imager)'  and 
diction  of  which  had  collected  round  those  convic- 
tions my  noblest,  as  well  as  my  most  delightful  feel- 
ings; that  I  should  admit  such  lines  to  be  mere 
nonseiise  or  lunacy,  is  too  much  for  the  most  ingeni- 
ous arguments  to  effect.  But  that  such  a  revolution 
of  taste  should  be  brought  about  by  a  few  broad  as- 
sertions, seems  little  less  than  impossible.  On  the 
contrary,  it  would  require  an  effort  of  charity  not  to 
dismiss  the  criticism  with  the  aphorism  of  the  wise 
man,  in  animam  malevolam  sapientia  haud  intrare 
potest. 

What,  then,  if  this  very  critic  should  have  cited  a 
large  number  of  single  lines,  and  even  of  long  para- 
graphs, which  he  himself  acknowledges  to  possess 
eminent  and  original  beauty?  What  if  he  himself  has 
owned,  that  beauties  as  great  are  scattered  in  abun- 
dance throughout  the  whole  book?  And  yet,  though 
under  this  impression,  should  have  commenced  his 
critique  in  vulgar  exultation,  with  a  prophecy  meant 
to  secure  its  own  fulfilment?  With  a  "This  won't 
do!"  What?  if  after  such  acknowledgments,  ex- 
torted from  his  own  judgment,  he  should  proceed 
from  charge  to  charge  of  tameness,  and  raving; 
flights  and  flatness;  and  at  length,  consigning  the  au- 
thor to  the  house  of  incurables,  should  conclude  with 
a  strain  of  rudest  contempt,  evidently  grounded  in 
the  distempered  state  of  his  own  moral  associations? 
Suppose,  too,  all  this  done  without  a  single  leading 
principle  established  or  even  announced,  and  without 
any  one  attempt  at  argumentative  deduction,  though 
the  poet  had  presented  a  more  than  usual  opportunity 
for  it,  by  having  previously  made  public  his  own 
principles  of  judgment  in  poetry,  and  supported  them 
by  a  connected  train  of  reasoning! 

The  office  and  duty  of  the  poet  is  to  select  the 
most  dignified  as  well  as 

"  The  happiest,  gayest  attitude  of  things." 

The  reverse,  for  in  all  cases  a  reverse  is  possible,  is 
the  appropriate  business  of  burlesque  and  travesty,  a 
predominant  taste  for  which,  has  been  always  deemed 
a  mark  of  a  low  and  degraded  mind.  When  I  was 
at  Rome,  among  many  other  visits  to  the  tomb  of  Ju- 
lius II.,  1  went  thither  once  with  a  Prussian  artist,  a 
man  of  genius  and  great  vivacity  of  feeling.  As  we 
were  gazing  on  Michael  Angelo's  Moses,  our  con- 
versation turned  on  the  horns  and  beard  of  that  stu- 
pendous statue ;  of  the  necessity  of  each  to  support 
the  other;  of  the  super-human  effect  of  the  former, 
and  the  necessity  of  the  existence  of  both  to  give  a 
harmony  and  integrity  both  to  the  image  and  the  feel- 
ing excited  by  it.  Conceive  them  removed,  and  the 
statue  would  become  u?i-natural,  without  being  super- 
natural.  We  called  to  mind  the  horns  of  the  rising 
sun,  and  I  repeated  the  noble  passage  from  Taylor's 
Holy  Dying.  That  horns  were  the  emblem  of  pow  er 
and  sovereignty  among  the  Eastern  nations,  and  are 
still  retained  as  such  in  Abyssinia;  the  Achelous  of 
the  ancient  Greeks ;  and  the  probable  ideas  and  feel- 
ings, that  originally  suggested  the  mixture  of  the  hu- 
man and  the  brute  form  in  the  figure,  by  which  they 
334 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


325 


realized  the  idea  of  their  mysterious  Pan,  as  repre- 
senting intelligence  blended  with  a  darker  power, 
deeper,  mightier,  and  more  universal  than  the  con- 
scious intellect  of  man;  than  intelligence; — all  these 
thoughts  and  recollections  passed  in  procession  be- 
fore our  minds.  My  companion,  who  possessed  more 
than  his  share  of  the  hatred  which  his  countrymen 
bore  to  the  French,  had  just  observed  to  me,  "  a 
Frenchman,  Sir!  is  the  only  animal  in  the  human 
shape,  that  by  no  possibility  can  lift  itself  tip  to  reli- 
gion or  poetry :"  when,  lo !  two  French  officers  of 
distinction  and  rank  entered  the  church !  "  Mark 
you,"  whispered  the  Prussian,  "the  first  thing  which 
those  scoundrels  will  notice,  (for  they  will  bruin  by 
instantly  noticing  the  statue  in  parts,  without  one  mo- 
ment's pause  of  admiration  impressed  by  the  whole,) 
will  be  the  horns  and  the  beard.  And  the  associations, 
which  they  will  immediately  connect  with  them,  will  be 
those  of  a  he-goat  and  a  cuckold."  Never  did  man 
guess  more  luckily-  Had  he  inherited  a  portion  of 
the  great  legislator's  prophetic  powers,  whose  statue 
we  had  been  contemplating,  he  could  scarcely  have 
uttered  words  more  coincident  with  the  result ;  for 
even  as  he  had  said  so  it  came  to  pass. 

In  the  Excursion-,  the  poet  has  introduced  an  old 
man,  born  in  humble  but  not  abject  circumstances, 
who  had  enjoyed  more  than  usual  advantages  of  edu- 
cation, both  from  books  and  from  the  more  awful  dis- 
cipline of  nature.  This  person  he  represents,  as  hav- 
ing been  driven  by  the  restlessness  of  fervid  feelings, 
and  from  a  craving  intellect  to  an  itinerant  life ;  and 
as  having  in  consequence  passed  the  larger  portion 
of  his  time,  from  earliest  manhood,  in  villages  and 
hamlets  from  door  to  door, 

"  A  vagrant  merchant  bent  beneath  his  load." 

Now  whether  this  be  a  character  appropriate  to  a 
lofty  didactic  poem,  is,  perhaps,  questionable.  It  pre- 
sents a  fair  subject  for  controversy ;  and  the  question 
is  to  be  determined  by  the  congruiivor  incongruity 
of  such  a  character,  with  what  shall  be  proved  to  be 
the  essential  constituents  of  poetry.  But  surely  the 
critic,  who,  passing  by  all  the  opportunities  which 
such  a  mode  of  life  would  present  to  such  a  man  ;  all 
the  advantages  of  the  liberty  of  nature,  of  solitude 
and  of  solitary  thought ;  all  the  varieties  of  places  and 
Masons,  through  which  his  track  had  lain,  with  all 
the  varying  imagery  they  bring  with  them;  and, 
lastly,  all  the  observations  of  men, 

"  Their  manners,  their  enjoyments  and  pursuits. 
Their  passions  and  their  feelings," 

which  the  memory  of  these  yearly  journeys  must 
have  given  and  recalled  to  such  a  mind — the  critic,  I 
say.  who,  from  the  multitude  of  possible  associations 
should  pass  by  all  these,  in  order  to  fix  his  attention 
exclusively  on  the  pin  papers,  and  slay  tapes,  which 
might  have  been  among  the  wares  of  his  pack;  this 
critic,  in  my  opinion,  cannot  be  thought  to  possess  a 
much  higher  or  much  healthier  state  of  moral  feeling, 
than  the  Fre.nch.mex  above  recorded. 


CHAPTER  XXII. 

The  characteristic  defects  of  Wordsworth's  poetry,  with  the 
principles  from  which  the  judgment,  that  they  are  defects, 
is  deduced — Their  proportion  to  the  beauties — For  the 
greatest  part  characteristic  of  his  theory  only. 

If  Mr.  Wordsworth  have  set  forth  principles  of 
poetry  which  Ins  arguments  are  insufficient  to  sup- 
port, let  him  and  those  who  have  adopted  his  senti- 
ments be  set  right  by  the  confutation  of  those  argu- 
ments, and  by  the  substitution  of  more  philosophical 
principles.  And  still  let  the  due  credit  be  given  to 
the  portion  and  importance  of  the  truths  which  are 
blended  with  his  theory;  truths,  the  too  exclusive  at- 
tention to  which  had  occasioned  its  errors,  by  tempt- 
ing him  to  carry  those  truths  beyond  their  proper 
limits.  If  his  mistaken  theory  have  at  all  influenced 
his  poetic  compositions,  let  the  effects  be  pointed  out, 
and  the  instances  given.  But  let  it  likewise  be 
shown,  how  far  the  influence  has  acted:  whether  dif- 
fusively, or  only  by  starts;  whether  the  number  and 
importance  of  the  poems  and  passages  thus  infected 
be  great  or  trifling  compared  with  the  sound  portion; 
and,  lastly,  whether  they  are  inwoven  into  the  tex- 
ture of  his  works,  or  are  loose  and  separable.  The 
result  of  such  a  trial  would  evince,  beyond  a  doubt, 
what  it  is  high  time  to  announce  decisively  and  aloud, 
that  the  supposed  characteristics  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's 
poetry,  whether  admired  or  reprobated ;  whether 
they  are  simplicity  or  simpleness  ;  faithful  adherence 
to  essential  nature,  or  wilful  selections  from  human 
nature  of  its  meanest  forms  and  under  the  least  at- 
tractive associations ;  are  as  little  the  real  character- 
istics of  his  poetry  at  large,  as  of  his  genius  and  the 
constitution  of  his  mind. 

In  a  comparatively  small  number  of  poems,  he 
chose  to  try  an  experiment ;  and  this  experiment  we 
will  suppose  to  have  failed.  Yet  even  in  these  po- 
ems it  is  impossible  not  to  perceive,  that  the  natural 
tendency  of  the  poet's  mind  is  to  great  objects  and 
elevated  conceptions.  The  poem  entitled  "  Fidelity," 
is,  for  the  greater  part,  written  in  language  as  un- 
raised  and  naked  as  any  perhaps  in  the  two  volumes. 
Yet  take  the  following  stanza,  and  compare  it  with 
the  preceding  stanzas  of  the  same  poem : 

"  There  sometimes  does  a  leaping  fish 
Send  through  the  tarn  a  lonely  cheer  ; 
The  crags  repeat  the  Raven's  croak 
In  symphony  austere; 
Thiiher  the  rainbow  comes — the  cloud. 
And  mists  that  spread  the  flying  shroud  ; 
And  sun-beams:  and  the  sounding  blast, 
That  if  it  could  would  hurry  past, 
But  that  enormous  barrier  binds  it  fast." 

Or  compare  the  four  last  lines  of  the  concluding 
stanza  with  the  former  half: 

"  Yet  proof  was  plain,  that  since  the  day 
On  which  the  traveller  thus  had  died. 
The  dog  had  watch'd  about  Ihe  spot, 
Or  by  his  master's  side  : 
How  nourish' d  there  for  such  long  time 
He  knows  who  gave  that  love  sublime, 
A. A  gave  that  strength  of  feeling,  great 
Above  all  human  estimate." 

335 


326 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Can  any  candid  and  intelligent  mind  hesitate  in 
determining,  which  of  these  best  represents  the  ten- 
dency and  native  character  of  the  poet's  genius  ?  Will 
he  not  decide  that  the  one  was  so  written  because 
the  poet  would  so  write,  and  the  other  because  he 
could  not  so  entirely  repress  the  force  and  grandeur 
of  his  mind,  but  that  he  must  in  some  part  or  other 
of  every  composition  wfrite  otherwise?  In  short,  that 
his  only  disease  is  the  being  out  of  his  element;  like 
the  swan,  that  having  amused  himself  for  a  while, 
with  crushing  the  weeds  on  the  river's  bank,  soon  re- 
turns to  his  own  majestic  movements  on  its  reflecting 
and  sustaining  surface.  Let  it  be  observed,  that  I 
am  here  supposing  the  imagined  judge,  to  whom  I 
appeal,  to  have  already  decided  against  the  poet's  the- 
ory, as  far  as  it  is  different  from  the  principles  of  the 
art  generally  acknowledged. 

I  cannot  here  enter  into  a  detailed  examination  of 
Mr.  Wordsworth's  works ;  but  I  will  attempt  to  give 
the  main  results  of  my  own  judgment,  after  an  ac- 
quaintance of  many  years,  and  repeated  perusals. 
And  though,  to  appreciate  the  defects  of  a  great  mind, 
it  is  necessary  to  understand  previously  its  character- 
istic excellences,  yet  I  have  already  expressed  myself 
with  sufficient  fulness,  to  preclude  most  of  the  ill  ef- 
fects that  might  arise  from  my  pursuing  a  contrary 
arrangement.  I  will  therefore  commence  with  what 
I  deem  the  prominent  defects  of  his  poems  hitherto 
published. 

The  first  characteristic,  though  only  occasional,  de- 
fect, which  I  appear  to  myself  to  find  in  those  poems 
is  the  inconstancy  of  the  style.  Under  this  name  1 
refer  to  the  sudden  and  unprepared  transitions  from 
lines  or  sentences  of  peculiar  felicity,  (at  all  events 
striking  and  original)  to  a  style,  not  only  unimpas- 
sioned  but  undistinguished.  He  sinks  too  often  and 
too  abruptly  to  that  style  which  I  should  place  in  the 
second  division  of  language,  dividing  it  into  the  three 
species  ;  first,  that  which  is  peculiar  to  poetry ;  second, 
that  which  is  only  proper  in  prose;  and,  third,  the 
neutral,  or  common  to  both.  There  have  been  works, 
such  as  Cowley's  Essay  on  Cromwell,  in  which  prose 
and  verse  are  intermixed  (not  as  in  the  Consolation 
of  Boetius  or  the  Argenis  of  Barclay,  by  the  insertion 
of  poems  supposed  to  have  been  spoken  or  composed 
on  occasions  previously  related  in  prose,  but)  the  poet 
passing  from  one  to  the  other,  as  the  nature  of  his 
thoughts  or  his  own  feelings  dictated.  Yet  this  mode 
of  composition  does  not  satisfy  a  cultivated  taste. 
There  is  something  unpleasant  in  the  being  thus 
obliged  to  alternate  states  of  feeling  so  dissimilar,  and 
this  too,  in  a  species  of  writing,  the  pleasure  from 
which  is  in  part  derived  from  the  preparation  and 
previous  expectation  of  the  reader.  A  portion  of  that 
awkwardness  is  felt  which  hangs  upon  the  introduc- 
tion of  songs  in  our  modern  comic  operas ;  and  to  pre- 
vent which  the  judicious  Metastasio  (as  to  whose  ex- 
quisite taste  there  can  be  no  hesitation,  whatever 
doubts  may  be  entertained  as  to  his  poetic  genius)  uni- 
formly placed  the  aria  at  the  end  of  the  scene,  at  the 
same  time  that  he  almost  always  raises  and  impas- 
sions the  style  of  the  recitative  immediately  preced- 
ing.   Even  in  real  life,  the  difference  is  great  and 


evident  between  words  used  as  the  arbitrary  marks 
of  thought,  our  smooth  market-coin  of  intercourse  with 
the  image  and  superscription  worn  out  by  currency, 
and  those  which  convey  pictures,  either  borrowed 
from  one  outward  object  to  enliven  and  particularize 
some  other ;  or  used  allegorically,  to  body  forth  the 
inward  slate  of  the  person  speaking;  or  such  as  are 
at  least  the  exponents  of  his  peculiar  turn  and  unu- 
sual extent  of  faculty.  So  much  so  indeed,  that  in 
the  social  circles  of  private  life  we  often  find  a  strik- 
ing use  of  the  latter  put  a  stop  to  the  general  flow  of 
conversation,  and  by  the  excitement  arising  from  con- 
centrated attention,  produce  a  sort  of  damp  and  inter- 
ruption for  some  minutes  after.  But  in  the  perusal 
of  works  of  literary  art,  we  prepare  ourselves  for  such 
language ;  and  the  business  of  the  w  riter,  like  that 
of  a  painter  whose  subject  requires  unusual  splendor 
and  prominence,  is  so  to  raise  the  lower  and  neutral 
tints  that  what  in  a  different  style  would  be  the  com- 
manding  colors,  are  here  used  as  the  means  of  that 
gentle  gradation  requisite  in  order  to  produce  the  ef- 
fect of  a  whole.  Where  this  is  not  achieved  in  a  poem, 
the  metre  merely  reminds  the  reader  of  his  claims, 
in  order  to  disappoint  them;  and  where  this  defect 
occurs  frequently,  his  feelings  are  alternately  startled 
by  anticlimax  and  hyperclimax. 

I  refer  the  reader  to  the  exquisite  stanzas  cited  for 
another  purpose  from  the  blind  Highland  Boy;  and 
then  annex,  as  being,  in  my  opinion,  instances  of  this 
disharmony  in  style,  the  two  following  : 

"  And  one,  the  rarest,  was  a  shell, 
Which  he,  poor  child,  had  studied  well : 
The  shell  of  a  green  turtle,  thin 
And  hollow  ; — you  might  sit  therein, 
It  was  so  wide  and  deep." 

"  Ouv  Highland  hoy  oft  visited 
The  house  which  held  this  prize,  and  led 
By  choice  or  chance  did  thither  come 
One  day,  when  no  one  was  at  home, 
And  found  the  door  unbarred." 

Or  page  172,  vol  I. 

"  'Tis  gone,  forgotten,  let  ■Fie  do 
My  best.    There  was  a  smile  or  two — 
1  can  remember  them,  I  see 
The  smiles  worth  all  the  world  to  me. 
Pear  Baby,  I  must  lay  thee  down  : 
Thou  troublest  me  with  strange  alarms  ! 
Smiles  hast  thou,  sweet  ones  of  thine  own  ; 
I  cannot  keep  thee  in  my  arms. 
For  they  confound  me  :   as  it  is, 
I  have  forgot,  those  smiles  of  his  !" 

Or  page  2fi9,  vol.  I. 

"Thou  hast  a  nest,  for  thy  love  and  thy  rest, 
And  though  little  troubled  with  sloth, 
Drunken  lark  :  thou  would'st  be  loth 
To  be  such  a  traveller  as  I. 

Happy,  happy  liver, 
U'Hli  a  soil!  as  strong  as  a  mountain  river. 
Pouring  out  praise  to  th'  Almighty  Giver. 
.toy  and  jollity  be  wilh  us  both, 
Hearing  thee  or  else  some  other, 

As  merry  a  brother  : 
I  on  the  earth  will  go  plodding  on 
By  myself,  cheerfully,  till  the  day  is  done." 

The  incongruity  which  I  appear  to  find  in  this 
passage,  is  that  of  the  two  noble  lines  in  italics  with 
the  preceding  and  following.     So  vol.  II.  page  30. 
336 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


327 


•'  Close  by  a  pond,  upon  the  further  side 
Ho  stood  alone,  a  minute's  space  I  guess, 
I  watched  him,  he  continuing  motionless  ; 
To  the  pools  further  margin  then  I  drew  ; 
He  being  all  the  while  before  me  in  full  view.' 

Compare  this  with  a  repetition  of  the  same  image, 
in  the  next  stanza  but  two. 

"  And  still  as  I  drew  near  with  gentle  pace. 
Beside  the  little  pond  or  moorish  flood. 
Motionless  as  a  cloud  the  old  man  stood  ; 
That  heareth  not  the  loud  winds  as  they  call, 
And  moveth  altogether,  if  it  move  at  all." 

Or  lastly,  the  second  of  the  three  following  stanzas, 
compared  both  with  the  first  and  the  third. 

"My  former  thoughts  returned,  the  fear  that  kills. 
And  hope  that  is  unwilling  to  he  fed  ; 
Cold,  pain,  and  labor  and  all  fleshly  ills ; 
And  mighty  poets  in  their  misery  dead. 
But  now,  perplex'd  by  what  the  old  man  had  said, 
My  question  eagerly  did  I  renew. 
How  is  it  that  you  live,  and  what  is  it  you  do  ? 

He  with  a  smile  did  then  his  tale  repeat  ; 
And  said  that  gathering  leeches  far  and  wide 
He  travelled  :  stirring  thus  about  his  feet 
The  waters  of  the  ponds  where  they  abide. 
"  Once  I  could  meet  with  them  on  every  side, 
"  But  they  have  dwindled  long  by  slow  decay ; 
"  Yet  still  I  persevere,  and  find  them  where  I  may." 
While  he  was  talking  thus,  the  lonely  place, 
The  old  man's  shape,  and  speech  all  troubled  me  : 
In  my  mind's  eye  I  seemed  to  see  him  pace 
About  the  weary  moors  continually. 
Wandering  about,  alone  and  silently." 

Indeed  this  fine  poem  is  especially  characteristic  of 
the  author.  There  is  scarce  a  defect  or  excellence 
in  his  writings  of  which  it  would  not  present  a  speci- 
men. But  it  would  be  unjust  not  to  repeat  that  this 
defect  is  only  occasional.  From  a  careful  reperusal 
of  the  two  volumes  of  poems,  I  doubt  whether  the 
objectionable  passages  would  amount  in  the  whole 
to  one  hundred  lines ;  not  the  eighth  part  of  the  num- 
ber of  pages.  In  the  Excursion,  the  feeling  of  in- 
congruity is  seldom  excited  by  the  diction  of  any  pas- 
sage considered  in  itself,  but  by  the  sudden  superiority 
of  some  other  passage  forming  the  context. 

The  second  defect  I  could  generalize  with  tolera- 
ble accuracy,  if  the  reader  will  pardon  an  uncouth 
and  new-coined  word.  There  is,  I  should  say,  not 
seldom  a  matter-of-facttiess  in  certain  poems.  This 
may  be  divided  into,  jirst,  a  laborious  minuteness  and 
fidelity  in  the  representation  of  objects,  and  their  po- 
sitions, as  they  appeared  to  the  poet  himself;  second- 
ly, the  insertion  of  accidental  circumstances,  in  order 
to  the  full  explanation  of  his  living  characters,  their 
dispositions  and  actions  ;  which  circumstances  might 
be  necessary  to  establish  the  probability  of  a  stale- 
ment  in  real  life,  where  nothing  is  taken  for  granted 
by  the  hearer,  but  appears  superfluous  in  poetry, 
where  the  reader  is  willing  to  believe  for  his  own 
sake.  To  this  accidentality  I  object,  as  contravening 
the  essence  of  poetry,  which  Aristotle  pronounces  to 
be  frucaioTarov  (coi  <pt\oso<piK<!>TaTov  ytvbs,  the  most  in- 
tense, weighty,  and  philosophical  product  of  human 
art ;  adding,  as  the  reason,  that  it  is  the  most  catholic 
and  abstract.  The  following  passage  from  Daven- 
ant's  prefatory  letter  to  Hobbs,  well  expresses  this 
truth.     "When   I  considered   the  actions  which   I 


meant  to  describe  (those  inferring  the  persons)  I  was 
again  persuaded  rather  to  choose  those  of  a  former 
age,  than  the  present ;  and  in  a  century  so  far  removed 
as  might  preserve  me  from  their  improper  examina- 
tions, who  know  not  the  requisites  of  a  poem,  nor 
how  much  pleasure  they  lose  (and  even  the  pleasures 
of  heroic  poesy  are  not  unprofitable)  who  take  away 
the  liberty  of  a  poet,  and  fetter  his  feet  in  the  shac- 
kles of  an  historian.  For  why  should  a  poet  doubt 
in  story  to  mend  the  intrigues  of  fortune  by  more  de- 
lightful conveyances  of  probable  fictions,  because 
austere  historians  have  entered  into  bond  to  truth  ? 
An  obligation  which  were  in  poets  as  foolish  and  un- 
necessary, as  is  the  bondage  of  false  martyrs,  who  lie 
in  chains  for  a  mistaken  opinion.  But  by  (his  I  would 
imply,  that  truth,  narrative  and  past,  is  the  idol  of  his- 
torians {who  worship  a  dead  thing)  and  truth  operative, 
and  bu  effects  continually  alive,  is  the  mistress  of  poets, 
who  hath  not  her  existence  in  matter,  but  in  reason." 

For  this  minute  accuracy  in  the  painting  of  local 
imagery,  the  lines  in  the  Excursion,  p.  96,  97,  and 
98,  may  be  taken,  if  not  as  a  striking  instance,  yet  as 
an  illustration  of  my  meaning.  It  must  be  some 
strong  motive  (as,  for  instance,  that  the  description 
was  necessary  to  the  intelligibility  of  the  tale)  which 
could  induce  me  to  describe  in  a  number  of  verses 
what  a  draftsman  could  present  to  the  eye  with  in- 
com  parably  greater  satisfaction  by  half  a  dozen  strokes 
of  his  pencil,  or  the  painter  with  as  many  touches  of 
his  brush.  Such  descriptions  too  often  occasion  in  the 
minds  of  a  reader,  who  is  determined  to  understand 
his  author,  a  feeling  of  labor,  not  very  dissimilar  to 
that  with  which  he  would  construct  a  diagram,  line 
by  line,  for  a  long  geometrical  proposition.  It  seems 
to  be  like  taking  the  pieces  of  a  dissected  map  out  of 
its  box.  We  first  look  at  one  part,  and  then  at  an 
other,  then  join  and  dove-tail  them ;  and  when  the 
successive  acts  of  attention  have  been  completed, 
there  is  a  retrogressive  effort  of  mind  to  behold  it  as 
a  whole.  The  Poet  should  paint  to  the  imagination, 
not  to  the  fancy;  and  I  know  no  happier  case  to  ex- 
emplify the  distinction  between  these  two  faculties. 
Master-pieces  of  the  former  mode  of  poetic  painting 
abound  in  the  writings  of  Milton,  ex.  gr. 

"The  fig  tree,  not  that  kind  for  fruit  renown'd, 

"  But  such,  as  at  this  day  to  Indians  known 

"  In  Malabar  or  Decan,  spreads  her  arms 

"  Branching  so  broad  and  long,  that  in  the  ground 

"  The  bended  twigs  take  root,  and  daughters  grow 

"  Jihout  the  mother-tree,  a  pillared  shade 

"  Hish  over-arched,  and  echoing  walks  between  : 

"  There  oft  the  Indian  Herdsman,  shunning  heat, 

"  Shelters  in  cool,  and  tends  his  pasturing  herds 

"  Mt  loop  holes  cut  through  thicket  shade." 

Milton,  P.  L.  9,  1100. 
This  is  creation  rather  than  painting ;  or  if  paint- 
ing, yet  such,  and  with  such  co-presence  of  the  whole 
picture  flashed  at  once  upon  the  eye,  as  the  sun 
paints  in  a  camera  obscura.  But  the  poet  must  like- 
wise understand  and  command  what  Bacon  calls  the 
vestigia  communia  of  the  senses,  the  latency  of  all  in 
each,  and  more  especially,  as  by  a  magical  pena  du- 
plex, the  excitement  of  vision  by  sound,  and  the  ex- 
ponents of  sound:  thus,  "The  echoing  walks  be- 
tween," may  be  almost  said  to  reverse  the  fable  in 
337 


328 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


tradition  of  the  head  of  Memnon,  in  the  Egyptian 
statue.  Such  may  be  deservedly  entitled  the  crea- 
tive words  in  the  world  of  imagination. 

The  second  division  respects  an  apparent  minute 
adherence  to  mat ler-of -fact  in  character  and  inci- 
dents; a  biographical  attention  to  probability,  and  an 
anxiety  of  explanation  and  retrospect.  Under  this 
head,  I  shall  deliver  with  no  feigned  diffidence,  the 
results  of  my  best  reflection  on  the  great  point  of  con- 
troversy between  Mr.  Wordsworth,  and  his  objec- 
tors; namely,  on  the  choice  of  his  characters.  I 
have  already  declared,  and,  I  trust,  justified,  my  utter 
dissent  from  the  mode  of  argument  which  his  critics 
have  hitherto  employed.  To  their  question,  why  did 
you  choose  such  a  character,  or  a  character  from  such 
a  rank  of  life  ?  the  Poet  might,  in  my  opinion,  fairly 
retort:  why,  with  the  conception  of  my  character,  did 
you  make  wilful  choice  of  mean  or  ludicrous  associ- 
ations not  furnished  by  me,  but  supplied  from  your 
own  sickly  and  fastidious  feelings?  How  was  it,  in- 
deed, probable,  that  such  arguments  could  have  any 
weight  with  an  author,  whose  plan,  whose  guiding 
principle  and  main  object  it  was,  to  attack  and  sub- 
due that  state  of  association,  which  leads  us  to  place 
the  chief  value  on  those  things  in  which  man  dif- 
fers from  man,  and  to  forget  or  disregard  the  high 
dignities  which  belong  to  human  nature,  the  sense 
and  the  feeling  which  may  be,  and  ought  to  be  found 
in  all  ranks  ?  The  feelings  with  which,  as  Christians, 
we  contemplate  a  mixed  congregation  rising  or  kneel- 
ing before  their  common  Maker,  Mr.  Wordsworth 
would  have  us  entertain  at  all  times  as  men,  and  as 
readers ;  and  by  the  excitement  of  this  lofty,  yet 
prideless  impartiality  in  poetry,  he  might  hope  to  have 
encouraged  its  continuance  in  real-life.  The  praise 
of  good  men  be  his !  In  real  life,  and  I  trust,  even  in 
my  imagination,  I  honor  a  virtuous  and  wise  man 
without  reference  to  the  presence  or  absence  of  arti- 
ficial advantages.  Whether  in  the  person  of  an 
armed  baron,  a  laurel'd  bard,  &c.  or  of  an  old  pedlar 
or  still  older  leech-gatherer,  the  same  qualities  of  head 
and  heart  must  claim  the  same  reverence.  And  even 
in  poetry  I  am  not  conscious  that  I  have  ever  suffered 
my  feelings  to  be  disturbed  or  offended  by  any 
thoughts  or  images  which  the  poet  himself  has  not 
presented. 

But  yet  I  object,  nevertheless,  and  for  the  follow- 
ing reasons :  First,  because  the  object  in  view,  as  an 
immediate  object,  belongs  to  the  moral  philosopher, 
and  would  be  pursued,  not  only  more  appropriately, 
but  in  my  opinion,  with  far  greater  probability  of  suc- 
cess, in  sermons  or  moral  essays,  than  in  an  elevated 
poem.  It  seems  indeed,  to  destroy  the  main  funda- 
mental distinction,  not  only  between  a  poem  and 
prose,  but  even  between  philosophy  and  works  of 
fiction,  inasmuch  as  it  proposes  truth  for  its  immediate 
object,  instead  of  pleasure.  Now,  till  the  blessed  time 
shall  come,  when  truth  itself  shall  be  pleasure,  and 
both  shall  be  so  united  as  to  be  distinguishable  in 
words  only,  not  in  feeling,  it  will  remain  the  poet's 
office  to  proceed  upon  that  state  of  association  which 
actually  exists  as  general,  instead  of  attempting  first 
to  make  it  what  it  ought  to  be,  and  then  to  let  the 


pleasure  follow.  But  here  is,  unfortunately,  a  smali 
Hysteron-rroteron.  For  the  communication  of  plea- 
sure is  the  introductory  means  by  which  alone  the 
poet  must  expect  to  moralize  his  readers.  Secondly: 
though  I  were  to  admit,  for  a  moment,  this  argument 
to  be  groundless,  yet  how  is  the  moral  effect  to  be  pro- 
duced, by  merely  attaching  the  name  of  some  low 
profession  to  powers  which  are  least  likely,  and  to 
qualities  which. are  assuredly  not  more  likely,  to  be 
(bund  in  it?  The  poet,  speaking  in  his  own  person, 
may  at  once  delight  and  improve  us  by  sentiments 
which  teach  us  the  independence  of  goodness,  of  wis- 
dom, and  even  of  genius,  on  the  favors  of  fortune. 
And  having  made  a  due  reverence  before  the  throne 
of  Antonine,  he  may  bow  with  equal  awe  before 
Epictetus  among  his  fellow-slaves — 

"  and  rejoice 


In  llie  plain  presence  of  his  dignity." 

Who  is  not  at  once  delighted  and  improved,  when 
the  poet  Wordsworth  himself  exclaims, 

"  O  many  are  the  poets  that  are  sown 
By  Nature  ;  men  endowed  with  highest  gifts, 
The  vision  sent,  the  faculty  divine, 
Yet  wanting  the  accomplishment  of  verse, 
Not  having  e'er,  as  life  advanced,  been  led 
By  circumstance  to  take  unto  the  height 
The  measure  of  themselves,  these  favour'd  beings 
All  but  a  scatter'd  few,  live  out  their  time 
Husbanding  that  which  they  possess  within. 
And  go  to  the  grave  unthought  of.    Strongest  minds 
Are  often  those  of  whom  the  noisy  world 
Hears  least." 

Excursion,  B.  1. 

To  use  a  colloquial  phrase,  such  sentiments  in  such 
language,  do  one's  heart  good  ;  though  I,  for  my  part, 
have  not  the  fullest  faith  in  the  truth  of  the  observa- 
tion. On  the  contrary,  I  believe  the  instances  to  be 
exceedingly  rare;  and  should  feel  almost  as  strong 
an  objection  to  introduce  such  a  character  in  a  poetic 
fiction,  as  a  pair  of  black  swans  on  a  lake  in  a  fancy 
landscape.  When  I  think  how  many  and  how  much 
better  books  than  Homer,  or  even  than  Herodotus, 
Pindar,  or  Eschylus,  could  have  read,  are  in  the 
power  of  almost  every  man,  in  a  country  where 
almost  every  man  is  instructed  to  read  and  write; 
and  how  restless,  how  difficultly  hidden,  the  powers 
of  genius  are;  and  yet  find  even  in  situations  the 
most  favorable,  according  to  Mr.  Wordsworth,  for  the 
formation  of  a  pure  and  poetic  language  ;  in  situations 
which  ensure  familiarity  with  the  grandest  objects  of 
the  imagination  ;  but  one  Burns  among  the  shepherds 
of  Scotland,  and  not  a  single  poet  of  humble  life 
among  those  of  English  lakes  and  mountains;  I  con- 
clude, that  Poetic  Genius  is  not  only  a  very  delicate 
but  a  very  rare  plant. 
But  be  this  as  it  may,  the  feelings  with  which 

"  I  think  of  Cliatlerton,  the  marvellous  boy, 
The  sleepless  soul,  that  perish'd  in  his  pride  : 
<  >f  Burns,  that  walk'd  in  glory  and  in  joy 
Behind  bis  plough  upon  the  mountain-side" — 

are  widely  different  from  those  with  which  I  should 
read  a  poem,  where  the  author,  having  occasion  for 
the  character  of  a  poet  and  a  philosopher  in  the  fable 
of  his  narration,  had  chosen  to  make  him  a  chimney- 
338 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


329 


tweeper  ;  and  then,  in  order  to  remove  all  doubts  on 
the  subject,  had  invented  an  account  of  his  birth,  pa- 
rentage, and  education,  with  all  the  strange  and  for- 
tunate accidents  which  had  concurred  in  making  him 
at  once  poet,  philosopher,  and  sweep!  Nothing  but 
biography  can  justify  this.  If  it  be  admissible  even 
in  a  Novel,  it  must  be  one  in  the  manner  of  De  Foe's, 
that  were  meant  to  pass  for  histories,  not  in  the  man- 
ner of  Fielding's ;  in  the  life  of  Moll  Flanders,  or 
Colonel  Jack,  not  in  a  Tom  Jones,  or  even  a  Joseph 
Andrews.  Much  less,  then,  can  it  be  legitimately 
introduced  in  a  poem,  the  characters  of  which,  amid 
the  strongest  individualization,  must  still  remain  re- 
presentative. The  precepts  of  Horace,  on  this  point, 
are  grounded  on  the  nature  both  of  poetry  and  of  the 
human  mind.  They  are  not  more  peremptory  than 
wise  and  prudent.  For,  in  the  first  place,  a  deviation 
from  them  perplexes  the  reader's  feelings,  and  all  the 
circumstances  which  are  feigned,  in  order  to  make 
such  accidents  less  improbable,  divide  and  disquiet 
his  faith,  rather  than  aid  and  support  it.  Spite  of  all 
attempts,  the  fiction  will  appear,  and,  unfortunately, 
not  as  ficticious,  but  as  false.  The  reader  not  only 
knows  that  the  sentiments  and  language  are  the  poet's 
own,  and  his  own  too,  in  his  artificial  character  as 
poet ;  but,  by  the  fruitless  endeavors  to  make  hirn 
think  the  contrary,  he  is  not  even  suffered  to  forget 
it.  The  effect  is  similar  to  that  produced  by  an  epic 
poet,  when  the  fable  and  the  characters  are  derived 
from  Scripture  history,  as  in  the  Messiah  of  Klop- 
stock,  or  in  Cumberland's  Calvary ;  and  not  merely 
suggested  by  it,  as  in  the  Paradise  Lost  of  Milton. 
That  iltusion,  contradistinguished  from  delusion,  that 
negative  faith  which  simply  permits  the  images  pre- 
sented to  work  by  their  own  force,  without  either 
denial  or  affirmation  of  their  real  existence  by  the 
judgment,  is  rendered  impossible  by  their  immediate 
neighborhood  to  words  and  facts  of  known  and  ab- 
solute truth.  A  faith  which  transcends  even  historic 
belief,  must  absolutely  put  out  this  mere  poetic  Ana- 
lagon  of  faith,  as  the  summer  sun  is  said  to  extin- 
guish our  household  fires  when  it  shines  full  upon 
them.  What  would  otherwise  have  been  yielded  to 
as  pleasing  fiction,  is  repelled  as  revolting  falsehood. 
The  effect  produced  in  this  latter  case  by  the  solemn 
belief  of  the  reader,  is  in  a  less  degree  brought  about, 
in  the  instances  to  which  I  have  been  objecting,  by 
the  baffled  attempts  of  the  author  to  make  him  be- 
lieve. 

Add  to  all  the  foregoing,  the  seeming  uselessness 
both  of  the  project  and  of  the  anecdotes  from  which 
it  is  to  derive  support.  Is  there  one  word,  for  in- 
stance, attributed  to  the  pedlar  in  the  Excursion, 
characteristic  of  a  pedlar  ?  One  sentiment  that  might 
not  more  plausibly,  even  without  the  aid  of  any  pre- 
vious explanation,  have  proceeded  from  any  wise  and 
beneficent  old  man,  of  a  rank  or  profession  in  which 
the  language  of  learning  and  refinement  are  natural, 
and  to  be  expected  ?  Need  the  rank  have  been  at 
all  particularized,  where  nothing  follows  which  the 
knowledge  of  that  rank  is  to  explain  or  illustrate  I 
When,  on  the  contrary,  this  information  renders  the 
man's  language,  feelings,  sentiments,  and   informa- 


tion, a  riddle  which  must  itself  be  solved  by  episodes 
of  anecdote  ?  Finally,  when  this,  and  this  alone, 
could  have  induced  a  genuine  poet  to  inweave  in  a 
poem  of  the  loftiest  style,  and  on  subjects  the  loftiest 
and  of  most  universal  interest,  such  minute  mat- 
ters of  fact,  (not  unlike  those  furnished  for  the  obitu- 
ary of  a  magazine  by  the  friends  of  some  obscure 
ornament  of  society  lately  deceased  in  some  obscure 
town,)  as, 

"  Among  the  lulls  of  Athol  he  was  born. 
There,  on  a  small  hereditary  farm, 
An  unproductive  slip  of  rugged  ground, 
His  father  dwelt,  and  died,  in  poverty  ; 
While  he,  whose  lowly  fortune  1  retrace, 
The  youngest  of  three  sons,  was  yet  a  babe, 
A  little  one — unconscious  of  their  loss. 
But  ere  he  had  outgrown  his  infant  days, 
His  widow'd  mother,  for  a  second  mate. 
Espoused  the  teacher  of  the  Village  School ; 
Who  on  her  offspring  zealously  bestowed 
Needful  instruction." 

"  From  his  sixth  year,  the  boy  of  whom  1  speak, 
In  summer,  tended  cattle  on  the  hills ; 
But  through  the  inclement  and  the  perilous  days 
Of  long-continuing  winter,  he  repaired 
To  his  step-father's  school." — &c. 

For  all  the  admirable  passages  interposed  in  this 
narration  might,  with  trifling  alterations,  have  been 
far  more  appropriately,  and  with  far  greater  veri- 
similitude, told  of  a  poet  in  the  character  of  a  poet ; 
and  without  incurring  another  defect  which  I  shall 
now  mention,  and  a  sufficient  illustration  of  which 
will  have  been  here  anticipated. 

Third:  an  undue  predilection  for  the  dramatic 
form  in  certain  poems,  from  which  one  or  other  of 
two  evils  results.  Either  the  thoughts  and  diction  are 
different  from  that  of  the  poet,  and  then  there  arises 
an  incongruity  of  style ;  or  they  are  the  same  and 
indistinguishable,  and  then  it  presents  a  species  of 
ventriloquism,  where  two  are  represented  as  talking, 
while,  in  truth,  one  man  only  speaks. 

The  fourth  class  of  defects  is  closely  connected 
with  the  former;  but  yet  are  such  as  arise  likewise 
from  an  intensity  of  feeling  disproportionate  to  such 
knowledge  and  value  of  the  objects  described,  as  can 
be  fairly  anticipated  of  men  in  general,  even  of  the 
most  cultivated  classes;  and  with  which,  therefore, 
few  only,  and  those  few  particularly  circumstanced, 
can  be  supposed  to  sympathise.  In  this  class  I  com- 
prise occasional  prolixity,  repetition,  and  an  eddying 
instead  of  progression  of  thought.  As  instances,  see 
pages  27,  28.  and  62,  of  the  Poems,  Vol.  I.,  and  the 
first  eighty  lines  of  the  Sixth  Book  of  the  Excursion. 

Fifth,  and  last:  thoughts  and  images  too  great  for 
the  subject.  This  is  an  approximation  to  what  might 
be  called  mental  bombast,  as  distinguished  from  ver- 
bal ;  for,  as  in  the  latter,  there  is  a  disproportion  of 
the  expressions  to  the  thoughts,  so,  in  this,  there  is  a 
disproportion  of  thought  to  the  circumstance  and  oc- 
casion. This,  by-the-by,  is  a  limit  of  which  none  but 
a  man  of  genius  is  capable.  It  is  the  awkwardness 
and  strength  of  Hercules,  with  the  distaff  of  Omphale. 

It  is  a  well-known  fact,  lhat  bright  colors  in  motion 
both  make  and  leave  the  strongest  impressions  on  the 
eye.  Nothing  is  more  likely,  too,  than  that  a  vivid 
3u"J 


330 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


image,  or  visual  spectrum,  thus  originated,  may  be- 
come the  link  of  association  in  recalling  the  feelings 
tind  images  that  had  accompanied  the  original  im- 
pression.    But,  if  we  describe  this  in  such  lines  as 

"  They  flash  upon  that  inward  eye. 
Which  is  the  bliss  of  solitude  !" 

in  what  words  shall  we  describe  the  joy  of  retro- 
spection, when  the  images  and  virtuous  actions  of  a 
whole  well-spent  life,  pass  before  that  conscience 
which  is,  indeed,  the  inward  eye;  which  is,  indeed, 
the  "bliss  of  solitude?"  Assuredly  We  seem  to  sink 
most  abruptly,  not  to  say  burlesquely,  and  almost  as 
in  a  medley  from  this  couplet  to — 

"  And  then  my  heart  with  pleasure  fills, 
And  dances  with  ihe  daffodils."  Vol.  i.  p.  320. 

The  second  instance  is  from  Vol.  II.,  page  12, 
where  the  poet,  having  gone  out  for  a  day's  tour  of 
pleasure,  meets,  early  in  the  morning,  with  a  knot 
of  gypsies,  who  had  pitched  their  blanket  tents  and 
straw-beds,  together  with  their  children  and  asses,  in 
some  field  by  the  road-side.  At  the  close  of  the  day, 
on  his  return,  our  tourist  found  them  in  the  same 
place.     "Twelve  hours,"  says  he, 

"  Twelve  hours,  twelve  bounteous  hours,  are  gone  while  I 
Have  been  a  traveller  under  open  sky. 
Much  witnessing  of  change  and  cheer, 
Yet  as  I  left  I  find  them  here !" 

Whereat  the  poet,  without  seeming  to  reflect  that  the 
poor  tawny  wanderers  might  probably  have  been 
tramping,  for  weeks  together,  through  road,  lane, 
over  moor  and  mountain,  and,  consequently,  must 
have  been  right  glad  to  rest  themselves,  their  chil- 
dren, and  cattle,  for  one  whole  day ;  and  overlooking 
the  obvious  truth,  that  such  repose  might  be  quite  as 
necessary  for  them  as  a  walk  of  the  same  continuance 
was  pleasing  or  healthful  for  the  more  fortunate 
poet;  expresses  his  indignation  in  a  series  of  lines,  the 
diction  and  imagery  of  which  would  have  been  rather 
above  than  below  the  mark,  had  they  been  applied 
to  the  immense  empire  of  China,  improgressive  for 
thirty  centuries: 

"  The  weary  Sun  betook  himself  to  rest, 
Then  issued  P'cspcr  from  the  fulgent  west, 
Outshining,  like  a  visible  God, 
The  glorious  path  in  which  he  trod  ! 
And  now  ascending,  after  one  dark  hour, 
And  one  night's  diminution  of  her  power, 
Behold  the  miahty  Moon  I  this  way 
She  looks,  as  if  at  them — but  they 
Regard  not  her — Oh,  better  wrong  and  Rtrife, 
Better  vain  deeds  or  evil,  than  such  life  ! 
The  silent  Heavens  have  eoinjrs  on  : 
The  Stars  have  tasks — but  these  have  none  !" 

The  last  instance  of  this  defect,  (for  I  know  no 
other  than  these  already  cited,)  is  from  the  Ode,  page 
351,  Vol.  II.,  where,  speaking  of  a  child,  "  a  six  year's 
darling  of  a  pigmy  size,"  he  thus  addresses  him : 

"  Thou  best  philosopher,  who  yet  dost  keep 
Thy  heritage  !   Thou  eye  among  the  blind, 
That,  deaf  and  silent,  read'st  the  eternal  deep, 
Haunted  for  ever  by  the  Eternal  Mind — 
Mighty  Prophet !  Peer  blest  ! 
On  whom  those  truths  do  rest, 


Which  we  are  toiling  all  our  lives  to  find  ! 
Thou,  over  whom  thy  immortality 
Broods  like  the  day,  a  master  o'er  the  sla*e  ; 
A  presence  that  is  not  to  be  put  by  !" 

Now  here,  not  to  stop  at  the  daring  spirit  of  meta- 
phor which  connects  the  epithets  "  deaf  and  silent," 
with  the  apostrophized  eye ;  or  (if  we  are  to  refer  it 
to  the  preceding  word,  philosopher,)  the  faulty  and 
equivocal  syntax  of  the  passage;  and  without  ex- 
amining the  propriety  of  making  a  "  master  brood 
o'er  a  slave,"  or  the  day  brood  at  all ;  we  will  mere- 
ly ask,  what  does  all  this  mean  ?  In  what  sense  is  a 
child  of  that  age  a  philosopher  ?  In  what  sense  does 
he  read  "the  eternal  deep?"  In  what  sense  is  he 
declared  to  be  "for  ever  haunted  by  the  Supreme 
BeingV'or  so  inspired  as  to  deserve  the  titles  of  a 
mighty  prophet,  a  blessed  seer  ?  By  reflection  ?  by 
knowledge  ?  by  conscious  intuition  ?  or  by  any  form 
or  modification  of  consciousness  ?  These  would  be 
tidings  indeed ;  but  such  as  would  pre-suppose  an 
immediate  revelation  to  the  inspired  communicator, 
and  require  miracles  to  authenticate  his  inspiration. 
Children,  at  this  age,  give  us  no  such  information  of 
themselves;  and  at  what  time  were  we  dipt  in  the 
Lethe,  which  has  produced  such  utter  oblivion  of  a 
state  so  godlike  ?  There  are  many  of  us  that  still 
possess  some  remembrances,  more  or  less  distinct, 
respecting  themselves  at  six  years  old  ;  pity  that  the 
worthless  straws  only  should  float,  while  treasures, 
compared  with  which  all  the  mines  of  Golconda  and 
Mexico  were  but  straws,  should  be  absorbed  by  some 
unknown  gulf  into  some  unknown  abyss. 

But  if  this  be  too  wild  and  exorbitant  to  be  sus- 
pected as  having  been  the  poet's  meaning;  if  these 
mysterious  gifts,  faculties,  and  operations,  are  not 
accompanied  with  consciousness,  who  else  is  con- 
scious of  them  ?  or  how  can  it  be  called  the  child,  if  it 
be  no  part  of  the  child's  conscious  being  ?  For  aught 
I  know,  the  thinking  Spirit  within  me  may  be  sub- 
stantially one  with  the  principle  of  life,  and  of  vital 
operation.  For  aught  I  know,  it  may  be  employed 
as  a  secondary  agent  in  the  marvellous  organization 
and  organic  movements  of  my  body.  But  surely,  it 
would  be  strange  language  to  say,  that  /  construct 
my  heart !  or  that  I  propel  the  finer  influences 
through  my  nerves !  or  that  I  compress  my  brain,  and 
draw  the  curtains  of  sleep  round  my  own  eyes!  Spi- 
noza and  Behmen  were,  on  different  systems,  both 
Pantheists;  and  among  the  ancients  there  were  philo- 
sophers, teachers  of  the  EN  KAI  ITAN,  who  not  only 
taught  that  God  was  All,  but  that  this  All  constituted 
God.  Yet  not  even  these  would  confound  the  part, 
as  a  part  wit'ti  the  whole,  as  the  whole.  Nay,  in  no 
system  is  the  distinction  between  the  individual  and 
God,  between  the  Modification  and  the  one  only  Sub- 
stance, more  sharply  drawn,  than  in  that  of  Spinoza 
Jacobi,  indeed,  relates  of  Lessing,  that  after  a  con- 
versation with  him  at  the  house  of  the  poet  Glkijj, 
(the  Tyrtams  and  Anacreon  of  the  German  Parnas- 
sus,) in  which  conversation  L.  had  avowed  privately 
to  Jacobi  his  reluctance  to  admit  any  personal  exist- 
ence of  the  Supreme  Being,  or  the  possibility  of  per- 
sonality except  in  a  finite  Intellect ;  and  while  they 
340 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


331 


were  sitting  at  table,  a  show  it  of  rain  came  on  unex- 
pectedly- Gleim  expressed  his  regret  at  the  circum- 
stance, because  they  hail  meant  to  drink  their  wine 
in  the  garden;  upon  which  Leasing,  in  (/no  of  his 
hall-earnest,  half-joking  moods, nodded  to  Jacohi,  ana 
said,  ••  It  is  I,  perhaps,  thai  am  doing  that"  i.  e.  rain- 
ing! and  J.  answered,  "or  perhaps  I."  Gleira  con- 
tented himself  with  staring  at  them  both,  without 
asking  for  any  explanation. 

So  with  regard  to  this  passage.  In  what  sense  can 
the  magnificent  attributes,  above  quoted,  be  appro- 
priated to  a  child,  which  would  not  make  them 
equally  suitable  to  a  bt  e,  or  a  dog,  or  a  field  of  corn  ■' 
or  even  to  a  ship,  or  to  the  wind  and  waves  that  pro 
pel  it?  The  omnipresent  Spirit  works  equally  in 
them,  as  in  the  child  ;  and  the  child  is  equally  uncon- 
scious of  it  as  thev.  It  cannot  surely  be,  that  the 
four  lines,  immediately  following,  arc  to  contain  the 
explanation  ? 

'•  To  whom  the  grave 
Is  but  a  lonely  bed  without  the  sense  or  sight 

Of  day,  or  the  warm  light; 
A  place  of  thought  where  we  in  waiting  lie." 

Surely,  it  cannot  be  that  this  wonder-rousing  apos- 
trophe is  but  a  comment  on  the  little  poem  of  "  We 
are  Seven  ?"  that  the  whole  meaning  of  the  passage 
is  reducible  to  the  assertion,  that  a  child,  who,  by  the 
bye,  at  six  years  old  would  have  been  better  instruct- 
ed in  most  Christian  families,  has  no  other  notion  of 
death  than  that  of  lying  in  a  dark,  cold  place  ?  And 
still,  I  hope,  not  as  in  a  place,  of  thought !  not  the 
frightful  notion  of  lying  aicake  in  his  grave!  The 
analogy  between  death  and  sleep  is  too  simple,  too 
natural,  to  render  so  horrid  a  belief  possible  for  chil- 
dren ;  even  had  they  not  been  in  the  habit,  as  all 
Christian  children  are,  of  hearing  the  latter  term 
used  to  express  the  former.  Rut  if  the  child's  belief 
be  only,  that  "  he  is  not  dead,  but  sleepeth  ;"  wherein 
does  it  differ  from  that  of  his  father  and  mother,  or  any 
other  adult  and  instructed  person  ?  To  form  an  idea  of 
a  thing's  becoming  nothing,  or  of  nothing  becoming  a 
thing,  is  impossible  to  all  finite  beings  alike,  of  what- 
ever age,  and  however  educated  or  uneducated. 
Thus  it  is  with  splendid  paradoxes  in  general.  If  the 
words  are  taken  in  the  common  sense,  thev  convey 
an  absurdity  ;  and  if,  in  contempt  of  dictionaries  and 
custom,  they  are  so  interpreted  as  toavoid  the  absurd- 
ity, the  meaning  dwindles  into  some  bald  truism. 
Thus  you  must  at  once  understand  the  words  con- 
trary to  their  common  import,  in  order  to  arrive  at  any 
sense;  and  according  to  their  common  import,  if  you 
are  to  receive  from  them  any  feeling  of  sublimity  or 
admiration. 

Though  the  instances  of  this  defect  in  Air.  Words- 
worth's poems  are  so  few,  that  for  themselves  it 
would  have  been  scarcely  just  to  attract  the  reader's 
attention  toward  them;  yet  I  have  dwelt  on  it,  and 
perhaps  the  more  for  this  very  reason.  For  being  so 
very  few,  they  cannot  sensibly  detract  from  the  re- 
putation of  an  author,  who  is  even  characterized  by 
the  number  of  profound  truths  in  his  writings,  which 
will  stand  the  severest  analysis;  and  vet,  few  as  thev 
are,  they  are  exactly  those  passages  which  his  blind 


admirers  would  be  most  likely,  and  best  able,  to  imi- 
tate. Hut  Wordsworth,  where  he  is  indeed  Words- 
worth, may  be  mimicked  by  copyists,  he  may  be  plun- 
dered by  plagiarists;  but  he  cannot  be  imitated, 
except  by  those  who  are  not  born  to  be  imitators. 
For  without  his  depth  of  feeling  and  his  imaginative 
power,  his  serixe  would  want  its  vital  warmth  and 
peculiarity;  and  without  his  strong  sense,  his  mysti- 
cism would  become  sickly — mere  fog  and  dimness! 

To  these  defects,  which,  as  appears  by  the  extracts, 
are  only  occasional,  I  may  oppose,  with  far  less  fear 
of  encountering  the  dissent  of  any  candid  and  intelli- 
gent render,  the  following  (for  the  most  part  corres- 
excellences.  First,  an  austere  purity  of  ian- 
hoth  grammatically  and  logically;  in  short,  a 
perfect  appropriateness  of  the  words  to  the  mean- 
ing. Of  how  high  value  I  deem  this,  and  how  par- 
ticularly estimable  I  hold  the  example  at  the  present 
day,  has  been  already  stated  ;  and  in  part,  too,  the  rea- 
sons on  which  I  ground  both  the  moral  and  intellec- 
tual importance  of  habituating  ourselves  to  a  strict 
accuracy  of  expression.  It  is  noticeable,  how  limited 
an  acquaintance  with  the  masterpieces  of  art  will 
suffice  to  form  a  correct  and  even  a  sensitive  taste, 
where  none  but  masterpieces  have  been  seen  and 
admired  ;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  the  most  correct 
notions,  and  the  widest  acquaintance  with  the  works 
of  excellence  of  all  ages  and  countries,  will  not  per- 
fectly secure  us  against  the  contagious  familiarity 
with  the  far  more  numerous  offspring  of  tastelessness 
or  of  a  perverted  taste.  If  this  be  the  case,  as  it  no- 
toriously is,  with  the  arts  of  music  and  painting,  much 
more  difficult  will  it  be  to  avoid  the  infection  of  mul- 
tiplied and  daily  examples  in  the  practice  of  an  art, 
which  uses  words,  and  words  only,  as  its  instruments. 
In  poetry,  in  which  every  line,  every  phrase,  may 
pass  the  ordeal  of  deliberation  and  deliberate  choice, 
it  is  possible,  and  barely  possible,  to  attain  that  ulti- 
matum which  I  have  ventured  to  propose  as  the  in- 
fallible test  of  a  blameless  style:  namely,  its  untrans- 
talableness  in  words  of  the  same  language,  without 
injury  to  the  meaning.  Be  it  observed,  however,  thai 
I  include  in  the  meaning  of  a  word,  not  only  its  cor- 
respondent object  alone,  but  likewise  all  the  associa- 
tions which  it  recalls.  For  language  is  framed  to  con- 
vey not  the  object  alone,  but  likewise  the  character, 
mood,  and  intenti  his  of  the  person  who  is  represent- 
ing it.  In  poetry  it  is  practicable  to  preserve  the  dic- 
tion, uncorrupted  by  the  affectations  and  misappro- 
priations, which  promiscuous  authorship,  and  reading 
not  promiscuous,  only  because  it  is  disproportional'y 
most  conversant  with  the  compositions  of  the  day. 
have  rendered  general.  Yet,  even  to  the  poet,  oom- 
in  his  own  province,:!  is  an  arduous  work: 
and  as  the  result  and  pledge  of  a  watchful  good 
sense,  of  fine  and  luminous  distinction,  and  of  com- 
plete self-possession,  may  justly  claim  all  the  honor 
which  belongs  !o  an  attainment  equally  difficult  and 
valuable,  and  the  more  valuable  for  being  rare.  Il 
is  at  all  times  the  proper  food  of  the  understanding; 
but,  in  an  age  of  corrupt  eloquence,  it  is  both  food 
and  antidote. 

In  prose,  I  doubt  whether  it  be  even  possible  ti 
341 


332 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


preserve  our  style,  wholly  unalloyed  by  the  vicious 
phraseology  which  meets  us  every  where, from  the  ser- 
mon to  the  newspaper,  from  the  harangue  of  the  legis- 
lator to  the  speech  from  the  convivial  chair,  announ- 
cing a  toast  or  sentiment.  Our  chains  rattle,  even  while 
we  are  complaining  of  them.  The  poems  of  Boetius 
rise  high  in  our  estimation  when  we  compare  them  with 
those  of  his  contemporaries,  as  Sidonius,  Apollinaris, 
&c.  They  might  even  be  referred  to  a  purer  age,  but 
that  the  prose  in  which  they  are  set,  as  jewels  in  a 
crown  of  lead  or  iron,  betrays  the  true  age  of  the  wri- 
ter. Much,  however,  may  be  effected  by  education.  I 
believe,  not  only  from  grounds  of  reason,  but  from 
having,  in  great  measure,  assured  myself  of  the  fact 
by  actual  though  limited  experience,  that,  to  a  youth, 
led  from  his  first  boyhood  to  investigate  the  meaning 
of  every  word,  and  the  reason  of  its  choice  and  po- 
sition, logic  presents  itself  as  an  old  acquaintance 
under  new  names. 

On  some  future  occasion  more  especially  demand- 
ing such  disquisition,  I  shall  attempt  to  prove  the 
close  connection  between  veracity  and  habits  of 
mental  accuracy ;  the  beneficial  after-effects  of  ver- 
bal precision  in  the  preclusion  of  fanaticism,  which 
masters  the  feelings  more  especially  by  indistinct 
watch-words ;  and  to  display  the  advantages  which 
language  alone,  at  least  which  language  with  incom- 
parably greater  ease  and  certainty  than  any  other 
means,  presents  to  the  instructor  of  impressing  modes 
of  intellectual  energy  so  constantly,  so  imperceptibly, 
and,  as  it  were,  by  such  elements  and  atoms  as  to  se- 
cure in  due  time  the  formation  of  a  second  nature. 
When  we  reflect,  that  the  cultivation  of  the  judg- 
ment is  a  positive  command  of  the  moral  law,  since 
the  reason  can  give  the  principle  alone,  and  the  con- 
science bears  witness  only  to  the  motive,  while  the 
application  and  effects  must  depend  on  the  judgment : 
when  we  consider,  that  the  greater  part  of  our  suc- 
cess and  comfort  in  life  depends  on  distinguishing  the 
similar  from  the  same,  that  which  is  peculiar  in  each 
thing  from  that  which  it  has  in  common  with  others, 
so  as  still  to  select  the  most  probable,  instead  of  the 
merely  possible  or  positively  unfit,  we  shall  learn  to 
value  earnestly,  and  with  a  practical  seriousness,  a 
mean  already  prepared  for  us  by  nature  and  society, 
of  teaching  the  young  mind  to  think  well  and  wisely 
by  the  same  unrcmembercd  process,  and  with  the 
same  never  forgotten  results,  as  those  by  which  it  is 
taught  to  speak  and  converse.  Now,  how  much 
warmer  the  interest,  how  much  more  genial  the  feel- 
ings of  reality  and  practicability,  and  thence  how 
much  stronger  the  impulses  to  imitation  are,  which  a 
contemporary  writer,  and  especially  a  contemporary 
poet,  excites  in  youth  and  commencing  manhood,  has 
been  treated  of  in  the  earlier  pages  of  these  sketches. 
I  have  only  to  add,  that  all  the  praise  which  is  due  in 
the  exertion  of  such  influence  lor  a  purpose  so  impor- 
tant, joined  with  that  which  must  be  claimed  for  the 
infrequency  of  the  same  excellence  in  the  same  per- 
fection, belongs  in  fall  ricrht  to  Mr.  Wordsworth. 
I  am  far,  however,  from  denying  that  we  have  poets 
whose  general  style  possesses  the  same  excellence,  as 
Mr.  Moore,  Lord  Byron,  Mr.  Bowles,  and,  in  all  his 


later  and  more  important  works,  our  laurel-honoring 
Laureate.  But  there  are  none,  in  whose  works  I  do 
not  appear  to  myself  to  find  more  exceptions  than  in 
those  of  Wordsworth.  Quotations  or  specimens 
would  here  be  wholly  out  of  place,  and  must  be  left 
for  the  critic  who  doubts  and  would  invalidate  the 
justice  of  this  eulogy  so  applied. 

The  second  characteristic  excellence  of  Mr.  W.'s 
works  is,  a  correspondent  weight  and  sanity  of  the 
thoughts  and  sentiments — won,  not  from  books,  but 
from  the  poet's  own  meditative  observation.  They 
are  fresh,  and  have  the  dew  upon  them.  His  muse, 
at  least  when  in  her  strength  of  wing,  and  when  she 
hovers  aloft  in  her  proper  element, 

Makes  audible  a  linked  lay  of  truth, 

Of  truth  profound  a  Bweet  continuous  lay. 

Not  learnt,  but  native,  her  own  natural  notes  ! 

S.  T.  C. 

Even  throughout  his  smaller  poems  there  is  scarcely 
one  which  is  not  rendered  valuable  by  some  just  and 
original  reflection. 

See  page  26,  vol  2d ;  or  the  two  following  passages 
in  one  of  his  humblest  compositions : 

"  O  Reader  !  had  you  in  your  mind 
Such  stores  as  silent  thought  can  bring, 
O  gentle  Reader !  you  would  find 
A  tale  in  every  thing." 

and 

"  I  have  heard  of  hearts  unkind,  kind  deeds 
With  coldness  stilt  returning : 
Alas!  the  gratitude  of  men 
Has  oftener  left  me  mourning." 

or  in  a  still  higher  strain  the  six  beautiful  quotations, 
page  134 : 

"  Thus  fares  it  still  in  our  decay  : 
And  yet  the  wiser  mind 
Mourns  less  for  what  age  takes  away 
Than  what  it  leaves  behind. 

The  Blackbird  in  the  summer  trees. 
The  lark  upon  the  hill. 
Let  loose  their  carols  when  they  please; 
Are  quiet  when  they  will. 

With  nature  never  do  they  wage 
A  foolish  strife  ;  they  see 
A  happy  youth,  and  their  old  age 
Is  beautiful  and  free  ! 

r>ot  we  are  pressed  by  heavy  laws  ; 
And  often,  glad  no  more. 
We  wear  a  face  of  juy,  because 
We  have  been  glad  of  yore. 

If  there  is  one  who  need  bemoan 

Ills  kindred  laid   in  earth. 

The  household  hearts  that  were  his  own. 

It  is  the  man  of  mirth. 

My  days,  my  Friend,  are  almost  gone, 
My  life  has  been  Approved, 

And  many  love  me  ;  hut  by  none 
Am  1  enough  beloved." 

or  the  sonnet  on  Bonaparte,  page  202,  vol.  2:  or 
finally,  (for  a  volume  would  scarce  suffice  to  exhaust 
the  instances,)  the  last  stanza  of  the  poem  on  the 
withered  Celandine,  vol.  2,  p.  212. 

3-12 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


333 


To  be  a  prodigal's  favorite — then,  worse  trutb, 
A  miser's  pensioner — behold  our  lot ! 
Oh  man  !  that  from  thy  fair  and  shining  youth 
Age  might  but  take  the  things  youth  needed  not." 

Both  in  respect  of  this  and  of  the  former  excellence, 
;  Mr.  Wordsworth  strikingly  resembles  Samuel  Daniel, 
I  one  of  the  golden  writers  of  our  golden  Klizabethian 
age.  now  most  causelessly  neglected  ;  Samuel  Daniel, 
diction  bears  no  mark  of  time,  no  distinction 
of  age,  which  has  been,  and,  as  long  as  our  language 
shall  last,  will  be,  so  far  the  language  of  to-day  and 
for  ever,  as  that  it  is  more  intelligible  to  us  than  the 
transitory  fashions  of  our  own  particular  age.  A  simi- 
lar praise  is  due  to  his  sentiments.  No  frequency  of 
perusal  can  deprive  them  of  their  freshness,  for 
though  they  are  brought  into  the  full  day-light  of 
every  reader's  comprehension,  yet  are  they  drawn 
up  from  depths  which  few  in  any  age  are  privileged 
to  visit,  into  which  few  in  any  age  have  courage  or 
inclination  to  descend.  If  Mr.  Wordsworth  is  not 
equally  with  Daniel,  alike  intelligible  to  all  readers 
of  average  understanding  in  all  passages  of  his  works, 
the  comparative  difficulty  does  not  arise  from  the 
greater  impurity  of  the  ore,  but  from  the  nature  and 
uses  of  the  metal.  A  poem  is  not  necessarily  ob- 
scure, because  it  does  not  aim  to  be  popular.  It  is 
enough,  if  a  work  be  perspicuous  to  those  for  whom 
it  is  written,  and 

"  Fit  audience  find,  though  few." 
To  the  "Ode  on  the  intimation  of  immortality,  from 
recollections  of  early  childhood,"  the  poet  might  have 
prefixed  the  lines  which  Dante  addresses  to  one  of  his 
own  Canzoni — 

"  Canzon,  io  credo,  che  earanno  radi 

Che  tua  ragione  imendan  bene : 

Tanto  lor  sei  faticoso  ed  alto." 
"  O  lyric  song,  there  will  be  few,  think  I, 

Who  may  thy  import  understand  aright : 

Thou  art  for  them  so  arduous  and  so  high  !" 

But  the  ode  was  intended  for  such  readers  only  as 
had  been  accustomed  to  watch  the  flux  and  reflux  of 
their  inmost  nature,  to  venture  at  times  into  the  twi- 
light realms  of  consciousness,  and  to  feel  a  deep  in- 
terest in  modes  of  inmost  being,  to  which  they  know- 
that  the  attributes  of  time  and  space  are  inapplicable  < 
and  alien,  but  which  yet  cannot  be  conveved,  save  in 
symbols  of  time  and  space.  For  such  readers  the- 
sense  is  sufficiently  plain,  and  they  will  be  as  littl/ 
disposed  to  charge  Mr.  Wordsworth  with  believing 
the  platonic  pre-existence  in  the  ordinary  interpreta- 
tion of  the  words,  as  I  am  to  believe  that  Plato  him- 
self ever  meant  or  taught  it 

floXXa  01  Ltz 

vof  i)Kta  /3/Xi7 

''Evtov  zvti  (paoiroa; 

$<i>vavra  svvcroistv  £j 

Al  to  zav  cofiTiviiiis 

Xari^ci.     Toipos  b  vo\- 

Xa  £<£oj  <pia. 

MaSdvrtj  6c,  Xd.jcoj 

riayyXojfjia,   KdpaKt;  5f 

"A.Kpavra  yaovtrov 

Atdj  Trp&s  opvi$a  Suov. 


ayum- 


Third:  (and  wherein  lie  soars  far  above  Daniel, 
the  sinewy  strength  and  originality  of  single  line* 
and  paragraphs:  the  frequent  curiosa  felicitas  of  his 
diction,  of  which  I  need  not  here  give  specimens, 
having  anticipated  them  in  a  preceding  page.  This 
beauty,  and  as  eminently  characteristic  of  Words- 
worth's poetry,  his  rudest  assailants  have  felt  them- 
selves compelled  to  acknowledge  and  admire. 

Fourth :  the  perfect  truth  of  nature  in  his  images 
and  descriptions,  as  taken  immediately  from  nature, 
and  proving  a  long  and  genial  intimacy  with  the  very 
spirit  which  gives  the  physiognomic  expression  to  all 
the  works  of  nature.  Like  a  green  field  reflected  in 
a  calm  and  perfectly  transparent  lake,  the  image  is 
distinguished  from  the  reality  only  by  its  greater  soft- 
ness and  lustre.  Like  the  moisture  or  the  polish  on 
a  pebble,  genius  neither  distorts  nor  false-colors  its 
objects;  but,  on  the  contrary,  brings  out  many  a  vein 
and  many  a  tint,  which  escape  the  eye  of  common 
observation,  thus  raising  to  the  rank  of  gems  what 
had  been  often  kicked  awav  by  the  hurrying  foot  of 
the  traveller  on  the  dustv  high  road  of  custom. 

Let  me  refer  to  the  whole  description  of  skating, 
vol.  I.  page  42  to  47,  especially  to  the  lines, 

"  So  through  ihe  darkness  and  the  cold  we  flew, 
And  not  a  voice  was  idle  :  with  the  din 
Meanwhile  the  precipices  rang  aloud  ; 
The  leafless  trees  and  every  icy  crag 
Tinkled  like  iron  ;  while  the  distant  hills 
Into  the  tumult  sent  an  alien  sound 
Of  melancholy,  not  unnoticed,  while  the  stars 
Eastward  were  sparkling  clear,  and  in  the  west 
The  orange  sky  of  evening  died  away." 

Or  to  the  poem  on  the  green  linnet,  vol.  I.  p.  244. 
What  can  be  more  accurate,  yet  more  lively,  than 
the  two  concluding  stanzas  >. 

"  Upon  yon  tuft  of  hazel  trees, 
That  twinkle  to  the  gusty  breeze. 
Behold  him  perched  in  ecstasies, 

Yet  seeming  still  to  hover; 
There  !  where  the  flutter  of  his  wings 
Upon  his  back  and  body  flings 
Shadows  and  sunny  glimmerings 

That  cover  him  all  over. 
While  thus  before  my  eyes  he  gleams, 
A  brother  of  the  leaves  he  seems  ; 
When  in  a  moment  forth  he  teems 

His  little  song  in  gushes: 
As  if  it  pleased  him  to  disdain 
And  mock  the  form  when  he  did  feign 
While  he  was  dancing  with  the  train 

Of  leaves  among  the  bushes." 

Or  the  description  of  the  blue  cap,  and  of  the  noon- 
tide silence,  p.  284;  or  the  poem  to  the  cuckoo,  p. 
299 ;  or,  lastly,  though  1  might  multiply  the  references 
to  ten  times  the  number,  to  the  poem  so  completely 
Wordsworth's,  commencing 

"  Three  years  she  grew  in  sun  and  shower,"  &c. 

Fifth:  a  meditative  pathos,  a  union  of  deep  and 
subtle  thought  with  sensibility;  a  sympathy  with  man 
as  man  ;  the  sympathy  indeed  of  a  contemplator, 
rather  than  a  fellow  sufferer  or  co-mate,  (spectator 
haud  particeps,)  but  of  a  contemplator,  from  whose 
view  no  difference  of  rank  conceals  the  sameness  of 
the  nature  ;  no  injuries  of  wind  or  weather,  of  toil, 
343 


334 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


or  even  of  ignorance,  wholly  disguise  the  human  face 
divine.  The  superscription  and  the  image  of  the 
Creator  still  remain  legible  to  him  under  the  dark 
lines  with  which  guilt  or  calamity  had  cancelled  or 
cross-barred  it.  Here  the  man  and  the  poet  lose  and 
find  themselves  in  each  other,  the  one  as  glorified, 
the  latter  as  substantiated.  In  this  mild  and  philo- 
sophic pathos,  Wordsworth  appears  to  me  without  a 
compeer.  Such  he  ?'s;  so  he  writes.  See  vol  I., 
page  134  to  136,  or  that  most  affecting  composition, 

the  "  Affliction  of  Margaret of ,"  page 

165  to  lf)8,  which  no  mother,  and,  if  1  may  judge  by 
my  own  experience,  no  parent  can  read  without  a 
tear.  Or  turn  to  that  genuine  lyric,  in  the  former 
edition,  entitled,  the  "  Mad  Mother,"  page  174  to  178, 
ol'  which  I  cannot  refrain  from  quoting  two  of  the 
stanzas,  both  of  them  tor  their  pathos,  and  the  former 
tor  the  fine  transition  in  the  two  concluding  lines  of 
the  stanza,  so  expressive  of  that  deranged  state  in 
which,  from  the  increased  sensibility,  the  sufferer's 
attention  is  abruptly  drawn  off  by  every  trifle,  and  in 
the  same  instant  plucked  back  again  by  the  one  des- 
potic thought,  and  bringing  home  with  it,  by  the 
blending  fusing  power  of  Imagination  and  Passion, 
the  alien  object  to  which  it  had  been  so  abruptly  di- 
verted, no  longer  an  alien,  but  an  ally  and  an  inmate. 

"Suck,  little  babe,  oh  suck  again! 
Ii  cools  my  blood  ;  it  cools  my  brain: 
Thy  lips,   I  feel  them,  baby  1  they 
Draw  from  my  heart  the  pain  away. 
Oil  !  press  me  witli  thy  lit  lie  hand  ; 
It  loosens  something  at  my  chest; 
About  that  tight  and  deadly  band 
I  feel  thy  little  fingers  prest. 
The  breeze,  I  see,  is  in  the  tree; 
It  comes  to  cool  my  babe  and  me." 

"Thy  father  cares  not  for  my  brea9t, 
'T  is  thine,  sweet  baby,   there  to  rest, 
'T  is  all  thine  own  ! — and  if  its  hue 
Be  changed,  that  was  so  fair  to  view, 
'Tis  fair  enough  for  thee,  my  dove  I 
My  beauty,  little  child,   is  flown  ; 
But  thou  wilt  live  wilh  me   in   love; 
And   what  if  my  poor  cheek  be  brown? 
'Tis  well  for  me  thou  can'st  not  see 
How  pale  and  wan   it  else  would  be." 

Last,  and  pre-eminently,  I  challenge  lor  this  poet 
the  gift  of  Imagination  in  the  highest  and  strictest 
sense  of  the  word.  In  the  play  of  Fane;/,  Words- 
worth, to  my  feelings,  is  not  always  graceful,  and 
sometimes  recondite.  The  likeness  is  occasionally  too 
strange,  or  demands  too  peculiar  a  point  of  view,  or 
is  such  as  appears  the  creature  of  predetermined  re- 
search, rather  than  spontaneous  presentation.  Indeed, 
his  fancy  seldom  displays  itself!  as  mere  and  unmodi- 
fied fancy.  But  in  imaginative  power,  he  stands 
nearest  of  all  modern  writers  to  Shakspeare  and 
Milton:  and  yet  in  a  kind  perfectly  unborrowed  and 
his  own.  To  employ  his  own  words,  which  are  at 
once  an  instance  and  an  illustration,  he  does  indeed 
to  all  thoughts  and  to  all  objects — 


-add  the  gleam, 


The  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land. 
The  consecration,  and  the  poet's  dream." 

I  shall  select  a  few  examples  as  most  obviously 
manifesting  this  faculty ;  but  if  I  should  ever  be  for- 


tunate enough  to  render  my  analysis  of  imagination, 
its  origin  and  characters,  thoroughly  intelligible  to  the 
reader,  he  will  scarcely  open  on  a  page  of  this  poet's 
works,  without  recognising,  more  or  less,  the  presence 
and  the  influences  of  this  faculty. 

from  the  poem  on  the  Yew  Trees,  vol.  I.,  pages 
303,  304. 

"  But  worthier  still  of  note 
Are  those  fraternal  four  of  Borrowdale, 
Joined  in  one  solemn  and  capacious  grove  : 
Huge  trunks  ! — and  each  particular  trunk  a  growth 

Of  intertwisted  fibres  serpentine 
Up  coiling,  and  inveterately  convolved — 
Not  uninformed  wilh  phantasy,  and  looks 
That  threaten  the  profane  ; — a  pillared  shade, 
Upon  whose  graseless  floor  of  red- brown  hue. 
By  shedding?  from  the  pinal  umbrage  tinged 
Perennially — beneath  whose  sable  roof 
Of  boughs,  as  if  for  festal  purpose  decked 
With  unrejoicing  berries,  ghostly  shapes 
May  meet  at  noontide — Fear  and  tiemhling  Hope, 
Silence  and  Foresight — Death,  llie  skeleton. 
And  Time,  the  shadow — there  to  celebrate. 
As  in  a  natural  temple  scattered  o'er 
Wilh  altars  undisturbed  of  mossy  stone. 

United  worship  ;  or  in  mute  repose 
To  lie,  and  listen  to  the  mountain  tluod 
Murmuring  from  Glanamara's  inmost  caves." 

The  effect  of  the  old  man's  figure  in  the  poem  of 
Resignation  and  Independence,  vol.  II ,  page  33. 

"  While  he  was  talking  thus,  the  lonely  place, 
The  old  man's  shape,  and  speech,  all  troubled  me: 
In  my  mind's  eye  1  seemed  to  see  him  pace 
About  the  weary  moors  continually. 
Wandering  about  alone  and  silently." 

Or  the  8th,  9th,  19th,  26th,  31  st  and  33d,  in  the  col- 
lection of  miscellaneous  sonnets — the  sonnet  on  the 
subjugation  of  Switzerland,  page  210,  or  the  last  ode 
from  which  I  especially  select  the  two  following 
stanzas  or  paragraphs,  page  349  to  350. 

"  Our  birth  is  but  a  sleep  and  a  forgetting  : 
The  soul  that  rises  with  us,  our  life's  star. 
Hath  had  elsewhere  its  setting, 

And  cometh  from  afar. 
Not  in  entire  forgelfulness. 
And  not  in  utter  nakedness. 
But  trailing  clouds  of  glory  do  we  come 
From  God  who  is  our  home  : 
Heaven  lies  about  us  in  our  infancy  ! 
Shades  of  the  prison-house  begin  to  close 

Upon  the  growing  boy  ; 
But  he  beholds  the  light,  and  whence  it  flows  ; 

He  sees  it  in  his  joy  ! 
The  youth  who  daily  further  from  the  east 
Must  travel,  still  i9  nature's  priest. 

And  by  the  vision  splendid 

Is  on  his  way  attended  ; 
At  length  the  man  perceives  it  die  away, 
And  fade  into  the  light  of  common  day." 

And  page  352  to  354  of  the  same  ode. 

"  O  joy  that  in  our  embers 
Is  something  that  doth   live, 
That  nature  yet  remembers 
What  was  so  fugitive! 

The  thought  of  our  past  years  in  me  doth  breed 
Perpetual  benedictions:   not  indeed 
For  that  which  is  most  worthy  to  he  blest — 
Delight  and  liberty  the  simple  creed 
Of  childhood,  whether  busy  or  at  rest, 
Wilh  new-fledged  hope  still  fluttering  in  his  bteast:— 
Not  for  these  I  raise 
The  song  of  thanks  and  praise  ; 

344 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


335 


But  fur  those  obstinate  questionings 

Of  9ense  and  outward  things:, 

Fallings  from  us,  vanishings  ; 

Blank   misgivings  of  a  creature 

Moving  about  in  worlds  not  realized, 

IliL-h  instincts,  before  which  our  mortal  nature 

Did  iremhle  like  a  guiity  thing  surprised: 

Bui   ful  those  first  affections, 

Those  shadowy  recollections, 

Which,  he  they  what  they  may, 

Are  yet  the  fountain  light  of  all  our  day, 

Are  yet  a  master  light  of  all  our  seeing  ; 

I'phold  us — cherish — and  have  power  to  make 

Our  noisy  years  seem  momenta  in  the  being 

Of  the  eternal  silence  ;  truths  that  wake 

To  perish  never : 
Which  neiiher  lisilessness.  nor  mad  endeavor, 
Nor  man  nor  hoy, 
Nor  all  that  is  at  enmity  with  joy, 
Can  utterly  abolish  or  destroy  '. 
Hence,  in  a  season  of  calm  weather, 
Though  inland  far  we  be. 
Our  souls  have  sight  of  that  immortal  sea 
Which  brought  us  hither, 
Can  in  a  moment  travel  thither — 
And  see  the  children  sport  upon  the  shore. 
And  hear  the  mighty  waters  rolling  evermore." 

And  since  it  would  be  unfair  to  conclude  with  an 
extract,  which,  though  highly  characteristic,  must 
yet,  from  the  nature  of  the  thoughts  and  the  subject, 
be  interesting,  or  perhaps  intelligible,  to  but  a  limited 
number  of  readers,  I  will  add  from  the  poet's  last 
published  work  a  passage  equally  Wordsworthian ; 
of  the  beauty  of  which,  and  of  the  imaginative  power 
displayed  therein,  there  can  be  but  one  opinion  and 
one  feeling.     See  White  Doe,  page  5. 

"Fast  the  church-yard  fills;  anon 
Look  again  and  they  are  gone; 
The  cluster  round  the  porch,   and  the  folk 
Who  sate  in  the  shade  of  the  prior's  oak  ! 
And  scarcely  have  they  disappear'd 
Ere  the  prelusive  hymn  is  heard: — 
With  one  consent  the  people  rejoice. 
Filling  the  church  with  a  lofty  voice  ! 
Tney  sine  a  service  which  they  feel, 
For  'tis  the  sun-rise  of  their  zeal. 
And  faith  and  hope  are  in  their  prime 
In  great  Eliza's  golden  time." 
A  moment  ends  the  fervent  din, 
And  all  is  hushed   without   and  within; 
For  though  the  priest  more  tranquilly 
Recites  the  holy  liturgy. 
The  only  voice  which  you  can  hear 
Is  the  river  murmuring  near. 
When  soft  ! — the  dusky  trees  between, 
And  down  the    path  through   the  open  green, 
Where  is  no   living  thing   to  be  Been: 
And  through  yon  gateway,  where  is  found. 
Beneath  the  arch   wilh  ivy  hound. 
Free  entrance  to  the  church-yard   ground, 
And   right  across  the  verdant  sod 
Towards  the  very  house  of  God  ; 
fumes  gliding  in  with  lovely  gleam, 
Comes  eliding  in  serene  and  slow, 
Soft  and  silent  as  a  dream, 
A   solitary  doe  ! 
White  she  is  as  lily  of  June, 
And   beauteous  as   the   silver  moon 
When  out  of  sitrlit  the  clouds  are  driven, 
And  she  is  left  alone  in  heaven  '. 
Or  like  a  ship  some  genile  day 
In  sunshine  sailing  far  away — 
A  glittering  ship  that  hath  the  plain 
Of  ocean  for  her  own  domain. 


23 


Ee2 


What  harmonious  pensive  changes 
Wait  upon  her  as  she  ranges 
Round  and  round  this  pile  of  state. 
Overthrown  and  desolate  I 
Now  a  step  or  two  her  way 
Is  through  space  of  open  day. 
Where  the  enamoured  sunny  light 
Brightens  her  that  was  so  bright: 
Now  doth  a  delicate  shadow  fall, 
Falls  upon  her  like  a  breath 
From  some   lofty  arch  or  wall, 
As  she  passes  underneath. 

The  following  analogy  will,  I  am  apprehensive, 
appear  dim  and  fantastic,  but  in  reading  Bartrani's 
Travels.  I  could  not  help  transcribing  the  followin': 
lines  as  a  sort  of  allegory,  or  connected  simile  and 
metaphor  of  Wordsworth's  intellect  and  genius.  "  The 
soil  is  a  deep,  rich,  dark  mould,  on  a  deep  stratum  of 
tenacious  clay ;  and  that  on  a  foundation  of  rocks, 
which  often  break  through  both  strata,  lifting  their 
back  above  the  surface.  The  trees  which  chiefly 
grow  here  are  the  gigantic  black  oak  ;  magnolia  mag» 
niflora;  fraximus  excelsior;  platane ;  and  a  few 
stately  tulip  trees."  What  Mr.  Wordsworth  will  pro- 
duce, it  is  not  for  me  to  prophesy ;  but  I  could  pro- 
nounce with  the  liveliest  convictions  what  he  is 
capable  of  producing.  It  is  the  First  Genuine  Phi- 
losophic Poem. 

The  preceding  criticism  will  not,  I  am  aware,  avail 
to  overcome  the  prejudices  of  those  who  have  made 
it  a  business  to  attack  and  ridicule  Mr.  Wordsworth's 
compositions. 

Truth  and  prudence  might  be  imagined  as  concen- 
tric circles.  The  poet  may  perhaps  have  passed  be- 
yond the  latter,  but  he  has  confined  himself  far 
within  the  bounds  of  the  former,  in  designating  these 
critics  as  too  petulant  to  be  passive  to  a  genuine  poet, 
and  too  feeble  to  grapple  with  him ; — "  men  of  palsied 
imaginations,  in  whose  minds  all  healthy  action  is  lan- 
guid; who,  therefore,  feel  as  the  many  direct  them,  or 
with  the  many  are  greedy  after  vicious  provocatives." 

Let  not  Mr.  Wordsworth  be  charged  with  having 
expressed  himself  too  indignantly,  till  the  wanton- 
ness and  the  systematic  and  malignant  perseverance 
of  the  aggressions  have  been  taken  into  fair  conside- 
ration. I  myself  heard  the  commander  in  chief  of 
this  unmanly  warfare  make  a  boast  of  his  private  ad- 
miration of  Wordsworth's  genius.  I  have  heard  him 
declare,  that  whoever  came  into  his  room  would  pro- 
bably find  the  Lyrical  Ballads  lying  open  on  his 
table,  and  that  (speaking  exclusively  of  those  written 
by  Mr.  Wordsworth  himself)  he  could  nearly  repeat 
the  whole  of  them  by  heart.  But.  a  Review,  in  order 
to  be  a  saleable  article,  must  be  personal,  uliarp,  and 
pointed ;  and,  since  then,  the  Poet  has  made  himself, 
and  with  himself  all  who  were,  or  were  supposed  to 
be,  bis  friends  and  admirers,  the  object  of  the  critic'- 
revenge — how?  by  having  spoken  of  a  work  so  con- 
ducted in  the  terms  \\  hich  it  deserved  !  I  once  heard 
a  clergyman  in  boots  and  buckskin  avow,  that  he 
would  cheat  his  own  father  in  a  horse.  A  moral  sys- 
tem of  a  similar  nature  seems  to  have  been  adopted 
by  too  many  anonymous  critics.  As  we  used  to  say 
at  school,  in  reviewing,  they  make  being  rogues  :  and 
he,  who  complains,  is  to  be  laughed  at  ibr  his  igno- 
345 


336 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


ranee  of  the  game.  With  the  pen  out  of  their  hand 
ihey  are  honorable  men.  They  exert,  indeed,  power 
(which  is  to  that  of  the  injured  party  who  should 
attempt  to  expose  their  glaring  perversions  and  mis- 
statements, as  twenty  to  one)  to  write  down,  and 
(where  the  author's  circumstances  permit)  to  impove- 
rish the  man,  whose  learning  and  genius  they  them- 
selves in  private  have  repeatedly  admitted.  They 
knowingly  strive  to  make  it  impossible  for  the  man 
even  to  publish*  any  future  work,  without  exposing 
himself  to  all  the  wretchedness  of  debt  and  embar- 
rassment. But  this  is  all  in  their  vocation,  and, 
bating  what  they  do  in  their  vocation,  "  who  can  say 
that  black  is  /he  white  of  their  eye  ?'•' 

So  much  for  the  detractors  from  Mr.  Wordsworth's 
merits.  On  the  other  hand,  much  as  1  might  wish 
for  their  fuller  sympathy,  1  dare  not  flatter  myself, 
that  the  freedom  with  which  I  have  declared  my 
opinions  concerning  both  his  theory  and  his  defects, 
most  of  which  are  more  or  less  connected  with  his 
theory  either  as  cause  or  effect,  will  be  satisfactory 
or  pleasing  to  all  the  poet's  admirers  and  advocates. 
More  indiscriminating  than  mine  their  admiration 
may  be  ;  deeper  and  more  sincere  it  cannot  be.  But 
1  have  advanced  no  opinion  either  for  praise  or  cen- 
sure, other  than  as  texts  introductory  to  the  reasons 
which  compel  me  to  form  it.  Above  all,  I  was  fully 
convinced  that  such  a  criticism  was  not  only  wanted, 
but  that,  if  executed  with  adequate  ability,  it  must 
conduce  in  no  mean  degree  to  Mr.  Wordsworth's 
reputation.  His  fame  belongs  to  another  age,  and 
can  neither  be  accelerated  or  retarded.    How  small 


*  Not  many  months  ago,  an  eminent  bookseller  was  asked 

what  he  thought  of 1    The  answer  was,  "  I  have 

heard  his  powers  very  highly  spoken  of  by  some  of  our  first- 
rale  men  ;  but  I  would  not  have  a  work  of  his  if  any  one 
would  give  it  me  :  for  he  is  spoken  but  slightly  of,  or  not  at 
all,  in  the  Quarterly  Review  ;  and  the  Edinburgh,  you  know, 
is  decided  to  cut  him  up  !" 


the  proportion  of  the  defects  are  to  the  beauties,  I 
have  repeatedly  declared  ;  and  that  no  one  of  them 
originates  in  deficiency  of  poetic  genius.  Had  they 
been  more  and  greater,  I  should  still,  as  a  friend  to 
his  literary  character  in  the  present  age,  consider  an 
analytic  display  of  them  as  pure  gain  ;  if  only  it 
removed,  as  surely  to  all  reflecting  minds  even  the 
foregoing  analysis  must  have  removed,  the  strange 
mistake  so  slightly  grounded,  yet  so  widely  and  in- 
dustriously propagated,  of  Mr.  Wordsworth's  turn 
ibr  simplicity  !  I  am  not  half  as  much  irritated  by 
hearing  his  enemies  abuse  him  for  vulgarity  of  style, 
subject,  and  conception,  as  I  am  disgusted  with  the 
gilded  side  of  the  same  meaning,  as  displayed  by 
some  affected  admirers,  with  whom  he  is,  forsooth, 
a  sweet,  simple  poet  !  and  so  natural,  that  little  master 
Charles,  and  his  younger  sister,  are  so  charmed  with 
them,  that  they  play  at  "  Goody  Blake,  or  at  "  John- 
ny and  Betty  Foy  !" 

Were  the  collection  of  poems  published  with  these 
biographical  sketches  important  enough,  (which  I  am 
not  vain  enough  to  believe,)  to  deserve  such  a  dis- 
tinction: EVEN  AS  I  HAVE  DONE,  SO  WOULD  I  BE 
DONE   UNTO. 

For  more  than  eighteen  months  have  the  volume 
of  Poems,  entitled  Sibylline  Leaves,  and  the  pre- 
sent volumes  up  to  this  page  been  printed,  and  ready 
for  publication.  But  ere  I  speak  of  myself  in  the 
tones  which  are  alone  natural  to  me  under  the  cir- 
cumstances of  late  years,  I  would  fain  present  my- 
self to  the  reader  as  I  was  in  the  first  dawn  of  my 
literary  life  : 

When  Hope  grew  round  me,  like  the  climbing  vine, 
And  fruits  and  foliage  not  my  own  seem'd  mine  ! 

For  this  purpose,  I  have  selected  from  the  letters 
which  I  wrote  home  from  Germany,  those  which 
appeared  likely  to  be  the  most  interesting,  and  at  the 
same  time  most  pertinent  to  the  title  of  this  work. 


Satgrane's  3Lttttv&. 


LETTER  I. 

On  Sunday  morning,  September  16, 1798,  the  Ham- 
burg Pacquet  set  sail  from  Yarmouth:  and  I,  for  the 
first  time  in  my  life,  beheld  my  native  land  retiring 
from  me.  At  the  moment  of  its  disappearance — in 
all  the  kirks,  churches,  chapels,  and  meeting-houses, 
in  which  the  greater  number,  1  hope,  of  my  country- 
men were  at  that  time  assembled,  I  will  dare  ques- 
tion whether  there  was  one  more  ardent  prayer  offer- 
ed up  to  heaven  than  that  which  I  then  preferred  for 
my  country.  Now,  then,  (said  1  to  a  gentleman  who 
was  standing  near  me,)  we  are  out  of  our  country. 
Not  yet,  not  yet!  he  replied,  and  pointed  to  the  sea  ; 
"  This,  too,  is  a  Briton's  country."  This  bon  mot  gave 
a  fillip  to  my  spirits,  I  rose  and  looked  round  on  my 


fellow-passengers,  who  were  all  on  the  deck.  We 
were  eighteen  in  number,  videlicil,  five  Englishmen, 
an  English  lady,  a  French  gentleman  and  his  servant, 
an  Hanoverian  and  his  servant,  a  Prussian,  a  Swede, 
two  Danes,  and  a  Mulatto  boy,  a  German  tailor  and 
his  wife,  (the  smallest  couple  I  ever  beheld)  and  a 
Jew.  We  were  all  on  the  deck  ;  but  in  a  short  time 
I  observed  marks  of  dismay.  The  lady  retired  to  the 
cabin  in  some  confusion,  and  many  of  the  faces  round 
me  assumed  a  very  doleful  and  frog-colored  appear- 
ance ;  and  within  an  hour  the  number  of  those  on 
deck  was  lessened  by  one  half.  I  was  giddy,  but  not 
sick,  and  the  giddiness  soon  went  away,  but  left  a 
feverishness  and  want  of  appetite,  which  I  attributed, 
in  great  measure,  to  the  sava  mephitis  of  the  bilge- 
water  ;  and  it  was  certainly  not  decreased  bv  the  ex- 

346 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


337 


portations  from  the  cabin.  However,  I  was  well 
enough  to  join  the  able-bodied  passengers,  one  of 
whom  observed,  not  inaptly,  that  Momus  might  have 
discovered  an  easier  way  to  see  a  man's  inside  than 
by  placing  a  window  in  his  breast.  lie  needed  only 
have  taken  a  salt-water  trip  in  a  pacquet-boat. 

I  am  inclined  to  believe,  that  a  pacquet  is  liir  supe- 
rior to  a  stage-coach,  as  a  means  of  making  men  open 
out  to  each  other.  In  the  latter,  the  uniformity  of 
posture  disposes  to  dozing,  and  the  de'initeness  of  the 
period  at  which  the  company  will  separate  makes 
each  individual  think  more  of  those  to  whom  he  is 
going,  than  of  those  with  whom  he  is  going.  But  at 
sea,  more  curiosity  is  excited,  if  only  on  this  account, 
that  the  pleasant  or  unpleasant  qualities  of  your  com- 
panions are  of  greater  importance  to  you,  from  the 
uncertainty  how  long  you  may  be  obliged  to  house 
with  them.  Besides,  if  you  are  countrymen,  that  now 
begins  to  form  a  distinction  and  a  bond  of  brother- 
hood ;  and,  if  of  different  countries,  there  are  new  in- 
citements of  conversation,  more  to  ask  and  more  to 
communicate.  I  found  that  I  had  interested  the 
Danes  in  no  common  degree.  I  had  crept  into  the 
boat  on  the  deck  and  fallen  asleep;  but  was  awaked 
by  one  of  them  about  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon, 
who  told  me  that  thev  had  been  seeking  me  in  every 
hole  and  corner,  and  insisted  that  I  should  join  their 
party  and  drink  with  them.  He  talked  English  with 
such  fluency,  as  left  me  wholly  unable  to  account  for 
the  singular  and  even  ludicrous  incorrectness  with 
which  he  spoke  it.  I  went,  and  found  some  excel- 
lent wines  and  a  dessert  of  grapes  with  a  pine-apple. 
The  Danes  had  christened  me  Doctor  Theology,  and 
dressed  as  I  was  all  in  black,  with  large  shoes  and 
black  worsted  stockings,  I  might  certainly  have  pass- 
ed very  well  for  a  Methodist  missionary.  However, 
I  disclaimed  my  title.  What  then  may  you  be?  A 
man  of  fortune  ?  No! — A  merchant?  No! — A  mer- 
chant's traveller  ?  No! — A  clerk?  No! — Un  Phi- 
losophe,  perhaps?  It  was  at  that  time  in  my  life,  in 
which,  of  all  possible  names  and  characters,  I  had 
the  greatest  disgust  to  that  of  "  un  Philosophe."  But 
I  was  weary  of  being  questioned,  and  rather  than  be 
nothing,  or  at  best,  only  the  abstract  idea  of  a  man,  I 
submitted  by  a  bow,  even  to  the  aspersion  implied  in 
the  word  "un  Philosophe."  The  Dane  then  inform- 
ed me,  that  all  in  the  present  partv  were  philosophers 
likewise.  Certes  we  were  not  of  the  stoic  school. 
For  we  drank  and  talked  and  sung,  till  we  talked 
and  sung  altogether;  and  then  we  rose,  and  danced 
on  the  deck  a  set  of  dances,  which,  in  one  sense  of 
the  word  at  least,  were  very  intelligibly  and  appro- 
priately entitled  reels.  The  passengers  who  lay  in 
the  cabin  below,  in  all  the  agonies  of  sea-sickness, 
must  have  found  our  bacchanalian  merriment 


Harsli  and  of  dissonant  mood  for  their  complaint. 
I  thought  so  at  the  time;  and  (by  way,  I  suppose, 
of  supporting  my  newly-assumed  philosophical  cha- 
racter) I  thought,  too,  how  closely  the  greater  number 
of  our  virtues  are  connected  with  the  fear  of  death, 
and  how  little  sympathy  we  bestow  on  pain,  where 
there  is  no  danger. 


The  two  Danes  were  brothers.  The  one  was  a 
man  with  a  clear  white  complexion,  white  hair,  and 
white  eye-brows,  looked  silly,  and  nothing  that  he  ut- 
tered gave  the  lie  to  his  looks.  The  other,  whom,  by 
way  of  eminence,  I  have  called  the  Dank,  had  like- 
wise white  hair,  but  was  much  shorter  than  his  bro- 
ther, with  slender  limbs,  and  a  very  thin  face  slight- 
ly pock-fretten.  This  man  convinced  me  of  the  jus- 
tice of  an  old  remark,  that  many  a  faithful  portrait  in 
our  novels  and  farces  has  been  rashly  censured  for 
an  outrageous  caricature,  or  perhaps  nonenity.  I  had 
retired  to  my  station  in  the  boat;  he  came  and  seat- 
ed himself  by  my  side,  and  appeared  not  a  little  tip- 
sy. He  commenced  the  conversation  in  the  most 
magnific  style,  and  as  a  sort  of  pioneering  to  his  own 
vanity,  he  flattered  me  with  such  grossness !  The 
parasites  of  the  old  comedy  were  modest  in  the  com- 
parison. His  language  and  accentuation  were  so  ex- 
ceedingly singular,  that  I  determined,  for  once  in  my 
life,  to  take  notes  of  a  conversation.  Here  it  follows, 
somewhat  abridged  indeed,  but  in  all  other  respects 
as  accurately  as  my  memory  permitted. 

The  Dane.  Vat  imagination  !  vat  language  !  vat 
vast  science!  and  vat  eyes!  vat  a  milk-vite  forehead! 
— O  my  heafen !  vy  you  're  a  Got ! 

Answer.    You  do  me  too  much  honor,  sir. 

The  Dane.  O  me !  if  you  should  dink  I  is  flatter- 
ing you! — No,  no,  no!  I  haf  ten  tousand  a  year!  Veil 
— and  vat  is  dat  ?  a  mere  trifle !  I  'ouldnt  gif  my  sin- 
cere heart  for  ten  times  dhe  money. — Yes,  you  're  a 
Got!  I  a  mere  man!  But,  my  dear  friend!  dhink  of 
me  as  a  man !  Is,  is — I  mean  to  ask  you  now  my  dear 
friend — is  I  not  very  eloquent?  Is  I  not  speak  Eng- 
lish very  fine  ? 

A nsw.  Most  admirably  !  Believe  me,  sir!  I  have 
seldom  heard  even  a  native  talk  so  fluently. 

The  Dane,  {squeezing  my  hand  with  great  vehe- 
mence.) My  dear  friend!  vat  an  affection  and  fidelity 
we  have  for  each  odher!  But  tell  me,  do  tell  me — Is 
I  not,  now  and  den,  speak  some  fault  ?  Is  I  not  in 
some  wrong  ? 

Answ.  Why,  sir,  perhaps  it  might  be  observed  by 
nice  critics  in  the  English  language,  that  you  occa- 
sionally use  the  word  '-is"  instead  of  "am."  In  our 
best  companies,  we  generally  say  I  am,  and  not  I  is, 
or  Ise.     Excuse  me,  sir!     It  is  a  mere  trifle. 

The  Dane.  O!  is,  is,  am,  am,  am.  Yes,  yes — I 
know,  I  know. 

Answ.  I  am,  thou  art,  he  is,  we  are,  ye  are,  they  are. 

The  Dane.  Yes,  yes — I  know,  I  know — Am,  am, 
am,  is  de  presens,  and  is,  is  de  perfectum — yes,  yes 
— and  are,  is  dhe  plusquam  perfectum. 

Answ.     And  "art,"  sir,  is 

The  Dane.  My  dear  friend!  it  is  dhe  plusquam 
perfectum,  no,  no — dhat  is  a  great  lie.  "  Are"  is  the 
plusquam  perfectum — and  "art"  is  dhe  plusquam 
plueperfectum — (then  swinging  my  hand  to  and  fro, 
and  corking  his  Utile  bright  hazel  eyes  at  me  that 
danced  with  vanity  and  wine.)  You  see,  my  dear 
friend  !  that  I  too  have  some  lehrning. 

Answ.     Learning,  sir?    Who  dares  suspect  it? 
Who  can  listen  to  you  for  a  minute ;  who  can  even 
look  at  you,  without  perceiving  the  extent  of  it? 
347 


338 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


The  Dane.  My  dear  friend  ! — {then  with  a  would- 
be  humble  look,  and  in  a  tone  of  voice,  as  if  he  was 
reasoning) — I  could  not  talk  so  of  presens  and  imper- 
fectum,  and  futurum  and  plusquaniplue  perfectum, 
and  all  dhat,  my  dear  friend !  without  some  lehrn- 
ing? 

Answ.  Sir!  a  man  like  you  cannot  talk  on  any 
subject  without  discovering  the  depth  of  his  informa- 
tion. 

The  Dane.  Dhe  grammatic  Greek,  my  friend! 
ha!  ha!  ha!  (laughing,  and  swinging  my  hand  to  and 
fro, — then,  with  a  sudden  transition  to  great  solemni- 
ty.) Now  I  will  tell  you,  my  dear  friend!  Dhere 
did  happen  about  me  vat  de  whole  historia  of  Den- 
mark record  no  instance  about  nobody  else.  Dhe 
bishop  did  ask  me  all  dhe  questions  about  all  dhe  re- 
ligion in  dhe  Latin  grammar. 

Answ.  The  grammar,  sir  ?  The  language  I  pre- 
sume— 

The  Dane.  (A  little  offended.)  Grammar  is  lan- 
guage, and  language  is  grammar — 

Answ.    Ten  thousand  pardons ! 

The  Dane.    Veil,  and  I  was  only  fourteen  years — 

Answ.    Only  fourteen  years  old  ? 

The  Dane.  No  more.  I  was  fourteen  years  old 
— and  he  asked  me  all  questions,  religion  and  philos- 
ophy, and  all  in  dhe  Latin  language — and  I  answered 
him  all  every  one,  my  dear  friend !  all  in  dhe  Latin 
language. 

Answ.     A  prodigy!  an  absolute  prodigy! 

The  Dane.  No,  no,  no  !  he  was  a  bishop,  a  great 
superintendant. 

Ans.    Yes  !  a  bishop. 

The  Dane.  A  bishop — not  a  mere  predicant,  not 
a  prediger. 

Ans.  My  dear  Sir,  we  have  misunderstood  each 
other.  I  said  that  your  answering  in  Latin  at  so 
early  an  age,  was  a  prodigy,  that  is,  a  thing  that  is 
wonderful,  that  does  not  often  happen. 

The  Dane.  Often  !  Dhere  is  not  von  instance 
recorded  in  dhe  whole  historia  of  Denmark. 

Ans.    And  since  then,  Sir ? 

The  Dane.  I  was  sent  ofer  to  dhe  Vest  Indies — 
to  our  island,  and  dhere  I  had  no  more  to  do  vid 
books.  No  !  no !  I  put  my  genius  another  way — 
and  I  haf  made  ten  tousand  pound  a  year.  Is  not 
dhat  ghenius,  my  dear  friend  ? — But  vat  is  money  ? 
I  dhink  the  poorest  man  alive  my  equal.  Yes,  my 
dear  friend  !  my  little  fortune  is  pleasant  to  my  gen- 
erous heart,  because  I  can  do  good — no  man  with  so 
little  a  fortune  ever  did  so  much  generosity — no  per- 
son, no  man  person,  no  woman  person  ever  denies  it. 
But  we  are  all  Got's  children. 

Here  the  Hanoverian  interrupted  him,  and  the 
other  Dane,  the  Swede,  and  the  Prussian,  joined  us, 
together  with  a  young  Englishman  who  spoke  the 
German  fluently,  and  interpreted  to  me  many  of  the 
Prussian's  jokes.  The  Prussian  was  a  travelling 
merchant,  turned  of  three  score,  a  hale  man,  tall, 
strong,  and  stout,  full  of  stories,  gesticulations,  and 
buffoonery,  with  the  soul  as  well  as  the  look,  of  a 
mountebank,  who,  while  he  is  making  you  laugh, 
picks  your  pocket.     Amid   all  his  droll  looks  and 


droll  gestures,  there  remained  one  look  untouched  by 
laughter ;  and  that  one  look  was  the  true  face,  the 
others  were  but  its  mask.  The  Hanoverian  was  a 
pale,  fat,  bloated  young  man,  whose  father  had  made 
a  large  fortune  in  London,  as  an  army  contractor. 
He  seemed  to  emulate  the  manners  of  young  En- 
glishmen of  fortune.  He  was  a  good-natured  fellow, 
not  without  information  or  literature,  but  a  most  i 
egregious  coxcomb.  He  had  been  in  the  habit  of 
attending  the  House  of  Commons,  and  had  once 
spoken,  as  he  informed  me,  with  great  applause  in  a 
debating  society.  For  this  he  appeared  to  have  quali- 
fied himself  with  laudable  industry,  for  he  was  per- 
fect in  Walker's  Pronouncing  Dictionary,  and  with 
an  accent  which  forcibly  reminded  me  of  the  Scotch- 
man in  Roderic  Random,  who  professed  to  teach  the 
English  pronunciation,  he  was  constantly  deferring 
to  my  superior  judgment,  whether  or  no  I  had-  pro- 
nounced this  or  that  word  with  propriety,  or  "  the 
true  delicacy."  When  he  spoke,  though  it  were 
only  half  a  dozen  sentences,  he  always  rose ;  for 
which  I  could  detect  no  other  motive  than  his  par- 
tiality to  that  elegant  phrase  so  liberally  introduced 
in  the  orations  of  our  British  legislators,  "  While  I 
am  on  my  legs."  The  Swede,  whom  for  reasons 
that  will  soon  appear,  I  shall  distinguish  by  the  name 
of  "Nobility,"  was  a  strong-featured,  scurvy-faced 
man,  his  complexion  resembling,  in  color,  a  red-hot 
poker  beginning  to  cool.  He  appeared  miserably 
dependent  on  the  Dane,  but  was,  however,  incom- 
parably, the  best  informed,  and  most  rational  of  the 
party.  Indeed,  his  manners  and  conversation  dis- 
covered him  to  be  both  a  man  of  the  world  and  a 
gentleman.  The  Jew  was  in  the  hold  ;  the  French 
gentleman  was  lying  on  the  deck,  so  ill  that  I  could 
observe  nothing  concerning  him,  except  the  affection- 
ate attentions  of  his  servant  to  him.  The  poor  fellow- 
was  very  sick  himself,  and  every  now  and  then  ran 
to  the  side  of  the  vessel,  still  keeping  his  eye  on  his 
master  but  returned  in  a  moment  and  seated  himself 
again  by  him,  now  supporting  his  head,  now  wiping 
his  forehead,  and  talking  to  him  all  the  while,  in  the 
most  soothing  tones.  There  had  been  a  matrimonial 
squabble  of  a  very  ludicrous  kind  in  the  cabin,  be- 
tween the  little  German  tailor  and  his  little  wife. 
He  had  secured  two  beds,  one  for  himself,  and  one 
for  her.  This  had  struck  the  little  woman  as  a  very 
cruel  action;  she  insisted  upon  their  having  but  one, 
and  assured  the  mate,  in  the  most  piteous  tones,  that 
she  was  his  lawful  wife.  The  mate  and  the  cabin 
boy  decided  in  her  favor,  abused  the  little  man  for 
his  want  of  tenderness  with  much  humor,  and  hoist- 
ed him  into  the  same  compartment  with  his  sea-sick 
wife.  This  quarrel  was  interesting  to  me,  as  it  pro- 
cured me  a  bed  which  I  otherwise  should  not  have 
had. 

In  the  evening,  at  seven  o'clock,  the  sea  rolled 
higher,  and  the  Dane,  by  means  of  the  greater  agi- 
tation, eliminated  enough  of  what  he  had  been 
swallowing  to  make  room  for  a  great  deal  more. 
His  favorite  potation  was  sugar  and  brandy,  i.  e.  a 
very  little  warm  water  with  a  large  quantity  of  bran- 
dy, sugar,  and  nutmeg.  His  servant  boy,  a  black- 
348 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


330 


eyed  Mulatto,  had  a  good-natured  round  face,  exactly 
the  color  of  the  skin  of  the  walnut-kernel.  The 
Dane  and  1  wore  again  seated  tete-a-tete  in  the  ship"s 
boat.  The  conversation,  which  was  now,  indeed, 
rather  an  oration  than  a  dialogue,  became  extravagant 
beyond  all  that  I  ever  heard.  He  told  me  that  he 
had  made  a  large  fortune  in  the  island  of  Santa 
Cruz,  and  was  now  returning  to  Denmark  to  enjoy  I 
::  !!'•  expatiated  on  the  style  in  which  he  meant  : 
to  live,  and  the  great  undertakings  which  he  pro- 
to  himself  to  commence,  till  the  brandy,  aiding 
liis  vanity,  and  his  vanity  and  garrulity  aiding  the 
brandy,  he  talked  like  a  madman — entreated  me  to  j 
accompany  him  to  Denmark — there  I  should  see  his 
influence  with  the  government,  and  he  would  intro- 
duce me  to  the  king,  &c.  &c.  Thus  he  went  on 
dreaming  aloud,  and  then  passing  with  a  very  lyrical 
transition  to  the  subject  of  general  politics,  he  de- 
claimed, like  a  member  of  the  Corresponding  Society, 
about,  (not  concerning)  the  Rights  of  Man,  and  as- 
sured me  that  notwithstanding  his  fortune,  he  thought 
the  poorest  man  alive  his  equal.  "  All  are  equal,  my 
dear  friend  !  all  are  equal!  Ve  are  all  Got's  children. 
The  poorest  man  haf  the  same  rights  with  me.  Jack! 
Jack!  some  more  sugar  and  brandy.  Dhere  is  dhat 
fellow  now  !  He  is  a  mulatto — but  he  is  my  equal. 
That's  right,  Jack!  (taking  the  sugar  and  brandy.) 
Here  you  Sir!  shake  hands  with  dhis  gentleman! 
Shake  hands  with  me,  you  dog!  Dhere,  dhere! — 
We  are  all  equal,  my  dear  friend  !  Do  I  not  speak 
like  Socrates,  and  Plato,  and  Cato — they  were  all 
philosophers,  my  dear  philosophe !  all  very  great 
men! — and  so  was  Homer  and  Virgil — but  they  were 
poets,  yes,  yes !  I  know  all  about  it ! — But  what  can 
any  body  say  more  than  this  ?  we  are  all  equal,  all 
Got's  children.  I  haf  ten  tousand  a  year,  but  I  am 
no  more  than  the  meanest  man  alive.  I  haf  no  pride  ; 
and  yet.  my  dear  friend  !  I  can  say  do  !  and  it  is  clone. 
Ha  !  ha  !  ha!  my  dear  friend  !  Now  dhere  is  dhat 
gentleman,  (pointing  to  "  Nobility,")  he  is  a  Swedish 
baron — you  shall  see.  Ho  !  (calling  to  the  Swede)  get 
me,  will  you,  a  bottle  of  wine  from  the  cabin. 
Swede. — Here  Jack  !  go  and  get  your  master  a  bottle 
of  wine  from  the  cabin  !  Dane.  No,  no,  no  !  do  you 
go  now — you  go  yourself— ;/ou  go  now  !  Swede. 
Pah  ! — Dane.  Now  go!  Go  I  pray  you.  And  the 
swede   WENT. 

After  this,  the  Dane  commenced  an  harangue  on 
religion,  and  mistaking  me  for  "  un  philosophe"  in 
the  continental  sense  of  the  word,  he  talked  of  Deity 
in  a  declamatory  style,  very  much  resembling  the 
devotional  rants  of  that  rude  blunderer,  Mr.  Thomas 
Paine,  in  his  Age  of  Reason,  and  whispered  in  my 
ear,  what  damned  hypocrism  all  Jesus  Christ's  busi- 
ness was.  I  dare  aver,  that  few  men  have  less  rea- 
son to  charge  themselves  with  indulging  in  persijlagu 
than  myself.  I  should  hate  it  if  it  were  only  that  it 
is  a  Frenchman's  vice,  and  feel  a  pride  in  avoiding 
it  because  our  own  language  is  too  honest  to  have  a 
word  to  express  it.  But  in  this  instance,  the  tempta- 
tion had  been  too  powerful,  and  I  have  placed  it  on 
the  list  of  my  offences.  Pericles  answered  one  of  his 
dearest  friends,  who  had  solicited  him  on  a  case  of 


life  and  death,  to  take  an  equivocal  oath  for  his  pre- 
sen ation  :  Debeo  amicis  opitulari,  sed  usque  ad  Deos* 
Kriendship  herself  must  place  her  last  and  boldest 
step  on  this  side  the  altar.  What  Pericles  would  not 
do  to  save  a  friend's  life,  you  may  be  assured  I  would 
not  hazard,  merely  to  mill  the  chocolate-pot  of  a 
drunken  fool's  vanity  till  it  frothed  over.  Assuming 
a  serious  look,  I  professed  myself  a  believer,  and  sunk 
at  once  an  hundred  fathoms  in  his  good  graces.  He 
retired  to  his  cabin,  and  1  wrapped  myself  up  in  my 
great-coat  and  looked  at  the  water.  A  beautiful 
while  cloud  of  foam  at  momentary  intervals  coursed 
by  the  side  of  the  vessel  with  a  roar,  and  little  stars 
of  flame  danced  and  sparkled  and  went  out  in  it :  and 
every  now  and  then,  light  detachments  of  this  white 
cloud-like  foam  darted  offfrom  the  vessel's  side,  each 
with  its  own  small  constellation,  over  the  sea,  and 
scoured  out  of  sight,  like  a  Tartar  troop  over  a  wil- 
derness. 

It  was  cold,  the  cabin  was  at  open  war  with  my 
olfactories,  and  I  found  reason  to  rejoice  in  my  great- 
coat, a  weighty,  high-caped,  respectable  rug,  the  col- 
lar of  which  turned  over,  and  played  the  part  of  a 
nightcap  very  passably.  In  looking  up  at  two  or  three 
bright  stars,  which  oscillated  with  the  motion  of  the 
sails,  I  fell  asleep,  but  was  awakened  at  one  o'clock, 
Monday  morning,  by  a  shower  of  rain.  I  found  my- 
self compelled  to  go  down  into  the  cabin,  where  I 
slept  very  soundly,  and  awoke  with  a  very  good  ap- 
petite, at  breakfast  time,  my  nostrils,  the  most  placa- 
ble of  all  the  senses,  reconciled  to,  or,  indeed,  insen- 
sible of  the  mephitis. 

Monday,  September  17th,  I  had  a  long  conversa- 
tion with  the  Swede,  who  spoke  with  the  most  poig- 
nant contempt  of  the  Dane,  whom  he  described  as  a 
fool,  purse-mad ;  but  he  confirmed  the  boasts  of  the 
Dane  respecting  the  largeness  of  his  fortune,  which 
he  had  acquired  in  the  first  instance  as  an  advocate, 
and  afterwards  as  a  planter.  From  the  Dane,  and 
from  himself,  I  collected,  that  he  was  indeed  a  Swe- 
dish nobleman,  who  had  squandered  a  fortune  that 
was  never  very  large,  and  had  made  over  his  pro- 
perty to  the  Dane,  on  whom  he  was  now  utterly  de- 
pendent. He  seemed  to  suffer  very  little  pain  from 
the  Dane's  insolence.  He  was  in  a  high  degree  hu- 
mane and  attentive  to  the  English  lady,  who  suffered 
most  fearfully,  and  for  whom  he  performed  many 
little  offices  with  a  tenderness  and  delicacy  which 
seemed  to  prove  real  goodness  of  heart.  Indeed  his 
general  manners  and  conversation  were  not  only 
pleasing,  but  even  interesting ;  and  I  struggled  to 
believe  his  insensibility,  respecting  the  Dane,  philo- 
sophical fortitude.  For,  though  the  Dane  was  now 
quite  sober,  his  character  oozed  out  of  him  at  every 
pore.  And  after  dinner,  when  he  was  again  flushed 
with  wine,  every  quarter  of  an  hour,  or  perhaps 
oftener,  he  would  shout  out  to  the  Swede,  "Ho! 
Nobility,  go  —  do  such  a  thing!  Mr.  Nobility!  tell 
the  gentlemen  such  a  story,  and  so  forth,"  with  an 
insolence  which  must  have  excited  disgust  and  de- 

*  Translation. — It  behooves  me  to  side  with  my  friends, 
but  only  as  far  as  the  gods. 

349 


340 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


testation,  if  his  vulgar  rants  on  the  sacred  rights  of 
equality/joined  to  this  wild  havoc  of  general  gram- 
mar, no  less  than  of  the  English  language,  had  not 
rendered  it  so  irresistibly  laughable. 

At  four  o'clock,  I  observed  a  wild  duck  swimming 
on  the  waves,  a  single  solitary  wild  duck.  It  is  not 
easy  to  conceive,  how  interesting  a  thing  it  looked  in 
that  round,  objectless  desert  of  waters.  I  had  asso- 
ciated such  a  feeling  of  immensity  with  the  ocean, 
that  I  felt  exceedingly  disappointed,  when  I  was  out 
of  sight  of  all  land,  at  the  narrowness  and  nearness, 
as  it  were,  of  the  circle  of  the  horizon.  So  little  are 
images  capable  of  satisfying  the  obscure  feelings  con- 
nected with  words.  In  the  evening  the  sails  were 
lowered,  lest  we  should  run  foul  of  the  land,  which 
can  be  seen  only  at  a  small  distance.  At  four 
o'clock,  on  Tuesday  morning,  I  was  awakened  by  the 
cry  of  land !  land !  It  was  an  ugly  island  rock,  at  a 
distance  on  our  left,  called  Ileiligeland,  well  known 
to  many  passengers  from  Yarmouth  to  Hamburg, 
who  have  been  obliged,  by  stormy  weather,  to  pass 
weeks  and  weeks  in  weary  captivity  on  it,  stripped 
of  all  their  money  by  the  exorbitant  demands  of  the 
wretches  who  inhabit  it.  So,  at  least,  the  sailors  in- 
formed me.  About  nine  o'clock  we  saw  the  main 
land,  which  seemed  scarcely  able  to  hold  its  head 
above  water,  low,  flat,  and  dreary,  with  light-houses 
and  land-marks,  which  seemed  to  give  a  character 
and  language  to  the  dreariness.  We  entered  the 
mouth  of  the  Elbe,  passing  Neuwerk ;  though  as  yet, 
the  right  bank  only  of  the  river  was  visible  to  us. 
On  this  I  saw  a  church,  and  thanked  God  for  my  safe 
voyage,  not  without  affectionate  thoughts  of  those  I 
had  left  in  England.  At  eleven  o'clock  on  the  same 
morning,  we  arrived  at  Cuxhaven,  the  ship  dropped 
anchor,  and  the  boat  was  hoisted  out  to  carry  the 
Hanoverian  and  a  few  others  on  shore.  The  captain 
agree  to  take  us,  who  remained,  to  Hamburg  for  ten 
guineas,  to  which  the  Dane  contributed  so  largely, 
that  theother  passengers  paid  but  half  a  guinea  each. 
Accordingly,  we  hauled  anchor,  and  passed  gently 
up  the  river.  At  Cuxhaven  both  sides  of  the  river 
may  be  seen  in  clear  weather;  we  could  now  see  the 
right  bank  only.  We  passed  a  multitude  of  English 
traders  that  had  been  waiting  many  weeks  for  a 
wind.  In  a  short  time  both  banks  became  visible, 
both  flat,  and  evidencing  the  labour  of" human  hands, 
by  their  extreme  neatness.  On  the  left  bank  I  saw  a 
church  or  two  in  the  distance ;  on  the  right  bank  we 
passed  by  steeple  and  windmill,  and  cottage,  and 
windmill  and  single  house,  windmill  and  windmill, 
and  neat  single  house,  and  steeple.  These  were  the 
objects,  and  in  the  succession.  The  shores  were  very 
green,  and  planted  with  trees  not  inelegantly.  Thir- 
ty-five miles  from  Cuxhaven,  the  night  came  on  us, 
and  as  the  navigation  of  the  Elbe  is  perilous,  we 
dropped  anchor. 

Over  what  place,  thought  I,  does  the  moon  hang  to 
your  eye,  my  dearest  friend  ?  To  me  it  hung  over 
the  left  bank  of  the  Elbe.  Close  above  the  moon 
was  a  huge  volume  of  deep  black  cloud,  while  a  very 
thin  fillet  crossed  the  middle  of  the  orb,  as  narrow, 
and  thin,  and  black  as  a  ribbon  of  crape.    The  long 


trembling  road  of  moonlight,  which  lay  on  the  water, 
and  reached  to  the  stern  of  our  vessel,  glimmered 
dimly  and  obscurely.  We  saw  two  or  three  lights 
from  the  right  bank,  probably  from  bed-rooms.  I  ti-lt 
the  striking  contrast  between  the  silence  of  this  ma- 
jestic stream,  whose  banks  are  populous  with  men 
j  and  women  and  children,  and  flocks  and  herds — be- 
tween the  silence  by  night  of  this  peopled  river,  and 
the  ceaseless  noise  and  uproar,  and  loud  agitations  of 
the  desolate  solitude  of  the  ocean.  The  passengers 
below  had  all  retired  to  their  beds;  and  I  felt  the 
interest  of  this  quiet  scene  the  more  deeply,  from  the 
circumstance  of  having  just  quitted  them.  For  the 
Prussian  had,  during  the  whole  of  the  evening,  dis- 
played all  his  talents  to  captivate  the  Dane,  who  had 
admitted  him  into  the  train  of  his  dependants.  The 
young  Englishman  continued  to  interpret  the  Prus- 
sian's jokes  to  me.  They  were  all,  without  excep- 
tion, profane  and  abominable,  but  some  sufficiently 
witty,  and  a  few  incidents,  which  he  related  in  his 
own  person,  were  valuable  as  illustrating  the  man- 
ners of  the  countries  in  which  they  had  taken  place. 
Five  o'clock  on  Wednesday  morning  we  hauled 
the  anchor,  but  were  soon  obliged  to  drop  it  again  in 
consequence  of  a  thick  fog,  which  our  captain  feared 
would  continue  the  whole  day ;  but  about  nine  it 
cleared  off,  and  we  sailed  slowly  along,  close  by  the 
shore  of  a  very  beautiful  island,  forty  miles  from  Cux- 
haven, the  wind  continuing  slack.  This  holme  or 
island  is  about  a  mile  and  a  half  in  length,  wedge- 
shaped,  well  wooded,  with  glades  of  the  liveliest 
green,  and  rendered  more  interesting  by  the  remark- 
ably neat  farm-house  on  it.  It  seemed  made  for  re- 
tirement without  solitude — a  place  that  would  allure 
one's  friends  while  it  precluded  the  impertinent  calls 
of  mere  visiters.  The  shores  of  the  Elbe  now  became 
more  beautiful,  with  rich  meadows  and  trees  running 
like  a  low  wall  along  the  river's  edge;  and  peering 
over  them,  neat  houses  and  (especially  on  the  right 
bank)  a  profusion  of  steeple-spires,  white,  black  or 
red.  An  instinctive  taste  teaches  men  to  build  their 
churches  in  flat  countries  with  spire-steeples,  which 
as  they  cannot  be  referred  to  any  other  object,  point 
as  with  a  silent  finger  to  the  sky  and  stars,  and  some- 
times when  they  reflect  the  brazen  light  of  a  rich 
though  rainy  sunset,  appear  like  a  pyramid  of  flame 
burning  heavenward.  I  remember  once,  and  once 
only,  to  have  seen  a  spire  in  a  narrow  valley  of  a 
mountainous  country.  The  effect  was  not  only  mean 
but  ludicrous,  and  reminded  me,  against  my  will,  of 
an  extinguisher ;  the  close  neighborhood  of  the  high 
mountain  at  the  foot  of  which  it  stood,  had  so  com- 
pletely dwarfed  it,  and  deprived  it  of  all  connection 
with  the  sky  or  clouds.  Forty-six  English  miles  from 
Cuxhaven,  and  sixteen  from  Hamburg,  the  Danish 
village  Veder,  ornaments  the  left  bank  with  its  black 
steeple,  and  close  by  it  the  wild  and  pastoral  hamlet 
of  Schulau.  Hitherto,  both  the  right  and  left  bank, 
green  to  the  very  brink,  and  level  with  the  river,  re- 
sembled the  shores  of  a  park  canal.  The  trees  and 
houses  were  alike  low ;  sometimes  the  low  trees  over- 
topping the  yet  lower  houses;  sometimes  the  low 
houses  rising  above  the  yet  lower  trees.  But  at 
350 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


341 


Schulau,  the  left  bank  rises  at  once  forty  or  fifty  feet, 
and  stares  on  the  river  with  its  perpendicular  facade 
of  sand,  thinly  patched  with  tufts  of  green.  The  Elbe 
continued  to  present  a  more  and  more  lively  spectacle 
from  the  multitude  of  fishing-boats  and  the  flocks  of 
sea  gulls  wheeling  round  them,  the  clamorous  rivals 
and  companions  of  the  fishermen ;  till  we  came  to 
Hlaukaness,  a  most  interesting  village  scattered  amid 
scattered  trees,  over  three  hills  in  three  divisions. 
Each  of  the  three  hills  stares  upon  the  river,  with 
faces  of  bare  sand  with  which  the  boats,  with  their 
bare  poles,  standing  in  files  along  the  banks,  made  a 
<<ort  of  fantastic  harmony.  Between  each  facade 
lies  a  green  and  woody  dell,  each  deeper  than  the 
other.  In  short,  it  is  a  large  village  made  up  of  indi- 
vidual cottages,  each  cottage  in  the  centre  of  its  own 
little  wood  or  orchard,  and  each  with  its  own  sepa- 
rate path ;  a  village  with  a  labyrinth  of  paths,  or  ra- 
ther a  neighborhood  of  houses !  It  is  inhabited  by 
fishermen  and  boat-makers,  the  Blankanese  boats 
being  in  great  request  through  the  whole  navigation 
of  the  Elbe.  Here  first  we  saw  the  spires  of  Ham- 
burg, and  from  hence  as  far  as  Altona,  the  left  bank 
of  the  Elbe  is  uncommonly  pleasing,  considered  as  the 
vicinity  of  an  industrious  and  republican  city ;  in  that 
style  of  beauty,  or  rather  prettiness,  that  might  tempt 
the  citizen  into  the  country,  and  yet  gratify  the  taste 
which  he  had  acquired  in  the  town.  Summer  houses 
and  Chinese  show-work  are  every  where  scattered 
along  the  high  and  green  banks ;  the  boards  of  the 
farm-houses  left  unplastered  and  gaily  painted  with 
green  and  yellow;  and  scarcely  a  tree  not  cut  into 
shapes,  and  made  to  remind  the  human  being  of  his 
own  power  and  intelligence  instead  of  the  wisdom  of 
nature.  Still,  however,  these  are  links  of  connection 
between  town  and  country,  and  far  better  than  the 
affectation  of  tastes  and  enjoyments  for  which  men's 
habits  have  disqualified  them.  Pass  them  by  on  Sat- 
urdays and  Sundays  with  the  burghers  of  Hamburg 
smoking  their  pipes,  the  women  and  children  feast- 
ing in  the  alcoves  of  box  and  yew,  and  it  becomes  a 
nature  of  its  own.  On  Wednesday,  four  o'clock,  we 
left  the  vessel,  and  passing  with  trouble  through  the 
huge  masses  of  shipping  that  seemed  to  choke  the 
wide  Elbe  from  Altona  upward,  we  were  at  length 
landed  at  the  Boom  House,  Hamburg. 


LETTER  n.    (TO  A  LADY.) 

Ratzeburg. 
Meine  liebe  Freundin, 

See  how  natural  the  German  comes  from  me,  though 
I  have  not  yet  been  six  weeks  in  the  country! — al- 
most as  fluently  as  English  from  my  neighbor  the 
Amptschreiber,  (or  public  secretary.)  who,  as  often  as 
we  meet,  though  it  should  be  half  a  dozen  times  in 
the  same  day,  never  fails  to  greet  me  with — "** 
dham  your  ploot  unt  eyes,  my  dearest  Englander  ! 
vhee  noes  it  V — which  is  certainly  a  proof  of  great 
generosity  on  his  part,  these  words  being  his  whole 


stock  of  English.  I  had,  however,  a  better  reason 
than  the  desire  of  displaying  my  proficiency ;  lor  I 
wished  to  put  you  in  good  humor  with  a  language, 
from  the  acquirement  of  which  I  have  promised  my- 
self much  edification,  and  the  means,  too,  of  commu- 
nicating a  new  pleasure  toyou  and  your  sister,  during 
our  winter  readings.  And  how  can  I  do  this  better 
than  by  pointing  out  its  gallant  attention  to  the  Indies  ( 
Our  English  affix,  ess,  is,  I  believe,  confined  either  to 
words  derived  from  the  Latin,  as  actress,  directress, 
&c.  or  from  the  French,  as  mistress,  duchess,  and  the 
like.  But  the  German,  in,  enables  us  to  designate 
the  sex  in  every  possible  relation  of  life.  Thus  the 
Amptman's  lady  is  the  Frau  Amptmam'/i — the  secre- 
tary's wife  (by-the-by  the  handsomest  woman  I  have 
yet  seen  in  Germany)  is  Die  allerliebste  Frau  Ampt- 
schreibenn — the  colonel's  lady,  Die  Frau  Obrist/H  or 
colonelm — and  even  the  pastor's  wife,  Die  Frau  pas- 
tor/;?. But  I  am  especially  pleased  with  iheh  freund- 
in, which,  unlike  the  arnica  of  the  Romans,  is  seldom 
used  but  in  its  best  and  purest  sense.  Now,  I  know 
it  will  be  said,  that  a  friend  is  already  something  more 
than  a  friend,  when  a  man  feels  an  anxiety  to  express 
to  himself  that  this  friend  is  a  female;  but  this  I 
deny — in  that  sense,  at  least,  in  which  the  objection 
will  be  made.  I  would  hazard  the  impeachment  of 
heresy,  rather  than  abandon  my  belief  that  there  is  a 
sex  in  our  souls  as  well  as  in  their  perishable  gar- 
ments ;  and  he  who  does  not  feel  it,  never  truly  loved 
a  sister — nay,  is  not  capable  even  of  loving  a  wife  as 
she  deserves  to  be  loved,  if  she  indeed  be  worthy  of 
that  holy  name. 

Now,  I  know,  my  gentle  friend,  what  you  are  mur- 
muring to  yourself-— "This  is  so  like  him!  running 
away  after  the  first  bubble  that  chance  has  blown  off 
from  the  surface  of  his  fancy,  when  one  is  anxious  to 
learn  where  he  is,  and  what  he  has  seen."  Well, 
then!  that  I  am  settled  at  Ratzeburg,  with  my  mo- 
tives and  the  particulars  of  my  journey  hither, 

will  inform  you.  My  first  letter  to  him,  with  which, 
doubtless,  he  has  edified  your  whole  fireside,  left  me 
safely  landed  at  Hamburg,  on  the  Elbe  Stairs,  at  the 
Boom  House.  While  standing  on  the  stairs,  1  was 
amused  by  the  contents  of  the  passage  boat  which 
crosses  the  river  once  or  twice  a  day  from  Hamburg 
to  Haarburg.  It  was  stowed  close  with  all  the  peo- 
ple of  all  nations,  in  all  sorts  of  dresses ;  the  men  all 
with  pipes  in  their  mouths,  and  these  pipes  of  all 
shapes  and  fancies — straight  and  wreathed,  simple 
and  complex,  long  and  short,  cane,  clay,  porcelain, 
wood,  tin,  silver,  and  ivory;  most  of  them  with  silver 
chains  and  silver  bole-covers.  Pipes  and  boots  are 
the  first  universal  characteristic  of  the  male  Ham- 
burgers that  would  strike  the  eye  of  a  raw  traveller. 
But  I  forget  my  promise  of  journalizing  as  much  as 
possible.  Therefore — September  19th,  afternoon — My 
companion,  who,  you  recollect,  speaks  the  French 
language  with  unusual  propriety,  had  formed  a  kind 
of  confidential  acquaintance  with  the  emigrant,  who 
appeared  to  be  a  man  of  sense,  and  whose  manners 
were  those  of  a  perfect  gentleman.  He  seemed 
about  fifty,  or  rather  more.  Whatever  is  unpleasant 
in  French  manners  from  excess  in  the  degree,  had 
351 


342 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


been  softened  down  by  age  or  affliction  ;  and  all  that 
is  delightful  in  the  kind,  alacrity  and  delicacy  in 
little  attentions,  &c.  remained,  and  without  bustle, 
gesticulation,  or  disproportionate  eagerness.  His 
demeanor  exhibited  the  minute  philanthropy  of  a 
polished  Frenchman,  tempered  by  the  sobriety  of  the 
English  character,  disunited  from  its  reverse.  There 
is  something  strangely  attractive  in  the  character  of 
a  gentleman  when  you  apply  the  word  emphatically, 
and  yet  in  that  sense  of  the  term  which  it  is  more 
easy  to  feel  than  to  define.  It  neither  includes  the 
possession  of  high  moral  excellence,  nor  of  necessity 
even  the  ornamental  graces  of  manner.  I  have  now 
in  my  mind's  eye,  a  person  whose  life  would  scarcely 
stand  scrutiny,  even  in  the  court  of  honor,  much  less 
in  that  of  conscience;  and  his  manners,  if  nicely  ob- 
served, would,  of  the  two,  excite  an  idea  of  awkward- 
ness rather  than  of  elegance  ;  and  yet,  every  one  who 
conversed  with  him  felt  and  acknowledged  the  gen* 
tleman.  The  secret  of  the  matter,  I  believe  to  be 
this — we  feel  the  gentlemanly  character  present  to 
us  whenever,  under  all  the  circumstances  of  social 
intercourse,  the  trivial  not  less  than  the  imporlant, 
through  the  whole  detail  of  his  manners  and  deport- 
ment, and  with  the  ease  of  a  habit,  a  person  shows 
respect  to  others  in  such  a  way,  as  at  the  same  time 
implies,  in  his  own  feelings,  an  habitual  and  assured 
anticipation  of  reciprocal  respect  from  them  to  him- 
self In  short,  the  gentlemanly  character  arises  out 
of  the  feeling  of  equality,  acting  as  a  habit,  yet  flex- 
ible to  the  varieties  of  rank,  and  modified  without 
being  disturbed  or  superseded  by  them.  This  de- 
scription will,  perhaps,  explain  to  you  the  ground  of 
one  of  your  own  remarks,  as  I  was  Englishing  to  you 
the  interesting  dialogue  concerning  the  causes  of  the 
corruption  of  eloquence.  "  What  perfect  gentlemen 
these  old  Romans  must  have  been  !  I  was  impressed, 
I  remember,  with  the  same  feeling  at  the  time  I  was 
reading  a  translation  of  Cicero's  philosophical  dia- 
logues, and  of  his  epistolary  correspondence:  while 
in  Pliny's  Letters  I  seemed  to  have  a  different  feel- 
ing— he  gave  me  the  nolion  of  a  very  fine  gentle- 
man." You  uttered  the  words  as  if  you  had  felt  that 
the  adjunct  had  injured  the  substance,  and  the  in- 
creased degree  altered  the  kind.  Pliny  was  the 
courtier  of  an  absolute  monarch — Cicero,  an  aristo- 
cratic republican.  For  this  reason  the  character  of 
gentleman,  in  the  sense  to  which  I  have  confined  it, 
is  frequent  in  England,  rare  in  France,  and  found, 
where  it  is  found,  in  age,  or  at  the  latest  period  of 
manhood  ;  while  in  Germany  the  character  is  almost 
unknown.  But  the  proper  antipotle  of  a  gentleman 
is  to  be  sought  for  among  ihe  Anglo-American  demo- 
crats. 

I  owe  this  digression,  as  an  act  of  justice,  to  this 
amiable  Frenchman,  and  of  humiliation  for  myself 
For  in  a  little  controversy  between  us  on  the  subject 
of  French  poetry,  he  made  me  feel  my  own  ill  be- 
havior by  the  silent  reproof  of  contrast;  and  when 
I  afterwards  apologized  to  him  for  the  warmth  of  my 
language,  he  answered  me  with  a  cheerful  expression 
of  surprise,  and  an  immediate  compliment,  which  a 
gentleman  might  both  make  with  dignity,  and  receive 


with  pleasure.  I  was  pleased,  therefore,  to  find  il 
agreed  on,  that  we  should,  if  possible,  take  up  our 
quarters  in  the  same  house.  My  friend  went  with 
him  in  search  of  a  hotel,  and  I  to  deliver  my  letters 
of  recommendation. 

I  walked  onward  at  a  brisk  pace,  enlivened  not  so 
much  by  any  thing  I  actually  saw,  as  by  the  confused 
sense  that  1  was  for  the  first  time  in  my  life  on  the 
continent  of  our  planet.  I  seemed  to  myself  like  a 
liberated  bird  that  had  been  hatched  in  an  avian', 
who  now  after  his  first  soar  of  freedom  poises  him- 
self in  the  upper  air.  Very  naturally  I  began  to 
wonder  at  all  things,  some  for  being  so  like  and  some 
for  being  so  unlike  the  things  in  England — Dutch 
women  with  large  umbrella  hats  shooting  out  half  a 
yard  before  them,  with  a  prodigal  plumpness  of  petti- 
coat behind — the  women  of  Hamburg  with  caps 
plated  on  the  caul  with  silver  or  gold,  or  both,  bor- 
dered round  with  stiffened  lace,  which  stood  out  be- 
fore their  eyes,  but  not  lower,  so  that  Ihe  eyes  spar- 
kled through  it — the  Hanoverian  women  with  the 
fore  part  of  the  head  bare,  then  a  stiff  lace  standing 
up  like  a  wall  perpendicular  on  the  cap,  and  the  cap 
behind  tailed  with  an  enormous  quantity  of  ribbon, 
which  lies  or  tosses  on  the  back : 

"Their  visnomies  seem'd  like  a  goodly  banner, 
Spread  in  defiance  of  all  enemies."  Spenser. 

The  ladies  all  in  English  dresses,  all  rouged,  and 

all  with  bad  teeth:  which  you  notice  instantly  from 
their  contrast  to  the  almost  animal,  too  glossy  mother- 
of-pearl  whiteness,  and  the  regularity  of  the  teeth 
of  the  laughing,  loud-talking  country  women  and 
servant  girls,  who,  with  their  clean  white  stockings, 
and  with  slippers  without  heel-quarters,  tripped  along 
the  dirty  streets  as  if  they  were  secured  by  a  charm 
from  the  dirt;  with  a  lightness,  too,  which  surprised 
me,  who  had  alwaj-s  considered  it  as  one  of  the  an- 
noyances of  sleeping  in  an  Inn,  that  I  had  to  clatter 
up  stairs  in  a  pair  of  them.  The  streets  narrow;  to 
my  English  nose  sufficiently  offensive,  and  explain- 
ing at  first  sight  the  universal  use  of  boots  ;  without 
any  appropriate  path  for  the  foot-passengers;  the 
gable  ends  of  the  houses  all  towards  the  street,  some 
in  the  ordinary  triangular  form,  and  entire,  as  the 
botanists  say,  but  the  greater  number  notched  and 
scolloped  with  more  than  Chinese  grotesqueness. 
Above  all,  I  was  struck  with  the  profusion  of  win- 
dows, so  large  and  so  many  that  the  houses  look  all 
glass.  Mr.  Pitt's  window  tax,  with  its  pretty  little 
addilionals  sprouting  out  from  it,  like  young  toad- 
lets  on  the  back  of  a  Surinam  toad,  would  certainly 
improve  the  appearance  of  the  Hamburg  houses, 
which  have  a  slight  summer  look,  not  in  keeping 
with  their  size,  incongruous  with  the  climate,  and 
precluding  that  feeling  of  retirement  and  self-content, 
which  one  wishes  to  associate  with  a  house  in  a  noisy 
city.  But  a  conflagration  would,  1  fear,  be  the  pre- 
vious requisite  to  the  production  of  any  architectural 
beauty  in  Hamburg:  for  verily  it  is  a  filthy  town.  I 
moved  on  and  crossed  a  multitude  of  ugly  bridges, 
with  huge  black  deformities  of  water  wheels  close 
by  them.  The  water  intersects  the  city  every  v\  here. 
352 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


343 


and  would  have  furnished  to  the  genius  of  Italy  the 
capabilities  of  all  that  is  most  beautiful  and  raagnifi- 
cent  in  architecture.  It  might  have  been  the  rival 
of  Venice,  and  it  is  huddle  and  ugliness,  stench  and 
stagnation.  The  Jungfer  Stieg,  (i.  e.  young  ladies' 
walk.)  to  which  mv  letters  directed  me.  made  an  ex- 
ception. It  is  a  walk  or  promenade  planted  with 
treble  rows  of  elm  trees,  which,  being  yearly  pruned 
and  cropped,  remain  slim  and  dwarf-like.  This  walk 
occupies  one  side  of  a  square  piece  of  water,  with 
many  swans  on  it  perfectly  tame  ;  and,  moving 
the  swans,  showy  pleasure  boats  with  ladies  in  them. 
rowed  by  their  husbands  or  lovers.    ***** 

(Some  paraqruplis  have  hi  in  here  omitted.) 
thus  embarrassed  by  sad  and  solemn  politeness,  still 
more  than  by  broken  English,  it  sounded  like  the 
voice  of  an  old  friend  when  I  heard  the  emigrant's 
servant  inquiring  after  me.  He  had  come  lor  the 
purpose  of  guiding  me  to  our  hotel.  Through  streets 
and  streets  I  pressed  on  as  happy  as  a  child,  and,  I 
doubt  not,  with  a  childish  expression  of  wonderment 
in  my  busy  eyes,  amused  by  the  wicker  wagons  with 
moveable  benches  across  them,  one  behind  the  other; 
(these  were  the  hackney  coaches ;)  amused  by  the 
sign-boards  of  the  shops,  on  which  all  the  articles 
sold  within  are  painted,  and  that,  too,  very  exactly, 
though  in  a  grotesque  confusion  ;  (a  useful  substitute 
for  language  in  this  great  mart  of  nations ;)  amused 
with  the  incessant  tinkling  of  the  shop  and  house 
door  bells,  the  bell  hanging  over  each  door,  and 
struck  with  a  small  iron  rod  at  every  entrance  and 
exit;  and  finally,  amused  by  looking  in  at  the  win- 
dows as  I  passed  along :  the  ladies  and  gentlemen 
drinking  coffee  or  playing  cards,  and  the  gentlemen 
all  smoking.  I  wished  myself  a  painter,  that  I  might 
have  sent  you  a  sketch  of  one  of  the  card  parties. 
The  long  pipe  of  one  gentleman  rested  on  the  table, 
its  bole  half  a  yard  from  his  mouth,  filming  like  a  cen- 
ser by  the  fish  pool;  the  other  gentleman,  who  was 
dealing  the  cards,  and,  and  of  course  had  both  hands 
employed,  held  his  pipe  in  his  teeth,  which,  hanging 
down  between  his  knees,  smoked  beside  his  ancles. 
Hogarth  himself  never  drew  a  more  ludicrous  distor- 
tion both  of  attitude  and  physiognomy,  than  this  effort 
occasioned  ;  nor  was  there  wanting  beside  it  one  of 
those  beautiful  female  faces  which  the  same  Hogarth, 
in  whom  the  satirist  never  extinguished  that  love  of 
beauty  which  belonged  to  him  as  a  poet,  so  often  and 
so  gladly  introduces  as  the  central  figure  in  a  crowd 
of  deformities,  which  figure  (such  is  the  power  of 
true  genius!)  neither  acts,  nor  is  mean!  to  act,  as  a 
contrast;  but  diffuses  through  all,  and  over  each  of 
the  group,  a  spirit  of  reconciliation  and  human  kind- 
ness ;  and  even  when  the  attention  is  no  longer  con- 
sciously directed  to  the  cause  of  this  feeling,  still 
blends  its  tenderness  with  our  laughter;  and  thus 
prevents  the  instructive  merriment  at  the  whims  of 
nature,  or  the  foibles  or  humors  of  our  fellow  men, 
from  degenerating  into  the  heart-poison  of  contempt 
or  hatred. 

Our  hotel  die  wilde  man,  [the  sign  of  which- was 
no  bad  likeness  of  the  landlord,  who  had  engrafted 
on  a  very  grim  face  a  restless  grin,  that  was  at  every 


man's  service,  and  which  indeed,  like  an  actor  re- 
hearsing to  himself,  he  kept  playing  in  expectation  of 
an  occasion  for  it,)  neither  our  hotel,  I  say,  nor  its 
landlord,  were  of  the  genteelest  class.  But  it  has  one 
creat  advantage  for  a  stranger,  by  being  in  the  mar- 
ket place,  and  the  next  neighbor  of  the  huge  church 
of  St.  Nicholas;  a  church  with  shops  and  houses 
built  up  against  it,  out  of  which  trern:  and  warts  its 
high  massy  steeple  rises,  necklaced  near  the  lop  with 
a  round  of  large  gilt  balls.  A  better  [wile-star  could 
scarcely  Ik?  desired.  Long  shall  I  retain  the  impres- 
sion made  on  my  mind  by  the  awful  echo,  so  loud 
and  long  and  tremulous,  of  the  deep-toned  clock 
within  this  church,  which  awoke  me  at  two  in  the 
morning  from  a  distressful  dream,  occasioned,  I  be- 
lieve, by  the  feather  bed,  which  is  used  here  instead 
of  bed  clothes.  I  will  rather  carry  my  blanket  about 
with  me  like  a  wild  Indian,  than  submit  to  this  abo- 
minable custom.  Our  emigrant  acquaintance  was, 
xve  found,  an  intimate  friend  of  the  celebrated  Abbe 
de  Lisle ;  and  from  the  large  fortune  which  he  pos- 
sessed under  the  monarchy,  had  rescued  sufficient 
not  only  for  independence,  but  for  respectability.  He 
had  offended  some  of  his  fellow  emigrants  in  Lon- 
don, whom  he  had  obliged  with  considerable  sums, 
by  a  refusal  to  make  further  advances,  and  in  conse- 
quence of  their  intrigues,  had  received  an  order  to 
quit  the  kingdom.  I  thought  it  one  proof  of  his  in- 
nocence, that  he  attached  no  blame  either  to  the  alien 
act,  ot  to  the  minister  who  had  exerted  it  against 
him ;  and  a  still  greater,  that  he  spoke  of  London 
with  rapture,  and  of  liis  favorite  niece,  who  had  mar- 
ried and  settled  in  England,  with  all  the  fervor  and 
all  the  pride  of  a  fond  parent,  A  man  sent  by  force 
out  of  a  country,  obliged  to  sell  out  of  the  stocks  at  a 
great  loss,  and  exiled  from  those  pleasures  and  that 
stvle  of  society  which  habit  had  rendered  essential 
to  his  happiness,  whose  predominant  feelings  were 
3  et  all  of  a  private  nature,  resentment  for  friendship 
outraged,  and  anguish  for  domestic  affections  inter- 
rupted— such  a  man,  I  think,  I  could  dare  warrant 
guiltless  of  espionage  in  any  service,  most  ot  all  in 
that  of  the  present  French  Directory.  He  spoke  with 
ecstasy  of  Paris  under  the  monarchy :  and  yet  the 
particular  facts,  which  made  up  his  description,  left 
as  deep  a  conviction  on  my  mind,  of  French  vvorth- 
liness,  as  his  own  tale  had  done  of  emigrant  ingrati- 
tude. Since  my  arrival  in  Germany,  I  have  not  met 
a  single  person,  even  among  those  who  abhor  the  re- 
volution, that  spoke  with  favor,  or  even  charitv,  of 
the  French  emigrants.  Though  the  belief  of  their 
influence  in  the  origination  of  this  disastrous  war. 
(from  the  horrors  of  which  North  Germany  deems 
itself  onlv  reprieved,  not  secured,)  may  have  some 
share  in  the  general  aversion  with  which  they  are- 
regarded  ;  yet  I  am  deeply  persuaded  that  the  far 
greater  part  is  owing  to  their  own  profligacy,  to  their 
treachery  and  hard-hearted ness  to  each  other,  and 
the  domestic  misery  or  corrupt  principles  which  so 
many  of  them  have  carried  into  the  families  of  their 
protectors.  ?>Iy  heart  dilated  with  honest  pride,  as  1 
recalled  to  mind  the  stern  yet  amiable  characters  of 
|  -.'.riots,  who  sought  refuge  on  the  Ccr» 
353 


J44 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


tinent  at  the  restoration  !  O  let  not  our  civil  war 
under  the  first  diaries,  he  paralleled  with  the  French 
revolution!  In  the  former,  the  chalice  overflowed  from 
excess  of  principle;  in  the  latter,  from  the  fermenta- 
tion of  the  dregs !  The  former  was  a  civil  war  be- 
tween the  virtues  and  virtuous  prejudices  of  the  two 
parties  :  the  latter  between  the  vices.  The  Venitian 
glass  of  the  French  monarchy  shivered  and  flew 
asunder  with  the  working  of  a  double  poison. 

Sept.  20lh.  I  was  introduced  to  Mr.  Klopstock,  the 
brother  of  the  poet,  who  again  introduced  me  to  pro- 
fessor Ebeling,  an  intelligent  and  lively  man,  though 
deaf:  so  deaf,  indeed,  that  it  was  a  painful  eflbrt  to 
talk  with  him,  as  we  were  obliged  to  drop  all  our 
pearls  into  a  huge  ear-trumpet.  From  this  courteous 
and  kind-hearted  man  of  letters,  (I  hope  the  German 
literati  in  general  may  resemble  this  first  specimen,) 
I  heard  a  tolerable  Italian  pitn,  and  an  interesting 
anecdote.  When  Bonaparte  was  in  Italy,  having 
been  irritated  by  some  instance  of  perfidy,  he  said  in 
a  loud  and  vehement  tone,  in  a  public  company — 
"  'Tis  a  true  proverb,  gli  Italiani  /nl/i  ladroni;" — (i. 
e.  the  Italians  all  plunderers.)  A  lady  had  the  cou- 
rage to  reply — "  Non  tutti.  ma  buona  parte  ;" — (not 
all,  but  a  good  part,  or  Bonaparte.)  This,  I  confess, 
sounded  to  my  ears  as  one  of  the  many  good  things 
that  might  have  been  said.  The  anecdote  is  more 
valuable,  for  it  instances  the  ways  and  means  of 
French  insinuation.  Hoche  had  received  much  in- 
formation concerning  the  face  of  the  country,  from  a 
map  of  unusual  fullness  and  accuracy,  the  maker  of 
which,  he  heard,  resided  at  Dusseldorf.  At  the 
storming  of  Dusseldorf  by  the  French  army,  Hoche 
previously  ordered  that  the  house  and  property  of  this 
man  should  be  preserved,  and  entrusted  the  perform- 
ance of  the  order  to  an  officer  on  whose  troop  he 
could  rely.  Finding  afterwards  that  the  man  had  es- 
caped before  the  storming  commenced,  Hoche  ex- 
claimed, "He  had  no  reason  to  flee!  it  is  for  such 
men,  and  not  against  them,  that  the  French  nation 
makes  war,  and  consents  to  shed  the  blood  of  its  chil- 
dren."    You  remember  Milton's  sonnet — 

"  The  great  Emathian  conqueror  bid  spare 
The  huuse  of  Pindarus,  when  temple  and  tower 
Went  to  the  ground" 

Now,  though  the  Dusseldorf  map-maker  may  stand 
in  the  same  relation  to  theTheban  bard,  as  the  snail 
that  makes  its  path  by  lines  of  film  on  the  wall  it 
creeps  over,  to  the  eagle  that  soars  sunward)  and 
beats  the  tempest  with  its  wings ;  it  docs  not  there- 
fore follow,  that  the  Jacobin  of  France  may  not  be  as 
valiant  a  general  and  as  good  a  politician  as  the  mad- 
man of  Macedon. 

From  Professor  Ebeling's,  Mr.  Klopstock  accom- 
panied my  friend  and  me  to  his  own  house,  where  I 
saw  a  fine  bust  of  his  brother.  There  was  a  solemn 
and  heavy  greatness  in  his  countenance,  which  cor- 
responded to  my  preconceptions  of  his  slvle  and 
genius.  I  saw  there,  likewise,  a  very  fine  portrait  of 
Lessing,  whose  works  are  at  present  the  chief  object 
of  my  admiration.  His  eyes  were  uncommonly  like 
mine;  if  any  thing,  rather   larger  and  mure  promi- 


nent. But  the  lower  part  of  his  face  and  his  nose — 
O  what  an  exquisite  expression  of  elegance  and  sen- 
sibility ! — There  appeared  no  depth,  weight,  or  com- 
prehensiveness, in  the  forehead.  The  whole  face 
seemed  to  say,  that  Lessing  was  a  man  cf  quick  and 
voluptuous  feelings;  of  an  active,  but  light  fancy; 
acute;  yet  acute  not  in  the  observation  of  actual  life, 
but  in  the  arrangements  and  management  of  the  ideal 
world,  i.  e.  in  taste  and  in  metaphysics.  I  assure 
you,  that  I  wrote  these  very  words  in  my  memoran- 
dum book,  with  the  portrait  before  my  eyes,  and 
when  I  knew  nothing  of  Lessing  but  his  name,  and 
that  he  was  a  German  writer  of  eminence. 

We  consumed  two  hours  and  more  over  a  bad  din- 
ner, at  the  table  d'llote.  "  Patience  at  a  German 
ordinary,  smiling  at  time."  The  Germans  are  the 
worst  cooks  in  Europe.  There  is  placed  for  every 
two  persons  a  bottle  of  common  wine,  Rhenish  and 
Claret  alternately  ;  but  in  the  houses  of  the  opulent, 
during  the  many  and  long  intervals  of  the  dinner, 
the  servants  hand  round  glasses  of  richer  wines.  At 
the  Lord  of  Culpin's  they  came  in  this  order:  Bur- 
gundy—  Madeira — Port — Frontiniac — Pacchiaretti — 
Old  Hock — Mountain — Champagne — Hock  again — 
Bishop,  and  lastly.  Punch.  A  tolerable  quantum, 
methinks  !  The  last  dish  at  the  ordinary,  viz.  slices 
of  roast  pork,  (for  all  the  larger  dishes  are  brought 
in,  cut  up,  and  first  handed  round,  and  then  set  on 
the  table,)  with  stewed  prunes  and  other  sweet  fruits, 
and  this  followed  by  cheese  and  butter,  with  plates 
of  apples,  reminded  me  of  Shakspeare ;  *  and  Shak- 
speare  put  it  in  my  head  to  go  to  the  French  comedy 
******* 

Bless  me !  Why  it  is  worse  than  our  modern  En- 
glish plays  !  The  first  act  informed  me,  that  a  court 
martial  is  to  be  held  on  a  Count  Vatron,  who  had 
drawn  his  sword  on  the  Colonel,  his  brother-in-law. 
The  officers  plead  in  his  behalf— in  vain!  J  lis  wife, 
the  Colonel's  sister,  pleads  with  most  tempestuous 
agonies — in  vain!  She  falls  into  hysterics  and  faints 
away,  to  the  dropping  of  the  inner  curtain!  In  the 
second  act  sentence  of  death  is  passed  on  the  Count 
— his  wife  as  frantic  and  hysterical  as  before  ;  more 
so  (good  industrious  creature  !)  she  could  not  he.  The 
third  and  last  act,  the  wife  still  frantic,  very  frantic 
indeed!  the  soldiers  just  about  to  fire,  the  handker- 
chief actually  dropped,  when  reprieve  !  reprieve  !  is 
heard  from  behind  the  scenes:  and  in  comes  Prince 
somebody,  pardons  the  Count,  and  the  wile  is  still 
frantic,  only  with  joy  ;  that  was  a!! ! 

O  dear  lady!  this  is  one  of  the  cases  in  which 
laughter  is  followed  by  melancholy:  for  such  is  the 
kind  of  drama  which  is  now  substituted  every  where 
fi«-  Shakspeare  and  Racine.  You  well  know  that  1 
offer  violence  to  my  own  feelings  in  joining  these 
names.  But,  however  meanly  1  may  think  of  the 
French  serious  drama,  even  in  its  most  perlc<  ; 
mens;  and  with  whatever  right  I  may  complain  of 


*"  Slender.  1  bruised  my  shin  with  playing  with  sword 
and  dagger  for  a  dish  of  stewed  prunes,  and  by  my  troth  I 
cannot  abide  the  smell  of  hot  meat  since."  So  acnm  : 
F.nuis.  "  I  will  make  an  end  of  my  dinner  ;  there's  pippins 
and  cheese  yet  to  come." 

354 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


345 


its  perpetual  falsification  of  the  language,  and  of  the 
connexions  and  transitions  of  thought,  which  Nature 
has  appropriated  to  states  of  passion  ;  still,  however, 
the  French  tragedies  are  consistent  works  of  art,  and 
the  offspring  ofgreat  intellectual  power.  Preserving 
a  fitness  in  the  parts,  and  a  harmony  in  the  whole, 
they  form  a  nature  of  their  own.  though  a  false 
nature.  Still  they  excite  the  minds  of  the  spectators 
to  active  thought,  to  a  striving  after  ideal  excellence. 
The  soul  is  not  stupified  into  mere  sensations  by  a 
worthless  sympathy  with  our  own  ordinary  sufferings, 
or  an  empty  curiosity  for  the  surprising,  undignified 
by  the  language  or  the  situations  winch  awe  and 
delight  the  imagination.  What,  (I  would  ask  of 
the  crowd,  that  press  forward  to  the  pantomimic 
tragedies  and  weeping  comedies  of  Kotzebue  and 
his  imitators.)  what  are  you  seeking  ?  Is  it  comedy  .' 
But  in  the  comedy  of  Shakspeare  and  Moliere,  the 
more  accurate  my  knowledge, and  the  more  profound- 
ly I  think,  the  greater  is  the  satisfaction  that  mingles 
with  my  laughter.  For  though  the  qualities  which 
these  writers  pourtray  are  ludicrous  indeed,  either 
from  the  kind  or  the  excess,  and  exquisitely  ludicrous, 
yet  are  they  the  natural  growth  of  the  human  mind, 
and  such  as,  with  more  or  less  change  in  the  drapery, 
I  can  apply  to  my  own  heart,  or,  at  least,  to  whole 
classes  of  my  fellow  creatures.  How  often  are  not 
the  moralist  and  the  metaphysician  obliged  for  the 
happiest  illustrations  of  general  truths,  and  the  subor- 
dinate laws  of  human  thought  and  action,  to  quota- 
tions not  only  from  the  tragic  characters,  but  equally 
from  the  Jacques,  Falstafil  and  even  from  the  fools 
and  clowns  of  Shakspeare,  or  from  the  Miser,  Hypo- 
chondriast,  and  Hypocrite,  of  Moliere  !  Say  not,  that 
I  am  recommending  abstractions  :  for  these  class- 
characteristics,  which  constitute  the  instructiveness 
of  a  character,  are  so  modified  and  particularized  in 
each  person  of  the  Shaksperian  Drama,  that  life  itself 
does  not  excite  more  distinctly  that  sense  of  indi- 
viduality which  belongs  to  real  existence.  Paradox- 
ical as  it  may  sound,  one  of  the  essential  properties 
of  geometry  is  not  less  essential  to  dramatic  excel- 
lence, and  (if  I  may  mention  his  name  without 
pedantry  to  a  lady)  Aristotle  has  accordingly  required 
of  the  poet  an  involution  of  the  universal  in  the 
individual.  The  chief  differences  are,  that  in  geome- 
try it  is  the  universal  truth  itself,  which  is  uppermost 
in  the  consciousness;  in  poetry,  the  individual  form 
in  which  the  truth  is  clothed.  With  the  ancients, 
and  not  less  with  the  elder  dramatists  of  England  and 
France,  both  comedy  and  tragedy  were  considered  as 
kinds  of  poetry.  They  neither  sought  in  comedy  to 
make  us  laugh  merely,  much  less  to  make  us  laugh 
by  wry  faces,  accidents  of  jargon,  slang  phrases  for 
the  day,  or  the  clothing  of  common-place  morals  in 
metaphors,  drawn  from  the  shops  or  mechanic  occu- 
pations of  their  characters  ;  nor  did  they  condescend 
in  trarredy  to  wheedle  away  the  applause  of  the 
spectators,  by  representing  before  them  fac-similes 
of  their  own  mean  selves  in  all  their  existing  mean- 
ness, or  to  work  on  their  sluggish  sympathies  by  a 
pathos  not  a  whit  more  respectable  than  the  maudlin 
tears  of  drunkenness.    Their  tragic  scenes  were 


meant  to  affect  us  indeed,  but  within  the  bounds  of 
pleasure,  and  in  union  with  the  activity  both  of  our 
understanding  and  imagination.  They  wished  to 
transport  the  mind  to  a  sense  oi'its  possible  greatness, 
and  to  implant  the  germs  of  that  greatness  during 
the  temporary  oblivion  of  the  worthless  "thing  we 
are,"  and  of  the  peculiar  state  in  which  each  man 
happens  to  be;  suspending  our  individual  recol- 
lections, and  lulling  them  to  sleep  amid  the  music 
of  nobler  thoughts. 

Hold!  (raethinks  I  hear  the  spokesman  of  the 
crowd  reply,  and  we  will  listen  to  him.  I  am  the 
plaintiff,  and  be  he  the  defendant.) 

Defendant.  Hold!  are  not  our  modern  senti- 
mental plays  filled  with  the  best  Christian  morality  i 

Plaintiff.  Yes !  just  as  much  of  it,  and  just  that 
part  of  it  which  you  can  exercise  without  ;i  single 
Christian  virtue — without  a  single  sacrifice  that  is 
really  painful  to  you! — just  as  much  as  falters  you, 
sends  you  away  pleased  with  your  own  hearts,  and 
finite  reconciled  to  your  vices,  which  can  never  be 
thought  very  ill  of,  when  they  keep  such  good  com- 
pany, and  walk  hand  in  hand  with  so  much  compas- 
sion and  generosity;  adulation  so  loathsome,  that  you 
would  spit  in  the  man's  lace  who  dared  oiler  it  to 
you  in  a  private  company,  unless  you  interpreted  it. 
as  insulting  irony,  you  appropriate  with  infinite  satis- 
faction, when  you  share  the  garbage  with  the  whole 
stye,  and  gobble  it  out  of  a  common  trough.  No 
Csesar  must  pace  your  boards — no  Antony,  no  royal 
Dane,  no  Orestes,  no  Andromache  ! 

D.  No :  or  as  few  of  them  as  possible.  What 
has  a  plain  citizen  of  London  or  Hamburg  to  do  with 
your  kings  and  queens,  and  your  school-boy  Pagan 
heroes  ?  Besides,  every  body  knows  the  storits  ; 
and  what  curiosity  can  we  leel 

P.  What,  Sir,  not  lor  the  manner  ?  not  for  the  de- 
lightful language  of  the  poet?  not  for  the  situations, 
the  action  and  re-action  of  the  passions  ? 

D.  You  are  hasty,  Sir!  the  only  curiosity  we  leel 
is  the  story;  and  how  can  we  be  anxious  concerning 
the  end  of  a  play,  or  be  surprised  by  it,  when  we 
know  how  it  will  turn  out  ? 

P.  Your  pardon  for  having  interrupted  you  !  we 
now  understand  each  other.  You  seek,  then,  in  a 
tragedy,  which  wise  men  of  old  held  for  the  highest 
effort  of  human  genius,  the  same  gratification  as  that 
you  receive  from  a  new  novel,  the  last  German  ro- 
mance, and  other  dainties  of  the  day,  which  can  be 
enjoyed  but  once.  If  you  carry  these  feelings  to  the 
sister  art  of  Painting,  Michael  Angelo's  Sestine 
Chapel,  and  the  Scripture  Gallery  of  Raphael,  can 
expect  no  tavor  from  you.  You  know  all  about  thent 
beforehand;  and  are,  doubtless,  more  familiar  with 
the  subjects  of  those  paintings  than  with  the  tragic 
tales  of  the  historic  or  heroic  ages.  There  is  a  con- 
sistency, therefore,  in  your  preference  of  contempo- 
rary writers:  for  the  great  men  of  former  times, 
those  at  least  who  were  deemed  great  by  our  ances- 
tors, sought  so  little  to  gratify  this  kind  of  curiosity, 
that  they  seem  to  have  regarded  the  story  in  a  not 
much  higher  light  than  the  painter  regards  his  can- 
vas ;  as  that  on,  not  by  which  they  were  to  display 
355 


346 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


their  appropriate  excellence.  No  work,  resembling 
a  tale  or  romance,  can  well  show  less  variety  of 
invention  in  the  incidents,  or  less  anxiety  in  weaving 
them  together,  than  the  Don  Quixote  of  Cervan- 
tes. Its  admirers  feel  the  disposition  to  go  back  and 
re-peruse  some  preceding  chapter,  at  least  ten  times 
lor  once  that  they  find  any  eagerness  to  hurry  for- 
wards: or  open  the  book  on  those  parts  which  they 
best  recollect,  even  as  we  visit  those  friends  often- 
cst  whom  we  love  most,  and  with  whose  characters 
and  actions  we  are  the  most  intimately  acquainted. 
In  the  divine  Ariosto,  (as  his  countrymen  call  this, 
their  darling  poet,)  I  question  whether  there  be  a 
single  tale  of  his  own  invention,  or  the  elements  of 
which  were  not  familiar  to  the  readers  of  "  old  ro- 
mance." I  will  pass  hy  the  ancient  Greeks,  who 
thought  it  even  necessary  to  the  fable  of  a  tragedy, 
that  its  substance  should  be  previously  known.  That 
there  had  been  at  least  fifty  tragedies  with  the  same 
title,  would  be  one  of  the  motives  which  determined 
Sophocles  and  Euripides,  in  the  choice  of  Electra  as 
a  subject.     Rut  Milton 

D.  Ay,  Milton,  indeed  !  but  do  not  Dr.  Johnson, 
and  other  great  men  tell  us,  that  nobody  now  reads 
Milton  but  as  a  task  ? 

P.  So  much  the  worse  for  them,  of  whom  this  can 
he  trulv  said  !  But  why  then  do  you  pretend  to  ad- 
mire Shakspeare  ?  The  greater  part,  if  not  all,  of  Ms 
dramas  were,  as  far  as  the  names  and  the  main  inci- 
dents are  concerned,  already  stock  plays.  All  the 
stories,  at  least,  on  which  they  are  built,  pre-existed 
in  the  chronicles,  ballads,  or  translations  of  contem- 
porary or  preceding  English  writers.  Why,  I  repeat, 
do  you  pretend  to  admire  Shakspeare  ?  Is  it,  perhaps, 
that  you  only  pretend  to  admire  him  ?  However,  as 
once  for  all  you  have  dismissed  the  well  known 
events  and  personages  of  history,  or  the  epic  muse, 
what  have  you  taken  in  their  stead  ?  Whom  has 
i/rmr  tragic  muse  armed  with  her  bowl  and  dagger? 
the  sentimental  muse,  I  should  have  said,  whom  you 
have  seated  in  the  throne  of  tragedy  ?  What  heroes 
has  she  reared  on  her  buskins? 

D.  O !  our  good  friends  and  next  door  neighbors — 
honest  tradesmen,  valiant  tars,  high-spirited  half-pay 
officers,  philanthropic  Jews,  virtuous  courtezans,  ten- 
der-hearted braziers,  and  sentimental  rat-catchers!  (a 
little  bluff  or  so,  but  all  our  very  generous,  tender- 
hearted characters  are  a  little  rude  or  misanthropic, 
and  all  our  misanthropes  very  tender-hearted.) 

P.  But  I  pray  you,  friend,  in  what  actions,  great  or 
interesting,  can  such  men  be  engaged  ? 

D.  They  give  away  a  great  deal  of  money  ;  find 
rich  dowries  for  young  men  and  maidens,  who  have 
all  other  good  qualities  ;  they  browbeat  lords,  baro- 
nets, and  justices  of  the  peace,  (for  they  are  as  bold 
as  Hector!)  they  rescue  stage-coaches  at  the  instant 
they  are  falling  down  precipices  ;  carry  away  infants 
in  the  sight  of  opposing  armies  ;  and  some  of  our  per- 
formers act  a  muscular  able-bodied  man  to  such  per- 
fection, that  our  dramatic  poets,  who  always  have 
the  actors  in  their  eye,  seldom  fail  to  make  their  fa- 
vorite male  character  as  strong  as  Samson.  And 
then  they  take  such  prodigious  leaps !    And  what  is 


done  on  the  stage,  is  more  striking  even  than  what  is 
acted.  I  once  remember  such  a  deafenine  explosion 
that  I  coidd  not  hear  a  word  of  the  play  for  half  an 
act  after  it ;  and  a  little  real  gunpowder  being  set  fire 
to  at  the  same  time,  and  smelt  by  all  the  spectators, 
the  naturalness  of  the  scene  was  quite  astonishing! 

P.  But  how  can  you  connect  with  such  men  and 
such  actions  that  dependence  of  thousands  on  the  fate 
of  one,  which  gives  so  lofty  an  interest  to  the  person- 
ages of  Shakspeare,  and  the  Greek  tragedians?  How 
can  you  connect  with  them  that  sublimest  of  all  feel- 
ings, the  power  of  destiny  and  the  controlling  might 
of  heaven,  which  seems  to  elevate  the  characters 
which  sink  beneath  his  irresistible  blow? 

D.  O,  mere  fancies !  We  seek  and  find  on  the 
present  stage,  our  own  wants  and  passions,  our  own 
vexations,  losses,  and  embarrassments. 

P.  It  is  your  poor  own  pettifbeging  nature,  then, 
which  you  desire  to  have  represented  before  you,  not 
human  nature  in  its  height  and  vigor?  But  surely 
yon  might  find  the  former,  with  all  its  joys  and  sor- 
rows, more  conveniently  in  your  own  houses  and 
parishes. 

D.  True!  but  here  comes  a  difference.     Fortune 

is  blind,  but  the  poet  has  his  eyes  open,  and  is  besides 

!  as  complaisant  as  fortune  is  capricious.     He  makes 

j  every  thing  turn  out  exactly  as  we  would  wish  it. 

He  gratifies  us  by  representing  those  as  hateful  or 

contemptible  whom  we  hate  and  wish  to  despise. 

P.  (aside)  That  is,  he  gratifies  your  envy  by  libel- 
ling your  superiors. 

D.  He  makes  all  those  precise  moralists,  who  affect 
to  be  better  than  their  neighbors,  turn  out  at  hist  ab- 
ject hypocrites,  traitors,  and  hard-hearted  villains ; 
and  your  men  of  spirit,  who  take  their  girl  and  their 
glass  with  equal  freedom,  prove  the  true  men  of 
honour,  and  (that  no  part  of  the  audience  may  remain 
unsatisfied)  reform  in  the  last  scene,  and  leave  no 
doubt  on  the  minds  of  the  ladies,  that  they  will  make 
most  faithful  and  excellent  husbands;  though  it  does 
seem  a  pity,  that  they  should  be  obliged  to  get  rid  of 
qualities  which  had  made  them  so  interesting!  Be- 
sides, the  poor  become  rich  all  at  once;  and,  in  the 
final  matrimonial  choice,  the  opulent  and  high-born 
themselves  are  made  to  confess,  that  virtue  is  the 

ONLY   TRUE    NOBILITY,  AND   THAT   A    LOVKI.Y  WOMAN 
IS   A   DOWRY    OF   HERSELF ! 

P.  Excellent!  but  you  have  forgotten  those  bril- 
liant flashes  of  loyalty,  those  patriotic  praises  of  the 
king  and  old  England,  which,  especially  if  conveyed 
in  a  metaphor  from  the  ship  or  the  shop,  so  often  soli- 
cit, and  so  unfailingly  receive  the  public  plaudit  !  I 
give  your  prudence  credit  for  the  omission.  For  the 
whole  system  of  your  drama  is  a  moral  and  intellec- 
lectual  Jacobinism  of  the  most  dangerous  kind,  and 
those  common-place  rants  of  loyalty  are  no  better 
than  hypocrisy  in  your  playwrights,  and  your  own 
sympathy  with  them  a  gross  self-delusion.  For  the 
whole  secret  of  dramatic  popularity  consists,  with 
you,  in  the  confusion  and  subversion  of  the  natural 
order  of  things,  their  causes  and  their  effects  ;  in  the 
excitement  of  surprise,  by  representing  the  qualities 
of  liberality,  refined  feeling,  and  a  nice  sense  of  ho- 
356 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


347 


nor  (those  things,  rather,  which  pass  among  you  for 
inch)  in  persona  and  in  classes  of  life  where  experi- 
ence teaches  us  least  to  expect  them;  and  in  reward- 
ing with  all  the  sympathies  that  are  the  dues  of  vir- 
tue, those  criminals  whom  law,  reason,  and  religion, 
bavi   excommunicated  from  our  esteem  .' 

And  now,  good  night!  Truly.'  I  might  have  writ- 
ten this  last  sheet  without  having  gone  to  Germany, 
but  I  fancied  myself  talking"  to  you  by  your  own  fire- 
side, and  can  you  think  it  a  small  pleasure  to  me  to 
forget,  now  and  then,  that  I  am  not  there  ]  Besides, 
you  and  my  other  good  friends  have  made  up  your 
minds  to  me  as  I  am.  and  from  whatever  place  I 
write,  you  will  expect  that  part  of  my  "  Travels"  will 
consist  of  the  excursions  in  my  own  mind. 


LETTER  III. 


Ratzeburg. 


No  little  fish  thrown  back  again  into  the* water,  no 
fly  unimprisoned  from  a  child's  hand,  could  more 
buoyantly  enjoy  its  element,  than  I  this  clean  and 
peaceful  house,  with  this  lovely  view  of  the  town, 
groves,  and  lake  of  Ratzeburg,  from  the  window  at 
which  I  am  writing.  My  spirits,  certainly,  and  my 
health  I  fancied,  were  beginning  to  sink  under  the 
noise,  dirt,  and  unwholesome  air  of  our  Hamburg  ho- 
tel. I  left  it  on  Sunday,  Sept.  23d,  with  a  letter  of 
introduction  from  the  poet  Klopstock,  to  the  Aropt- 
man  of  Ratzeburg.  The  Amptman  received  me  with 
kindness,  and  introduced  me  to  the  worthy  pastor, 
who  agreed  to  board  and  lodge  me  for  any  length  of 
time  not  less  than  a  month.  The  vehicle,  in  which  I 
took  my  place,  was  considerably  larger  than  an  Eng- 
lish siage-coach,  to  which  it  bore  much  the  same  pro- 
portion and  rude  resemblance,  that  an  elephant's  ear 
does  to  the  human,  lis  top  was  composed  of  naked 
of  different  colors,  and  seeming  to  have  been 
pans  of  different  wainscots.  Instead  of  windows, 
there  were  leathern  curtains  with  a  little  eye  of  glass 
in  each  ;  they  perfectly  answered  the  purpose  of  keep- 
ing out  the  prospect,  and  letting  in  the  cold.  I  could 
observe  little,  therefore,  but  the  inns  and  farm-houses 
at  which  we  stopped.  BJiey  were  all  alike,  except 
in  size:  one  great  room,  Tike  a  barn,  with  a  hay-lofi 
over  it,  the  straw  and  hay  dangling  in  tufts  through 
the  boards  which  ibrmed  the  ceiling  of  the  room,  and 
the  (loor  of  the  loft.  From  this  room,  which  is  paved 
like  a  street,  sometimes  one,  sometimes  two  smaller 
ones,  are  enclosed  at  one  end.  These  are  commonly 
floored.  In  the  large  room,  the  cattle,  piss,  poultry, 
men,  women  and  children,  live  in  amicable  commu- 
nity ;  yet  there  was  an  appearance  of  cleanliness  and 
comfort.  One  of  these  houses  I  measured.  It 
was  an  hundred  feet  in  length.  The  apartments 
were  taken  off  from  one  corner ;  between  these  and 
the  stalls  there  was  a  small  interspace,  and  here  the 
breadth  was  forty-eight  feet,  but  thirty-two  where  the 
stalls  were:  of  course,  the  stalls  were  on  each  side 
eighl  feet  in  depth.   The  faces  of  the-cows,  &c  were 

r  f2 


turned  towards  the  room;  indeed,  they  were  in  it,  so 
thai  they  had  at  least  the  comfort  of  seeing  each 
other's  faces.  Stall  feeding  is  universal  in  this  part 
oft  lermany,  a  practi<  e  concerning  which  the  agricul- 
turist and  the  poel  are  likely  to  entertain  opposite 
opinions,  or  ai  least  to  have  very  different  feelings 
The  wood  work  of  these  buildings  on  the  outside  is 
left  unplastered,  as  in  old  houses  among  us,  and  be- 
ing painted  red  and  green,  it  cuts  and  tessellates 
the  buildings  very  gayly.  From  within  three  miles 
of  Hamburg  almost  to  Molln,  which  is  thirty  miles 
from  it,  the  country,  as  far  as  I  could  see  it,*vas  a 
i,  only  varied  by  woods.  At  Molln  it  became 
more  beautiful.  I  observed  a  small  lake  nearly  sur- 
rounded with  groves,  and  a  palace  in  view,  belong- 
ing to  the  king  of  Great  Britain,  and  inhabited  by  the 
tor  of  the  Forests.  We  were  nearly  the  same 
time  in  travelling  the  thirty-five  miles  from  Hamburg 
to  Ratzeburg,  as  we  had  been  in  going  from  London 
to  Yarmouth,  one  hundred  and  twenty-six  miles. 

The  lake  of  Ratzeburg  runs  from  south  to  north, 
about  nine  miles  in  length,  and  varying  in  breadth 
from  three  miles  to  half  a  mile.  About  a  mile  from 
the  southernmost  point  it  is  divided  into  two,  of  course 
very  unequal  parts,  by  an  island,  which  being  con- 
nected by  a  bridge  and  a  narrow  slip  of  land  with  the 
one  shore,  and  by  another  bridge  of  immense  length 
with  the  other  shore,  forms  a  complete  isthmus.  On 
this  island  the  town  of  Ratzeburg  is  built.  The  pas- 
tor's house  or  vicarage,  together  with  the  Amptman's. 
AmptSehreiber's,  and  the  church,  stands  near  the  sum- 
mit of  a  hill,  which  slopes  down  to  the  slip  of  land  and 
the  little  bridge,  from  which,  through  a  superb  mili- 
tary gate,  you  step  into  the  island-town  of  Ratzeburg. 
This  again  is  itself  a  little  hill,  by  ascending  and  de- 
scending which  you  arrive  at  the  long  bridge,  and  so 
to  the  other  shore.  The  water  to  the  south  of  the 
town  is  called  the  Little  Lake,  which,  however,  al- 
most engrosses  the  beauties  of  the  whole  :  the  shores 
being  just  often  enough  green  and  bare  to  give  the 
proper  effect  to  the  magnificent  groves  which  occupy 
the  greater  part  of  their  circumference.  From  the 
turnings,  windings,  and  indentations  of  the  shore,  the 
views  vary  almost  every  ten  steps,  and  the  whole  has 
a  sort  of  majestic  beauty,  a  feminine  grandeur.  At 
the  north  of  the  Great  Lake,  and  peeping  over  it,  I 
see  the  seven  church  towers  of  Lubec,  at  the  distance 
of  twelve  or  thirteen  miles,  yet  as  distinctly  as  if  they 
\'.cr,-  ii  >t  three.  The  only  defect  in  the  view  is,  that 
Ratzeburg  is  built  entirely  of  red  bricks,  and  all  the 
'nouses  roofed  with  red  tiles.  To  the  eye,  therefore, 
it  presents  a  clump  of  brick-dust  red.  Yet  this  even- 
ing, Oct.  hah,  twenty  minutes  past  five,  1  saw  the 
town  perfectly  beautiful,  and  the  whole  softened 
down  into  complete  keeping,  if  I  may  borrow  a  term 
from  the  painters.  The  sky  over  Ratzeburg  and  all 
the  easl,  was  a  pure  evening  blue,  while  over  the 
west  it  was  covered  with  light  sandy  clouds.  Hence 
a  deep  red  light  spread  over  the  whole  prospect,  in 
undisturbed  harmony  with  the  red  town,  the  brown- 
red  woods,  and  the  yellow-red  reeds  on  the  skirts  oi 
the  lake.  Two  or  three  boats,  with  single  persons 
paddling  them,  floated  up  and  down  in  the  rich  light. 
357 


348 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


which  not  only  was  itself  in  harmony  with  all,  but 
brought  all  into  harmony. 

I  should  have  told  you  that  I  went  back  to  Ham- 
burg on  Thursday,  (Sept.  27th.)  to  take  leave  of  my 
friend,  who  travels  southward,  and  returned  hither 
on  the  Monday  following.  From  F.mpfelde,  a  vil- 
lage halfway  from  Ralzeburg,  I  walked  from  Ham- 
burg through  deep  sandy  roads,  and  a  dreary  flat: 
the  soil  every  where  white,  hungry,  and  excessively 
pulverized;  but  the  approach  to  the  city  is  pleasing! 
Light  cool  country  houses,  which  you  can  look 
through  and  see  the  gardens  behind  them,  widi  ar- 
bors and  trellis  work,  and  thick  vegetable  walls,  and. 
trees  in  cloisters  and  piazzas,  each  house  with  neat 
rails  before  it,  and  green  seals  within  the  rails.  Every 
object,  whether  the  growth  of  nature  or  the  work  of 
man,  was  neat,  and  artificial.  It  pleased  me  far  bet- 
ter than  if  the  houses  and  gardens  and  pleasure-fields 
had  been  in  a  nobler  taste  ;  for  this  nobler  taste  would 
have  been  mere  apery.  The  busy,  anxious,  money- 
loving  merchant  of  Hamburg  could  only  have  adopt- 
ed, he  could  not  have  evjoijed  the  simplicity  of  na- 
ture. The  mind  begins  to  love  nature  by  imitating 
human  conveniences  in  nature;  but  this  is  a  step  in 
intellect,  though  a  low  one — and  were  it  not  so,  yet 
all  around  me  spoke  of  innocent  enjoyment  and  sen- 
sitive comforts,  and  I  entered  with  unscrupulous  sym- 
pathy into  the  enjoyments  and  comforts  even  of  the 
busy,  anxious,  and  money-loving  merchants  of  Ham- 
burg. In  this  charitable  and  Catholic  mood  I  reached 
the  vast  ramparts  of  the  city.  These  are  huge  green 
cushions,  one  rising  above  the  other,  with  trees  grow- 
ing in  the  interspaces,  pledges  and  symbols  of  a  long 
peace.  Of  my  return  I  have  nothing  worth  commu- 
nicating, except  that  I  took  extra  post,  which  answers 
to  posting  in  England.  These  north  German  post- 
chaises  are  uncovered  wicker  carls.  An  English 
dust-cart  is  a  piece  of  finery,  a  chef  d'eeuvre  of  me- 
chanism, compared  with  them;  and  the  horses.' — a 
savage  might  use  their  ribs  instead  of  his  fingers  for 
a  numeration  table.  Wherever  we  stopped,  the  pos- 
tilion fed  his  cattle  with  the  brown  rye  bread  of 
which  he  eat  himself,  all  breakfasting  together,  only 
the  horses  had  no  gin  to  their  water,  and  the  postilion 
no  water  to  his  gin.  Now  and  henceforward  for  sub- 
jects of  more  interest  to  you,  and  to  the  objects  in 
search  of  which  I  left  you:  namely,  the  literati  and 
literature  of  Germany. 
Believe  me,  I  walked  with  an  impression  of  awe 

on  my  spirits,  as  W and  myself  accompanied 

Mr.  Klopstock  to  the  house  of  his  brother,  the  poet, 
which  stands  about  a  quarter  of  a  mile  from  the  city 
gate.  It  is  one  of  a  row  of  little  common-place  sum- 
mer houses,  (for  so  they  looked,)  with  four  or  five 
rows  of  young  meagre  elm  trees  before  the  windows, 
beyond  which  is  a  green,  and  then  a  dead  fiat,  inter- 
sected with  several  roads.  Whatever  beauty  (thought 
T)  may  be  before  the  poet's  eyes  at  present,  it  must 
certainly  be  purely  of  his  own  creation.  We  waited 
a  few  minutes  in  a  neat  little  parlor,  ornamented 
with  the  figures  of  two  of  the  muses,  and  with  prints, 
the  subjects  of  which  were  from  Klopstock's  odes. 
The  poet  entered;  I  was  much  disappointed  in  his 


countenance,  and  recognized  in  it  no  likeness  to  the 
bust.  There  was  no  comprehension  in  the  forehead, 
no  weight  over  the  eye-brows,  no  expression  of  pecu- 
liarity, moral  or  intellectual,  on  the  eyes,  no  massive- 
ness  in  the  general  countenance.  He  is,  if  any  thing, 
rather  below  the  middle  size.  He  wore  very  large 
half-boots,  which   his   legs   filled,  so  fearfully  were 

|  they  swoln.     However,  though  neither  W nor 

I  myself  could  discover  any  indications  of  sublimity  or 
enthusiasm  in  his  physiognomy,  we  were  both  equally 
impressed  with  his  liveliness,  and  his  kind  and  ready 
;  courtesy.  He  talked  in  French  with  my  friend,  and 
with  difficulty  spoke  a  few  sentences  to  me  in  En- 
glish. His  enunciation  was  not  in  the  least  affected 
]  by  the  entire  want  of  his  upper  teeth.  The  conver- 
[  sation  began  on  his  part  by  the  expression  of  his  rap- 
ture at  the  surrender  of  the  detachment  of  French 
troops  under  General  Humbert.  Their  proceedings 
in  Ireland  with  regard  to  the  committee  which  they 
had  appointed,  with  the  rest  of  their  organizing  sys- 
tem, seemed  to  have  given  the  poet  great  entertain- 
ment. He  then  declared  his  sanguine  belief  in  Nel- 
son's victory,  and  anticipated  its  confirmation  with  a 
keen  and  triumphant  pleasure.  His  words,  tones, 
looks,  implied  the  most  vehement  Anti-Gallicanism. 
The  subject  changed  to  literature,  and  I  inquired  in 
Latin  concerning  the  history  of  German  Poetry,  and 
the  elder  German  Poets.  To  my  great  astonishment, 
he  confessed  that  he  knew  very  little  on  the  subject. 
He  had  indeed  occasionally  read  one  or  two  of  their 
elder  writers,  but  not  so  as  to  enable  him  to  speak  of 
their  merits.  Professor  Ebeling,  he  said,  would  pro- 
bably give  me  every  information  of  this  kind :  the 
subject  had  not  particularly  excited  his  curiosity.  He 
then  talked  of  Milton  and  Glover,  and  thought  Glo- 
ver's blank  verse  superior  to  Milton's.     W and 

myself  expressed  our  surprise ;  and  my  friend  gave 
his  definition  and  notion  of  harmonious  verse,  that  it 
consisted  (the  English  iambic  blank  verse  above  all) 
in  the  apt  arrangement  of  pauses  and  cadences,  and 
the  sweep  of  whole  paragraphs, 

"  with  many  a  winding  bout 


Of  linked  sweetness  long  drawn  out," 

and  not  the  even  flow,  much  less  in  the  prominence 
or  antithetic  vigor  of  single  lines,  which  were  indeed 
injurious  to  the  total  effect.Acept  where  they  were 
introduced  for  some  specific  purpose.  Klopstock  as- 
sented, and  said  that  he  meant  to  confine  Glover's 
superiority  to  single  lines.  He  told  us  that  he  had 
read  Milton,  in  a  prose  translation,  when  he  was 
fourteen.  *      I    understood    him    thus    myself,    and 

W interpreted   Klopstock's  French  as  I  had 

already  construed  it.  He  appeared  to  know  very 
little  of  Milton,  or  indeed  of  our  poets  in  general. 
He  spoke  with  great  indignation  of  the  English 
prose  translation  of  his  Messiah.  All  the  translations 
had  been   bad.  very  bad — but  the  English  was  no 

*  This  was  accidentally  confirmed  to  me  by  an  old  Gemian 
gentleman  at  Helmstadt,  who  had  been  Klopstock's  school 
and  bed  fellow.  Among  other  boyish  anecdotes,  he  related 
that  the  young  poet  set  a  particular  value  on  a  translalion  of 
the  Paradise  Lost,  and  always  slept  with  it  under  his  pillow. 
358 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


319 


translation ;  there  were  pages  on  pages  not  in  the 
Original — arid  half  the  original  was  not  to  he  found 

in  the  translation.    W told  him  that  I  intended 

to  translate  a  few  of  his  odes  as  specimens  of  Ger- 
man lyrics;  he  then  said  to  me  in  English,  "I  wish 
you  would  render  into  English  some  select  passages 
of  the  Messiah,  and  revenge  me  of  your  country- 
men!" It  was  the  liveliest  tiling  which  he  produced 
in  the  whole  conversation.  He  told  us  that  his  first 
ode  was  liliv  years  older  than  his  last.  I  looked  at 
him  with  much  emotion — I  considered  him  as  the 
venerable  father  of  German  poetry  ;  as  a  good  man  ; 
as  a  Christian;  seventy-four  years  old  ;  with  legs 
enormously  swoln,  yet  active,  lively,  cheerful,  and 
kind,  and  communicative.  Mv  eyes  felt  as  it  a  tear 
were  swelling  into  them.  In  the  portrait  of  Lessing, 
there  was  a  toupee  periwig,  which  enormously  in- 
jured the  effect  of  his  physiognomy;  Klopstock  wore 
the  same,  powdered  and  frizzled.  By-the-bye,  old 
men  ought  never  to  wear  powder — the  contrast  be- 
tween a  large  snow-white  wi:r  and  the  color  of  an  old 
man's  skin  is  disgusting,  and  wrinkles  in  such  a  neigh- 
borhood appear  only  channels  for  dirt.  It  is  an  honor 
to  poets  and  great  men  that  you  think  of  them  as 
parts  of  nature;  and  any  thing  of  trick  and  fashion 
wounds  you  in  them  as  much  as  when  you  see  vene- 
rable yews  clipped  into  miserable  peacocks.  The  au- 
thor of  the  Messiah  should  have  worn  his  own  grey 
hair.  His  powder  and  periwig  were  to  the  eye, 
what  Mr.  Virgil  would  be  to  the  oar. 

Klopstock  dwelt  much  on  the  superior  power 
which  the  German  language  possessed  of  concentrat- 
ing meaning.  He  said  he  had  often  translated  parts 
of  Homer  and  Virgil,  line  by  line,  and  a  German 
line  proved  always  sufficient  for  a  Greek  or  Latin 
one.  In  English  you  cannot  do  this.  I  answered, 
that  in  English  we  could  commonly  render  one  Greek 
heroic  line  in  a  line  and  a  half  of  our  common  he- 
roic metre,  and  I  conjectured  that  this  line  and  a  half 
would  be  found  to  contain  no  more  syllables  than  one 
German  or  Greek  hexameter.  He  did  not  under- 
stand me  ;*  and  I,  who  wished  to  hear  his  opinions, 
not  to  correct  them,  was  glad  thai  he  did  not. 

*  Klopstock's  observation  was  partly  true  and  partly  errone- 
ous. In  the  literal  sense  of  his  words,  and  if  we  confine  the 
comparison  to  the  average  of  space  required  foi  the  expres- 
sion of  the  same  thought  in  the  two  languages,  11  is  errone- 
ous. I  have  translated  some  German  hexameters  into  Eng- 
lish hexameters,  and  find,  thai  on  the  average,  three  lines 
English  will  express  four  lines  German.  The  reason  is  evi- 
dent :  our  language  abounds  in  monosyllables  and  dissyllables. 
The  German,  not  less  than  the  Greek,  is  a  polysyllable  lan- 
guage. But  in  another  point  of  view  the  remark  was  not 
without  foundation.  For  the  German,  possessing  the  Bame 
unlimited  privilege  of  forming  compounds,  both  with  pre- 
positions, and  with  epithets  as  the  Greek,  ii  can  express  the 
richest  single  Greek  word  in  a  single  German  on»,  and  is 
thus  freed  from  the  necessity  of  weak  or  ungraceful  para- 
phrases. I  will  content  myself  with  one  example  at  present, 
viz.  the  use  of  the  prefixed  particles,  ver,  zer,  evt,  an 
thus,  reissen  to  rend,  verreissen  to  rend  away,  zcrreissen  to 
rend  to  pieces,  entreissen  to  rend  oft*  or  out  of  a  tiling,  in 
the  active  sense  :  er  schraelzen  to  mel' — ver,  zer,  ent,  schmel- 
zen — and  in  like  manner  through  all  the  verbs  neuter  and 
active.  If  you  consider  only  how  much  we  should  feel  the 
loss  of  the  prefix  be,  as  in  bedropl.  besprinkle,  besot,  espe- 
cially in  our  poetical  language,  and  then  think  that  this  same 
mode  of  composition  is  carried  through  all  their  simple  and 


We  now  took  our  leave.  At  the  beginning  of  tbe 
French  Revolution,  Klopstock  wrote  odes  of  congra- 
tulation. He  received  some  honorary  presents  from 
the  French  Republic,  (a  golden  crown,  I  believe,) 
',  and,  like  our  Priestley,  was  invited  to  a  seat  in  the 
legislature,  which  he  declined.  But  when  French 
lilx>rty  metamorphosed  herself  into  a  fury,  he  sent 
back  those  presents  with  a  palinodia,  declaring  his 
abhorrence  of  their  proceedings;  and  since  then  he 
has  been  perhaps  more  than  enough  an  Anti-Gal- 
lican.  I  mean,  that  in  his  just  contempt  and  detes- 
tation of  the  crimes  and  follies  of  the  Revolutionists, 
he  suffers  himself  to  forget  that  the  revolution  itself 
is  a  process  of  the  Divine  Providence;  and  that  as 
the  folly  of  men  is  the  wisdom  of  God,  so  are  their 
iniquities  instruments  of  his  goodness.  From  Klop- 
stock's  house  we  walked  to  the  ramparts,  discoursing 
together  on  the  poet  and  his  conversation,  till  our  at- 
tention was  diverted  to  the  beauty  and  singularity  of 
the  sunset,  and  its  effects  on  the  objects  round  us. 
There  were  woods  in  the  distance.  A  rich  sandy 
light  (nay,  of  a  much  deeper  color  than  sandy)  lay 
over  these  woods  that  blackened  in  the  blaze.  Over 
that  part  of  the  woods  which  lay  immediately  under 
the  intenser  light,  a  brassy  mist  floated.  The  trees 
on  the  ramparts,  and  the  people  moving  to  and  fro 
between  them,  were  cut  or  divided  into  equal  seg- 
ments of  deep  shade  and  brassy  light.  Had  the  trees, 
and  the  bodies  of  the  men  and  women,  been  divided 
into  equal  segments  by  a  rule  or  pair  of  compasses, 
the  portions  could  not  have  been  more  regular.  All 
else  was  obscure.  It  was  a  fairy  scene!  and  to  in- 
crease its  romantic  character,  among  the  moving  ob- 
jects thus  divided  into  alternate  shade  and  bright- 
ness, was  a  beautiful  child,  dressed  with  the  elegant 
simplicity  of  an  English  child,  riding  on  a  stately 
goat,  the  saddle,  bridle,  and  other  accoutrements  of 
which  were  in  a  high  degree  costly  and  splendid. 
Before  I  quit  the  subject  of  Hamburer,  let  me  sav, 
that  I  remained  a  day  or  two  longer  than  I  otherwise 
should  have  done,  in  order  to  be  present  at  the  feast 
of  St.  Michael,  the  patron  saint  of  Hamburg,  expect- 
ing to  see  the  civic  pomp  of  this  commercial  Repub- 
lic. I  was,  however,  disappointed.  There  were  no 
processions;  two  or  three  sermons  were  preached  to 

compound  prepositions,  and  many  of  their  adverbs.;  and 
that  with  most  of  these  the  Germans  have  the  same  privilege 
as  we  have  of  dividing  them  from  the  verb  and  placing  them 
at  the  end  of  ihe  sentence;  you  will  have  no  difficulty  in 
comprehending  the  reality  and  the  cause  of  this  superior 
power  in  the  German  of  condensing  meaning,  in  which  its 
great  poet  exulted  It  is  impossible  to  read  half  a  dozen 
pages  of  Wieland  without  perceiving  that  in  this  respect  tbe 
German  has  no  rival  but  the  Gieek.  And  yet  I  seem  to  feel, 
that  concentration  or  condensation  is  not  the  happiest  mode 
of  expressing  this  excellence,  which  seems  to  consist  not  so 
much  in  the  less  lime  required  for  conveying  an  impression, 
as  in  the  unity  and  simultaneousness  with  which  the  impres- 
sion is  conveyed.  It  lends  to  make  their  language  more 
picturesque:  it  depictures  images  better.  We  have  obtain- 
ed this  power  in  part  by  our  compound  verbs  derived  from 
the  Latin  ;  and  the  sense  of  its  ereat  effect  no  doubt  induced 
our  Milton  both  to  the  u-e  and  the  abuse  of  Latin  derivatives. 
Boi  still  these  prefixed  particles,  conveying  no  separate  or 
separable  meaning  to  the  mere  English  reader,  cannot  pos- 
sibly act  on  the  mind  with  ihe  f  irce  or  liveliness  of  an  original 
and  homogeneous  language  such  as  the  German  is,  and  be- 
sides are  confined  to  certain  words. 

359 


350 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


two  or  three  old  women  in  two  or  three  churches, 
and  St.  Michael  and  his  patronage  wished  elsewhere 
by  the  higher  classes,  all  places  of  entertainment, 
theatre,  &c.  being  shut  up  on  this  day.  In  Hamburg, 
there  seems  to  be  no  religion  at  all :  in  Lubec  it  is 
confined  to  the  women.  The  men  seem  determined 
to  be  divorced  from  their  wives  in  the  other  world, 
if  they  cannot  in  this.  You  will  not  easily  conceive 
a  more  singular  sight  than  is  presented  by  the  vast 
aisle  of  the  principal  church  at  Lubec,  seen  from  the 
organ-loft;  for  being  filled  with  female  servants,  and 
persons  in  the  same  class  of  life,  and  all  their  caps 
having  gold  and  silver  cauls,  it  appears  like  a  rich 
pavement  of  gold  and  silver. 

I  will  conclude  this  letter  with  the  mere  transcrip- 
tion of  notes,  which  my  friend  W made  of  his 

conversations  with  Klopstock,  during  the  interviews 
that  took  place  after  my  departure.  On  these  I  shall 
make  but  one  remark  at  present,  and  that  will  appear 
a  presumptuous  one,  namely,  that  Klopstock's  re- 
marks on  the  venerable  sage  of  Koenigsburg  are,  to 
my  own  knowledge,  injurious  and  mistaken;  and  so 
far  is  it  from  being  true  that  his  system  is  now  given 
up,  that  throughout  the  Universities  of  Germany  there 
is  not  a  single  professor  who  is  not  either  a  Kantean, 
or  a  disciple  of  Fichte,  whose  system  is  built  on  the 
Kantean,  and  pre-supposes  its  truth;  or  lastly,  who, 
though  an  antagonist  of  Kant  as  to  his  theoretical 
work,  has  not  embraced  wholly  or  in  part  his  moral 
system,  and  adopted  part  of  his  nomenclature.  "  Klop- 
stock having  wished  to  see  the  Calvary  of  Cumber- 
land, and  asked  what  was  thought  of  it  in  England, 
I  went  to  Remnant's,  (the  English  bookseller,)  where 
I  procured  the  Analytical  Review,  in  which  is  con- 
tained the  review  of  Cumberland's  Calvary.  I  re- 
membered to  have  read  there  some  specimens  of  a 
blank  verse  translation  of  the  Messiah.  I  had  men- 
tioned this  to  Klopstock,  and  he  had  a  great  desire  to 
see  them.  I  walked  over  to  his  house  and  put  the 
book  into  his  hands.  On  adverting  to  his  own  poem, 
he  told  me  he  began  the  Messiah  when  he  was 
seventeen ;  he  devoted  three  entire  years  to  the  plan, 
without  composing  a  single  line,  fie  was  greatly  at 
a  loss  in  what  manner  to  execute  his  work.  There 
were  no  successful  specimens  of  versification  in  the 
German  language  before  this  time.  The  first  three 
cantos  he  wrote  in  a  species  of  measured  or  numerous 
prose.  This,  though  done  with  much  labor  and 
.some  success,  was  far  from  satisfying  him.  He  had 
composed  hexameters  both  Latin  and  Greek  as  a 
chool  exercise,  and  there  had  been  also  in  the  Ger- 
man language  attempts  in  that  style  of  versification. 
These  were  only  of  very  moderate  merit.  One  day 
he  was  struck  with  the  idea  of  what  could  be  done 
Ul  this  way;  he  kept  his  room  a  whole  day,  even 
went  without  his  dinner,  and  found  that  in  the  even- 
ing he  had  written  twenty-three  hexameters,  versify- 
ing a  part  of  what  he  had  before  written  in  prose. 
From  that  time,  pleased  with  his  efforts,  he  composed 
no  more  in  prose.  To-day  he  informed  me  that  he 
had  finished  his  plan  before  he  read  Milton.  He 
was  enchanted  to  see  an  author  who  before  him  had 
trod  the  same  path.    This  is  a  contradiction  of  what 


he  said  before.  He  did  not  wish  to  speak  of  his  poem 
to  any  one  till  it  was  finished  ;  but  some  of  his  friends 
who  had  seen  what  he  had  finished,  tormented  him 
till  he  had  consented  to  publish  a  few  books  in  a 
journal.  He  was  then,  I  believe,  very  young,  about 
twenty-five.  The  rest  was  printed  at  different  pe- 
riods, four  books  at  a  time.  The  reception  given  to 
the  first  specimens  was  highly  flattering.  He  was 
nearly  thirty  years  in  finishing  the  whole  poem,  but 
of  these  thirty  years  not  more  than  two  were  em- 
ployed in  the  composition.  He  only  composed  in  fa- 
vorable moments;  besides,  he  had  other  occupations. 
He  values  himself  upon  the  plan  of  his  odes,  and  ac- 
cuses the  modern  lyrical  writers  of  gross  deficiency 
in  this  respect.  I  laid  the  same  accusation  against 
Horace:  he  would  not  hear  of  it  —  but  waived  the 
discussion.  He  called  Rousseau's  Ode  to  Fortune  a 
moral  dissertation  in  stanzas.  I  spoke  of  Dryden's 
St.  Cecilia;  but  he  did  not  seem  familiar  with  our 
writers.  He  wished  to  know  the  distinctions  between 
our  dramatic  and  epic  blank  verse.  He  recommended 
me  to  read  his  Herman  before  I  read  either  the  Mes- 
siah or  the  odes.  He  flattered  himself  that  some 
time  or  other  his  dramatic  poems  would  be  known  in 
England.  He  had  not  heard  ofCowper.  He  thought 
that  Voss,  in  his  translation  of  the  Iliad,  had  done 
violence  to  the  idiom  of  the  Germans,  and  had  sa- 
crificed it  to  the  Greek,  not  remembering  sufficiently 
that  each  language  has  its  particular  spirit  and  ge- 
nius. He  said  Lessing  was  the  first  of  their  dramatic 
writers.  I  complained  of  Nathan  as  tedious.  He 
said  there  was  not  enough  of  action  in  it,  but  that 
Lessing  was  the  most  chaste  of  their  writers.  He 
spoke  favorably  of  Goethe ;  but  said  that  his  ."  Sor- 
rows of  Werter"  was  his  best  work,  better  than  any 
of  his  dramas;  he  preferred  the  first  written  to  the 
rest  of  Goethe's  dramas.  Schiller's  "  Robbers"  he 
found  so  extravagant  that  he  could  not  read  it.  I 
spoke  of  the  scene  of  the  setting  sun.  He  did  not 
know  it.  He  said  Schiller  could  not  live.  He 
thought  Don  Carlos  the  best  of  his  dramas ;  but  said 
that  the  plot  was  inextricable.  It  was  evident  he 
knew  little  of  Schiller's  works;  indeed,  he  said  he 
could  not  read  them.  Burgher,  he  said,  was  a  true 
poet,  and  would  live ;  that  Schiller,  on  the  contrary, 
must  soon  be  forgotten ;  that  he  gave  himself  up  to 
the  imitation  of  Shakspeare,  who  often  was  extrava- 
gant, but  that  Schiller  was  ten  thousand  times  more 
so.  He  spoke  very  slightingly  of  Kotzebue,  as  an 
immoral  author  in  the  first  place,  and  next,  as  defi- 
cient in  power.  At  Vienna,  said  he,  they  are  trans- 
ported with  him ;  but  we  do  not  reckon  the  people  of 
Vienna  either  the  wisest  or  the  wittiest  people  of 
Germany.  He  said  Wieland  was  a  charming  author, 
and  a  sovereign  master  of  his  own  language  ;  that  in 
this  respect  Goethe  could  not  be  compared  to  him, 
or,  indeed,  could  anybody  else.  He  said  that  his  fault 
was  10  lie  fertile  to  exuberance.  I  told  him  the  Obe- 
ron  had  just  been  translated  into  English.  He  asked 
me  if  I  was  not  delighted  with  the  poem.  I  an- 
swered, that  I  thought  the  story  began  to  flag  about 
the  seventh  or  eighth  book,  and  observed,  that  it  was 
unworthy  of  a  man  of  genius  to  make  the  interest  of 
3C0 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


351 


a  long  poem  turn  entirely  upon  animal  gratification. 
He  seemed  at  first  disposed  to  excuse  this  by  saying, 
that  there  arc  different  subjects  lor  poetry,  and  that 
poels  are  mil  willing  lo  he  restricted  in  their  choice. 
1  answered,  that  I  thought  the  passion  of  love  as  well 
suited  lo  the  purposes  of  poetry  as  any  other  passion  ; 
but  that  it  was  a  cheap  way  of  pleasing,  to  fix  the 
attention  of  the  reader  through  a  long  poem  on  the 
mere  appetite.  Well,  but,  said  he,  yon  see  that  such 
poems  please  everybody.  I  answered,  that  it  was 
the  province  of  a  great  poet  to  raise  people  up  to  his 
own  level,  not  to  descend  to  theirs.  He  agreed,  and 
confessed,  that  on  no  account  whatsoever  would  he 
have  written  a  work  like  the  Oberon.  lie  spoke  in 
raptures  of  Wieland's  style,  and  pointed  out  the  pas- 
sage where  Retzia  is  delivered  of  her  child,  as  ex- 
quisitely beautiful.  I  said  that  I  did  not  perceive 
any  very  striking  passages;  but  that  I  made  allow- 
ance for  the  imperfections  of  a  translation.  Of  the 
thefts  of  Wieland,  he  said,  they  were  so  exquisitely 
managed,  that  the  greatest  writers  might  be  proud  to 
steal  as  he  did.  lie  considered  the  books  and  fables 
of  old  romance  writers  in  the  light  of  the  ancient 
mythology,  as  a  sort  of  common  property,  from  which 
a  man  was  free  *o  take  whatever  he  could  make  a 
good  use  of.  An  Englishman  had  presented  him 
with  the  odes  of  Collins,  which  he  had  read  with 
pleasure.  lie  knew  little  or  nothing  of  Gray,  except 
his  Essay  in  the  churchyard.  He  complained  of  the 
Fool  in  Lear.  I  observed,  that  he  seemed  to  give  a 
terrible  wildness  to  the  distress;  but  still  he  com- 
plained. He  asked  whether  it  was  not  allowed,  that 
Pope  had  written  rhyme  poetry  with  more  skill  than 
any  of  our  writers.  I  said  I  preferred  Dryden,  be- 
cause his  couplets  had  greater  variety  in  their  move- 
ment. He  thought  my  reason  a  good  one;  but  asked 
whether  the  rhyme  of  Pope  were  not  more  exact. 
This  question  I  understood  as  applying  to  the  final 
terminations,  and  observed  to  him  that  I  believed  it 
w:as  the  case,  but  that  I  thought  it  was  easy  to  excuse 
some  inaccuracy  in  the  final  sounds,  if  the  general 
sweep  of  the  verse  was  superior.  I  told  him  that 
we  were  not  so  exact  with  regard  to  the  final  endings 
of  lines  as  the  French.  He  did  not  seem  to  know 
that  we  made  no  distinction  between  masculine  and 
feminine  (i.  e.  single  or  double)  rhymes;  at  least,  he 
put  inquiries  to  me  on  this  subject.  He  seemed  to 
think  that  no  language  could  ever  be  so  far  tbrmed 
as  that  it  might  not  be  enriched  by  idioms  borrowed 
from  another  tongue.  I  said  this  was  a  very  danger- 
ous practice;  and  added,  that  I  thought  Milton  had 
often  injured  both  his  prose  and  verse  by  taking  this 
liberty  too  frequently.  I  recommended  to  him  the 
prose  works  of  Dryden  as  models  of  pure  and  native 
English.  I  was  treading  upon  tender  ground,  as  I 
have  reason  to  suppose  that  he  has  himself  liberally 
indulged  in  the  practice. 

The  same  day  I  dined  at  Mr.  Klopstock's,  where  I 
had  the  pleasure  of  a  third  interview  with  the  poet. 
We  talked  principally  about  indifferent  things.  I 
asked  him  what  he  thought  of  Kant.  He  said  that 
his  reputation  was  much  on  the  decline  in  Germany. 
That  for  his  own  part  he  was  not  surprised  to  find  it 
24 


so,  as  the  works  of  Kant  were  to  him  utterly  incom- 
prehensible; that  he  had  often  been  pestered  by  tho 
Kanteans,  but  was  rarely  in  the  practice  of  arguing 
with  them.  His  custom  was  to  produce  the  book, 
open  it,  and  point  to  a  passage,  and  beg  they  would 
explain  it.  This  they  ordinarily  attempted  to  do,  by 
substituting  their  own  ideas.  1  do  not  want,  I  say, an 
explanation  of  your  own  ideas,  but  of  the  passage 
which  is  before  us.  In  this  way  I  generally  bring  the 
dispute  to  an  immediate  conclusion.  He  spoke  of 
Wolfe  as  the  first  metaphysicianthey  had  in  Germany. 
Wolfe  had  followers,  but  they  could  hardly  be  called 
a  sect;  and  luckily  till  the  appearance  of  Kant,  about 
fifteen  years  ago,  Germany  had  not  been  pestered  by 
any  sect  of  philosophers  whatsoever,  hut  that  each 
man  had  separately  pursued  his  inquiries  uncontrolled 
by  the  dogmas  of  a  Master.  Kant  had  appeared  am- 
bitious to  be  the  founder  of  a  sect — that  he  had  suc- 
ceeded, but  that  the  Germans  were  now  coming  to 
their  senses  again.  That  Nicolai  and  Engel  had  in 
different  ways  contributed  to  disenchant  the  nation; 
but,  above  all,  the  incomprehensibility  of  the  philoso- 
pher and  his  philosophy.  He  seemed  pleased  to  hear, 
that  as  yet  Kant's  doctrines  had  not  met  with  any  ad- 
mirers in  England — did  not  doubt  but  that  we  had 
too  much  wisdom  to  be  duped  by  a  writer,  who  set  at 
defiance  the  common  sense  and  common  understand- 
ings of  men.  We  talked  of  tragedy.  He  seemed  to 
rate  highly  the  power  of  exciting  tears.  I  said  that 
nothing  was  more  easy  than  to  deluge  an  audience; 
that  it  was  done  every  day  by  the  meanest  writers." 
I  must  remind  you,  my  friend,  first,  that  these  notes, 
&c.  are  not  intended  as  specimens  of  Klopstock's  in- 
tellectual power,  or  even  "colloquial  prowess,"  to 
judge  of  which,  by  an  accidental  conversation,  and 
this  with  strangers,  and  those  too  foreigners,  would 
be  not  only  unreasonable,  but  calumnious.  Secondly, 
I  attribute  little  other  interest  to  the  remarks,  than 
what  is  derived  from  the  celebrity  of  the  person  who 
made  them.  Lastly,  if  you  ask  me  whether  I  have 
read  the  Messiah,  and  what  I  think  of  it?  I  answer, 
as  yet  the  first  four  books  only;  and  as  to  my  opinion, 
(the  reasons  of  which  hereafter,)  you  may  guess  it, 
from  what  I  could  not  help  muttering  to  myself,  when 
the  good  pastor  this  morning  told  me  that  Klopstock 
was  the  German  Milton — "  a  very  German  Milton 
indeed  ! ! !" — Heaven  preserve  you,  and 

.S.  T.  Coleridge. 


CHAPTER  XXIII. 

Quid,  quod  prafatione  pra:munierim  libellum,  qua  Conor 
omnem  orfendiculi  ansam  pra'cidere  ?  Neque  quicquara 
addubito,  qnin  ea  candidia  omnibus  faciat  satis.  Quid 
autem  facias  ietis,  qui  vel  ob  ingenii  pertinaciam  sibi  satis- 
fied nolent,  ve)  stupidiores  sint  quam  ut  satisfactionem 
intelligant  ?  Nam  quern  ad  modum  Simonides  dixit,  Thes- 
salos  hebetiores  esse  quam  ut  possint  a  so  decipi,  ita  quos- 
dam  videas  stupidiores  quam  ut  placari  queant.  Adha:c, 
noil  mirum  est,  invenire  quod  calumnietur  qui  nihil  aliud 
quaerit  nisi  quod  calumnietur. 

Erasmus,  ad  Dorpium  Tcologum. 
Is  the  rifacciamento  of  The  Friend,  I  have  in- 
serted extracts  from  the  Conciones  ad   Populum, 
361 


352 


COLERIDGE'S  PHOSE  WORKS. 


printed,  though  scarcely  published,  in  the  year  1795, 
in  the  very  heat  and  height  of  my  antiminislerial  en- 
thusiasm :  these  in  proof  that  my  principles  of  politics 
have  sustained  no  change.  In  the  present  chapter,  I 
have  annexed  to  my  Letters  from  Germany,  with 
particular  reference  to  that  which  contains  a  disqui- 
sition on  the  modern  drama,  a  critique  on  the  Trage- 
dy of  Bertram,  written  within  the  last  twelve  months: 
in  proof,  that  I  have  been  as  falsely  charged  with  any 
fickleness  in  my  principles  of  taste.  The  letter  was 
written  to  a  friend  ;  arid  the  apparent  abruptness  with 
which  it  begins,  is  owing  to  the  omission  of  the  intro- 
ductory sentences. 

You  remember,  my  dear  Sir,  that  Mr.  Whitbread, 
shortly  before  his  death,  proposed  to  the  assembly 
subscribers  of  Drury-Lane  Theatre,  that  the  concern 
should  be  farmed  to  some  responsible  individual, 
under  certain  conditions  and  limitations  ;  and  that  his 
proposal  was  rejected,  not  without  indignation,  as 
subversive  of  the  main  object,  for  the  attainment  of 
which,  the  enlightened  and  patriotic  assemblage  of 
philo-dramatists  had  been  induced  to  risk  their  sub- 
scriptions. Now,  this  object  was  avowed  to  be  no 
less  than  the  redemption  of  the  British  stage,  not  only 
from  horses,  dogs,  elephants,  and  the  like  zoological 
rarities,  but  also  from  the  more  pernicious  barbarisms 
and  Kotzebuisms  in  morals  and  taste.  Drury-Lane 
was  to  be  restored  to  its  former  classical  renown ; 
Shakspeare,  Johnson,  and  Otway,  with  the  expur- 
gated muses  of  Vanburgh,  Congreve  and  Wycherly, 
were  to  be  re-inaugurated  in  their  rightful  dominion 
over  British  audiences;  and  the  Herculean  process 
was  to  commence  by  exterminating  the  speaking 
monsters  imported  from  the  banks  of  the  Danube, 
compared  with  which  their  mute  relations,  the  emi- 
grants from  Exeter  'Change,  and  Polito  (late  Pid- 
cock's)  show-carts,  were  tame  and  inoffensive.  Could 
an  heroic  project,  at  once  so  refined  and  so  arduous, 
be  consistently  entrusted  to,  could  its  success  be  ra- 
tionally expected  from  a  mercenary  manager,  at 
whose  critical  quarantine  the  lucri  bonus  ordo  would 
conciliate  a  bill  of  health  to  the  plague  in  person  ? 
No!  As  the  work  proposed,  such  must  be  the  work 
masters.  Rank,  fortune,  liberal  education,  and  (their 
natural  accompaniments  or  consequences)  critical  dis- 
cernment, delicate  tact,  disinterestedness,  unsuspected 
morals,  notorious  patriotism,  and  tried  Mecsnaship, 
these  were  the  recommendations  that  influenced  the 
votes  of  the  proprietary  subscribers  of  Drury-Lane 
Theatre,  these  the  motives  that  occasioned  the  elec- 
tion of  its  Supreme  Committee  of  Management. 
This  circumstance  alone  would  have  excited  a  strong 
interest  in  the  public  mind,  respecting  the  first  pro- 
duction of  the  Tragic  Muse  which  had  been  an- 
nounced under  such  auspices  and  had  passed  the 
ordeal  of  such  judgments;  and  the  Tragedy,  on 
which  you  have  requested  my  judgment,  was  the 
work  on  which  the  great  expectations,  justified  by  so 
many  causes,  were  doomed  at  length  to  settle. 

But  before  I  enter  on  the  examination  of  Bertram, 
or  the  Castle  of  St.  Aldobrand,  I  shall  interpose  a  few 
words  on  the  phrase  German  Drama,  which  I  hold  to 
be  altogether  a  misnomer.    At  the  time  of  Lessing, 


the  German  Stage,  such  as  it  was,  appears  to  have 
been  a  flat  and  servile  copy  of  the  French.  It  was 
Lessing  who  first  introduced  the  name  and  the  works 
of  Shakspeare  to  the  admiration  of  the  Germans] 
and  I  should  not,  perhaps,  go  too  iar,  if  I  add,  that  it 
was  Lessing  who  first  proved  to  all  thinking  men, 
even  to  Shakspeare's  own  countrymen,  the  true  na- 
ture of  his  apparent  irregularities.  These,  he  de- 
monstrated were  deviations  only  from  the  Accidents 
of  the  Greek  Tragedy  ;  and  from  such  accidents  as 
hung  a  heavy  weight  on  the  wings  of  the  Greek 
Poets,  and  narrowed  their  flight  within  the  limits  of 
what  we  may  call  the  Heroic  Opera.  He  proved, 
that  in  all  the  essentials  of  art,  no  less  than  in  the 
truth  of  nature,  the  plays  of  Shakspeare  were  in- 
comparably more  coincident  with  the  principles  of 
Aristotle,  than  the  productions  of  Corneille  and 
Racine,  notwithstanding  the  boasted  regularity  of 
the  latter.  Under  these  convictions,  were  Lessing's 
own  dramatic  works  composed.  Their  deficiency  is 
in  depth  and  in  imagination ;  their  excellence  is  in 
the  construction  of  the  plot,  the  good  sense  of  the 
sentiments,  the  sobriety  of  the  morals,  and  the  high 
polish  of  the  diction  and  dialogue.  In  short,  his 
dramas  are  the  very  antipodes  of  all  those  which  it 
has  been  the  fashion,  of  late  years,  at  once  to  abuse 
and  to  enjoy  under  the  name  of  the  German  Drama. 
Of  this  latter,  Schiller's  Robbers  was  the  earliest  spe- 
cimen; the  first  fruits  of  his  youth,  (I  had  almost 
said  of  his  boyhood)  and,  as  such,  the  pledge  and 
promise  of  no  ordinary  genius.  Only  as  such  did  the 
maturer  judgment  of  the  author  tolerate  the  play. 
During  his  whole  life  he  expressed  himself  concern- 
ing this  production,  with  more  than  needful  asperity, 
as  a  monster  not  less  offensive  to  good  taste  than  to 
sound  morals  ;  and,  in  his  latter  years,  his  indignation 
at  the  unwonted  popularity  of  the  Robbers,  seduced 
him  into  contrary  extremes,  viz  :  a  studied  feebleness 
of  interest,  (as  far  as  the  interest  was  to  be  derived 
from  incidents  and  the  excitement  of  curiosity ;)  a  dic- 
tion elaborately  metrical;  the  affectation  of  rhymes; 
and  the  pedantry  of  the  chorus.  But  to  understand 
the  true  character  of  the  Robbers,  and  of  the  count- 
less imitations  which  were  its  spawn,  I  must  inform 
you,  or  at  least,  call  to  your  recollection,  that  about 
that  time,  and  for  some  years  before  it,  three  of  the 
most  popular  books  in  the  German  language,  were, 
the  translations  of  Young's  Night  Thoughts,  Henry's 
Meditations,  and  Richardson's  Clarissa  Harlowe. 
Now,  we  have  only  to  combine  the  bloated  style  and 
peculiar  rhythm  of  Hervey,  which  is  poetic  only  on 
account  of  its  utter  unfitness  for  prose,  and  might  as 
appropriately  be  called  prosaic,  from  its  utter  unfit- 
ness for  poetry;  we  have  only,  I  repeat,  to  combine 
those  Herveyisms  with  the  strained  thoughts,  the 
figurative  metaphysics  and  solemn  epigrams  of  Young 
on  the  on'e  hand  ;  and  with  the  loaded  sensibility, 
the  minute  detail,  the  morbid  consciousness  of  every 
thought  and  feeling  in  the  whole  flux  and  reflux 
of  the  mind,  in  short,  the  self-involution  and  dream- 
like continuity  of  Richardson  on  the  other  hand  ;  and 
then,  to  add  the  horrific  incidents,  and  mysterious 
villains — (geniuses  of  supernatural  intellect,  if  you 
362 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


353 


will  take  the  author's  words  for  it,  but  on  a  level 
with  the  meanest  ruffians  of  the  condemned  cells,  if 
we  are  to  judge  by  their  actions  and  contrivances)— 
to  add  the  ruined  castles,  the  dungeons,  the  trap 
doors,  the  skeletons,  the  llesh-and-blood  ghosts,  and 
the  perpetual  moonshine  of  a  modern  author,  (them- 
selves the  literary  brood  of  the  Castle  of  Otranto,  the 
translations  of  which,  with  the  imitations  and  im- 
provements aforesaid,  were  about  that  time  beginning 
to  make  as  much  noise  in  Germany  as  their  originals 
were  making  in  England) — and  as  the  compound  of 
these  ingredients  duly  mixed,  you  will  recognise  the 
so-called  German  Drama.  The  Olla  Podrida  thus 
cooked  up,  was  denounced,  by  the  best  critics  in 
Germany,  as  the  mere  cramps  of  weakness,  and  or- 
gasms of  a  sickly  imagination,  on  the  part  of  the 
author,  and  the  lowest  provocation  of  torpid  feeling 
on  that  of  the  readers.  The  old  blunder,  however, 
concerning  the  irregularity  and  vvildness  of  Shak- 
speare,  in  which  the  German  did  but  echo  the 
French,  who  again  were  but  the  echoes  of  our  own 
critics,  was  still  in  vogue,  and  Shakspeare  was  quoted 
as  authority  for  the  most  anti-Shakspearean  Drama. 
We  have,  indeed,  two  poets  who  wrote  as  one,  near 
the  age  of  Shakspeare,  to  whom,  (as  the  worst  char- 
acteristic of  their  writings)   the   Coryphsus  of  the 

i  present  Drama  may  challenge  the  honor  of  being  a 
poor  relation,  or  impoverished  descendant.  For  if 
we  would  charitably  consent  to  forget  the  comic 
humor,  the  wit,  the  felicities  of  style,  in  other  words, 
all  the  poetry,  and  nine-tenths  of  all  the  genius  of 
Beaumont  and  Fletcher,  that  which  would  remain 
becomes  a  Kotzebue. 

The  so-called  German  Drama,  therefore,  is  English 
in  its  origin,  English  in  its  materials,  and  English  by 
re-adoption ;  and  till  we  can  prove  that  Kotzebue,  or 
any  of  the  whole  breed  of  Kotzebues,  whether 
dramatists  or  romantic  writers,  or  writers  of  romantic 

|  dramas,  were  ever  admitted  to  any  other  shelf  in  the 

(  libraries  of  well-educated  Germans  than  were  occu- 
pied by  their  originals,  and  apes'  apes  in  their  mother 
country,  we  should  submit  to  carry  our  own  brat  on 
our  own  shoulders;  or,  rather,  consider  it  as  a  lack- 
grace  returned  from  transportation  with  such  im- 
provements only  in  growth  and  manners  as  young 
transported  convicts  usually  come  home  with. 

I  know  nothing  that  contributes  more  to  a  clear 
insight  into  the  true  nature  of  any  literary  phenome- 
non, than  the  comparison  of  it  with  some  elder  pro- 

|  duction,  the  likeness  of  which  is  striking,  yet  only 
apjninnt ;  while  the  difference  is  real.  In  the  present 
case  this  opportunity  is  furnished  us  by  (he  old  Span- 
ish play,  entitled  Anlheisla  Fiilminato,  formerly,  and 
i  perhaps  still,  acted  in  the  churches  and  monasteries 
of  Spain,  and  which,  under  various  names,  (Don 
Juan,  the  Libertine,  <J-c.)  has  had  its  day  of  favor  in 
every  country  throughout  Europe.  A  populariiv  so 
extensive,  and  of  a  work  so  grotesque  and  extrava- 
gant, claims  and  merits  philosophical  attention  and 
investigation.  The  first  point  to  be  noticed  is,  that 
I  The  play  is  throughout  imaginative.  Nothing  of  it 
belongs  to  the  real  world  but  the  names  of  the  places 
and    persons.    The   comic   parts   equally  with   the 


tragic;  the  living,  equally  with  the  defunct  charac- 
ters, are  creatures  of  the  brain  ;  as  little  amenable  to 
the  rules  of  ordinary  probability  as  the  Satan  of 
Paradise  Lost,  or  the  Caliban  of  the  Tempest,  and, 
therefore,  to  be  understood  and  judged  of  as  imper- 
sonated abstractions.  Rank,  fortune,  wit,  talent,  ac- 
quired knowledge, and  liberal  accomplishments,  with 
beauty  of  person,  vigorous  health,  and  constitutional 
hardihood— all  these  advantages,  elevated  by  the 
habits  and  sympathies  of  noble  birth  and  national 
character,  are  supposed  to  have  combined  in  Don 
Juan,  so  as  to  give  him  the  means  of  carrying  into 
all  its  practical  consequences  the  doctrine  of  a  god- 
less nature  as  the  sole  ground  and  efficient  cause  not 
only  of  all  things,  events,  and  appearances,  but,  like- 
wise, of  all  our  thoughts,  sensations,  impulses,  and 
actions.  Obedience  to  nature  is  the  only  virtue  :  the 
gratifications  of  the  passions  and  appetites  her  only 
dictate ;  each  individual's  self-will  the  sole  organ 
through  which  nature  utters  her  commands,  and 

"  sVlf-contradiction  is  the  only  wrong  ! 
For,  by  the  laws  of  spirit,  in  the  right 
Is  every  individual  character 
That  acts  in  strict  consistence  with  itself." 

That  speculative  opinions,  however  impious  and 
daring  they  may  be,  are  not  always  followed  by  cor- 
respondent conduct,  is  most  true,  as  well  as  that  they 
can  scarcely,  in  anv  instance,  be  systematically  real- 
ized, on  account  of  their  unsuitableness  to  human 
nature,  and  to  the  institutions  of  society.  It  can  be 
hell,  only  where  it  is  all  hell ;  and  a  separate  world  of 
devils  is  necessary  for  the  existence  of  any  one  com- 
plete devil.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is  no  less  clear, 
nor,  with  the  biography  of  Carrier  and  his  fellow 
atheists  before  us,  can  it  be  denied,  without  wilful 
blindness,  that  the  (so  called)  system  of  nature,  (i.  e. 
materialism,  with  the  utter  rejection  of  moral  respon- 
sibility,of  a  present  providence  and  of  both  a  present 
and  future  retribution)  may  influence  the  characters 
and  actions  of  individuals,  and  even  of  communities 
to  a  degree  that  almost  does  away  the  distinction 
between  men  and  devils,  and  will  make  the  page  of 
the  future  historian  resemble  the  narration  of  a  mad- 
man's dreams.  It  is  not  the  wickedness  of  Don  Juan, 
therefore,  which  constitutes  the  character  an  abstrac- 
tion, and  removes  it  from  the  rules  of  probability  ; 
but  the  rapid  succession  of  the  correspondent  acts 
and  incidents,  his  intellectual  superiority,  and  the 
splendid  accumulation  of  his  gifts  and  desirable  qual- 
ities, as  co-existent  with  entire  wickedness  in  or.s  cud 
the  same  person.  But  this  likewise  is  the  very  cir- 
cumstance which  gives  to  this  strange  play  its  charm 
and  universal  interest.  Don  Juan  is,  from  beginning 
to  end,  an  intelligible  character,  as  much  so  as  the 
Satan  of  Milton.  The  poet  asks  only  of  the  reader, 
what  as  a  poet  he  is  privileged  to  ask,  viz.,  that  sort  of 
negative  faith  in  the  existence  of  such  a  being,  which 
we  willingly  give  to  productions  professedly  ideal, 
and  a  disposition  to  the  same  state  of  feelins  as  that 
with  which  we  contemplate  the  idealized  figures  of 
the  Apollo  Bclvidere,  and  the  Farnese  Hercules. 
What  the  Hercules  is  to  the  eye  in  corporeal  strength, 
Don  Juan  is  to  the  mind  in  strength  of  character. 
3C0 


354 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


The  ideal  consists  in  the  happy  balance  of  the  gene- 
ric with  the  individual.  The  former  makes  the 
character  representative  and  symbolical,  therefore 
instructive ;  because,  mutatis  mutandis,  it  is  applicable 
to  whole  classes  of  men.  The  latter  gives  its  living 
interest ;  for  nothing  lives  or  is  real,  but  as  definite  and 
individual.  To  understand  this  completely,  the  read- 
er need  only  recollect  the  specific  state  of  his  feel- 
ings, when  in  looking  at  a  picture  of  the  historic 
(more  properly  of  the  poetic,  or  heroic)  class,  he  ob- 
jects to  a  particular  figure  as  being  too  much  of  a 
portrait ;  and  this  interruption  of  his  complacency  he 
feels  without  the  least  reference  to,  or  the  least  ac- 
quaintance with,  any  person  in  real  life  whom  he 
might  recognise  in  this  figure.  It  is  enough  that  such 
a  figure  is  not  ideal ;  and  therefore,  not  ideal,  because 
one  of  the  two  factors  or  elements  of  the  ideal  is  in 
excess.  A  similar  and  more  powerful  objection  he 
would  feel  towards  a  set  of  figures  which  were  mere 
abstractions,  like  those  of  Cipriani,  and  what  have 
been  called  Greek  forms  and  faces,  i.  e.  outlines 
drawn  according  to  a  recipe.  These  again  are  not 
ideal,  because  in  these  the  other  element  is  in  excess. 
"  Forma  formans  per  forman  formatam  translucens," 
is  the  definition  and  perfection  of  ideal  art. 

This  excellence  is  so  happily  achieved  in  the  Don 
Juan,  that  it  is  capable  of  interesting  without  poetry, 
nay,  even  without  words,  as  in  our  pantomime  of  that 
name.  We  see,  clearly,  how  the  character  is  form- 
ed ;  and  the  very  extravagance  of  the  incidents,  and 
the  super-human  entireness  of  Don  Juan's  agency, 
prevents  the  wickedness  from  shocking  our  minds  to 
any  painful  degree.  (We  do  not  believe  it  enough  for 
this  effect ;  no,  not  even  with  that  kind  of  temporary 
and  negative  belief  or  acquiescence  which  I  have 
described  above.)  Meantime  the  qualities  of  his  cha- 
racter are  too  desirable,  too  flattering  to  our  pride  and 
our  wishes,  not  to  make  up  on  this  side  as  much  ad- 
ditional faith  as  was  lost  on  the  other.  There  is  no 
danger  (thinks  the  spectator  or  reader)  of  my  becom- 
ing such  a  monster  of  iniquity  as  Don  Juan  !  I  never 
shall  be  an  atheist!  /  shall  never  disallow  all  dis- 
tinction between  right  and  wrong !  I  have  not  the 
least  inclination  to  be  so  outrageous  a  drawcansir  in 
my  love  affairs!  But  to  possess  such  a  power  of  cap- 
tivating and  enchanting  the  affections  of  the  other 
sex!  to  be  capable  of  inspiring  in  a  charming  and 
even  a  virtuous  woman,  a  love  so  deep,  and  so  entire- 
ly personal  to  me!  that  even  my  worst  vices,  (if  I 
were  vicious)  even  my  cruelty  and  perfidy,  (if  1  were 
cruel  and  perfidious)  could  not  eradicate  the  passion! 
To  be  so  loved  for  my  own  self,  that  even  with  a  dis- 
tinct knowledge  of  my  character,  she  yet  died  to  save 
me  !  this,  sir,  takes  hold  of  two  sides  of  our  nature, 
the  better  and  the  worse.  For  the  heroic  disinterest- 
edness to  which  love  can  transport  a  woman,  cannot 
be  contemplated  without  an  honorable  emotion  of 
reverence  towards  womanhood ;  and  on  the  other 
hand,  il  is  among  the  miseries,  and  abides  in  the  dark 
ground-work  of  our  nature,  to  crave  an  outward  con- 
firmation of  that  something  within  us,  which  is  our 
Wry  self,  that  something,  not  made  up  of  our  qualities 
and  relations,  but  itself  the  supporter  and  substantial 


basis  of  all  these.  Love  me,  and  not  my  qualities, 
may  be  a  vicious  and  an  insane  wish,  but  it  is  not  a 
wish  wholly  without  a  meaning. 

Without  power,  virtue  would  be  insufficient  and 
incapable  of  revealing  its  being.  It  would  resemble 
the  magic  transformation  of  Tasso's  heroine  into  a 
tree,  in  which  she  could  only  groan  and  bleed.  (Hence 
power  is  necessarily  an  object  of  our  desire  and  of 
our  admiration.)  But  of  all  power,  that  of  the  mind 
is,  on  every  account,  the  grand  desideratum  of  hu- 
man ambition.  We  shall  be  as  gods  in  knowledge, 
was  and  must  have  been  the  first  temptation ;  and 
the  co-existence  of  great  intellectual  lordship  with 
guilt  has  never  been  adequately  represented  without 
exciting  the  strongest  interest,  and  for  this  reason,  that 
in  this  bad  and  heterogeneous  co-ordination  we  can 
contemplate  the  intellect  of  man  more  exclusively  as 
a  separate  self-subsistence,  than  in  its  proper  state  of 
subordination  to  his  own  conscience,  or  to  the  will  of 
an  infinitely  superior  being. 

This  is  the  sacred  charm  of  Shakspeare's  male  cha- 
racters in  general.  They  are  all  cast  in  the  mould 
of  Shakspeare's  gigantic  intellect;  and  this  is  the 
open  attraction  of" his  Richard,  Iago,  Edmund,  &c.  in 
particular.  But  again  :  of  all  intellectual  power,  that 
of  superiority  to  the  fear  of  the  invisible  world  is  the 
most  dazzling.  Its  influence  is  abundantly  proved  by 
the  one  circumstance,  that  it  can  bribe  us  into  a  vol- 
untary submission  of  our  better  knowledge,  into  sus- 
pension of  all  our  judgment  derived  from  constant 
experience,  and  enable  us  to  peruse  with  the  liveliest 
interest,  the  wildest  tales  of  ghosts,  wizards,  genii, 
and  secret  talismans.  On  this  propensity,  so  deeply 
rooted  in  our  nature,  a  specific  dramatic  probability 
may  be  raised  by  a  true  poet,  if  the  whole  of  his 
work  be  in  harmony ;  a  dramatic  probability,  suffi- 
cient for  dramatic  pleasure,  even  when  the  compo- 
nent characters  and  incidents  border  on  impossibility. 
The  poet  does  not  require  us  to  be  awake  and  be- 
lieve ;  he  solicits  us  only  to  yield  ourselves  to  a 
dream  ,•  and  this  too  with  our  eyes  open,  and  with 
our  judgment  perdue  behind  the  curtain  ready  to 
awake  us  at  the  first  motion  of  our  will ;  and  mean- 
time, only  not  to  disbelieve.  And  in  such  a  state  of 
mind,  who  but  must  be  impressed  with  the  cool  in- 
trepidity of  Don  John  on  the  appearance  of  his  fa- 
ther's ghost : 

"  Ghost.— Monstet !  behold  these  wounds!" 

"  J>.  John.— I  do  !  They  were  well  meant,  and  well  per- 
formed, I  see." 

"  Ghost. Repent,  repent  of  all  ihy  villanies. 

My  clamorous  blood  lo  heaven  for  vengeance  cries, 
Heaven  will  pour  out  his  judgments  on  you  all. 
Mill  irapes  for  you,  lor  you  each  fiend  doth  call, 
And  hourly  wails  your  unrepenting  fall. 
You  wilh  eternal  horrors  they'll  torment, 
Except  of  all  your  Crimea  you  suddenly  repent." 

(Ghost  sinks.) 

"  D.  John.— Farewell,  thou  art  a  foolish  ghost.  Repent, 
qnoih  he!  what  could  this  mean?  our  senses  are  all  in  a 
mist,  sure." 

"  /;.  Antonio.— (one  of  D.  Juan's  reprobate  companions.) 
They  are  not !  "f  was  a  ghost." 

"  1).  Lopez— (another  reprobate.)  I  ne'er  believed  those 
foolish  tales  before." 

"  T).  JoAn.— Come!  'Tis  no  matter.  Let  it  be  what  it 
will,  it  must  be  natural." 

364 


BIOGRAPIIIA  LITERARIA. 


355 


D.  Jlnt. — And  nature  is  unalterable  in  us  too." 
D.  John. — 'T  is   true !     The  nature  of  a  ghost  cannot 
e  ours." 


Who  also  can  deny  a  portion  of  sublimity  to  the 
tremendous  consistency  with  winch  he  stands  out  the 
last  fearful  trial,  like  a  second  Prometheus  ? 
'•  Chorus  of  Devils." 
"  Statue-Gkast. — Will  you  not  relent  and  feel  remorse  ?" 
"D.  John. — Couldst   thou  bestow  another  heart  on  me.  I 
might.    But  wilh  this  heart  1  have,  I  cannot." 
"  D.  Lopez. — These  things  are  prodigious." 
"  I>.  Anton. — I   have   a    sort  of  grudging   to   relent,   but 
something  holds  me  back." 
"  D.  Lop. — If  we  could,  't  is  now  too  late.    I  will  not." 
"  P.  .int.— We  defy  thee  !" 

"  Ghost. — Perish  ye  impious  wretches,  go  and  find  the  pun- 
ishments laid  up  in  store  for  you  !" 

(Thunder  and  lightning.    D.  Lop.  and  D.  Ant.  are  swallow- 
ed up.) 

"  Ghost  to  D.  John. — Behold  their  dreadful  fates  and 
know  that  thy  last  moment's  come  !" 

"D.John. — Think   not   to   fright   me,  foolish  ghost;    I'll 
break  your  marble  body  in  pieces,  and  pull  down  your  horse." 
(Thunder  and  lightning — chorus  of  devils,  &c. 
" D.  John. — These  things  I  see  with  wonder  but  no  fear. 
Were  all  the  elements  to  be  confounded, 
And  shuffled  all  into  their  former  chaos  ; 
Were  seas  of  sulphur  flaming  round  about  me, 
And  all  mankind  roaring  within  those  fires, 
I  could  not  fear,  or  feel  the  least  remorse. 
To  the  last  instant  I  would  dare  thy  power. 
Here  I  stand  firm,  and  all  thy  threats  condemn. 
Thy  murderer  (to  the  ghost  of  one  whom  he  had  murdered) 
Stands  here  !    Now  do  thy  worst  !' ' 

(He  is  sicalloiced  up  in  a  cloud  of  Jirc.) 

In  fine,  the  character  of  Don  John  consists  in  the 
union  of  every  thing  desirable  to  human  nature  as 
means,  and  which,  therefore,  by  the  well-known  law 
of  association  become  at  length  desirable  on  their  own 
account,  and  in  their  own  dignity  they  are  here  dis- 
played, as  being  employed  to  ends  so  inhuman,  that 
in  the  effect  they  appear  almost  as  means  without  an 
end.  The  ingredients  too  are  mixed  in  the  happiest 
proportion,  so  as  to  uphold  and  relieve  each  other — 
more  especially  in  that  constant  interpoise  of  wil, 
gaiety,  and  social  generosity,  which  prevents  the 
criminal,  even  in  his  most  atrocious  moments,  from 
sinking  into  the  mere  ruffian,  as  far,  at  least,  as  our 
imagination  sits  in  judgment.  Above  all,  the  fine 
suffusion  through  the  whole,  with  the  characteristic 
manners  and  feelings  of  a  highly  bred  gentleman 
gives  life  to  the  drama.  Thus  having  invited  the 
statue  ghost  of  the  governor  whom  he  had  murdered, 
to  supper,  which  invitation  the  marble  ghost  accept- 
ed by  a  nod  of  the  head,  Don  John  has  prepared  a 
banquet. 

"D.John — Some  wine,  sirrah!  Here's  to  Don  Pedro's 
ghost — he  should  have  been  welcome." 
"  D.  Lop.— The  rascal  is  afraid  of  you  after  death." 

(One  knock*  hard  at  the  door. 
"  D.  John. — (to  the  servant) — Rise  and  do  your  duty." 

—Oh  the  devil,  the  devil  '."  (marble  ghost  enters.) 
"D.John. — Ha!  't  is  the  ghost!     Let's  rise  and 
him  !    Come  Governor  you  are  welcome,  sit  there  ;   if  we 
had  thought  you  would  have  come,  we  would  have  staid  for 
you. 

******** 

Here  Governor,  your  health  !  Friends,  put  it  about  !  Here's 
excellent  meat,  taste  of  this  ragout.  Come  I  'II  help  you, 
come  eat,  and  let  old  quarrels  be  forgotten." 

(The  ghost  threatens  him  wiUi  vengeance. 
Gg 


"  D.  John. — We  are  too  much  confirmed — curse  on  this 
dry  discourse.    Come  here's  to  your  mistress  ;  you  had   one 
when  you  were  living  :  not  forgetting  your  sweet  sister." 
(Devils  enter.) 

"  D.  John. — Are  these  some  of  your  retinue  1  Devils  say 
you  ?  I  'in  sorry  I  lone  no  liurnt  brandy  to  treat  'em  with  ; 
that's  drink  fit  for  devils."  &c. 

Nor  is  the  scene  from  which  we  quote  interesting 
in  dramatic  probability  alone ;  it  is  susceptible  like- 
VI  ise  ol  a  Bound  moral ;  of  a  moral  that  has  more  than 
common  claims  on  the  notice  of  a  too  numerous  class, 
who  are  ready  to  receive  the  qualities  of  gentlemanly 
j  courage,  and  scrupulous  honor,  (in  all  the  recognized 
laws  of  honor)  as  the  substitutes  of  virtue,  instead  of 
its  ornaments.  This,  indeed,  is  the  moral  value  of 
the  play  at  large,  and  that  which  places  it  a!  a  world's 
dislance  from  the  spirit  of  modern  jacobinism.  The 
I  latter  introduces  to  us  clumsy  copies  of  these  showy 
I  instrumental  qualities,  in  order  to  reconcile  us  to  vice 
and  want  of  principle;  while  the  Atheista  Fubninato 
presents  an  exquisite  portraiture  of  the  same  qualities, 
in  all  their  gloss  and  glow  ;  but  presents  them  for  the 
sole  purpose  of  displaying  their  hollowness,  and  in 
order  to  put  us  on  our  guard  by  demonstrating  their 
utter  indifference  to  vice  and  virtue,  whenever  these 
and  the  like  accomplishments  are  contemplated  for 
themselves  alone. 

Eighteen  years  ago  I  observed,  that  the  whole  se- 
cret of  the  modern  Jacobinical  drama,  (which,  and 
not  the  German,  is  its  appropriate  designation)  and  of 
all  its  popularitv.  consists  in  the  confusion  and  sub- 
version of  the  natural  order  of  things  in  their  causes 
and  effects:  namely,  in  Ihe  excitement  of  surprise  by 
representing  the  qualities  of  liberality,  refined  feel- 
ing, and  a  nice  sense  of  honor  (those  things  rather 
which  pass  amongst  us  for  such)  in  persons  and  in 
classes  where  experience  teaches  us  least  to  expect 
them;  and  by  rewarding  with  all  the  sympathies 
which  are  the  due  of  virtue,  those  criminals  whom 
law,  reason,  and  religion  have  excommunicated  from 
our  esteem. 

This  of  itself  would  lead  me  back  to  Bertram  or 
the  Castle  of  St.  Aldobrand;  but,  in  my  own  mind, 
this  tragedy  was  brought  into  connexion  with  the 
Libertine,  (Shadwell's  adaptation  of  the  Atheista  Ful- 
mhiato  to  the  English  stage  in  the  reign  of  Charles 
the  Second)  by  the  fact,  that  our  modern  drama  is 
taken,  in  the  substance  of  it,  from  the  first  scene  of 
the  third  act  of  the  Libertine.  But  with  what  palpa- 
ble superiority  of  judgment  in  the  original!  Earth 
and  heil,  men  and  spirits,  are  up  in  arms  against  Don 
John:  the  two  former  acts  of  the  Play  have  not  only 
prepared  us  for  die  supernatural,  but  accustomed  us 
to  the  prodigious.  It  is,  therefore,  neither  more  nor 
less  than  we  anticipate,  when  the  captain  exclaims. 
•  In  all  the  dangers  1  have  been,  such  horrors  I  never 
knew.  I  am  quite  unmanned  ;"  and  when  the  her- 
mit  says,  "  that  he  had  beheld  the  ocean  in  wildest 
rage,  yet  ne'er  before  saw  a  storm  so  dreadful,  such 
horrid  flashes  of  lightning,  and  such  claps  of  thunder, 
were  never  in  my  remembrance."  And  Don  John's 
burst  of  startling  impiety  is  equally  intelligible  in  its 
motive,  as  dramatic  in  its  effect. 

But  what  is  there  to  account  for  the  prodigy  of  the 
3Gu 


356 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


tempest  at  Bertram's  shipwreck?  It  is  a  mere  super- 
natural effect  without  even  a  hint  of  any  supernatu- 
ral agency  ;  a  prodigy  without  any  circumstance  men- 
tioned thai  is  prodigious,-  and  a  miracle  introduced 
without  a  ground,  and  ending  without  a  result.  Every 
event  and  every  scene  of  the  play  might  have  taken 
place  as  well  if  Bertram  and  his  vessel  had  been 
driven  in  by  a  common  hard  gale,  or  from  want  of 
provisions.  The  first  act  would  have  indeed  lost  its 
greatest  and  most  sonorous  picture:  a  scene  for  the 
sake  of  a  scene,  without  a  word  spoken;  as  such, 
therefore,  (a  rarity  without  a  precedent)  we  must 
take  it,  and  be  thankful!  In  the  opinion  of  not  a  lew, 
it  was,  in  every  sense  of  the  word,  the  best  scene  in 
the  play.  I  am  quite  certain  it  was  the  most  innocent: 
and  the  steady,  quiet  uprightness  of  the  flame  of  the 
wax-candles  which  the  monks  held  over  the  roaring 
billows  amid  the  storm  of  wind  and  rain,  was  really 
miraculous. 

The  Sicilian  sea  coast :  a  convent  of  monks :  night : 
a  most  portentous,  unearthly  storm :  a  vessel  is 
wrecked  :  contrary  to  all  human  expectation,  one  man 
saves  himself  by  his  prodigious  powers  as  a  swimmer, 
aided  by  the  peculiarity  of  his  destination — 

-"  All,  all  did  parish — 


1st  Monk. — Change,  change  those  drenched  weeds — 
Prior. — I  wist  not  of  them — every  soul  did  perish — 

Enter  2d  Monk,  hastily. 

ltd  Monk. — No,  there  was  one  did  battle  with  the  storm 
With  careless  desperate  force  ;  full  many  times 
His  life  was  won  and  lost,  as  tho'  he  recked  not — 
No  hand  did  aid  him,  and  he  aided  none — 
Alone  he  breasted  the  broad  wave,  alone 
That  man  was  saved." 

Well !  This  man  is  led  in  by  the  monks,  supposed 
dripping  wet,  and  to  very  natural  inquiries,  he  either 
remains  silent,  or  gives  most  brief  and  surly  answers, 
and  after  three  or  four  of  these  half-line  courtesies, 
"  dashing  off  the  ?nonks"  who  had  saved  him,  he  ex- 
claims in  the  true  sublimity  of  our  modern  misan- 
thropic heroism — 

"  Off !  ye  are  men — there's  poison  in  your  tnuch 
Butl  must  yield,  for  this  (what  ?)  hath  left  me  strengthless." 

So  end  the  three  first  scenes.  In  the  next,  (the  Cas- 
tle of  St.  Aldobrand)  we  find  the  servants  there 
equally  frightened  with  this  unearthly  storm,  though 
wherein  it  differed  from  other  violent  storms  we  are 
not  told,  except  that  Hugo  informs  us,  page  9 — 

Piet. — "  Hugo,  well  met.    Does  e'en  thy  age  bear 

Memory  of  so  terrible  a  storm  1 

Hugo. — They  have  been  frequent  lately. 

Piet. — They  are  ever  so  in  Sicily. 

Hugo. — So  it  is  said.    Hut  storms  when  I  was  young 

Would  si  ill  pnss  o'er  like  Nature's  fitful  fevers, 

And  rendered  all  more  wholesome.    Now  their  rage 

Sent  thus  unseasonable  and  profitless 

Speaks  like  threats  of  heaven." 

A  most  perplexing  theory  of  Sicilian  storms  is  this  of 
old  Hugo!  and  what  is  very  remarkable,  not  apparent- 
ly founded  on  any  great  familiarity  of  his  own  with 
this  troublesome  article.  For  when  Pietro  asserts  the 
"ever  more  frequency"  of  tempests  in  Sicily,  the  old 
man  professes  to  know  nothing  more  of  the  fact,  but 
by  hearsay.     "  So  it  is  said." — But  why  he  assumed 


this  storm  to  be  unseasonable,  and  on  what  he  ground- 
ed his  prophecy,  (for  the  storm  is  still  in  full  furyj 
that  it  would  be  profitless,  and  without  the  physical 
powers  common  to  all  other  violent  sea-winds  in  pu- 
rifying the  atmosphere,  we  are  left  in  the  dark ;  as 
well  concerning  the  particular  points  in  which  he 
knew  it  (during  its  continuance)  to  differ  from  those 
that  he  had  been  acquainted  with  in  his  youth.  We 
arc  at  length  introduced  to  the  Lady  Imogine,  who, 
we  learn,  had  not  rested  "through"  the  night,  not  on 
account  of  the  tempest,  for 

"Loris  ere  the  storm  arose,  her  restless  gestures 
Forbade  all  hope  to  see  her  blest  with  sleep." 

Sitting  at  a  table,  and  looking  at  a  portrait,  she  in- 
forms us — First,  that  portrait-painters  may  make  a 
portrait  from  memory — 

"  The  limner's  art  may  trace  the  absent  feature." 
For  surely  these  words  could  never  mean,  that  a 
painter  may  have  a  person  sit  to  him,  who  afterwards 
may  leave  the  room  or  perhaps  the  country  ?  Second, 
that  a  portrait-painter  can  enable  a  mourning  lady 
to  possess  a  good  likeness  of  her  absent  lover,  but 
that  the  portrait-painter  cannot,  and  who  shall — 

"  Restore  the  scenes  in  which  they  met  and  parted  V 
The  natural  answer  would   have  been — Why  the 
scene-painter  to  be  sure !   But  this  unreasonable  lady 
requires,  in  addition,  sundry  things  to  be  painted  that 
have  neither  lines  nor  colors — 

"The  thoughts,  the  recollections  sweet  and  bitter 
Or  the  Elysian  dreams  of  lovers  when  they  loved." 

Which  Inst  sentence  must  be  supposed  to  mean :  when 
they  were  present  and  making  love  to  each  other. — 
Then,  if  this  portrait  could  speak,  it  would  "acquit 
the  faith  of  womankind."  How?  Had  she  remained 
constant }  No,  she  has  been  married  to  another  man, 
whoso  wife  she  now  is.  How  then?  Why,  that  in 
spite  of  her  marriage  vow,  she  had  continued  to 
yearn  and  crave  for  her  former  lover — 

"This  has  her  body,  that  her  mind  ; 
Which  has  the  better  bargain  V 

The  lover,  however,  was  not  contented  with  this 
precious  arrangement,  as  we  shall  soon  find.  The 
lady  proceeds  to  inform  us,  that  during  the  many 
years  of  their  separation,  there  have  happened  in  the 
different  parts  of  the  world,  a  number  of  "such 
things;"  even  such  as  in  a  course  of  years  always 
have,  and,  till  the  millennium,  doubtless  always  will 
happen  somewhere  or  other.  Yet  this  passage,  both 
in  language  and  in  metre,  is,  perhaps,  among  the  best 
parts  of  the  Play.  The  lady's  loved  companion  and 
most  esteemed  attendant,  Clotilda,  now  enters  and 
explains  this  love  and  esteem  by  proving  herself  a 
most  passive  and  dispassionate  listener,  as  well  as  a 
brief  and  lucky  querist,  who  asks  by  chance,  questions 
that  we  should  have  thought  made  for  the  very  sake 
of  the  answers.  In  short,  she  very  much  reminds  us 
of  those  puppet-heroines,  for  whom  the  showman  con- 
trives to  dialogue,  without  any  skill  in  ventriloquism 
This,  notwithstanding,  is  the  best  scene  in  the  Play 
and  though  crowded  with  solecisms, corrupt  diction 
366 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


357 


and  offences  against  metre,  would  possess  merits  suf- 
ficient to  outweigh  them,  if  we  could  suspend  the 
moral  sense  during  the  perusa\.  It  tells  well  and 
passionately  the  preliminary  circumstances,  and  thus 
overcomes  the  main  difficulty  of  most  first  acts,  viz. 
that  of  retrospective  narration.  It  tells  us  of  her 
having  been  honorably  addressed  by  a  noble  youth, 
of  rank  and  fortune  vastly  superior  to  her  own :  of 
their  mutual  love,  heightened  on  her  part  by  grati- 
tude;  of  his  loss  of  his  sovereign's  favor;  his  dis- 
grace, attainder  and  flight;  that  he  (thus  degraded) 
sunk  into  a  vile  ruffian,  the  chieftain  of  a  murderous 
banditti;  and  that  from  the  habitual  indulgence  of 
the  most  reprobate  habits  and  ferocious  passions,  he 
had  become  so  changed  even  in  his  appearance  and 
features, 

"That  she  who  bore  him  had  recoiled  from  him. 

Nor  known  the  alien  visage  of  her  child  ; 

Yet  still  she  [Iinogine]  loved  him." 
She  is  compelled  by  the  silent  entreaties  of  a  father, 
perishing  with  "bitter  shameful  want  on  the  cold 
earth,"  to  give  her  hand,  with  a  heart  thus  irrevoca- 
bly pre-engaged,  to  Lord  Aldobrand,  the  enemy  of 
her  lover,  even  to  the  very  man  who  had  baffled  his 
ambitious  schemes,  and  was,  at  the  present  time,  en- 
trusted with  the  execution  of  the  sentence  of  death 
which  had  been  passed  on  Bertram.  Now,  the  proof 
of  "woman's  love,"  so  industriously  heid  forth  for 
the  sympathy,  if  not  the  esteem  of  the  audience,  con- 
sists in  this :  that  though  Bertram  had  become  a  rob- 
ber and  a  murderer  by  trade,  a  ruffian  in  manners, 
yea,  with  form  and  features  at  which  his  own  mother 
could  not  but  "  recoil,"  yet  she,  (Lady  Imogine.)  "  the 
wife  of  a  most  noble,  honored  Lord,"  estimable  as  a 
man,  exemplary  and  affectionate  as  a  husband,  and 
the  fond  father  of  her  only  child — that  she,  notwith- 
standing all  this,  striking  her  heart,  dares  to  say  it — 

"But  thou  art  Bertram's  still,  and  Bertram's  ever." 
A  monk  now  enters,  and  entreats  in  his  Prior's  name 
for  the  wonted  hospitality,  and  "  free  noble  usage,''  of 
the  Castle  of  St.  Aldobrand,  for  some  wretched  ship- 
wrecked souls ;  and  from  this  we  learn,  for  the  first 
time,  to  our  infinite  surprise,  that  notwithstanding  the 
supernaturalness  of  the  storm  aforesaid,  not  only  Ber- 
tram, but  the  whole  of  his  gang,  had  been  saved,  by 
what  means  we  are  left  to  conjecture,  and  can  only 
conclude  that  they  had  all  the  same  desperate  swim- 
ming powers,  and  the  same  saving  destiny  as  the  hero, 
Bertram  himself.  So  ends  the  first  act,  and  with  it 
the  tale  of  the  events,  both  those  with  which  the  Tra- 
gedy begins,  and  those  which  had  occurred  previous 
to  the  date  of  its  commencement.  The  second  dis- 
plays Bertram  in  disturbed  sleep,  which  the  Prior, 
who  hangs  over  him,  prefers  calling  a  "  starting 
trance,"  and  with  a  strained  voice,  that  would  have 
awakened  one  of  the  seven  sleepers,  observes  to  the 
audience — 

"  How  the  lip  works  '.  How  the  bare  teeth  do  grind  ! 
And  beaded  drops  course  down  his  wrilhen  brow  !"* 


-"The  big  round  tears 


Coursed  one  another  down  his  innocent  nose 
In  piteous  chase." 


The  dramatic  effect  of  which  passage  we  not  only 
concede  to  the  admirers  of  this  Tragedy,  but  acknow  - 
ledge  the  further  advantage  of  preparing  the  audi- 
ence for  the  most  surprising  series  of  wry  faces,  pro- 
flated  mouths,  and  lunatic  gestures,  that  were  ever 
"launched  "  on  an  audience  to  "  sear  the  sense."i 

Prior. — "  I  will  awake  him  from  this  horrid  trance  ; 

This  is  no  nutural  sleep  !  Ho!  wake  thee,  stranger." 

This  is  rather  a  whimsical  application  of  the  verb 
reflex,  we  must  confess,  though  we  remember  a  simi- 
lar tmnsferof  the  agent  to  the  patient  in  a  manuscript 
Tragedy,  in  which  the  Bertram  of  the  piece,  pros- 
trating a  man  with  a  single  blow  of  his  fist,  exclaims 
— "  Knock  me  thee  down,  then  ask  thee  if  thou 
liv'st."  Well,  the  stranger  obeys;  and  whatever  hia 
sleep  might  have  been,  his  waking  was  perfectly 
natural,  for  lethargy  itself  could  not  withstand  the 
scolding  stentorship  of  Mr.  Holland,  the  Prior.  We 
next  learn  from  the  best  authority,  his  own  confession, 
that  the  misanthropic  hero,  whose  destiny  was  incom- 
patible with  drowning,  is  Count  Bertram,  who  not 
only  reveals  his  past  fortunes,  but  avows  with  open 
atrocity,  his  Satanic  hatred  oflmogine's  Lord,  and  his 
frantic  thirst  of  revenge;  and  so  the  raving  character 
scolds — and  what  else?  Does  not  the  Prior  act? 
Does  he  send  for  a  posse  of  constables  or  thief-takers, 
to  handcuff  the  villain,  and  take  him  either  to  Bed- 
lam or  Newgate  ?  Nothing  of  the  kind  ;  the  author 
preserves  the  unity  of  character,  and  the  scolding 
Prior  from  first  to  last  does  nothing  but  scold,  with 
the  exception,  indeed,  of  the  last  scene  of  the  last 
act,  in  which,  with  a  most  surprising  revolution,  he 
whines,  weeps,  and  kneels  to  the  condemned  blas- 
pheming assassin  out  of  pure  affection  to  the  high- 
hearted man,  the  sublimity  of  whose  angel-sin  rivals 
the  star-bright  apostate,  (i.  e.  who  was  as  proud  as 
Lucifer,  and  as  wicked  as  the  Devil,)  and  "had 
thrilled  him"  (Prior  Holland  aforesaid)  with  wild 
admiration. 

Accordingly,  in  the  very  next  scene,  we  have  this 
tragic  Machealh,  with  his  whole  gang,  in  the  Castle 
of  St.  Aldobrand,  without  any  attempt  on  the  Prior's 
part  either  to  prevent  him,  or  to  put  the  mistress  and 
servants  of  the  Castle  on  their  guard  against  their 
new  inmates,  though  he  (the  Prior)  knew,  and  con- 
fesses that  he  knew,  that  Bertram's  "fearful  mates" 


says  Shakspeare  of  a  wounded  stag,  hanging  his  head  over  a 
Btream  :  naturally,  from  the  position  of  the  head,  and  most 
beautifully,  from  the  associalion  of  the  preceding  image,  of 
the  chase,  in  which  "  the  poor  senuester'd  stag  from  the  hun- 
ter's aim  had  ta'en  a  hurt."  In  the  supposed  position  of 
Bertram,  the  metaphor,  if  not  false,  loses  all  the  propriety  of 
the  original. 

t  Among  a  number  of  other  instances  of  words  chosen 
without  reason,  Imogine,  in  the  first  act,  declares  thai  thun- 
der-storms were  not  able  to  intercept  her  prayers  for  "  the 
desperate  man,  in  desperate  ways  who  dealt" — 

"  Yea,  when  the  launched  bolt  did  sear  her  sense, 
Her  soul's  deep  orisons  were  breathed  for  him  ;" 

i.  e.  when  a  red-hot  bolt,  launched  at  her  from  a  thunder- 
cloud, had  cauterized  her  sense — in  plain  English,  burnt  ber 
eyes  out  of  her  head,  she  kept  still  praying  on. 

"  Was  not  this  love?    Yes.  thus  doth  woman  love ! 
367 


358 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


were  assassins  so  habituated  and  naturalized  to  guilt, 
that— 

"  When  their  drenched  hold  forsook  both  gold  and  ?prir, 
They  griped  their  daggers  with  a  murderer's  instinct ;" 

and  though  he  also  knew  that  Bertram  was  the  leader 
of"  a  band  whose  trade  was  blood.  To  the  Castle, 
however,  he  goes,  thus  with  the  holy  Prior's  consent, 
if  not  with  his  assistance;  and  thither  let  us  follow 
him. 

No  sooner  is  our  hero  safely  housed  in  the  Castle 
of  St.  Aldobrand,  than  he  attra<is  the  notice  of  the 
lady  and  her  confidante,  by  his  "  wild  and  terrible 
dark  eyes,"  "  muffled  form,"  "  fearful  form,"*  "  darkly 
wild,"  "  proudly  stern,"  and  the  like  common  place 
indefinites,  seasoned  by  merely  verbal  antithesis,  and, 
at  best,  copied  with  very  slight  change,  from  the  Con- 
rade  of  Southey's  Joan  of  Arc.  The  lady  lmogine, 
who  has  been  (as  is  the  case,  she  tells  us,  with  all 
?oft  and  solemn  spirits)  worshipping  the  moon  on  a 
terrace  or  rampart  within  view  of  the  castle,  insists 
on  having  an  interview  with  our  hero,  and  this,  too, 
tete-a-tete.  Would  the  reader  learn  why  and  where- 
fore the  confidante  is  excluded,  who  very  properly 
remonstrates  against  such  "  conference,  alone,  at 
uight,  with  one  who  bears  such  fearful  form  " — the 
reason  follows — "  why,  therefore  send  him  !"  I  say 
follows,  because  the  next  line,  "all  things  of  fear 
have  lost  their  power  over  me,"  is  separated  from  the 
former  by  a  break  or  pause,  and  beside  that  it  is  a 
very  poor  answer  to  the  danger — is  no  answer  at  all 
to  the  gross  indelicacy  of  this  wilful  exposure.  We 
must,  therefore,  regard  it  as  a  mere  afterthought,  that 
a  little  softens  the  rudeness,  but  adds  nothing  to  the 
weight  of  that  exquisite  woman's  reason  aforesaid. 
And  so  exit  Clotilda, and  enter  Bertram,  who  "stands 
without  looking  at  her,"  that  is,  with  his  lower  limbs 
forked,  his  arms  akimbo,  his  side  to  the  lady's  front, 
the  whole  figure  resembling'  an  inverted  Y.  He  is 
soon,  however,  roused  from  the  state  surly  to  the  state 
frantic,  and  then  follow  raving,  yelling,  cursing,  she 
tainting,  he  relenting,  in  run's  Imogine's  child, 
squeaks  "  mother !"  He  snatches  it  up,  and  with  a 
"God  bless  thee,  child!  Bertram  has  kissed  thy 
child," — the  curtain  drops.  The  third  act  is  short, 
and  short  be  our  account  of  it.  It  introduces  Lord 
St.  Aldobrand  on  his  road  homeward,  and  next  lmo- 
gine in  the  convent,  confessing  the  foulness  of  her 
heart  to  the  Prior,  who  first  indulges  his  old  humor 
with  a  fit  of  senseless  scolding,  then  leaves  her  alone 

*  This  sort  of  repetition  is  one  of  this  writer's  peculiarities, 
and  there  is  scarce  a  page  which  docs  not  furnish  one  or  more 
instances — F.x.  gr.  in  the  first  page  or  two.  Act  I.  line  7th, 
"and  deentid  that  I  might  sleep." — Line  10,  "  Did  rock  and 
quiver  in  the  bickering  glare." — Lines  14,  15,  16,  "  But  by 
the  momently  gleams  of  sheeted  blue,  Did  the  pale  marbles 
glare  so  sternly  on  me,  I  almost  deemed  they  lived." — Line 
37,  "The  glare  of  Hell."— Line  35,  "O  holy  Prior,  this  is 
no  earthly  storm." — Line  38,  "  This  is  no  earthly  storm." — 
Line  42,  "Dealing  with  us." — Line  43,  "Deal  thus  stern- 
ly."— Line  44,  "  Speak  !  thou  hast  something  seen!" — A 
fearful  sight .'" — Line  45,  "  What  hast  thou  seen  ?  A  pite- 
ous, fearful  sight." — Line  48,  "  quivering  gleams." — Line 
50,  "  In  the  hollow  pauses  of  the  storm." — Line  61,  "  The 
pauses  of  the  storm,"  &c. 


with  her  ruffian  paramour,  with  whom  she  makes 
at  once  an  infamous  appointment,  and  the  curtain 
drops,  that  it  may  be  carried  into  act  and  consumma- 
tion. 

I  want  words  to  describe  ihe  mingled  horror  and 
disgust  with  which  I  witnessed  the  opening  of  the 
fourth  act,  considering  it  as  a  melancholy  proof  of  the 
depravation  of  the  public  mind.  The  shocking  spirit 
of  jacobinism  seemed  no  longer  confined  to  politics. 
The  familiarity  with  atrocious  events  and  characters 
appeared  to  have  poisoned  the  taste,  even  where  it 
had  not  directly  disorganized  the  moral  principles, 
and  left  the  feelings  callous  to  all  the  mild  appeals, 
and  craving  alone  for  the  grossest  and  most  outrage- 
ous stimulants.  The  very  fact  then  present  to  our 
senses,  that  a  British  audience  could  remain  passive 
under  such  an  insult  to  common  decency,  nay,  re- 
ceive with  a  thunder  of  applause,  a  human  being 
supposed  to  have  come  reeking  from  the  consumma- 
tion of  this  complex  foulness  and  baseness,  these  and 
the  like  reflections  so  pressed  as  with  the  weight  of 
lead  upon  my  heart,  that  actor,  author,  and  tragedy 
would  have  been  forgotten,  had  it  not  been  for  a  plain 
elderly  man  sitting  beside  me,  who,  with  a  very  seri- 
ous face,  that  at  once  expressed  surprise  and  aver- 
sion, touched  my  elbow,  and,  pointing  to  the  actor, 
said  to  me  in  a  half-whisper — "  Do  you  see  that  little 
fellow  there*  he  has  just  been  committing  adultery!" 
Somewhat  relieved  by  the  laugh  which  this  droll  ad- 
dress occasioned,  I  forced  back  my  attention  to  the 
stage  sufficiently  to  learn  that  Bertram  is  recovered 
from  a  transient  fit  of  remorse,  by  the  information 
that  St.  Aldobrand  was  commissioned  (to  do  what 
every  honest  man  must  have  done  without  commis- 
sion, if  he  did  his  duty)  to  seize  him  and  deliver  him 
to  the  just  vengeance  of  the  law ;  an  informalion 
which  (as  he  had  long  known  himself,  to  be  an  at- 
tainted traitor  and  proclaimed  outlaw,  and  not  only  a 
trader  in  blood  himself,  but  notoriously  the  Captain 
of  a  gang  of  thieves,  pirates  and  assassins)  assuredly 
could  not  have  been  new  to  him.  It  is  this,  how- 
ever, which  alone  and  instantly  restores  him  to  his 
accustomed  state  of  raving,  blasphemy,  and  nonsense. 
Nexf  follows  Imogine's  constrained  interview  with 
her  injured  husband,  and  his  sudden  departure  again, 
all  in  love  and  kindness,  in  order  to  attend  the  feast 
of  St.  Anselm  at  the  convent.  This  was,  it  must  be 
owned,  a  very  strange  engagement  for  so  tender  a 
husband  to  make  within  a  few  minutes  after  so  long 
an  absence.  But  first  his  lady  has  told  him  that  she 
has  "  a  vow  on  her,"  and  wishes  "  that  black  perdi- 
tion may  gulph  her  perjured  soul," — (Note:  she  is 
lying  at  the  very  time)— if  she  ascends  his  bed  till 
her  penance  is  accomplished.  How,  therefore,  is  the 
poor  husband  to  amuse  himself  in  this  interval  of  her 
penance  ?  But  do  not  be  distressed,  reader,  on  ac- 
count of  Lord  St.  Aldobrand's  absence!  As  the  au- 
thor has  contrived  to  send  him  out  of  the  house, 
when  a  husband  would  be  in  his,  and  the  lover's 
way,  so  he  will  doubtless  not  be  at  a  loss  to  bring 
him  back  again  so  soon  as  he  is  wanted.  Well !  the 
husband  gone  in  on  the  one  side,  out  pops  the  lover 
1  from  the  other,  and  for  the  fiendish  purpose  of  har- 

368 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


359 


I  rowing  up  the  soul  of  his  wretched  accomplice  in 
i  guilt,  by  announcing  to  her  with  most  brutal  and 
blasphemous  execrations,  his  fixed  and  deliberate  re- 
•  solve  to  assassinate  her  husband  ;  all  this,  too,  is  for 
|  no  discoverable  purpose,  on  the  part  of  the  author, 
!  but  that  of  introducing  a  series  of  super-tragic  starts, 
I  pauses,  screams,  struggling,  dagger-throwing,  falling 
on  the  ground,  starting  up  again  wildly,  swearing, 
I  outcries  for  help,  falling  again  on  the  ground,  rising 
'again,  faintly  tottering  towards  the  door,  and,  to  end 
the  scene,  a  most  convenient  fainting  lit  of  our  lady's, 
just  in  time  to  give  Bertram  an  opportunity  of  seek- 
ing the  object  of  his  hatred,  before  she  alarms  the 
j  house,  which  indeed  she  has  had  full  time  to  have 
done  before,  but  that  the  author  rather  chose  she 
j  should  amuse  herself  and  the  audience  by  the  above- 
Idescribed  ravings  and  startings.  She  recovers  slowly, 
!and  to  her  enter  Clotilda,  the  confidante  and  mother 
jconfessor;  then  commences  what  in  theatrical  lan- 
guage is  called  the  madness,  but  which  the  author 
imore  accurately  entitles  delirium,  it  appearing  in- 
:deed  a  sort  of  intermittent  fever,  with  fits  of  light- 
headedness off  and  on,  whenever  occasion  and  stage 
jeffect  happen  to  call  for  it.  A  convenient  return  of 
I the  storm  (we  told  the  reader  beforehand  how  it 
'would  be)  had  changed 

"  The  rivulet  that  bathed  the  Convent  walls, 
Into  a  foaming  flood  ;  upon  its  brink 
The  Lord  and  his  small  train  do  stand  appalled. 
With  torch  and  bnll  from  their  high  battlements 
The  monks  do  summon  to  the  pats  in  vain  ; 
He  must  return  to-night." — 

Talk  of  the  devil,  and  his  horns  appear,  says  the 
(proverb:  and  sure  enough,  within  ten  lines  of  the 
;exit  of  the  messenger  sent  to  stop  him,  the  arrival  of 
(Lord  St.  Aldobrand  is  announced.  Bertram's  ruffian 
'■band  now  enter,  and  range  themselves  across  the 
stage,  giving  fresh  cause  for  Imogine's  screams  and 
madness.  St.  Aldobrand  having  received  his  mortal 
wound  behind  the  scenes,  totters  in  to  welter  in  his 
blood,  and  to  die  at  the  feet  of  this  double-damned 
adulteress. 

Of  her,  as  far  as  she  is  concerned  in  this  4th  act, 
we  have  two  additional  points  to  notice:  first,  ihe 
low  cunning  and  Jesuitical  trick  with  which  she  de- 
tludes  her  husband  into  words  of  forgiveness,  which 
(he  himself  does  not  understand;  and  secondly,  that 
(every  where  she  is  made  the  object  of  interest  and 
'•sympathy,  and  it  is  not  the  author's  fault,  if  at  any 
[moment  she  excites  feelings  less  gentle  than  those 
>we  are  accustomed  to  associate  with  the  self-accusa- 
tions of  a  sincere,  religious  penitent.     And  did  a  Bri- 
tish audience  endure  all  this?  They  received  it  wij,h 
plaudits,  which,  but  for  the  rivalry  of  the  carts  and 
hackney-coaches,  might  have  disturbed  the  evening 
prayers  of  the  scanty  week-day  congregation  at  St. 
Paul's  cathedral, 

Tempora  mutantur,  nos  et  mutamur  in  illis. 

Of  the  5th  act,  the  only  thing  noticeable  (for  rant 

and  nonsense,  though  abundant  as  ever,  have,  long 

before  the  last  act,  become  things  of  course)  is  the 

profane  representation  of  the  high  altar  in  a  chapel, 

Gg2 


with  all  the  vessels  and  other  preparations  for  the 
holy  sacrament.  A  hymn  is  actually  sung  on  the 
stage  by  the  choirister  boys!  For  the  rest,  Imogine, 
who  now  and  then  talks  deliriously,  but  who  is  al 
ways  light-headed,  so  far  as  her  gown  and  hair  can 
make  her  so,  wanders  about  in  dark  woods,  with  ca- 
vern-rocks and  precipices  in  the  back  scene;  and  a 
number  of  mute  dramatis  persona;  move  in  and  out 
continually,  for  whose  presence  there  is  always  at 
least  this  reason,  that  they  afford  something  to  be 
seen,  by  that  very  large  part  of  a  llrury-lane  audi- 
ence, who  have  small  chance  of  hearing  a  word. 
She  had,  it  appears,  taken  her  child  with  her;  but 
what  becomes  of  the  child,  whether  she  murdered  it 
or  not,  nobody  can  tell,  nobody  can  learn ;  it  was  a 
riddle  at  the  representation,  and,  after  a  most  atten- 
tive perusal  of  the  play,  a  riddle  it  remains. 

"  No  more  T  know,  I  wish  I  did, 
Anil  I  would  tell  it  all  to  you; 
For  what  became  of  this  poor  child 
There's  none  that  ever  knew." 

Wordsworth's  Thorn. 

Our  whole  information*  is  derived  from  the  follow- 
ing words — 

"  Prior. — Where  is  thy  child  ? 

Clotil.— [Pointing  to  the  cavern  into  which  she  had  look- 
ed] Oh,  he  lies  cold  within  his  cavern  tomb  ! 

Why  dost  thou  urge  her  with  the  horrid  theme  1 

Prior. — I  Who  will  not,  the  reader  may  observe,  be  dis- 
appointed of  his  dose  of  scolding,] 

It  was  to  make  [nnere  wake]  one  living  cord  o'  th'  heart. 

And  I  will  try,  tho'  my  own  breaks  at  it. 

Where  is  thy  child  1 

Imng. — [With  a  frantic  laugh] 

The  forest-fiend  had  snatched  him — 

He  [who  ?  the  fiend  or  the  child  7]  rides  the  night-mare 
through  the  wizzard  woods." 

Now,  these  two  lines  consist  in  a  senseless  plagiarism 
from  the  counterfeited  madness  of  Edgar  in  Lear, 
who,  in  imitation  of  the  gipsy  incantations,  puns  on 
the  old  word  Mair,  a  Mag;  and  the  no  less  senseless 
adoption  of  Dryden's  forest-fiend,  and  the  wizzard 
stream  bv  which  Milton,  in  his  Lycidas,  so  finely 
characterizes  the  spreading  Deva,  fabulosus  Amnis. 
Observe,  too,  these  images  stand  unique  in  the 
speeches  of  Imogene,  without  the  slightest  resem- 
blance to  any  thing  she  says  before  or  after.  But  we 
are  weary.  The  characters  in  this  act  frisk  about, 
hcrp,  there,  and  everywhere,  as  teazingly  as  the  Jack- 
o'lanthom  lights  which  mischievous  boys,  from  across 
a  narrow  street,  throw  with  a  looking-glass  on  the 
faces  of  their  opposite  neighbors.  Bertram  disarmed, 
outheroding  Charles  de  Moor  in  the  Robbers,  befaces 
the  collected  knights  of  St.  Anselm,  (all  in  complete 
armor,)  and  so,  by  pure  dint  of  black  looks,  he  out- 
dares them  into  passive  poltroons.  The  sudden  revo- 
lution in  the  Prior's  manners  we  have  before  noticed, 
and  it  is  indeed  so  outre,  that  a  number  of  the  audi- 
ence imagined  a  great  secret  was  to  come  out,  viz. 
that  the  Prior  was  one  of  the  many  instances  of  a 

*  The  child  is  an  important  p-rsonage,  for  I  see  not  by 
what  possible  means  the  author  could  have  ended  the  second 
and  third  acts,  hot  for  its  timely  appearance.  How  ungrate 
ful,  then,  not  further  to  notice  its  fate  ! 

369 


380 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


youthful  sinner  metamorphosed  into  an  old  scold,  and 
that  this  Bertram  would  appear  at  last  to  be  his  son. 
Imogine  re-appears  at  the  convent,  and  dies  of  her 
own  accord.  Bertram  slabs  himself,  and  dies  by  her 
side;  and  that  the  play  may  conclude  as  it  began, 
viz.  in  a  superfetatiorl  of  blasphemy  upon  nonsense, 
because  he  had  snatched  a  sword  from  a  despicable 
coward,  who  retreats  in  terror  when  it  is  pointed  to- 
wards him  in  sport ;  this  felode  se,  and  thief-captain, 
this  loathsome  and  leprous  confluence  of  robbery, 
adultery,  murder,  and  cowardly  assassination,  this 
monster,  whose  best  deed  is,  the  having  saved  his 
betters  from  the  degradation  of  hanging  him,  by  turn- 
ing Jack  Ketch  to  himself,  first  recommends  the  cha- 
ritable Monks  and  holy  Prior  to  pray  for  his  soul,  and 
then  has  the  folly  and  impudence  to  exclaim, 

"  I  died  no  felon's  death, 
A  warrior's  weapon  freed  a  warrior's  soul  !" 


CHAPTER  XXIV. 

CONCLUSION. 

It  sometimes  happens  that  we  are  punished  for  our 
faults  by  incidents,  in  the  causation  of  which  these 
faults  had  no  share  ;  and  this  I  have  always  felt  the 
severest  punishment.  The  wound,  indeed,  is  of  the 
same  dimensions';  but  the  edges  are  jagged,  and  there 
is  a  dull  under-pain  that  survives  the  smart  which  it 
had  aggravated.  For  there  is  always  a  consolatory 
feeling  that  accompanies  the  sense  of  a  proportion 
between  antecedents  and  consequents.  The  sense 
of  before  and  after  becomes  lioth  intelligible  and  in- 
tellectual when,  and  only  when,  we  contemplate  the 
succession  in  the  relations  of  cause  and  effect,  which 
like  the  two  poles  in  the  magnet,  manifest  the  being 
and  the  unity  of  the  one  power  by  relative  opposites, 
and  give,  as  it  were,  a  substratum  of  permanence,  of 
identity,  and,  therefore,  of  reality  to  the  shadowy  flux 
of  time.  It  is  eternity,  revealing  itself  in  the  pheno- 
mena of  time ;  and  the  perception  and  acknowledg- 
ment of  the  proportionality  and  appropriateness  of  the 
present  to  the  past,  prove  to  the  afflicted  soul,  that  it 
has  not  yet  been  deprived  of  the  sight  of  God  ;  that  it 
can  still  recognize  the  effective  presence  of  a  Father, 
though  through  a  darkened  glass  and  a  turbid  atmo- 
sphere, though  of  a  Father  that  is  chastising  it.  And 
for  tliis  cause,  doubtless,  are  we  so  framed  in  mind, 
and  even  so  organized  in  brain  and  nerve,  that  all 
confusion  is  painful.  It  is  within  the  experience  of 
many  medical  practitioners,  that  a  patient,  with 
strange;  and  unusual  symptoms  of  disease,  has  been 
more  distressed  in  mind,  more  wretched  from  the 
fact  of  being  unintelligible  to  himself  and  others,  than 
from  the  pain  or  danger  of  the  disease  ;  nay,  that  the 
patient  has  received  the  most  solid  comfort,  and  re- 
sumed a  genial  and  enduring  cheerfulness,  from  some 
new  symptom  or  product,  that  had  at  once  determined 
the  name  and  nature  of  his  complaint,  and  rendered 
it  an  intelligible  effect  of  an  intelligible  cause;  even 
though  the  discovery  did  at  the  same  moment  pre- 
clude all  hope  of  restoration.    Hence  the  mystic  the- 


ologians, whose  delusions  we  may  more  confidently 
hope  to  separate  from  their  actual  intuitions,  when 
we  condescend  to  read  their  works  without  the  pre- 
sumption that  whatever  our  fancy,  (always  the  ape, 
and  too  often  the  adulterator  and  counterfeit  of  our 
memory)  had  not  made  or  cannot  make  a  picture  of, 
must  be  nonsense;  hence,  I  say,  the  Mystics  have 
joined  in  representing  the  state  of  the  reprobate  spi- 
rits as  a  dreadful  dream  in  which  there  is  no  sense 
of  reality,  not  even  of  the  pangs  they  are  enduring — 
an  eternity  without  lime,  and,  as  it  were,  below  it — 
God  present,  without  manifestation  of  his  presence. 
But  these  are  depths  which  we  dare  not  linger  over. 
Let  us  turn  to  an  instance  more  on  a  level  with  the 
ordinary  sympathies  of  mankind.  Here,  then,  and  in 
this  same  healing  influence  of  light  and  distinct  be- 
holding, we  may  detect  the  final  cause  of  that  in- 
stinct which,  in  the  great  majority  of  instances,  leads 
and  almost  compels  the  afflicted  to  communicate 
their  sorrows.  Hence,  too,  flows  the  alleviation  that 
results  from  "  opening  out  our  griefs ;"  which  are 
thus  presented  in  distinguishable  forms  instead  of  the 
mist  through  which  whatever  is  shapeless  becomes 
magnified  and  (literally)  enormous.  Casimir,  in  the 
fifth  ode  of  his  third  book,  has  happily  expressed  this 
thought.* 

Me  longus  silendi 

Edit  amor ;  facilisque  Luctus 

Hausit  medullas.    Fugerit  ocius, 

Simul  negantem  visere  jusseris 

Aures  amicorum,  et  loquacem 

Questibus  evacuaris  iram. 

OHm  querendo  desinimus  queri, 
Ipsoque  flelu  lacryma  perditur, 
Nee  fortis  teque,  si  per  omnes 
Cura  volet  residetque  ramus. 

Vires  amicis  perdit  in  auribus 
Minorque  semper  dividitur  dolor 
Per  multa  permissus  vagari 
Fectora. — 

Id.  Lib.  III.  Od.  5. 

I  shall  not  make  this  an  excuse,  however,  for 
troubling  my  readers  with  any  complaints  or  explana- 
tions, with  which,  as  readers,  they  have  little  or  no 
concern.  It  may  suffice,  (for  the  present  at  least)  to 
declare  that  the  causes  that  have  delayed  the  pub- 
lication of  these  volumes  for  so  long  a  period  after 
they  had  been  printed  off  were  not  connected  with 
any  neglect  of  my  own ;  and  that  they  would  form 


*  Classically,  loo,  as  far  as  consists  with  the  allegorizing 
faney  of  the  modern,  that  still  striving  to  project  the  inward, 
cnntra-clislinguishes  itself  from  the  seeming  ease  with  which 
the  poetry  of  the  ancients  reflects  the  world  without.  Casi- 
mir affords,  perhaps,  the  most  sinking  instance  of  this  cha- 
racteristic difference;  for  his  style  and  diction  are  really 
classical,  while  Cowley,  who  resembles  Casimir  in  many  re- 
spects, completely  barbarizes  Ms  Latiniiy,  and  even  his 
metre,  by  the  heterogeneous  nature  of  his  thoughts.  That 
Dr. Johnson  should  have  passed  a  eontraiy  judgment,  and 
have  even  preferred  Cowley's  Latin  poems  to  Milton's,  is  a 
caprice  that  has,  if  I  mistake  not,  excited  the  surprise  of  all 
scholars.  I  was  much  amused  last  summer  with  the  laugh- 
able affright  with  which  an  Italian  poet  perused  a  page  of 
Cowley's  Davideis,  contrasted  with  the  enthusiasm  with 
which  he  first  ran  through,  and  then  read  aloud,  Milton's 
Mansus  and  Ad  Fatrem. 

370 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


361 


an  instructive  comment  on  the  chapter  concerning 
authorship  as  a  trade,  addressed  to  young  men  of 
genius  in  the  lirst  volume  of  this  work.  I  remember 
the  ludicrous  effect  which  the  first  sentence  of  an 
auto-biographv,  which,  happily  for  the  writer,  was 
as  meagre  in  incidents  as  it  is  well  possible  for  the 
life  of  an  individual  to  be — "The  eventful  life  which 
I  am  about  to  record,  from  the  hour  in  which  I  rose 
into  exist  on  this  planet,"  &c.  Yet  when,  notwith- 
standing this  warning  example  of  self-importance 
before  me,  I  review  my  own  life,  I  cannot  refrain 
from  applying  the  same  epithet  to  it,  and  with  more 
than  ordinary  emphasis — and  no  private  feeling,  that 
affected  myself  only,  should  prevent  me  from  pub- 
lishing the  same,  (for  write  it  I  assuredly  shall,  should 
life  and  leisure  be  granted  me)  if  continued  reflection 
should  strengthen  my  present  belief,  that  my  history 
would  add  its  contingent  to  the  enforcement  of  one 
important  truth,  viz.  that  we  must  not  only  love  our 
neighbors  as  ourselves,  but  ourselves  likewise  as 
our  neighbors ;  and  that  we  can  do  neither,  unless 
we  love  God  above  both. 

Who  lives  that's  not 
Depraved  or  depraves  ?    Who  dies,  that  bears 
Not  one  spurn  to  the  grave — of  their  friends'1  /rift  ? 

Strange  as  the  delusion  may  appear,  yet  it  is  most 
true,  that  three  years  ago  I  did  not  know  or  believe 
that  I  had  an  enemy  in  the  world ;  and  now,  even 
my  strongest  sensations  of  gratitude  are  mingled 
with  tear,  and  I  reproach  myself  for  being  too  often 
disposed  to  ask — Have  I  one  friend  ? — During  the 
many  years  which  intervened  between  the  compo- 
sition and  the  publication  of  the  Christabel,it  became 
almost  as  well  known  among  literary  men,  as  if  it 
had  been  on  common  sale ;  the  same  references 
were  made  to  it,  a"nd  the  same  liberties  taken  with 
it,  even  to  the  very  names  of  the  imaginary  persons 
in  the  poem.  From  almost  all  of  our  most  celebrated 
Poets,  and  from  some  with  whom  1  had  no  personal 
acquaintance,  I  either  received  or  heard  of  expres- 
sions of  admiration  that  (r  can  truly  say)  appeared  to 
myself  utterly  disproportionate  to  a  work  that  pro- 
tended to  be  nothing  more  than  a  common  Faery 
Tale.  Many,  who  had  allowed  no  merit  to  my  other 
poems,  whether  printed  or  manuscript,  and  who  have 
frankly  told  me  as  much,  uniformly  made  an  excep- 
tion in  favor  of  the  Christabel  and  the  Poem  en- 
titled Love.  Year  after  year,  and  in  societies  of  the 
most  different  kinds,  I  had  been  entreated  to  recite 
it ;  and  the  result  was  still  the  same  in  all,  and  alto- 
gether different  in  this  respect  from  the  effect  pro- 
duced by  the  occasional  recitation  of  any  other  poems 
I  had  composed.— Tins  before  the  publication.  And 
since  then,  with  very  few  exceptions,  I  have  heard 
nothing  but  abuse,  and  this  loo  in  a  spirit  of  bitter- 
ness at  least  as  disproportionate  to  the  pretensions  of 
the  poem,  had  it  been  the  most  pitiably  below  medi- 
ocrity, as  the  previous  eulogies,  and  far  more  inexpli- 
cable. In  the  Edinburgh  Review,  it  was  assailed 
With  a  malignity  and  a  spirit  of  personal  hatred  that 
ought  to  have  injured  only  the  work  in  which  such 
a  tirade  was  suffered  to  appear;  and  this  review  was 


generally  attributed  (whether  rightly  or  no  I  know 
not)  to  a  man  who,  both  in  my  presence  and  in  my 
absence,  has  frequently  pronounced  it  the  finest  poem 
of  its  kind  in  the  language.  This  may  serve  as  a 
warning  to  authors,  that  in  their  calculations  on  the 
probable  reception  of  a  poem,  they  must  subtract  to 
a  large  amount  from  the  panegyric ;  which  may 
have  encouraged  them  to  publish  it,  however  unsus- 
picious and  however  various  the  sources  of  this  pan- 
egyric may  have  been.  And  first,  allowances  must 
be  made  for  private  enmity,  of  the  very  existence  of 
which  they  had  perhaps  entertained  no  suspicion— 
for  personal  enmity  behind  the  mask  of  anonymous 
criticism  :  secondly,  for  the  necessity  of  a  certain 
proportion  of  abuse  and  ridicule  in  a  Review',  in  or- 
der to  make  it  saleable;  in  consequence  of  which, 
if  they  had  no  friends  behind  the  scenes,  the  chance 
must  needs  be  against  them ;  but  lastly,  and  chiefly, 
for  the  excitement  and  temporary  sympathy  of  feel- 
ing, w  hich  the  recitation  of  the  poem  by  an  admirer, 
especially  if  he  be  at  once  a  warm  admirer  and  a 
man  of  acknowledged  celebrity,  calls  forth  in  the 
audience.  For  this  is  really  a  species  of  Animal 
Magnetism,  in  which  the  enkindling  Reciter  by  per- 
petual comment  of  looks  and  tones,  lends  his  own 
will  and  apprehensive  faculty  to  his  Auditors.  They 
live  for  the  time  within  the  dilated  sphere  of  his 
intellectual  Being.  It  is  equally  possible,  though 
not  equally  common,  that  a  reader  left  to  himself 
should  sink  below  the  poem,  as  that  the  poem  left  to 
itself  should  flag  beneath  the  feelings  of  the  reader. — 
But  in  my  own  instance,  I  had  the  additional  misfor- 
tune of  having  been  gossipped  about,  as  devoted  to 
metaphysics,  and  worse  than  all,  to  a  system  incom- 
parably nearer  to  the  visionary  flights  of  Plato,  and 
even  to  the  jargon  of  the  mystics,  than  to  the  es- 
tablished tenets  of  Locke.  Whatever,  therefore, 
appeared  with  my  name,  was  condemned  beforehand, 
as  predestined  metaphysics.  In  a  dramatic  poem, 
which  had  been  submitted  by  me  to  a  gentleman  of 
great  influence  in  the  Theatrical  world,  occurred  the 
following  passage  : 

O  we  are  querulous  creatures  !    Little  less 
Than  all  things  can  suffice  to  make  us  happy  : 
And  little  more  than  nothing  is  enough 
To  make  us  wretched. 

Ay,  here  now!  (exclaimed  the  Critic)  here  come 
Coleridge's  Metaphysics  !  And  the  very  same  motive 
(that  is,  not  that  the  lines  were  unfit  for  the  present 
state  of  our  immense  Theatres,  but  that  they  were 
Metaphysics  *)  was  assigned  elsewhere  for  the  re- 
jection of  the  two  following  passages.  The  first  is 
spoken  in  answer  to  a  usurper,  who  had  rested  his 
plea  on  the  circumstance,  that  he  had  been  chosen 
by  the  acclamations  of  the  people  : 

*  Poor  unlucky  Metaphysics  !  and  what  are  they  1  A  sin- 
gle sentence  expresses  the  object  and  thereby  the  contents  of 
this  science.  TvuiSi  giavrov  :  et  Deum  quantum  licet  et  il, 
Deo  omnia  scibis.  Know  thyself:  and  so  shalt  thou  know 
God,  as  far  as  is  permitted  to  a  creature,  and  in  God  all 
things.— Surely,  there  is  a  strange— nay,  rather  a  too  natural 
aversion  in  many  to  know  themselves. 


371 


362 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


What  people  1    How  convened  1    Or  if  convened, 

Must  not  that  magic  power  that  charms  together 

Millions  of  men  in  council,  needs  have  power 

To  win  or  wield  them  1    Rather.  O  far  rather. 

Shout  forth  thy  titles  to  yon  circling  mountains, 

And  with  a  thousandfold  reverberation 

Make  ihe  rocks  flatter  thee,  and  ihe  volleying  air 

Unbribed,  shout  back  to  thee,  King  Emerich  ! 

Ry  wholesome  laws  to  embank  the  Sovereign  Power; 

To  deepen  by  restraint ;  and  by  prevention 

Of  lawless  will  to  amass  and  guide  the  flood 

In  its  majestic  channel,  is  man's  task 

And  the  true  patriot's  gloty  !    In  all  else 

Men  safelier  trust  to  Heaven,  than  to  themselves 

When  least  themselves:  even  in  those  whirling  crowds 

Where  folly  is  contagious,  and  too  oft 

Even  wise  men  leave  their  better  sense  at  home 

To  chide  and  wonder  at  them  when  return'd. 

The  second  passage  is  in  the  mouth  of  an  old  and 
experienced  Courtier,  betrayed  by  the  man  in  whom 
he  had  most  trusted. 

And  yet  Sarolta,  simple,  inexperienced, 
Could  see  him  as  he  was  and  oft  has  warned  me. 
Whence  learnt  she  this  7    O  she  was  innocent. 
And  to  be  innocent  is  Nature's  wisdom. 
The  fledge  dove  knows  the  prowlers  of  the  air, 
Fear'd  soon  as  seen,  and  flutters  back  to  shelter  ! 
And  the  young  steed  recoils  upon  his  haunches, 
The  never-yet-seen  adder's  hiss  first  heard  ! 
Ah  !  surer  than  suspicion's  hundred  eyes 
Is  that  fine  sense,  which  to  the  pure  in  heart 
By  mere  oppugnancy  of  their  own  goodness 
Reveals  the  approach  of  evil ! 

As,  therefore,  my  character  as  a  writer  could  not 
easily  be  more  injured  by  an  overt-act  than  it  was  al- 
ready in  consequence  of  the  report,  I  published  a 
work,  a  large  portion  of  which  was  professedly  meta- 
physical. A  long  delay  occurred  between  its  first 
annunciation  and  its  appearance;  it  was  reviewed 
therefore,  by  anticipation,  with  a  malignity,  so  avow- 
edly and  exclusively  personal,  as  is,  I  believe,  unpre- 
cedented even  in  the  present  contempt  of  all  common 
humanity  that  disgraces  and  endangers  the  liberty  of 
the  press.  After  its  appearance,  the  author  of  this 
lampoon  was  chosen  to  review  it  in  the  Edinburgh 
Review;  and  under  the  single  condition,  that  he 
should  have  written  what  he  himself  really  thought, 
and  have  criticised  the  work  as  he  would  have  done 
had  its  author  been  indifferent  to  him,  I  should  have 
chosen  that  man  myself  both  from  the  vigor  and  the 
originality  of  his  mind,  and  from  his  particular  acute- 
ness  in  speculative  reasoning,  before  all  others.  I 
remembered  Catullus's  lines, 

Desine  de  qunquam  quicquam  bene  velle  merer 

Aut  aliquem  fieri  posse  putare  pium. 
Omnia  sunt  ingrata:  nihil  fecisse  benigne  est: 

lmo,  etiam  tajdet,  ttedet  obestque  magis. 
Ut  mihi,  quern  nemo  gravius  nee  aceribus  urget 

Quam,  modo  qui  me  unum  atque  unicum  atnicum  habuit. 

But  I  can  truly  say,  that  the  grief  with  which  I 
read  this  rhapsody  of  premeditated  insult,  had  the 
Rhapsodist  himself  for  ils  whole  and  sole  object:  and 
that  the  indignant  contempt  which  it  excited  in  me 
was  as  exclusively  confined  lo  its  employer  and  su- 
borner. I  refer  to  this  Review  at  present,  in  conse- 
quence of  information  having  been  given  me,  that 
the  innuendo  of  my  "  potential  infidelity,"  grounded 
on  one  passage  of  my  first  Lay  Sermon,  has  been  re- 


ceived and  propagated  with  a  degree  of  credence,  of 
which  I  can  safely  acquit  the  originator  of  the  calum- 
ny. I  give  the  sentences  as  they  stand  in  the  sermon, 
premising  only,  that  I  was  speaking  exclusively  of 
miracles  worked  for  the  outward  senses  of  men.  "  It 
was  only  to  overthrow  the  usurpation  exercised  in 
and  through  the  senses,  that  the  senses  were  miracu- 
lously appealed  to.  Reason  and  Religion  are 
their  own  evidence.  The  natural  sun  is  in  this 
respect  a  symbol  of  the  spiritual.  Ere  he  is  fully 
arisen,  and  while  his  glories  are  still  under  veil,  he 
calls  up  the  breeze  to  chase  away  the  usurping  va- 
pors of  the  night  season,  and  thus  converts  the  air  it- 
self into  the  minister  of  its  own  purification :  not 
surely  in  proof  or  elucidation  of  the  light  from  heaven, 
but  to  prevent  its  interception. 

"  Wherever,  therefore,  similar  circumstances  co- 
exist with  the  same  moral  causes,  the  principles  re- 
vealed, and  the  examples  recorded,  in  the  inspired 
writings,  render  miracles  superfluous:  and  if  we  ne- 
glect to  apply  truths  in  expectation  of  wonders,  or  un- 
der pretext  of  the  cessation  of  the  latter,  we  tempt 
God,  and  merit  the  same  reply  which  our  Lord  gave 
to  the  Pharisees  on  a  like  occasion." 

In  the  sermon  and  the  notes,  both  the  historical 
truth  and  the  necessity  of  the  miracles  are  strongly 
and  frequently  asserted.  "  The  testimony  of  books 
of  history,  (i.  e.  relatively  to  the  signs  and  wonders 
wifh  which  Christ  came)  is  one  of  the  strong  and 
stately  pillars  of  the  church;  but  it  is  not  the  foun- 
dation !"  Instead,  therefore,  of  defending  myself, 
which  I  could  easily  effect  by  a  series  of  passages, 
expressing  the  same  opinion,  from  the  Fathers,  and 
the  most  eminent  Protestant  Divines  from  the  Refor- 
mation to  the  Revolution,  I  shall  merely  state  here, 
what  my  belief  is,  concerning  the  true  evidences  of 
Christianity.  1.  Its  consistency  with  right  Reason,  I 
consider  as  the  outer  Court  of  the  Temple,  the  com- 
mon area,  within  which  it  stands.  2.  The  miracles, 
with  and  through  which  the  Religion  was  first  re- 
vealed and  attested,  I  regard  as  the  steps,  the  vesti- 
bule, and  the  portal  of  the  Temple.  3.  The  sense, 
the  inward  feeling,  in  the  soul  of  each  believer  of  its 
exceeding  desirableyiess — the  experience  that  he  needs 
something,  joined  with  the  strong  foretokening,  that 
the  Redemption  and  the  Graces  propounded  to  us  in 
Christ,  are  what  he  needs ; — this  I  hold  to  be  the  true 
Foundation  of  the  spiritual  Edifice.  With  the 
strong  a  priori  probability  that  flows  in  from  1  and  3 
on  the  correspondent  historical  evidence  of  2,  no  man 
can  refuse  or  neglect  to  make  the  experiment  with- 
out guilt.  But  4,  it  is  the  experience  derived  from  a 
practical  conformity  to  the  conditions  of  the  Gospel — 
it  is  the  opening  Eye ;  the  dawning  Light ;  the  ter- 
rors and  the  promises  of  spiritual  Growth  ;  the  bless- 
edness of  loving  God  as  God,  the  nascent  sense  of 
Sin  haled  as  Sin,  and  of  the  incapability  of  attaining 
to  either  without  Christ;  it  is  the  sorrow  that  still 
rises  up  from  beneath,  and  the  consolation  that  meets 
it  from  above  ;  the  bosom  treacheries  of  the  Principal 
in  the  warfare,  and  the  exceeding  faithfulness  and 
long  suffering  of  the  uninterested  Ally  ; — in  a  word, 
it  is  the  actual  Trial  of  the  Faith  in  Christ,  with  its 
accompaniments  and  results,  that  must  form  the  arch- 
372 


BIOGRAPHIA  LITERARIA. 


363 


ed  Roof,  and  Faith  itself  is  the  completing  Key- 
stone.  In  order  to  an  efficient  belief  in  Christianity, 
a  man  must  have  been  a  Christian,  and  this  is  the 
seeming  argumentum  in  circulo,  incident  to  all  spirit- 
ual Truths,  to  every  subject  not  presentable  under 
the  lurms  of  Time  and  Space  as  long  as  we  attempt 
to  master  by  the  reflex  acts  of  the  Understanding, 
what  we  can  only  know  by  the  act  of  becoming,  "  Do 
the  will  of  my  father,  and  ye  shall  know  whether  I 
am  of  God."  These  four  evidences  I  believe  to  have 
been,  and  still  to  be,  for  the  world,  for  the  whole 
Church,  all  necessary,  all  equally  necessary ;  but  that 
at  present,  and  lor  the  majority  of  Christians  born  in 
Christian  countries,  I  believe  the  third  and  the  fourth 
evidences  to  be  the  most  operative,  not  as  supersed- 
ing, but  as  involving  a  glad  undoubting  faith  m  tin- 
two  former.  Credidi,  indeoque  iniellexi,  appears  to 
me  the  dictate  equally  of  Philosophy  and  Religion, 
even  as  I  believe  Redemption  to  be  the  antecedent 
of  Sanctification,  and  not  its  consequent.  All  spirit- 
ual predicates  may  be  construed  indifferently  as  modes 
of  Action,  or  as  states  of  Being.  Thus  Holiness  and 
Blessedness  are  the  same  idea,  now  seen  in  relation 
to  act,  and  now  to  existence.  The  ready  belief  which 
has  been  yielded  to  the  slander  of  my  "  potential  in- 
fidelity," I  attribute  in  part  to  the  openness  with 
which  I  have  avowed  my  doubts  whether  the  heavy 
interdict,  under  which  the  name  of  Benedict  Spin- 
oza lies,  is  merited  on  the  whole,  or  to  the  whole  ex- 
tent. Be  this  as  it  may,  I  wish,  however,  that  I  could 
find  in  the  books  of  philosophy,  theoretical  or  moral, 
which  are  alone  recommended  to  the  present  students 
of  Theology  in  our  established  schools,  a  few  passages 
as  thoroughly  Pauline,  as  completely  accordant  with 
the  doctrines  of  the  established  Church,  as  the  fol- 
lowing sentences  in  the  concluding  page  of  Spinoza's 
Ethics.  Deinde  quo  mens  amore  divino  seu  beatitu- 
dine  magis  gaudet,  eo  plus  inlelligil,  eo  majorem  in 
affectus  habet  potentiam,  et  eo  minus  ab  affectibus, 
qui  mali  sunt,  patitur :  atque  adeo  ex  eo,  quod  mens 
hoc  amore  divino  seu  beatitudine  gaudet,  potestatem 
habet  libidines  coercendi,  nemo  beatitudine  gaudet 
quia  affectus  coercuit;  sed  contra  potestas  libidines 
coercendi  ex  ipsa  beatitudine  oritur. 

With  regard  to  the  Unitarians,  it  has  been  shame- 
lessly asserted,  that  1  have  denied  them  to  be  Chris- 
tians. God  forbid !  For  how  should  I  know  what 
the  piety  of  the  heart  may  be,  or  what  quantum  of 
error  in  the  understanding  may  consist  with  a  saving 
faith  in  the  intentions  and  actual  dispositions  of  the 
whole  moral  being  in  any  one  individual  ?    Never 


will  God  reject  a  soul  that  sincerely  loves  him,  be  his 
speculative  opinions  what  they  may  ;  and  whether  in 
any  given  instance  certain  opinions,  be  they  unbelief 
or  misbelief,  are  compatible  with  a  sincere  love  of 
God,  God  only  can  know.  But  this  I  have  said,  and 
shall  continue  to  say  ;  that  if  the  doctrines,  the  sum 
of  which  I  believe  to  constitute  the  truth  in  Christ,  be 
Christianity, then  Unitariam'sm  is  not,  and  vice  versa: 
and  that  in  speaking  theologically  and  impersonally, 
i.  e.  of  Psilanthropism  and  Theantiiropism  as 
schemes  of  belief,  without  reference  to  individuals 
who  profess  either  the  one  or  the  other,  it  will  be  ab- 
surd to  use  a  different  language  as  long  as  it  is  the 
dictate  of  common  sense,  that  two  opposites  cannot 
properly  be  called  by  the  same  name.  I  should  feel 
no  offence  if  an  Unitarian  applied  the  same  to  me, 
any  more  than  if  he  were  to  say,  that  2  and  2  being 
4,  4  and  4  must  be  8. 

AXXa  PpoTwv 
Toe  jxiv  Kcvo<ppovES  av%aL 

Ef  ayaSwv  cj3a\ov. 
Toe  6'  av   KaTayHfitpStvT    ayav 
\s\vv  oiKttoiv  KaTti(j>a\tv  xa\o)v 
XupOS   tXKIi)V   07T1J50),   9d/ios    aTO^fios- 

This  has  been  my  object,  and  this  alone  can  be  my 
defence — and  O!  that  with  this  my  personal  as  well 
as  my  literary  life  might  conclude !  the  unquench- 
ed  desire  I  mean,  not  without  the  consciousness  of 
having  earnestly  endeavored  to  kindle  young  minds, 
and  to  guard  them  against  the  temptations  of  scorn- 
ers,  by  showing  that  the  scheme  of  Christianity,  as 
taught  in  the  Liturgy  and  Homilies  of  our  Church, 
though  not  discoverable  by  human  Reason,  is  yet  in 
accordance  with  it;  that  link  follows  link  by  neces- 
sary consequence;  that  Religion  passes  out  of  the  ken 
of  reason  only  where  the  eye  of  reason  has  reached 
its  own  horizon;  and  that  faith  is  then  but  its  contin- 
uation :  even  as  the  day  softens  away  into  the  sweet 
twilight,  and  twilight,  hushed  and  breathless,  steals 
into  the  darkness.  It  is  night,  sacred  night !  the  up- 
raised eye  views  only  the  starry  heaven  which  mani- 
fests itself  alone  ;  and  the  outward  beholding  is  fixed 
on  the  sparks  twinkling  in  the  awful  depth,  though 
suns  of  other  worlds,  only  to  preserve  the  soul  steady 
and  collected  in  its  pure  act  of  inward  adoration  to  the 
great  I  AM,  and  to  the  filial  Word  that  re-affirmeth 
it  from  eternity  to  eternity,  whose  choral  echo  is  the 
universe. 

6EJZ  MONJ2  AOHA. 


373 


&fte  iFtrUutr: 


A    SERIES    OF    ESSAYS,    TO    AID    IN   THE    FORMATION    OF 


FIXED  PRINCIPLES  IN  POLITICS,  MORALS,  AND  RELIGION, 


LITERARY  AMUSEMENTS  INTERSPERSED. 


Accipe  principium  rursus,  formamque  coactam 
Desere  :  mutata  melior  prooede  figura. Clatulian. 


Xwpari  Srjrivaa^  ept   ra^tv,  a(p'  fa  ip'pvcrSri^f 
AS^is-  ava?fioti5,  lipy  AOTil  epyov  cvuiSa^-. 

ZflPOA'STPOY  Aoyla. 


EPISTLE  DEDICATORY. 


Friend!  were  an  Author  privileged  lo  name  his 
own  judge — in  addition  to  moral  and  intellectual 
competence,  I  should  look  round  for  some  man, 
whose  knowledge  and  opinions  had  for  the  greater 
part  been  acquired  experimentally:  and  the  practi- 
cal habits  of  whose  life  had  put  him  on  his  guard 
with  respect  lo  all  speculative  reasoning,  without 
rendering  him  insensible  to  the  desirableness  of  prin- 
ciples more  secure  than  the  shifting  rules  and  theo- 
ries generalized  from  observations  merely  empirical, 
or  unconscious  in  how  many  departments  of  know- 
ledge, and  with  how  large  a  portion  even  of  profes- 
sional men,  such  principles  are  still  a  desideratum.  I 
would  select  too  one  who  felt  kindly,  nay,  even  par- 
tially, toward  me;  but  one  whose  partiality  had  its 
strongest  foundations  in  hope,  and  more  prospective 
than  retrospective  would  make  him  quick-sighted  in 
the  detection,  and  unreserved  in  the  exposure  of  the 
deficiencies  and  defects  of  each  present  work,  in  the 
anticipation  of  a  more  developed  future.  In  you, 
honored  Friend !  I  have  found  all  these  requisites 
combined  and  realized  :  and  the  improvement,  which 
these  Essays  have  derived  from  your  judgment  and 
judicious  suggestions,  would,  of  itself,  have  justified 
me  in  accompanying  them  with  a  public  acknow- 
ledgment of  die  same.     But  knowing,  as  you  cannot 


but  know,  that  I  owe  in  great  measure  the  power  of 
having  written  at  all  to  your  medical  skill,  and  lo  the 
characteristic  good  sense  which  directed  its  exertion 
in  my  behalf;  and  whatever  I  may  have  written  in 
happier  vein,  to  the  influence  of  your  society  and  lo 
the  daily  proofs  of  your  disinterested  attachment- 
knowing  too,  in  how  entire  a  sympathy  with  your 
feelings  in  this  respect  the  partner  of  your  name  has 
blended  the  affectionate  regards  of  a  sister  or  a 
daughter  with  almost  a  mother's  watchfulness  and 
unwearied  solicitude  alike  for  my  health,  interest, 
and  tranquillity  ; — you  will  not,  I  trust,  be  pained,  you 
ought  not,  I  am  sure,  be  surprised  that 


MR.   AND   MRS.   GILLMAN, 

OF  HIGHGATE, 
THESE  VOLUMES  ARE  DEDICATED, 

IN   TESTIMONY    OF   HIGH 

RESPECT 

AND   GRATEFUL   AFFECTION,    BY   THEIR 

FRIEND, 

S.  T.  COLERIDGE. 


October  7,  1818. 
Highgate. 


374 


THE  FRIEND. 


8G5 


THE   FRIEND. 


ESSAY  I. 


Grade  mihi,  non  est  parvip  fiduc;p,  polliceri  opem  decerlanti- 
bus,  consilium  dubiis,  lumen  cscis  spem  dcjeclis,  refrigeri 
amfessis.  Magna  quidem  hsec  sunt  si  fkinl ;  parva,  si  pro- 
iniliantur.  Verum  ego  non  tarn  aliis  legem  ponam,  quam 
legem  vobis  men-  propria;  mentis  exponam  :  quam  qui  pro- 
baverii,  teneat;  cui  non  placuerit,  abjiciat.  Optarem,  fa- 
teor,  talis  esse,  qui  prodesse  pussim  quam  plurimis. 

PETRARCH:  " De  Vita  Solilaria." 


Antecedent  to  all  History,  and  long  glimmering 
through  it  as  a  holy  Tradition,  there  presents  itself 
to  our  imagination  an  indefinite  period,  dateless  as 
Eternity,  a  State  rather  than  a  Time.  For  even  the 
sense  of  succession  is  lost  in  the  uniformity  of  the 
stream. 

It  was  toward  the  close  of  this  golden  age  (the  me- 
mory of  which  the  sell-dissatisfied  Race  of  Wen  have 
every  where  preserved  and  cherished)  when  Con- 
science acted  in  Man  with  the  ease  and  uniformity 
of  Instinct  ;  when  Labor  was  a  sweet  name  for  the 
activity  of  sane  Minds  in  healthful  Bodies,  and  all 
enjoyed  in  common  the  bounteous  harvest  produced, 
and  gathered  in,  by  common  effort;  when  there  ex- 
isted in  the  Sexes,  and  in  tfie  Individuals  of  each  Sex, 
just  variety  enough  to  permit  and  call  forth  the  gen- 
tle restlessness  and  final  union  of  chaste  love  and  in- 
dividual attachment,  each  seeking  and  finding  tho 
beloved  one  by  the  natural  affinity  of  their  Beings ; 
when  the  dread  Sovereign  of  the  Universe  was 
known  only  as  the  Universal  Parent,  no  Altar  but 
the  pure  Heart,  and  Thanksgiving  and  grateful  Love 
the  sole  Sacrifice 

In  this  blest  age  of  dignified  Innocence  one  of  their 
honored  Elders,  whose  absence  they  were  beginning 
to  notice,  entered  with  hurrying  steps  the  place  of 
their  common  assemblage  at  noon,  and  instantly  at- 
tracted the  general  attention  and  wonder  by  the  per- 
turbation of  his  gestures,  and  by  a  strange  trouble 
both  in  his  eyes  and  over  his  whole  countenance. 
After  a  short  but  deep  silence,  when  the  buzz  of  va- 
ried inquiry  was  becoming  audible,  the  old  man 
moved  toward  a  small  eminence,  and  having  ascend- 
ed it,  he  thus  addressed  the  hushed  and  listening 
company. 

"In  the  warmth  of  the  approaching  mid-day,  as  I 
was  reposing  in  the  vast  cavern,  out  of  which  from 
its  northern  portal  issues  the  river  that  winds  through 
our  vale,  a  voice  powerful,  yet  not  from  its  loudness, 
suddenly-  hailed  me.  Guided  by  my  ear  I  looked  to- 
ward the  supposed  place  of  the  sound  for  some  Form, 
from  which  it  had  proceeded.  I  beheld  nothing  but 
the  glimmering  walls  of  the  cavern.  Again,  as  I  nr.s 
(timing  round,  the  same  voice  hailed  me:  and  whi- 
thersoever I  turned   my  face,  thence  did   the  voice 


seem  to  proceed.  I  stood  still  therefore,  and  in  rev- 
erence awaited  its  continuation.  '  Sojournerof  Earth  ! 
(these  were  its  words)  hasten  to  the  meeting  of  thy 
Brethren,  and  the  words  which  thou  now  hearest, 
the  same  do  thou  repeat  unto  them.  On  the  thirtieth 
morn  from  the  morrow's  sun-rising,  and  during  the 
space  of  thrice  three  days  and  thrice  three  nights,  a 
thick  cloud  will  cover  the  sky,  and  a  heavy  rain  fall 
on  the  earth.  Go  ye  therefore,  ere  the  thirtieth  sun 
ariseth,  retreat  to  the  cavern  of  the  river,  and  there 
abide  till  the  clouds  have  passed  away  and  the  rain 
be  over  and  gone.  For  know  ye  of  a  certainly  thai 
whomever  that  rain  wettcth,  on  him,  yea,  on  him  and 
on  his  children's  children  will  fall — the  spirit  of  Mad- 
ness.' Yes!  Madness  was  the  word  of  the  voice: 
what  this  be,  I  know  not !  But  at  the  sound  of  the 
word  trembling  came  upon  me,  and  a  feeling  which 
I  would  not  have  had ;  and  I  remained  even  as  ye 
beheld  and  now  behold  me." 

The  old  man  ended,  and  retired.  Confused  mur- 
murs succeeded,  and  wonder,  and  doubt.  Dav  fol- 
lowed day,  and  every  day  brought  with  it  a  diminu- 
tion of  the  awe  impressed.  They  could  attach  no 
image,  no  remembered  sensations  to  the  threat.  The 
ominous  morn  arrived,  the  Prophet  had  retired  to  the 
appointed  cavern,  and  there  remained  alone  during 
the  appointed  time.  On  the  tenth  morning,  he  emer- 
ged from  his  place  of  shelter,  and  sought  his  friends 
and  brethren.  But  alas!  how  affiightful  the  change ! 
Instead  of  the  common  children  of  one  great  family, 
working  towards  the  same  aim  by  reason,  even  as  the 
bees  in  their  hives  by  instinct,  he  looked  and  beheld, 
here  a  miserable  wretch  watching  over  a  heap  of  hard 
and  unnutritious  substances,  which  he  had  dug  out 
of  the  earth,  at  the  cost  of  mangled  limbs  and  exhaust- 
ed faculties.  This  he  appeared  to  worship,  at  this 
he  gazed,  even  as  the  youths  of  the  vale  had  been 
accustomed  to  gaze  at  their  chosen  virgins  in  the  first 
season  of  their  choice.  There  he  saw  a  former  com- 
panion speeding  on  and  panting  after  a  butterfly,  or 
a  withered  leaf  whirling  onward  in  the  breeze;  and 
another  with  pale  and  distorted  countenance  follow- 
ing close  behind,  and  still  stretching  forth  a  dagger 
to  stab  his  precursor  in  the  back.  In  another  place 
he  observed  a  whole  troop  of  his  fellow-men  famish- 
ing and  in  fetters,  yet  led  by  one  of  their  brethren 
who  had  enslaved  them,  and  pressing  furiously  on- 
wards in  the  hope  of  famishing  and  enslaving  ano- 
ther troop  moving  in  an  opposite  direction.  For  the 
first  time,  the  Prophet  missed  his  accustomed  power 
of  distinguishing  between  his  dreams  and  his  waking 
perceptions.  He  stood  gazing  and  motionless,  when 
several  of  the  race  gathered  around  him,  and  enquir- 
ed of  each  other,  who  is  this  man  ?  how  strangely  lie 
looks!  how  wild  ! — a  worthless  idler!  exclaims  one: 
assuredly,  a  verv  dangerous  madman !  cries  a  second. 
In  short,  from  words  they  proceeded  to  violence:  till 
harassed,  endangered,  solitary  in  a  world  of  forms 
like  his  own,  without  sympathy,  without  object  of 
love,  he  at  length  espied  in  some  foss  or  furrow  a 
quantity  of  the  maddening  water  still  unevaporated, 
and  uttering  the  last  words  of  reason,  It  is  in  vain 
375 


366 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


TO  BE  SANE   IN    A  WORLD  OF    MADMEN,  plunged   find 

rolled  himself  in  the  liquid  poison,  and  came  out  as 
mad  and  not  more  wretched  than  his  neighbors  and 
acquaintance. 

The  plan  of  The  Friend  is  comprised  in  the  motto 
to  this  Essay.*  This  tale  or  allegory  seems  to  me  to 
coniain  the  objections  to  its  practicability  in  all  their 
strength.  Either,  says  the  Skeptic,  you  are  the  Blind 
offering  to  lead  the  Blind,  or  you  are  talking  the  lan- 
guage of  Sight  to  those  who  do  not  possess  the  sense 
of  seeing.  If  you  mean  to  be  read,  try  to  entertain 
and  do  not  pretend  to  instruct.  To  such  objections 
it  would  be  amply  sufficient,  on  any  system  of  faith, 
to  answer,  that  we  are  not  all  blind,  but  all  subject 
to  distempers  of  "the  mental  sight,"'  differing  in  kind 
and  in  degree  ;  that  though  all  men  arc  in  error,  they 
are  not  all  in  the  same  error,  nor  at  the  same  time; 
and  that  each  therefore  may  possibly  heal  the  other, 
even  as  two  or  more  physicians,  all  diseased  in  their 
general  health  yet  under  the  immediate  action  of  the 
disease  on  different  days,  may  remove  or  alleviate 
the  complaints  of  each  other.  But  in  respect  to  the 
entertainingness  of  moral  writings,  if  in  entertainment 
be  included  whatever  delights  the  imagination  or  af- 
fects the  generous  passions,  so  far  from  rejecting  such 
a  mean  of  persuading  the  human  soul,  my  very  sys- 
tem compels  me  to  defend  not  only  the  propriety  but 
the  absolute  necessity  of  adopting  it,  if  we  really  in- 
tend to  render  our  fellow-creatures  better  or  wiser. 

But  it  is  with  dullness  as  with  obscurity.  It  may 
be  positive,  and  the  author's  fault;  but  it  may  like- 
wise be  relative,  and  if  the  author  has  presented  his 
bill  of  fare  at  the  portal,  the  reader  has  himself  only 
to  blame.  The  main  question  then  is,  of  what  class 
are  the  persons  to  be  entertained  ? — "  One  of  the  later 
schools  of  the  Grecians  (says  Lord  Bacon)  is  at  a  stand 
to  think  what  should  be  in  it  that  men  should  love 
lies,  where  neither  they  make  for  pleasure,  as  with 
poets  ;  nor  for  advantage,  as  with  the  merchant;  but 
for  the  lie's  sake.  I  cannot  tell  why,  this  same  truth 
is  a  naked  and  open  day-light,  that  doth  not  show  the 
masques  and  mummeries  and  triumphs  of  the  present 
world  half  so  stately  and  daintily,  as  candle-lights. 
Truth  may  perhaps  come  to  the  price  of  a  pearl,  that 
showeth  best  by  day ;  but  it  will  not  rise  to  the  price 
of  a  diamond  or  carbuncle,  which  showeth  best  in 
varied  lights.  A  mixture  of  lies  doth  ever  add  plea- 
sure.    Doth  any  man  doubt,  that  if  there  were  taken 


*  (Translation.) — Believe  me,  it  requires  no  little  confi- 
dence, to  promise  Help  to  the  Struggl'm?,  Counsel  to  the 
Doubtful,  Light  to  the  Blind,  Hope  to  the  Despondent,  Re- 
freshment to  the  Weary.  These  are  indeed  great  things,  it' 
they  he  accomplished;  trifles  if  they  exist  hut  in  a  promise. 
I  however  aim  net  so  much  to  prescrihe  a  Law  for  others,  as 
to  set  forth  the  Law  of  my  own  Mind  ;  which  let  the  man, 
who  shall  have  approved  of  it,  abide  by  ;  and  let  him,  to 
whom  it  shall  appear  nut  reasonable,  reject  it.  It  i-  my  earn- 
est wish,  I  confess,  to  employ  my  understanding  and  acquire- 
ments in  thai  mode  and  direction,  in  which  1  may  he  en- 
abled to  benefit  the  largest  number  pos*ible  of  my  fellow- 
creatures. 


from  men's  minds  vain  opinions,  flattering  hopes,  false 
valuations,  imaginations  as  one  would,  and  the  like 
vinum  Da^monum  (as  a  Father  calleth  poetry)  but  it 
would  leave  the  minds  of  a  number  of  men  poor 
shrunken  things,  full  of  melancholy  and  indisposition, 
and  unpleasing  to  themselves?" 

A  melancholy,  a  too  general,  but  not,  I  trust,  a  uni- 
versal truth ! — and  even  where  it  does  apply,  yet  in 
manv  instances  not  irremediable.  Such  at  least 
must  have  been  my  persuasion :  or  the  present  work 
iiuist  have  been  wittingly  written  to  no  purpose.  If 
I  believe  our  nature  fettered  to  all  this  wretchedness 
of  head  and  heart  by  an  absolute  and  innate  neces- 
sity, at  least  by  a  necessity  which  no  human  power,  ' 
no  efforts  of  reason  or  eloquence  could  remove  or 
lessen;  I  should  deem  it  even  presumptuous  to  aim 
at  other  or  higher  object  than  that  of  amusing  a 
small  portion  of  the  reading  public. 

And  why  not?  whispers  worldly  prudence.  To 
amuse  though  only  to  amuse  our  visiters  is  wisdom  as 
well  as  good-nature,  where  it  is  presumption  to  at- 
tempt their  amendment.  And  truly  it  would  be 
most  convenient  to  me  in  respects  of  no  trifling  im- 
portance, if  I  could  persuade  myself  to  take  the  ad- 
vice. Relaxed  by  these  principles  from  all  moral  ob- 
ligation, and  ambitious  of  procuring  pastime  and  self- 
oblivion  for  a  race,  which  could  have  nothing  noble 
to  remember,  nothing  desirable  to  anticipate,  I  might 
aspire  even  to  the  praise  of  the  critics  and  dilettante 
of  the  higher  circles  of  society  ;  of  some  trusty  guide 
of  blind  fashion;  some  pleasant  Analyst  of  Taste, 
as  it  exists  both  in  the  palate  and  the  soul ;  some 
living  gauge  and  mete-wand  of  past  and  present 
genius.  But  alas!  my  former  studies  would  still 
have  left  a  wrong  bias!  If  instead  of  perplexing  my 
common  sense  with  the  flights  of  Plato,  and  of  stiff- 
ening over  the  meditations  of  the  imperial  Stoic,  I 
had  been  laboring  to  imbibe  the  gay  spirit  of  a 
Casti,  or  had  employed  my  erudition,  for  the  benefit 
of  the  favored  few,  in  elucidating  the  interesting  de- 
formities of  ancient  Greece  and  India,  what  might  I 
not  have  hoped  from  the  suffrage  of  those,  who  turn 
in  weariness  from  the  Paradise  Lost, — because  com- 
pared witii  the  prurient  heroes  and  grotesque  mon- 
sters of  Italian  Romance,  or  even  with  the  narrative 
dialogues  of  the  melodious  Metastasio, — that — "Ad- 
venturous Song, 

"  Which  justifies  the  ways  of  God  to  man," 
has  been  found  a  poor  substitute  for  Grimaldi,  a  most 
inapt  medicine  for  an  occasional  propensity  to  yawn  ? 
For,  as  hath  been  decided,  to  fill  up  pleasantly  the 
brief  intervals  of  fashionable  pleasures,  and  above 
all  to  charm  nwav  the  dusky  Gnome  of  Ennui,  is  the 
chief  and  ap]  ropriate  business  of  the  Poet  and — the 
Novelist!  This  duty  unfulfilled,  Apollo  will  have 
lavished  his  lies;  gifts  in  vain;  ami  Urania  henceforth 
must  be  content  to  inspire  Astronomers  alone,  and 
leave  the  Sons  of  Verse  to  more  amusive  Patron- 
esses. And  yet — ami  yet — 'out  it  will  be  time  to  be 
serious,  when  my  visiters  have  sat  down. 


37G 


THE  FRIEND. 


367 


ESSAY   II. 


Sic  oportet  ad  librum,  preserlim  miscellanei  generis,  legendum 
accedere  lectorem,  ut  Bolet  ad  eoovivium  oonviva  civilis. 
Convivator  anniliiur  omnibus  satislacere:  et  tamen  si  quid 
apponilnr,  quod  hujus  ant  iilius  palato  nun  respondeat,  et 
hie  et  iile  urbane  dissimulant,  et  alia  fercula  probant,  ne 
quid  conlristent  convivatorem.  Qnis  enim  eurn  convivam 
ferat,  qui  tantnm  hoc  animo  venial  ad  mensam,  ut  cat  pens 
quae  appoounlur  nee  vescalur  ipse,  nee  alios  vesci  sinat  i  el 
tamen  his  quoque  repenas  incivihores,  qui  palam.  (iui  sine 
fine  damnent  ae  lacerent  opua,  quod  nunquam  legerint.  Asl 
hoc  plusquam  sycophanticum  est  damnare  quod  nescias. 

ERASMUS. 


The  musician  may  tune  his  instrument  in  private, 
ere"his  audience  have  yet  assembled ;  the  architect 
conceals  the  foundation  of  his  building  beneath  the 
superstructure.  Rut  an  author's  harp  must  be  tuned 
in  the  hearing  of  those,  who  are  to  understand  its  af- 
ter harmonies ;  the  foundation  stones  of  his  edifice 
must  lie  open  to  common  view,  or  his  friends  will 
hesitate  to  trust  themselves  beneath  the  roof 

From  periodical  Literature  the  general  Reader 
deems  himself  entitled  to  expect  amusement,  and 
some  degree  of  information ;  and  if  the  writer  can 
convey  any  instruction  at  the  same  time  and  without 
demanding  any  additional  thought  (as  the  Irishman, 
in  the  hackneyed  jest,  is  said  to  have  passed  off  a 
light  guinea  between  two  halfpence)  this  superero- 
gatory merit  will  not  perhaps  be  taken  amiss.  Now 
amusement  in  and  for  itself  may  be  afforded  by  the 
gratification  either  of  the  curiosity  or  of  the  passions. 
I  use  the  former  word  as  distinguished  from  the  love 
of  knowledge,  and  the  latter  in  distinction  from  those 
emotions  which  arise  in  well  ordered  minds,  from  the 
perception  of  truth  or  falsehood,  virtue  or  vice: — emo- 
tions, which  are  always  preceded  by  thought,  and 
linked  with  improvement.  Again,  all  information 
pursued  without  any  wish  of  becoming  wiser  or  bet- 
ter thereby,  I  class  among  the  gratifications  of  mere 
curiosity,  whether  it  be  sought  for  in  a  light  Novel 
or  a  grave  History.  We  may  therefore  omit  the  word 
Information,  as  included  either  in  Amusement  or  in- 
struction. 

The  present  Work  is  an  experiment;  not  whether 
a  writer  may  honestly  overlook  the  one,  or  successfully 
omit  the  other,  of  the  two  elements  themselves,  which 
serious  Readers  at  least  persuade  themselves,  they 
pursue;  but  whether  a  change  might  not  be  hazard- 
ed of  the  usual  order,  in  which  periodical  writers 
have  in  general  attempted  to  convey  them.  Having 
myself  experienced  that  no  delight  either  in  kind  or 
degree,  was  equal  to  that  which  accompanies  the  dis- 
tinct perception  of  a  fundamental  truth,  relative  to 
our  moral  being;  bavin?,  long  after  the  completion 
of  what  is  ordinarily  called  a  learned  education,  dis- 
covered a  new  world  of  intellectual  profit  opening  on 
me — not  from  any  new  opinions,  but  lying,  as  it  were, 
at  the  roots  of  those  which  I  had  been  taught  in  child- 
hood in  my  Catechism  and  Spelling-book;  there  arose 
a  soothing  hope  in  my  mind  that  a  lesser  Public  might 
be  found,  composed  of  persons  susceptible  of  the 
25  Ilh 


same  delight,  and  desirous  of  attaining  it  by  the  same 
process.  I  heard  a  whisper  too  from  within,  (I  trust 
that  it  proceeded  from  Conscience  not  Vanity)  that  a 
duty  was  performed  in  the  endeavor  to  render  it  as 
much  easier  to  them,  than  it  had  been  to  me,  as  could 
be  effected  by  the  united  efforts  of  my  understand- 
ing and  imagination.* 

Actuated  by  this  impulse,  the  Writer  wishes,  in 
the  following  Essays,  to  convey  not  instruction  mere- 
ly, but  fundamental  instruction ;  not  so  much  to 
show  my  Reader  this  or  that  fact,  as  to  kindle  his 
own  torch  for  him,  and  leave  it  to  himself  to  choose 
the  particular  objects,  which  he  might  wish  to  ex- 
amine by  its  light.  The  Friend  does  not  indeed 
exclude  from  his  plan  occasional  interludes,  and 
vacations  of  innocent  entertainment  and  promiscuous 
|  information  ;  but  still  in  the  main  he  proposes  to  him- 
self the  communication  of  such  delight  as  rewards 
the  march  of  Truth,  rather  than  to  collect  the  flowers 
which  diversify  its  track,  in  order  to  present  them 
apart  from  the  homely  yet  foodful  or  medicinal  herbs, 
among  which  they  had  grown.  To  refer  men's 
opinions  to  their  absolute  principles,  and  thence 
their  feelings  to  the  appropriate  objects,  and  in  their 
true  degrees ;  and  finally,  to  apply  the  principles 
thus  ascertained,  to  the  formation  of  steadfast  con- 
victions concerning  the  most  important  questions  of 
Politics,  Morality,  and  Religion — these  are  to  be  the 
objects  and  the  contents  of  this  work. 

Themes  like  these  not  even  the  genius  of  a  Plato  or 
a  Bacon  could  render  intelligible,  without  demanding 
from  the  reader  thought  sometimes,  and  attention 
generally.  By  thought  I  here  mean  the  voluntary 
production  in  our  own  minds  of  those  states  of  con- 
sciousness, to  which,  as  to  his  fundamental  facts,  the 
Writer  has  referred  us ;  while  attention  has  for 
its  object  the  order  and  connexion  of  Thoughts  and 
Images,  each  of  which  is  in  itself  already  and 
familiarly  known.  Thus  the  elements  of  Geometry 
require  attention  only;  but  the  analysis  of  our  pri- 
mary faculties,  and  the  investigation  of  all  the  abso- 
lute grounds  of  Religion  and  Morals,  are  impossible 
without  energies  of  thought  in  addition  to  the  effort 
of  Attention.    The  Friend  will  not  attempt  to  dis- 

*  In  conformity  with  tins  anxious  wish  I  shnll  make  no 
apology  for  subjoining  a  Translation  of  my  Motto  to  this  Es- 
say. 

(  Translation.)    A  reader  should  sit  down  to  a  book,  espe- 
cially of  the  miscellaneous  kind, as  a  well-behaved  visiter  does 
to  a  banquet.    The  master  of  the  feast  e.verts  himself  to  sat- 
isfy all  his  guos's ;  but  if  after  all  his  care  and   pains  there 
should  still  be  something  or  other  put  on  the '.able  that  does 
not  suit  Ihis  or  that  person's  taslc,  they  politely  pass  it  over 
without  noticing  the  circumslnnce,  and  commend  otherdishes, 
thnt  thry  may  not  distress  their  kind  host,  or  throw  any  damp 
on  bis  spirits.    For  who  could  tolerate  a  guest  that  accepted 
an  im.  itation  to  your  table  with  no  other  purpose  but  that  of 
i  finding  fault  with  every  thing  put  before   him,  neither  eating 
1  himself,  or  suffering  others  to  eat  in  comfort.    And  yet  you 
I  may  fall  in  with  a  still  worse  set  than  even  these, — with  churls 
j  lhat  in  all  companies  and  without  stop  or  stay  will  condemn 
and  poll  to  pieces  a  work  which  they  had   never  read.    But 
this  sinks  below  the  baseness  of  an  Informer,  yea,  though  he 
v.-i  re  n  fal*e  witness  to  boot!    The  man,  who  abuses  a  thing 
of  which   be  is  utterly  ignorant,  unites  the  infamy  of  both — 
I  and  in  addition  to  this,  makes  himself  the  pander  and  syco- 
|  pliant  of  bis  own  and  other  men's  en^y  and  malignity. 

377 


368 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


guise  from  his  Readers  that  both  Attention  and 
Thought  are  Efforts,  and  the  latter  a  most  difficult 
and  laborious  Effort ;  nor  from  himself,  that  to  re- 
quire it  often  or  for  any  continuance  of  time  is  incom- 
patible with  the  nature  of  the  present  Publication, 
even  were  it  less  incongruous  than  it  unfortunately 
is  with  the  present  habits  and  pursuits  of  English- 
men. Accordingly  I  shall  be  on  my  guard  to  make 
the  Numbers  as  few  as  possible,  which  would  re- 
quire from  a  well-educated  Reader  any  energy  of 
thought  and  voluntary  abstraction. 

But  Attention,  I  confess,  will  be  requisite  through- 
out, except  in  the  excursive  and  miscellaneous  Es- 
says that  will  be  found  interposed  between  each  of 
the  three  main  divisions  of  the  Work.  On  what- 
ever subject  the  mind  feels  a  lively  interest,  atten- 
tion, though  always  an  effort,  becomes  a  delightful 
effort.  I  should  be  quite  at  ease,  could  I  secure  for 
the  whole  Work  as  much  of  it,  as  a  card-party  of 
earnest  whist-players  often  expend  in  a  single  even- 
ing, or  a  lady  in  the  making-up  of  a  fashionable 
dress.  But  where  no  interest  previously  exists,  at- 
tention (as  every  schoolmaster  knows)  can  be  pro- 
cured only  by  terror:  which  is  the  true  reason  why 
the  majority  of  mankind  learn  nothing  systematically, 
except  as  school-boys  or  apprentices. 

Happy  shall  I  be,  from  other  motives  besides  those 
of  self-interest,  if  no  fault  or  deficiency  on  my  part 
shall  prevent  the  Work  from  furnishing  a  presump- 
tive proof,  that  there  are  still  to  be  found  among  us 
a  respectable  number  of  Readers  who  are  desirous 
to  derive  pleasure  from  the  consciousness  of  being 
instructed  or  ameliorated,  and  who  feel  a  sufficient 
interest  as  to  the  foundations  of  their  own  opinions 
in  Literature,  Politics,  Morals,  and  Religion,  to  afford 
that  degree  of  attention,  without  which,  however 
men  may  deceive  themselves,  no  actual  progress 
ever  was  or  ever  can  be  made  in  that  knowledge, 
which  supplies  at  once  both  strength  and  nourish- 
ment 


ESSAY   III 


A'AX  ew;  ~aps\aliov  nj'v  rl^vqv  irapa"  gov  Torrpd  tov 

/lev  tu'-Su's- 
OiSov  Sav  'vtto  Kouizatrud  rutv,  Kai  'pvpd  tuiv,  tTra^&Sv, 
'  l5%vava  (it'll    npui'  tictov  a'virrj'v,   Kai  to'    Pa'    po$-' 

'a(pci\ov, 
'EiruXX/oir  Kai  Tttmvd  to  is-  Kai  totX/octi  ihkoo7^ 
Xv\o'v  ii&ov'z  OTU/iiiX^a  twv,  'avb  /3i/3X<W,  'avr}$-uiv. 
AltlSTOPH.  Ran^e. 


Imitation.* 

When  I  received  the  Muse  from  you,  I  found  her  puffed  and 

pampered, 
With  pompous  sentences  and  terms,  a  cumb'rous  huge  virago. 
My  first  attention  was  applied  to  make  her  look  genteelly, 

*  This  Imitation  is  printed  here  by  permission  jf  the  Au- 
thor, from  a  Series  of  free  Translations  of  selected  Scenes 
from  Aristophanes  :  a  work,  of  which  (should  the  Author  lie 
persuaded  to  make  it  public)  it  is  my  most  deliberate  judg- 


And  bring  her  to  a  moderate  bulk  by  dint  of  lighter  diet. 
I  fed  her  with  plain  household  phrase  and  cool  familiar  salad. 
With  water-gruel  episode,  with  sentimental  jelly, 
With  moral  mince-meat:  till  at  length  I  brought  her  withic 
compass. 

Frtre. 

In  the  preceding  Number  I  named  the  present 
undertaking  an  Experiment.  The  explanation  will 
be  found  in  the  following  Letter,  written  to  a  Cor- 
respondent during  the  first  attempt,  and  before  the 
plan  was  discontinued  from  an  original  error  in  the 
mode  of  circulation,  as  noticed  in  the  Preface. 

To  R.  L. 
Dear  Sir, 

When  I  first  undertook  the  present  Publication  for 
the  sake  and  with  the  avowed  object  of  referring  men 
in  all  things  to  Principles  or  fundamental  truths,  I 
was  well  aware  of  the  obstacles  which  the  plan  itself 
would  oppose  to  my  success.  For  in  order  to  the 
regular  attainment  of  this  object,  all  the  driest  and 
least  attractive  Essays  must  appear  in  the  first  fifteen 
or  twenty  Numbers,  and  thus  subject  me  to  the 
necessity  of  demanding  effort  or  soliciting  patience  in 
that  part  of  the  Work  where  it  was  most  my  interest 
to  secure  the  confidence  of  my  readers  by  winning 
their  favour.  Though  I  dared  warrant  for  the  plea- 
santness of  the  journey  on  the  whole;  though  I 
might  promise  that  the  road  would,  for  the  far  greater 
part  of  it,  be  found  plain  and  easy,  that  it  would 
pass  through  countries  of  various  prospect,  and  that 
at  every  stage  there  would  be  a  change  of  company ; 
it  still  remained  a  heavy  disadvantage,  that  1  had  to 
start  at  the  foot  of  a  high  and  steep  hill :  and  I  fore- 
saw, not  without  occasional  feelings  of  despondency, 
that  during  the  slow  and  laborious  ascent  it  would 
require  no  common  management  to  keep  my  passen- 
gers in  good  humour  with  the  vehicle  and  its  driver. 
As  far  as  this  inconvenience  could  be  palliated  by 
sincerity  and  previous  confessions,  I  have  no  reason 
to  accuse  mvself  of  neglect.  In  the  prospectus  of 
The  Friend,  which  for  this  cause  I  re-printed  and 
annexed  to  the  first  number,  I  felt  it  my  duty  to  in- 
form such  as  might  be  inclined  to  patronize  the  pub- 
lication, that  I  must  submit  to  be  esteemed  dull  by 
those  who  sought  chiefly  for  amusement :  and  this  I 
hazarded  as  a  general  confession,  though  in  my  own 
mind  I  fell  a  cheerful  confidence  that  it  would  apply 
almost  exclusively  to  the  earlier  Numbers.  I  could 
not  therefore  be  surprised,  however  much  I  may 
have  been  depressed,  by  the  frequency  with  which 
you  hear  The  Friend  complained  of  for  its  abstruse- 
ness  and  obscurity  ;  nor  did  the  highly  flattering  ex- 
pressions, with  which  you  accompanied  your  com- 
munication, prevent  me  from  feeling  its  truth  to  the 
whole  extent. 

An  author's  pen,  like  children's  legs,  improves  by 
exercise.  That  part  of  the  blame  which  rests  on 
myself,  I  am  exerting  my  best  faculties  to  remove. 


ment,  and  inmost  conviction,  that  it  will  form  an  important 
epoch  in  English  Literature,  and  open  our  sources  of  metri- 
cal and  rhythmical  wealth  in  the  very  heart  of  our  language 
of  which  few,  if  any,  among  us  are  aware. 

S.  T.  C. 
378 


THE  FRIEND. 


69 


A  man  long  accustomed  to  silent  and  solitary  medita- 
tion, in  proportion  as  he  increases  the  power  of  think- 
ing in  long  and  connected  trains,  is  apt  to  lose  or  less- 
en the  talent  of  communicating  his  thoughts  with 
grace  and   perspicuity.     Doubtless,  too,  I  have  in 
1  some  measure  injured  my  style,  in  respect  to  its  feci- 
I  lity  and  popularity,  from  having  almost  confined  my 
reading,  of  late  years,  to  the  works  of  the  Ancients 
and  those  of  the  elder  Writers  in  the  modern  lan- 
j  guages.     We  insensibly  imitate  what  we  habitually 
admire;  and  an  aversion  to  the  epigrammatic,  uncon- 
nected   periods  of   the   fashionable   Anglo-Gallican 
taste  has  too  often  made  me  willing  to  forget,  that  the 
stately  march  and  difficult  evolutions,  which  charac- 
terize the  eloquence  of  Hooker,  Bacon,  Milton,  and 
Jeremy  Taylor,  are,  notwithstanding  their  intrinsic 
excellence,  still  less  suited   to  a   periodical  Essay. 
This  fault  I  am  now  endeavoring  to  correct;  though 
I  can  never  so  far  sacrifice  my  judgment  to  the  de- 
sire of  being  immediately  popular,  as  to  cast  my  sen- 
tences in  the  French  moulds,  or  affect  a  style  which 
an  ancient  critic  would  have  deemed  purposely  in- 
vented for  persons  troubled  with  the  asthma  to  read, 
and  for  those  to  comprehend  who  labor  under  the 
more  pitiable  asthma  of  a  short-witted  intellect.    It 
cannot  but  be  injurious  to  the  human  mind  never  to 
be  called  into  effort;  the  habit  of  receiving  pleasure 
without  any  exertion  of  thought,  by  the  mere  excite- 
ment of  curiosity  and  sensibility,  may  be  justly  rank- 
ed among  the  worst  effects  of  habitual  novel  reading. 
It  is  true  that  these  short  and  unconnected  sentences 
are  easily  and  instantly  understood  :  but  it  is  equally 
true,  that  wanting  all  the  cement  of  thoughts  as  well 
as  of  style,  all  the  connections,  and  (if  you  will  for- 
give too  trivial  a  metaphor)  all  the  hooks-and-eyes  of 
the  memory,  they  are  as  easily  forgotten :  or  rather, 
it  is  scarcely  possible  that  they  should  be  remember- 
ed.— Nor  is  it  less  true,  that  those  who  confine  their 
reading  to  such  books  dwarf  their  own  faculties,  and 
finally  reduce  their  understanding  to  a  deplorable 
imbecility  :  the  fact  you  mention,  and  which  I  shall 
hereafter  make  use  of,  is  a  fair  instance  and  a  striking 
illustration.    Like  idle  morning  visiters,  the  brisk  and 
breathless  periods  hurry  in  and  hurry  off"  in  quick 
and  profitless  succession;  each  indeed  for  ihe  mo- 
ments of  its  stay  prevents  the  pain  of  vaeancv,  while 
it  indulges  the  love  of  sloth;  but  all  together  they 
leave  the  mistress  of  the  house  (the  soul  I  mean)  flat 
and  exhausted,  incapable  of  attending  to  her  own 
concerns,  and  unfitted  for  the  conversation  of  more 
rational  guests. 

I  know  you  will  not  suspect  me  of  fostering  so  idle 
a  hope,  as  that  of  obtaining  acquittal  by  recrimina- 
tion ;  or  think  that  I  am  attacking  one  fault,  in  order 
that  its  opposite  may  escape  notice  in  the  noise  and 
smoke  of  the  battery.  On  the  contrary,  I  shall  do 
m/  best,  and  even  make  all  allowable  sacrifices,  to 
render  my  manner  more  attractive  and  my  matter 
more  generally  interesting.  In  the  establishment  of 
principles  and  fundamental  doctrines,  I  must  of  ne- 
cessity require  the  attention  of  my  reader  to  become 
my  fellow-laborer.    The  primary  facts  essential  to  the 


intelligibility  of  my  principles  I  can  prove  to  others 
only  as  far  as  I  can  prevail  on  them  to  retire  into 
themselves  and  make  their  own  minds  the  objects  of 
their  steadfast  attention.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  I 
feel  too  deeply  the  importance  of  the  convictions, 
which  first  impelled  me  to  the  present  undertaking, 
to  leave  unattempted  any  honorable  means  of  recom 
mending  them  to  as  wide  a  circle  as  possible. 

Hitherto,  my  dear  Sir,  I  have  been  employed  in 
laying  the  foundation  of  my  work.  But  the  propel 
merit  of  a  foundation  is  its  massiveness  and  solidity 
The  conveniences  and  ornaments,  the  gilding  and 
stucco  work,  the  sunshine  and  sunny  prospects,  will 
come  with  the  superstructure.  Yet  I  dare  not  flatter 
myself,  that  any  endeavors  of  mine,  compatible  with 
the  duty  I  owe  to  truth  and  the  hope  of  permanent 
utility,  will  render  The  Friend  agreeable  to  the  ma- 
jority of  what  is  called  the  reading  public.  I  never 
expected  it.  How  indeed  could  I,  when  I  was  to 
borrow  so  little  from  the  influence  of  passing  events, 
and  when  I  had  absolutely  excluded  from  my  plan 
all  appeals  to  personal  curiosity  and  personal  inte- 
rests ?  Yet  even  this  is  not  my  greatest  impediment. 
No  real  information  can  be  conveyed,  no  important 
errors  rectified,  no  widely-injurious  prejudices  rooted 
up,  without  requiring  some  effort  or  thought  on  the 
part  of  the  reader.  But  the  obstinate  (and  toward  a 
contemporary  Writer,  the  contemptuous)  aversion  to 
all  intellectual  effort  is  the  mother  evil  of  all  which 
I  had  proposed  to  war  against,  the  Queen  Bee  in  the 
hive  of  our  errors  and  misfortunes,  both  private  and 
national.  To  solicit  the  attention  of  those,  on  whom 
these  debilitating  causes  have  acted  to  their  full  ex- 
tent, would  be  no  less  absurd  than  to  recommend 
exercise  with  the  dumb-bells,  as  the  only  mode  of 
cure,  to  a  patient  paralytic  in  both  arms.  You,  my 
dear  Sir,  well  know,  that  my  expectations  were  more 
modest  as  well  as  more  rational.  I  hoped  that  my 
readers  in  general  would  be  aware  of  the  impracti- 
cability of  suiting  every  Essay  to  every  taste  in  any 
period  of  the  work;  and  that  they  would  not  attribute 
wholly  to  the  author,  but  in  part  to  the  necessity  of 
his  plan,  the  austerity  and  absence  of  the  lighter 
graces  in  the  first  fifteen  or  twenty  numbers.  In  my 
cheerful  moods  I  sometimes  flattered  myself,  that  a 
few  even  among  those,  who  foresaw  thnt  my  lucu- 
brations would  at  all  times  require  more  attention 
than  from  the  nature  of  their  own  employments  they 
could  afford  them,  might  yet  find  a  pleasure  in  sup- 
porting the  Friend  during  its  infancy,  so  as  to  give  it 
a  chance  of  attracting  the  notice  of  others,  to  whom 
its  style  and  subjects  might  be  better  adapted.  But 
my  main  anchor  was  the  hope,  that  when  circum- 
stances gradually  enabled  me  to  adopt  the  ordinary 
means  of  making  the  publication  generally  known, 
there  might  be  found  throughout  the  Kingdom  a  suf- 
ficient number  of  meditative  minds,  who,  entertain- 
ing similar  convictions  with  myself  and  gratified  by 
the  prospect  of  seeing  them  reduced  to  form  and  sys- 
tem, would  take  a  warm  interest  in  the  work  from 
the  very  circumstance  that  it  wanted  those  allure- 
ments of  transitory  interests,  which  render  particular 
379 


370 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


patronage  superfluous,  and  for  the  brief  season  of 
their  blow  and  fragrance  attract  the  eye  of  thousands, 
who  would  pass  unregarded 

Flowers 

Of  sober  tint,  and  Herbs  of  medicinal  powers. 

S.  T.  C. 

In  these  three  introductory  Numbers,  The  Friend 
has  endeavored  to  realize  his  promise  of  giving  an 
honest  bill  of  fare,  both  as  to  the  objects  and  the 
style  of  the  Work.  With  reference  to  both  I  con- 
clude with  a  prophecy  of  Simon  Grynaeus,  from  his 
premonition  to  the  candid  Reader,  prefixed  to  Ficin- 
us's  translation  of  Plato,  published  at  Leyden,  1557. 
•  How  far  it  has  been  gradually  fulfilled  in  this  coun- 
try since  the  revolution  in  1688, 1  leave  to  my  candid 
and  intelligent  Readers  to  determine. 

'Ac  dolet  mihi  quidem  delkiis  literarum  inescntos 
subito  jam  homines  adeo  esse,  prasertim  qui  Christi- 
anos  esse  profitentur,  ut  legere  nisi  quod  ad  pre- 
sentem  gustum  facit,  sustineant  nihil :  unde  et  dis- 
ciplina  et  philosophia  ipsa  jam  fere  prorsus  etiam  a 
doctis  negliguntur.  Quod  quidem  propositum  studi- 
orum  nisi  mature  corrigetur,  tarn  magnum  rebus 
incommodum  dabit, quart)  dedit  barbaries  olim.  Per- 
tinax  res  barbaries  est  fateor;  sed  minus  potest 
tamen,  quam  ilia  persuasa  literatum,  prudentior  si 
ratione  caret,  sapienti®  virtutisque  specie  misere 
lectores  circumducens. 

Succedet  igitur,  ut  arbitror,  haud  ita  multo  post, 
pro  rusticana  saeculi  nostri  ruditate  capatrix  ilia 
blandi-loquentia,  robur  animi  virilis  omne,  omnem 
virtutem  masculum  profligatura,  nisi  cavetur.' 

translation.) — In  very  truth,  it  grieveth  me  that 
men,  those  especially  who  profess  themselves  to  be 
Christians,  should  be  so  taken  with  the  sweet  Bails 
of  Literature  that  they  can  endure  to  read  nothing 
but  what  gives  them  immediate  gratification,  no 
matter  how  low  or  sensual  it  may  be.  Consequently, 
the  more  austere  and  disciplinary  branches  of  phi- 
losophy itself,  are  almost  wholly  neglected,  even  by 
the  learned. — A  course  of  study  (if  such  reading, 
with  such  a  purpose  in  view,  could  deserve  that 
name)  which,  if  not  corrected  in  time,  will  occasion 
worse  consequences  than  even  barbarism  did  in  the 
times  of  our  forefathers.  Barbarism  is,  1  own.  a 
wilful  headstrong  thing;  but  with  all  its  blind  ob- 
stinacy it  has  less  power  of  doing  harm  than  this 
self-sufficient,  self-satisfied  plain  good  common-sense 
sort  of  writing,  this  prudent  saleable  popular  style 
of  composition,  if  it  be  deserted  by  Reason  and 
scientific  Insight ;  pitiably  decoying  the  minds  of 
men  by  an  imposing  show  of  amiableness,  and  prac- 
tical Wisdom,  so  that  the  delighted  Reader  knowing 
nothing  knows  all  about  almost  every  thing.  There 
will  succeed  therefore  in  my  opinion,  and  that  too 
within  no  long  time,  to  the  rudeness  and  rusticity  of 
our  age,  that  ensnaring  meretricious  popularness  in 
Literature,  with  all  the  tricksy  humilities  of  the  am- 
bitious candidates  for  the  favorable  suffrages  of  the 
judicious  Public,  which  if  we  do  not  take  good  care 
will  break  up  and  scatter  before  it  all  robustness  and 
manly  vigor  of  intellect,  all  masculine  fortitude  of 
virtue. 


ESSAY   IV. 


Si  modo  quae  Natura  et  Kalione  concessa  sint,  assumpseri- 
mus,  Prasumptionis  suspicio  a  nobis  quam  longissime 
abesse  debet.  Multa  Antiquitati,  nobismet  nihil  arrogamus. 
Nihilne  vns  ?  Nihil  melierculc.  nisi  quod  omnia  onini  ammo 
Veritali  arrogamus  et  SanctimonitB. 

ULK.  ItlNOV.  Dc  Controversies. 

(Translation.) — If  we  assume  only  what  Nature  and  Rea- 
Bnn  have  granted,  with  no  shadow  of  right  can  we  be  sus- 
pected of  Presumption.  To  Antiquity  we  arrogate  many 
things,  to  ourselves  nothing.  Nothing  1  Ay  nothing:  unless 
indeed  it  be.  that  with  all  our  strength  we  arrogate  all  things 
to  Truth  and  Moral  Purity. 

It  has  been  remarked  by  the  celebrated  IIaller, 
that  we  are  deaf  while  we  are  yawning.  The  same 
act  of  drowsiness  that  stretches  open  our  mouths 
closes  our  ears.  It  is  much  the  same  in  acts  of  the 
understanding.  A  lazy  half-attention  amounts  to  a 
mental  yawn.  Where  then  a  subject,  that  demands 
thought,  has  been  thoughtfully  treated,  and  with  an 
exact  and  patient  derivation  from  its  principles,  we 
must  be  willing  to  exert  a  portion  of  the  same  effort, 
and  to  think  with  the  author,  or  the  author  will  have 
thought  in  vain  for  us.  It  makes  little  difference  for 
the  time  being,  whether  there  be  an  hiatus  oscitans 
in  the  reader's  attention,  or  an  hiatus  lacrymabilis  in 
the  author's  manuscript.  When  this  occurs  during 
the  perusal  of  a  work  of  known  authority  and  estab- 
lished fame,  we  honestly  lay  the  fault  on  our  own 
deficiency,  or  on  the  unfitness  of  our  present  mood  ; 
but  when  it  is  a  contemporary  production,  over  which 
we  have  been  nodding,  it  is  far  more  pleasant  to  pro- 
nounce it  insufferably  dull  and  obscure.  Indeed,  as 
charity  begins  at  home,  it  would  be  unreasonable  to 
expect  that  a  reader  should  charge  himself  with  lack, 
of  intellect,  when  the  effect  may  be  equally  well  ac- 
counted for  by  declaring  the  author  unintelligible; 
or  that  he  should  accuse  his  own  inattention,  when 
by  half  a  dozen  phrases  of  abuse,  as  "heavy  stuff, 
metaphorical  jargon,"  &c,  he  can  at  once  excuse  his 
laziness,  and  gratify  his  pride,  scorn,  and  envy.  To 
similar  impulses  we  must  attribute  the  praises  of  a 
true  modern  reader,  when  he  meets  with  a  work  in 
the  true  modern  taste:  videlicet,  either  in  skipping, 
unconnected,  short-winded  asthmatic  sentences,  as 
easy  to  be  understood  as  impossible  to  be  remem- 
bered, in  which  the  merest  common-place  acquires  a 
momentary  poignancy,  a  petty  titillating  sting,  from 
affected  point  and  wilful  antithesis;  or  else  in  strut- 
ting and  rounded  periods,  in  which  the  emptiest  tru- 
isms are  blown  up  into  illustrious  bubbles  by  help  of 
film  and  inflation.  "Ay!"  (quoth  the  delighted 
reader)  "this  is  sense,  this  is  genius!  this  I  under- 
stand anil  admire!  /  hate  thought  the  very  same  a 
hundred  times  myself!''  In  other  words,  this  man 
has  reminded  me  of  my  own  cleverness,  and  there- 
fore I  admire  him.  O!  for  one  piece  of  egotism  that 
presents  itself  under  its  own  honest  bare  face  of  "I 
myself  I,"  there  are  fifty  that  steal  out  in  the  mask  of 
tuisms  and  ille-isms. 
It  has  ever  been  my  opinion,  that  an  excessive  soli- 
380 


THE  FRIEND. 


371 


Cltude  to  avoid  the  use  of  our  first  personal  pronoun 
more  often  has  its  source  in  conscious  selfishness  than 
in  true  self-ohli  vion.  A  quiet  observer  of  human  fol- 
lies may  often  amuse  or  sadden  his  thoughts  by  de- 
tecting a  perpetual  feeling  of  purest  egotism  through 
a  long  masquerade  of  Disguises,  the  half  of  which, 
had  old  Proteus  been  master  of  aa  manv,  would  have 
wearied  out  the  patience  of  Menelaus.  I  say,  the 
patience  only,  for  it  would  ask  more  than  the  simpli- 
city of  Polypheme,  with  his  one  eye  extinguished,  to 
be  deceived  by  so  poor  a  repetition  of  Nobody.  Yet  I 
can  with  strictest  truth  assure  my  Readers  that  with 
a  pleasure  combined  with  a  sense  of  weariness  I  see 
the  nigh  approach  of  that  point  of  my  labors,  in  which 
I  can  convey  my  opinions  and  the  workings  of  my 
heart  without  reminding  the  Reader  obtrusively  of 
myself.  But  the  frequency,  with  which  I  have  spoken 
in  my  own  person,  recalls  my  apprehensions  to  the 
second  danger,  which  it  was  my  hope  to  guard 
against;  the  probable  charge  of  Arrogance,  or  pre- 
sumption, both  for  daring  to  dissent  from  the  opinions 
of  great  authorities,  and,  in  my  following  numbers 
perhaps,  from  the  general  opinion  concerning  the  true 
value  of  certain  authorities  deemed  great.  The  word, 
Presumption,  I  appropriate  to  the  internal  feeling,  and 
Arrogance  to  the  way  and  manner  of  outwardly  ex- 
pressing ourselves. 

As  no  man  can  rightfully  be  condemned  without 
reference  to  some  definite  law,  by  the  knowledge  of 
which  he  might  have  avoided  the  given  fault,  it  is 
necessary  so  to  define  the  constituent  qualities  and 
conditions  of  arrogance,  that  a  reason  may  be  assign- 
able why  we  pronounce  one  man  guilty  and  acquit 
another.  For  merely  to  call  a  person  arrogant  or  most 
arrogant  can  convict  no  one  of  the  vice  except  per- 
haps the  accuser.  I  was  once  present,  when  a  young 
man  who  had  left  his  books  and  a  glass  of  water  to 
join  a  convivial  party,  each  of  whom  had  nearly  fin- 
ished his  second  bottle,  was  pronounced  very  drunk 
by  the  whole  party — "  he  looked  so  strange  and  pale !" 
Many  a  man  who  has  contrived  to  hide  his  ruling 
passion  or  predominant  defect  from  himself,  will  be- 
tray the  same  to  dispassionate  observers,  by  his  prone- 
ness  on  all  occasions  to  suspect  or  accuse  others  of  it. 
Now  arrogance  and  Presumption,  like  all  other  moral 
qualities,  must  be  shown  by  some  act  or  conduct: 
and  this  too  must  be  an  act  that  implies,  if  not  an  im- 
mediate concurrence  of  the  Will,  vet  some  faulty  con- 
stitution of  the  Moral  Habits.  For  all  criminality  sup- 
poses its  essentials  to  have  been  within  the  power  of 
the  Agent  Either  therefore  the  facts  adduced  do  of 
themselves  convey  the  whole  proof"  of  the  charge, 
and  the  question  rests  on  the  truth  or  accuracy  with 
which  they  have  been  stated ;  or  they  acquire  their 
character  from  the  circumstances.  I  have  looked 
into  a  ponderous  Review  of  the  Corpuscular  Philoso- 
phy by  a  Sicilian  Jesuit,  in  which  the  acrimonious 
Father  frequently  expresses  his  doubt  whether  he 
should  pronounce  Boyle  or  Newton  more  impious 
than  presumptuous,  or  more  presumptuous  than  impi- 
ous. They  had  !>oth  attacked  the  reigning  opinions 
on  most  important  subjects,  opinions  sanctioned  by 
the  greatest  names  of  antiquity,  and  by  the  general 
Hh2 


suffrage  of  their  learned  Contemporaries  or  immedi- 
ate Predecessors.  Locke  was  assailed  with  a  full 
cry  fir  his  presumption  in  having  deserted  the  philo- 
sophical system  at  that  time  generally  received  by 
the  Universities  of  Furope;  and  of  late  years  Dr. 
Priestley  bestowed  the  epithets  of  arrogant  and  inso- 
h  ni  on  Reid,  Beattie,  &c  ,  for  presuming  to  arraign 
certain  opinions  of  Mr.  Locke,  himself  repaid  in  kind 
by  many  of  his  own  countrymen  for  his  theological 
novelties.  It  will  scarcely  be  affirmed,  that  these 
accusations  were  all  of  them  just,  or  that  any  of  them 
were  lit  or  courteous.  Must  we  therefore  say,  that 
in  oider  to  avow  doubt  or  disbelief  of  a  popular  per- 
suasion without  arrogance,  it  is  required  that  the  dis- 
sentient should  know  himself  to  possess  the  genius, 
and  foreknow  that  he  should  acquire  the  reputation, 
of  Locke,  Newton,  Boyle,  or  even  of  a  Reid  or  Beat- 
tie?  But  as  this  knowledge  and  prescience  are  im- 
possible in  the  strict  sense  of  the  words,  and  could 
mean  no  more  than  a  strong  inward  conviction,  it  is 
manifest  that  such  a  rule,  if  it  were  universally  es- 
tablished, would  encourage  the  presumptuous,  and 
condemn  modest  and  humble  minds  alone  to  silence. 
And  as  this  silence  could  not  acquit  the  individual's 
own  mind  of  presumption,  unless  it  were  accompa- 
nied by  conscious  acquiescence  ;  Modesty  itself  must 
become  an  inert  quality,  which  even  in  private  soci- 
ety never  displays  its  charms  more  unequivocallv 
than  in  its  mode  of  reconciling  moral  deference  with 
intellectual  courage,  and  general  diffidence  with  sin- 
cerity in  the  avowal  of  the  particular  conviction. 

We  must  seek  then  elsewhere  for  the  true  marks 
by  which  Presumption  or  Arrogance  may  be  detect- 
ed, and  on  which  the  charge  may  be  grounded  with 
little  hazard  of  mistake  or  injustice.  And  as  I  confine 
my  present  observations  to  literature,  I  deem  such 
criteria  neither  difficult  to  determine  or  to  apply 
The  first  mark,  as  it  appears  to  me,  is  a  frequent  bare 
assertion  of  opinions  not  generally  received,  without 
condescending  to  prefix  or  annex  the  facts  and  rea- 
sons on  which  such  opinions  were  formed  ;  especially 
if  this  absence  of  logical  courtesy  is  supplied  by  con- 
temptuous or  abusive  treatment  of  such  as  happen  to 
doubt  ofj  or  oppose,  the  decisive  ipse  dixi.  But  to 
assert,  however  nakedly,  that  a  passage  in  a  lewd  no- 
vel, in  which  the  Sacred  Waitings  are  denounced  as 
more  likely  to  pollute  the  young  and  innocent  mind 
than  a  romance  notorious  for  its  indecency — to  assert, 
I  say,  that  such  a  passage  argues  equal  impudence 
and  ignorance  in  its  author,  at  the  time  of  writing  and 
publishing  it — this  is  not  arrogance ;  although  to  a 
vast  majority  of  the  decent  part  of  our  countrymen  it 
would  be  superfluous  as  a  truism,  if  it  were  exclu- 
sively an  author's  business  to  convey  or  revive  know- 
ledge, and  not  sometimes  his  duty  lo  awaken  the  in- 
dignation of  his  Reader  by  the  expression  of  his  own 

A  second  species  of  this  unamiable  quality,  whicl 
has  often  been  distinguished  by  the  name  of  War- 
burtonian  arrogance,  betrays  itself,  not  as  in  the  for 
mer,  by  proud  or  petulant  omission  of  proof  or  argu- 
ment, but  by  the  habit  of  ascribing  weakness  of 
intellect,' or  want  of  taste  and  sensibility,  or  hard- 
ness of  heart,  or  corruption  of  moral  principle,  to  all 
381 


372 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


who  deny  the  truth  of  the  doctrine,  or  the  sufficiency 
of  evidence,  or  the  fairness  of  the  reasoning  ad- 
duced in  its  support.  This  is  indeed  not  essentially 
different  from  the  first,  but  assumes  a  separate  char- 
acter from  its  accompaniments  :  for  though  both  the 
doctrine  and  its  proofs  may  have  been  legitimately 
supplied  by  the  understanding,  yet  the  bitterness  of 
personal  crimination  will  resolve  itself  into  naked 
assertion.  We  are,  therefore,  authorized  by  experi- 
ence, and  justified  on  the  principle  of  self-defence 
and  by  the  law  of  fair  retaliation,  in  attributing  it  to 
a  vicious  temper,  arrogant  from  irritability,  or  irri- 
table from  arrogance.  This  learned  arrogance  ad- 
mits of  many  gradations,  and  is  palliated  or  aggra- 
vated, accordingly  as  the  point  in  dispute  has  been 
more  or  less  controverted,  as  the  reasoning  bears  a 
greater  or  smaller  proportion  to  the  virulence  of  the 
personal  detraction,  and  as  the  persons  or  parties, 
who  are  the  objects  of  it,  are  more  or  less  respected, 
more  or  less  worthy  of  respect.* 

Lastly,  it  must  be  admitted  as  a  just  imputation  of 
presumption  when  an  individual  obtrudes  on  the 
public  eye,  with  all  the  high  pretensions  of  origin- 
ality, opinions  and  observations,  in  regard  to  which 
he  must  plead  wilful  ignorance  in  order  to  be  ac- 
quitted of  dishonest  plagiarism.  On  the  same  seat 
must  the  writer  be  placed,  who  in  a  disquisition  on 
any  important  subject  proves,  by  falsehoods  either 
of  omission  or  of  positive  error,  that  he  has  neglect- 
ed to  possess  himself,  not  only  of  the  information 
requisite  for  this  particular  subject,  but  even  of 
those  acquirements,  and  that  general  knowledge, 
which  could  alone  authorise  him  to  commence  a 
public  instructor  :  this  is  an  office  which  cannot  be 
procured  gratis.  The  industry,  necessary  for  the 
due  exercise  of  its  functions,  is  its  purchase-money; 
and  the  absence  or  insufficiency  of  the  same  is  so 
far  a  species  of  dishonesty,  and  implies  a  presump- 
tion in  the  literal  as  well  as  in  the  ordinary  sense  of 

*Had  the  author  of  the  Divine  Legation  of  Moses  more 
skilfully  appropriated  his  coarse  eloquence  of  abuse,  his  cus- 
tomary assurance  of  the  idiotcy,  both  in  head  and  heart,  of 
all  his  opponents;  if  he  had  employed  thosp  vigorous  argu- 
oients  of  his  own  vehement  humor  in  the  defence  of  Truths 
acknowledged  and  reverenced  by  learned  men  in  general  ; 
or  if  he  had  confined  them  to  the  names  of  Chubb,  VVool- 
slon,  and  other  precursors  of  Mr.  Thomas  Paine  ;  we  should 
perhaps  still  characterize  his  mode  of  controversy  by  its  rude 
violence,  but  not  so  often  have  heard  his  name  used,  even  by 
those  who  have  never  lead  his  writings,  as  a  proverbial  ex- 
pression of  learned  Arrogance.  But  when  a  novel  and  doubt- 
ful hypothesis  of  his  own  formation  was  the  citadel  to  be 
defended,  and  his  mephitic  hand-grenados  were  thrown 
with  the  fury  of  a  lawless  despotism  at  the  fair  reputation  of 
a  Sykes  and  a  Lardner,  we  not  only  confirm  the  verdict  of 
his  independent  contemporaries,  but  cease  to  wonder,  that 
arrogance  should  render  man  an  object  of  contempt  in  many, 
and  of  aversion  in  all  instances,  when  it  was  capable  of  hur- 
rying a  Christian  teacher  of  equal  talents  and  learning  into 
a  slanderous  vulgarity,  which  escapes  our  disgust  only  when 
we  see  the  writer's  own  reputation  the  sole  victim.  But 
throughout  his  great  work,  and  the  pamphlets  in  which  he 
supported  it,  he  always  seems  to  write  as  if  he  had  deemed 
it  a  duty  of  decorum  to  publish  his  fancies  on  the  Mosaic 
Law,  as  the  Law  itself  was  delivered,  that  is,  "  in  thunders 
and  lightnings;"  or  as  if  he  had  applied  to  his  own  book 
instead  of  the  sacred  mount,  the  menace — There  shall  not 
a  hand  touch  it  but  he  shall  surely  be  stoned  or  shot  through. 


the  word.  He  has  taken  a  thing  before  he  had  ac- 
quired any  right  or  title  thereto. 

If  in  addition  to  this  unfitness  which  every  man 
possesses  the  means  of  ascertaining,  his  aim  should 
be  to  unsettle  a  general  belief,  closely  connected 
with  public  and  private  quiet ;  and  if  his  language 
and  manner  be  avowedly  calculated  for  the  illiterate 
(and  perhaps  licentious)  part  of  his  countrymen; 
disgusting  as  his  presumption  must  appear,  it  is  yet 
lost  or  evanescent  in  the  close  neighborhood  of  his 
guilt.  That  Hobbes  translated  Homer  in  English 
verse  and  published  his  translation,  furnishes  no 
positive  evidence  of  his  self-conceit,  though  it  im- 
plies a  great  lack  of  self-knowledge  and  of  acquaint- 
ance with  the  nature  of  poetry.  A  strong  wish 
often  imposes  itself  on  the  mind  for  an  actual  pow- 
er;  the  mistake  is  favored  by  the  innocent  pleasure 
derived  from  the  exercise  of  versification,  perhaps 
by  the  approbation  of  intimates;  and  the  candidate 
asks  from  more  impartial  readers,  that  sentence, 
which  IVature  has  not  enabled  him  to  anticipate, 
But  when  the  philosopher  of  Mahnsbury  waged 
war  with  Wallis  and  the  fundamental  truths  of  pure 
geometry,  every  instance  of  his  gross  ignorance  and 
utter  misconception  of  the  very  elements  of  the 
science  he  proposed  to  confute,  furnished  an  unan- 
swerable fact  in  proof  of  his  high  presumption  ;  and 
the  confident  and  insulting  language  of  the  attack 
leaves  the  judicious  reader  in  as  little  doubt  of  his 
gross  arrogance.  An  illiterate  mechanic,  when  mis- 
taking some  disturbance  of  his  nerves  for  a  miracu- 
lous call  proceeds  alone  to  convert  a  tribe  of  savages, 
whose  language  he  can  have  no  natural  means  of 
acquiring,  may  have  been  misled  by  impulses  very 
different  from  those  of  high  selfopinion  ;  but  the 
illiterate  perpetrator  of  "  the  Age  of  Reason,"  must 
have  had  his  very  conscience  stupified  by  the  habitu- 
al intoxication  of  presumptuous  arrogance,  and  his 
common-sense  over-clouded  by  the  vapors  from  his 
heart. 

As  long  therefore  as  I  obtrude  no  unsupported  as- 
sertions on  my  Readers ;  and  as  long  as  I  state  my 
opinions  and  the  evidence  which  induced  or  compel- 
led me  to  adopt  them,  with  calmness  and  that  diffi- 
dence in  myself,  which  is  by  no  means  incompatible 
with  a  firm  belief  in  the  justness  of  the  opinions 
themselves;  while  I  attack  no  man's  private  life 
from  any  cause,  and  detract  from  no  man's  honors  in 
his  public  character,  from  the  truth  of  his  doctrines, 
or  the  merits  of  his  compositions,  without  detailing 
all  my  reasons  and  resting  the  result  solely  on  the  ar- 
guments adduced;  while  I  moreover  explain  fully 
the  motives  of  duty,  which  influenced  me  in  resolv- 
ing to  institute  such  investigation  ;  while  I  confine  all 
asperity  of  censure,  and  all  expressions  of  contempt, 
to  gross  violations  of  truth,  honor,  and  decency,  to 
the  base  corrupter  and  the  detected  slanderer;  \\!iile 
I  write  on  no  subject,  which  I  have  not  studied  with 
my  best  attention,  on  no  subject  which  my  education 
and  acquirements  have  incapacitated  me  from  pro- 
perly understanding;  and  above  all,  while  I  approve 
myself,  alike  in  praise  and  in  blame,  in  close  reason- 
ing and  in  impassioned  declamation,  a  steady  friend 
382 


THE  FRIEND. 


373 


to  the  two  best  and  surest  friends  of  all  men,  Truth 
and  Honesty;  I  will  not  fear  an  accusation  of  either 
Presumption  or  Arrogance  from  the  good  and  the 
wise:  I  shall  pity  it  from  the  weak,  and  despise  it 
from  the  wicked. 


ESSAY   V. 


In  eodem  pectore  nullum  est  honestorum  turpiumque  consor- 
tium :  et  cugitare  optima  simul  et  deterrnna  non  magis  est 
uniu8  animEB  quam  yusdem  huminis  bonum  esse  ac  malum. 
ttUINTILlAN. 

There  is  no  fellowship  of  honor  and  baseness  in  the  same 
breast;  and  to  combine  the  beet  and  the  worst  designs  is  no 
more  possible  in  one  mind,  than  it  is  lor  the  same  man  to  be 
at  the  same  instant  virtuous  and  vicious. 

Cognitio  veritalis  omnia  falsa,  si  modo  proferantur.  etiam 
quae  prius  inaudita  erant,  et  dijudicare  et  subvertere  idonea 
est.  AUGUSTINUS. 

A  knowledge  of  the  truth  is  equal  to  the  task  both  of  dis- 
cerning and  of  confuting  all  false  assertions  and  erroneous 
arguments,  though  never  before  met  with,  if  only  they  may 
freely  be  brought  forward. 


I  have  said,  that  my  very  system  compels  me  to 
make  every  fair  appeal  to  the  feelings,  the  imagina- 
tion, and  even  the  fancy.  If  these  are  to  be  with- 
held from  the  service  of  truth,  virtue,  and  happiness, 
to  what  purpose  were  they  given  ?  in  whose  service 
are  they  retained  <  I  have  indeed  considered  the  dis- 
proportion of  human  passions  to  their  ordinary  ob- 
jects among  the  strongest  internal  evidences  of  our 
future  destination,  and  the  attempt  to  restore  them  to 
their  rightful  claimants,  the  most  imperious  duty  and 
the  noblest  task  of  genius.  The  verbal  enunciation 
of  this  master-truth  could  scarcely  be  new  to  me  at 
any  period  of  my  life  since  earliest  youth  ;  but  I  well 
remember  the  particular  time,  when  the  words  first 
became  more  than  words  to  me,  when  they  incorpo- 
rated with  a  living  conviction,  and  took  their  place 
among  the  realities  of  my  being.  On  some  wide 
common  or  open  heath,  peopled  with  Ant-hills, 
during  some  one  of  the  grey-cloudy  days  of  the  late 
Autumn,  many  of  my  Readers  may  have  noticed  the 
effect  of  a  sudden  and  momentary  flash  of  sunshine 
on  all  the  countless  little  animals  within  his  view, 
aware  too  that  the  self-same  influence  was  darted  co- 
instantaneously  over  all  their  swarming  cities  as  far 
as  his  eye  could  reach ;  may  have  observed,  with 
what  a  kindly  force  the  gleam  stirs  and  quickens 
them  all !  and  will  have  experienced  no  unpleasur- 
able  shock  of  feeling  in  seeing  myriads  of  myriads 
of  living  and  sentient  beings  united  at  the  same  mo- 
ment in  one  gay  sensation,  one  joyous  activity  !  But 
awful  indeed  is  the  same  appearance  in  a  multitude 
of  rational  beings,  our  fellow-men,  in  whom  too  the 
effect  is  produced  not  so  much  by  the  external  occa- 
sion as  from  the  active  quality  of  their  own  thoughts. 
I  had  walked  from  Gottingen  in  the  year  1799,  to 
witness  the  arrival  of  the  Queen  of  Prussia,  on  her 
visit  to  the  Baron  Von  Hartzberg's  seat,  five  miles 


from  the  University.  The  spacious  outer  court  of  the 
palace  was  crowded  with  men  and  women,  a  sea  of 
heads,  wit!)  a  number  of  children  rising  out  of  it 
from  their  fathers'  shoulders.  After  a  buzz  of  two 
hours'  expectation,  the  avant-courier  rode  at  full  speed 
into  the  Court.  At  the  loud  cracks  of  his  long  whip 
and  the  trampling  of  his  horse's  hoofs,  the  universal 
shock  and  thrill  of  emotion — I  have  not  language  to 
convey  it — expressed  as  it  was  in  such  manifold 
looks,  gestures,  and  attitudes,  yet  with  one  and  the 
same  feeling  in  the  eyes  of  all !  Recovering  from 
the  first  inevitable  contagion  of  sympathy,  I  involun- 
tarily exclaimed,  though  in  a  language  to  myself 
alone  intelligible,  "O  man!  ever  nobler  than  thy 
circumstances!  Spread  but  the  mist  of  obscure  feel- 
ing over  any  form,  and  even  a  woman  incapable  of 
blessing  or  of  injury  to  thee  shall  be  welcomed  with 
an  intensity  of  emotion  adequate  to  the  reception  of 
the  Redeemer  of  the  world  !" 

To  a  creature  so  highly,  so  fearfully  gifted,  who, 
alienated  as  he  is  by  a  sorcery  scarcely  less  mysteri- 
ous than  the  nature  on  which  it  is  exercised,  yet  like 
the  fabled  son  of  Jove  in  the  evil  day  of  his  sensual 
bewitchment,  lifts  the  spindles  and  distaffs  of  Om- 
phale  with  the  arm  of  a  giant,  Truth  is  self  restora- 
tion: for  that  which  is  the  correlative  of  Truth,  the 
existence  of  absolute  Life,  is  the  only  object  which 
can  attract  towards  it  the  whole  depth  and  mass  of 
his  fluctuating  Being,  and  alone  therefore  can  unite 
Calmness  with  Elevation.  But  it  must  be  Truth 
without  alloy  and  unsophisticated.  It  is  bv  the  agency 
of  indistinct  conceptions,  as  the  counterfeits  of  the 
Ideal  and  Transcendent,  that  evil  and  vanity  exercise 
their  tyranny  on  the  feelings  of  man.  The  Powers 
of  Darkness  are  politic  if  not  wise  ;  but  surely  nothing 
can  be  more  irrational  in  the  pretended  children 
of  Light,  than  to  enlist  themselves  under  the  banners 
of  Truth,  and  yet  rest  their  hopes  on  an  alliance  with 
Delusion. 

Among  the  numerous  artifices,  by  which  austere 
truths  are  to  be  softened  down  into  palatable  false- 
hoods, and  Virtue  and  Vice,  like  the  atoms  of  Epicu- 
rus, to  receive  that  insensible  clinamen  which  is  to 
make  them  meet  each  other  half  way,  I  have  an 
especial  dislike  to  the  expression,  Pious  Frauds. 
Piety  indeed  shrinks  from  the  very  phrase,  as  an  at- 
tempt to  mix  poison  with  the  cup  of  Blessing:  while 
the  expediency  of  the  measures  which  this  phrase 
was  framed  to  recommend  or  palliate,  appears  more 
and  more  suspicious,  as  the  range  of  our  experience 
widens,  and  our  acquaintance  with  the  records  of 
History  becomes  more  extensive  and  accurate.  One 
of  the  most  seductive  arguments  of  Infidelity  grounds 
itself  on  the  numerous  passages  in  the  works  of  the 
Christian  Fathers,  asserting  the  lawfulness  of  Deceit 
for  a  good  purpose.  That  the  Fathers  held,  almost 
without  exception,  "That  wholly  without  breach  of 
duty  it  is  allowed  to  the  Teachers  and  heads  of  the 
Christian  Church  to  employ  artifices,  to  intermix 
falsehoods  with  truths,  and  especially  to  deceive  the 
enemies  of  the  faith,  provided  only  they  hereby  serve 
the  interests  of  Truth  and  the  advantage  of  man- 


383 


374 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


kind,"*  is  the  unwilling  confession  of  Ribof  :  (Pro- 
gram, de  Oeconomia  Patrum  )  St.  Jerom,  as  is  shown 
by  the  citations  of  this  learned  Theologian,  boldly 
attributes  this  management  (fafcitatem  dispensativam) 
even  to  the  Apostles  themselves.  But  why  speak  I 
of  the  ad  vantage  given  to  the  opponents  of  Christian- 
ity? Alas!  to  this  doctrine  chielly.  and  to  the  prac- 
tices derived  from  it,  we  must  attribute  the  utter 
corruption  of  the  Religion  itself  for  bo  many  naes  and 
even  now  over  so  large  a  portion  of  ilie  nvtlized 
world.  By  a  system  of  accommoda!  nur  Truth  to 
Falsehood,  the  Pastors  of  the  Ch  rch  gradually 
changed  the  life  and  light  of  the  Gospel  into  the  very 
superstitions  which  they  were  commissioned  to  dis- 
perse, and  thus  paganized  Christianity  in  order  to 
christen  Paganism.  At  this  very  hour  Europe  groans 
and  bleeds  in  consequence. 

So  niuch  in  proof  and  exemplification  of  the  pro- 
bable expediency  of  pious  deception,  as  suggested  by 
its  known  and  recorded  consequences.  An  honest 
man,  however,  possesses  a  clearer  light  than  that  of 
History.  He  knows,  that  by  sacrificing  the  law  of 
his  reason  to  the  maxim  of  pretended  prudence,  he 
purchases  the  sword  with  the  loss  of  the  arm  that  is 
to  wield  it.  The  duties  which  we  owe  to  our  own 
moral  being,  are  the  ground  and  condition  of  all 
other  duties;  and  to  set  our  nature  at  strife  with  it- 
self for  a  good  purpose,  implies  the  same  sort  of  pru- 
dence, as  a  priest  of  Diana  would  have  manifested, 
who  should  have  proposed  to  dig  up  the  celebrated 
charcoal  foundations  of  the  mighty  Temple  of  Ephe- 
sus,  in  order  to  furnish  fuel  for  the  burnt-offerings  on 
its  altars.  Truth,  Virtue  and  Happiness,  may  be 
distinguished  from  each  other,  but  cannot  be  divided. 
They  subsist  by  a  mutual  co-inherance,  which  gives 
a  shadow  of  divinity  even  to  our  human  nature.. 
■'  Will  ye  speak  deceitfully  for  God  ?"  is  a  searching 
question,  which  most  affectingly  represents  the  grief 
and  impatience  of  an  uncorrupted  mind  at  perceiving 
a  good  cause  defended  by  ill  means:  and  assuredly 
if  any  temptation  can  provoke  a  well-regulated  tem- 
per to  intolerance,  it  is  the  shameless  assertion,  that 
Truth  and  Falsehood  are  indifferent  in  their  own 
natures;  that  the  former  is  as  often  injurious  (and 
therefore  criminal)  and  the  latter  on  many  occasions 
as  beneficial  (and  consequently  meritorious)  as  the 
former. 

I  feel  it  incumbent  on  me,  therefore,  to  place  im- 
mediately before  my  Readers  in  the  fullest  and  clear- 

*  Integrum  omnino  Doctoribus  et  ccetus  Christiani  Jlntis- 
tilibus  esse,  ut  dolus  versent,  falsa  veris  intermiscant  et 
imprimis  religionis  hostes  fallant,  dummodo  vcritatis  com- 
■modis  ct  utilitati  inservant. —  1  trust,  I  need  not  add,  that  the 
imputation  of  such  principles  of  action  to  the  first  inspired 
Propngators  of  Christianity,  is  founded  on  the  gross  miscon- 
struction of  those  passages  in  the  writings  of  St.  Paul,  in 
which  the  necessity  of  employing  different  arguments  to  men 
of  different  capacities  and  prejudices,  is  supposed  and  ac- 
ceded to.  In  other  words,  St.  Paul  strove  to  speak  intelligi- 
bly, willingly  sacrificed  indifferent  things  to  matters  of  im- 
portance, and  acted  courteously  as  a  man,  in  order  to  win 
attention  as  an  Apostle.  A  traveller  prefers  for  daily  use  the 
coin  of  the  nation  through  which  he  is  passing,  to  bullion  or 
the  mintage  of  his  own  country:  and  is  this  to  justify  a  suc- 
ceeding traveller  in  the  use  of  counterfeit  coin  ! 


est  light,  the  whole  question  of  moral  obligation  re- 
specting the  communication  of  Truth,  its  extent  and 
conditions.  I  would  fain  obviate  all  apprehensions 
either  of  my  incaution  on  the  one  hand,  or  of  any  in- 
sincere reserve  on  the  other,  by  proving  that  the 
more  strictly  we  adhere  to  the  Letter  of  the  moral 
law  in  this  respect,  the  more  completely  shall  we 
reconcile  the  law  with  prudence ;  thus  securing  a 
purity  in  the  principle  without  mischief  from  the 
practice.  I  would  not,  I  could  not  dare,  address  my 
countrymen  as  a  Friend,  if  I  might  not  justify  the 
assumption  of  that  sacred  title  by  more  than  mere 
veracity,  by  openheartedness.  Pleasure,  most  often 
delusive,  may  be  born  of  delusion.  Pleasure,  her- 
self a  sorceress,  may  pitch  her  tents  on  enchanted 
ground.  But  Happiness  (or,  to  use  a  far  more  accu- 
rate as  well  as  more  comprehensive  term,  solid 
Well-Being)  can  be  built  on  Virtue  alone,  and  must 
of  necessity  have  Truth  for  its  foundation.  Add  to 
the  known  fact  that  the  meanest  of  men  feels  him- 
self insulted  by  an  unsuccessful  attempt  to  deceive 
him ;  and  hates  and  despises  the  man  who  had  at- 
tempted it.  What  place  then  is  left  in  the  heart  for 
Virtue  to  build  on,  if  in  any  case  we  may  dare  prac- 
tise on  others  what  we  should  feel  as  a  cruel  and 
contemptuous  wrong  in  our  own  persons?  Every 
parent  possesses  the  opportunity  of  observing,  how 
deeply  children  resent  the  injury  of  a  delusion ;  and 
if  men  laugh  at  the  falsehoods  that  were  imposed  on 
themselves  during  their  childhood,  it  is  because  they 
are  not  good  and  wise  enough  to  contemplate  the 
past  in  the  present,  and  so  to  produce  by  a  virtuous 
and  thoughtful  sensibility  that  continuity  in  their 
self-consciousness,  which  Nature  has  made  the  law 
of  their  animal  life.  Ingratitude,  sensuality,  and 
hardness  of  heart,  all  flow  from  this  source.  Men 
are  ungrateful  to  others  only  when  they  have  ceased 
to  look  back  on  their  former  selves  with  joy  and  ten- 
derness. They  exist  in  fragments.  Annihilated  as 
to  the  Past,  they  are  dead  to  the  Future,  or  seek  for 
the  proofs  of  it  everywhere,  only  not  (where  alone 
they  can  be  found)  in  themselves.  A  contemporary 
Poet  has  expressed  and  illustrated  this  sentiment 
with  equal  fineness  of  thought  and  tenderness  of 
feeling : 

My  heart  leaps  up  when  I  behold 

A  rain-bow  in  the  sky  ? 
So  was  it,  when  my  life  began ; 
So  is  it  now  I  am  a  man ; 
So  let  it  be,  when  I  grow  old, 

Or  let  me  die. 
The.  Child  is  Father  of  the  Man. 
And  I  would  wish  my  days  to  be 
Bound  each  to  each  by  vatvral  piety.\ 

WORDSWORTH. 


t  I  am  informed,  that  these  very  lines  have  been  cited',  as  a 
specimen  of  despicable  puerility.  So  much  the  worse  for  the 
citer.  Not  willingly  in  his  presence  would  1  behold  the  sun 
setting  behind  our  mountains,  or  listen  to  a  tale  of  distress  or 
virtue ;  I  should  be  ashamed  of  the  quiet  tear  on  my  own 
cheek.  But  let  the  dead  bury  the  dead  !  The  Poet  sang  for 
the  Living.  Of  what  value  indeed,  to  a  eane  mind,  are  the 
likings  or  dislikings  of  one  man,  grounded  on  the  mere  asser- 
tions of  another  1    Opinions  formed  from  opinions— what  are 

384 


THE  FRIEND. 


375 


Alas!  the  pernicious  influence  of  this  lax  morality  ex- 
tends from  the  nursery  and  the  school  to  the  cabinet  and 
senate.  It  is  a  common  weakness  with  men  in  power, 
who  have  used  dissimulation  successfully,  to  form  a 
passion  for  the  use  of  it,  dupes  to  the  love  of  duping ! 
A  pride  is  llattered  by  these  lies.  He  who  fancies 
that  he  must  be  perpetually  stooping  down  to  the  pre- 
judices of  his  lellow-creatnres,  is  perpetually  remind- 
ing and  re-assuring  himself  of  his  own  vast  superior- 
ity to  them.  But  no  real  greatness  can  long  co-exist 
with  deceit.  The  whole  faculties  of  man  must  be 
exerted  in  order  to  noble  energies ;  and  he  who  is  not 
earnestly  sincere  lives  in  but  half  his  being,  self-mu- 
tilated, self-paralyzed. 

The  latter  part  of  the  proposition,  which  has  drawn 
me  into  this  discussion,  that  I  mean  in  which  the  mo- 
rality of  intentional  falsehood  is  asserted,  may  safely 
be  trusted  to  the  Reader's  own  moral  sense.  Is  it  a 
groundless  apprehension,  that  the  patrons  and  admi- 
rers of  such  publications  mav  receive  the  punishment 
sf  their  indiscretion  in  the  conduct  of  their  sons  and 
daughters  ?  The  suspicion  of  methodism  must  be  ex- 
pected by  every  man  of  rank  and  fortune,  who  car- 
ries his  examination  respecting  the  books  which  are 
to  lie  on  his  breakfast-table,  farther  than  to  their  free- 
dom from  gross  verbal  indecencies,  and  broad  avow- 
als of  atheism  in  the  title-page.  For  the  existence  of 
an  intelligent  first  cause  may  be  ridiculed  in  the  notes 
of  one  poem,  or  placed  doubtfully  as  one  of  two  or 
three  possible  hypotheses,  in  the  very  opening  of  an- 
other poem,  and  both  be  considered  as  works  of  sale 
promiscuous  reading  "  virginibus  puerisque:"  and 
this  too  by  many  a  father  of  a  family,  who  would  hold 
himself  culpable  in  permitting  his  child  to  form  hab- 
its of  familiar  acquaintance  with  a  person  of  loose 
habits,  and  think  it  even  criminal  to  receive  into  his 
house  a  private  tutor  without  a  previous  inquiry  con- 
cerning his  opinions  and  principles,  as  well  as  his 
manners  and  outward  conduct.  How  little  I  am  an 
enemy  to  free  inquiry  of  the  boldest  kind,  and  where 
the  authors  have  differed  the  most  widely  from  my 
own  convictions  and  the  general  faith  of  mankind, 
provided  only,  the  enquiry  be  conducted  with  that 
seriousness,  which  naturally  accompanies  the  love  of 
truth,  and  that  it  is  evidently  intended  for  the  perusal 
of  those  only,  who  may  be  presumed  to  be  capable 
of  weighing  the  arguments,  I  shall  have  abundant 
occasion  of  proving  in  the  course  of  this  work.  Quin 
ipsa  philosophia  talibus  e  disputationibus  non  nisi  ben- 
eficium  recipil.  Nam  si  vera  proponit  homo  ingenio- 
sus  veritatisque  amans,  nova  ad  earn  accessio  fiet :  sin 
falsa,  refutatione  eorum  priores  lanlo  magis  stabilien- 
tur.*    Galil.«i  Syst.  Cosm.  p.  42. 

they,  but  clouds  sailing  under  clouds  which  impress  shadows 
upop  shadows'! 

Fungum  pelle  procul,  jubeo  !  nam  quid  roihi  fungo  1 
Coaveniunt  stomacho  non  minus  ista  §uo. 

1  was  always  pleased  with  the  motto  placed  under  the  figure 
of  the  Rosemary  in  old  Herbals: 

Sub,  apage!  Haud  tibo  spiro. 
*  (Translation.) — Moreover,  Philosophy  itself  cannot  but 


The  assertion,  that  truth  is  often  no  less  dangerous 
than  falsehood,  sounds  less  offensively  at  the  first 
hearing,  only  because  it  hides  its  deformity  in  an 
equivocation,  or  double  meaning  of  the  word  truth. 
What  may  be  rightly  affirmed  of  truth,  used  as  sy- 
nonymous with  verbal  accuracy,  is  transferred  to  it 
in  its  higher  sense  of  veracity.  By  verbal  truth  we 
mean  no  more  than  the  correspondence  of  a  given 
fact  to  given  words.  In  moral  truth,  we  involve  like- 
wise  the  intention  of  the  speaker,  that  his  words 
should  correspond  to  his  thoughts  in  the  sense  in 
which  he  expects  them  to  be  understood  by  others: 
and  in  this  latter  import  we  are  always  supposed  to 
use  the  word,  whenever  we  speak  of  truth  absolutely, 
or  as  a  possible  subject  of  a  moral  merit  or  demerit. 
It  is  verbally  true,  that  in  the  sacred  Scriptures  it  is 
written  :  "  As  is  the  good,  so  is  the  sinner,  and  he 
that  sweareth  as  he  that  feareth  an  oath.  A  man 
hath  no  better  thing  under  the  sun,  than  to  eat,  and 
to  drink,  and  to  be  merry.  For  there  is  one  event 
unto  all :  the  living  know  that  they  shall  die,  but  the 
dead  know  not  any  thing,  neither  have  they  any  more 
a  reward."  But  he  who  should  repeat  these  words, 
with  this  assurance,  to  an  ignorant  man  in  the  hour 
of  his  temptation,  lingering  at  the  door  of  the  ale- 
house, or  hesitating  as  to  the  testimony  required  of 
him  in  the  court  of  justice,  would,  spite  of  this  verbal 
truth,  be  a  liar,  and  the  murderer  of  his  brother's  con- 
science. Veracity,  therefore,  not  mere  accuracy;  to 
convey  truth,  not  merely  to  say  it ;  is  the  point  of 
duly  in  dispute:  and  the  only  difficulty  in  the  mind 
of  an  honest  man  arises  from  the  doubt,  whether  more 
than  veracity  (i.  e.  the  truth  and  nothing  but  the  truth) 
is  not  demanded  of  him  by  the  law  of  conscience ; 
whether  it  does  not  exact  simplicity ;  that  is,  the  truth 
only,  and  the  whole  truth.  If  we  can  solve  this  dif- 
ficulty, if  we  can  determine  the  conditions  under 
which  the  law  of  universal  reason  commands  the 
communication  of  the  truth  independently  of  conse- 
quences altogether,  we  shall  then  be  enabled  to  judge 
whether  there  is  any  such  probability  of  evil  conse- 
quences from  such  communication,  as  can  justify  the 
assertion  of  its  occasional  criminality,  as  can  perplex 
us  in  the  conception,  or  disturb  us  in  the  performance, 
of  our  duty. 

The  conscience,  or  effective  reason,  commands  the 
design  of  conveying  an  adequate  notion  of  the  thing 
spoken  of,  when  this  is  practicable:  but  at  all  events 
a  right  notion,  or  none  at  all.  A  school-master  is 
under  the  necessity  of  teaching  a  certain  rule  in 
simple  arithmetic  empirically,  (do  so  and  so,  and  the 
sum  will  always  prove  true)  the  necessary  truth  of 
the  rule  (i.  e.  that  the  rule  having  been  adhered  to, 
the  sum  must  always  prove  true)  requiring  a  know- 
ledge of  the  higher  mathematics  for  its  demonstra- 
tion. He,  however,  conveys  a  right  notion,  though 
he  cannot  convey  the  adequate  one. 

derive  benefit  from  such  discussions.  For  if  a  man  of  genius 
and  a  lover  of  Trulh  brings  just  positions  before  the  Public, 
there  is  a  fresh  accession  to  the  stock  of  Philosophic  fnsight; 
but  if  erroneous  positions,  the  former  Truihs  will  by  the  con- 
futation be  established  so  much  the  more  firmly. 
385 


376 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


ESSAY  VI. 


Ilo\vfia3lri  Kiipra  pev  0><pt\ht,  Kapra  yl  p\d~ru  riv 
evovra  yu><pt\ia  piv  riv  Se^ibv  "avtipa,  PXa-rrrct  of 
Ton  pijiilotf  (pwvcvvra  irav  cno?  Ktzi  Iv  iravri  tir/py. 
XpT  tit  Katfjov  pirpa  iioivaf  ootpir)?  yap  ovtos; 
'' ..jof,  "01  tie  c((j>  xaipou  pifaiv  povaiK^v  Trtirvvpivu? 
atiauxTtv,  o'v  irapatii  ^ovrai  ev  apyitj  yvw  p-qv,  airtiv  o 
(melius  ahinv)  i^ovai  ptapia^. 

Heraclitus  apud  Stobaum,  (Serm.  xxxiv. 
Ed.  Lgd.  p.  216.) 

(Translation.)—  General  Knowledge  ami  ready  Talent 
may  be  of  very  great  benefit,  but  they  may  likewise  be  of 
very  greal  disservice  to  the  possessor.  They  are  highly  ad- 
vantage 'us  tu  the  man  of  sound  judgment,  and  dexterous  in 
applying  them  ;  but  they  injure  your  fl.ieni  holder  forth  on  all 
subjects  in  all  companies.  It  is  necessary  to  know  the  mea- 
sures of  the  time  and  occasion  :  for  this  is  the  very  boundary 
of  wisdom— (that  by  which  it  is  defined,  and  distinguished 
from  mere  ability.)  Bui  he,  who  without  regard  to  the  unfit- 
ness of  the  time  and  the  audience  "  will  soar  in  the  high  rea- 
son of  his  fancies  with  his  garland  and  singing  rob.  s  about 
him,"  will  not  acquire  the  credit  of  seriousness  amidst  frivo- 
lity, but  will  be  condemned  for  his  silliness,  as  the  greatest 
idler  of  the  company  because  the  most  unseasonable. 


The  Moral  Law,  it  has  been  shown,  permits  an 
inadequate  communication  of  unsophisticated  truth, 
on  the  condition  that  it  alone  is  practicable,  and  binds 
us  to  silence  when  neither  is  in  our  power.  We 
must  first  inquire  then,  What  is  necessary  to  consti- 
tute, and  what  may  allowably  accompany,  a  right 
though  inadequate  notion?  And  secondly,  what  are 
the  circumstances,  from  which  we  may  deduce  the 
impracticability  of  conveying  even  a  right  notion; 
the  presence  or  absence  of  which  circumstances  it 
therefore  becomes  our  duty  to  ascertain  ?  In  answer 
to  the  first  question,  the  conscience  demands :  1. 
That  it  should  be  the  wish  and  design  of  the  mind 
to  convey  the  truth  only;  that  if  in  addition  to  the 
negative  loss  implied  in  its  inadequateness,  the  notion 
communicated  should  lead  to  any  positive  error,  the 
cause  should  lie  in  the  fault  or  defect  of  the  Recipi- 
ent, not  of  the  Communicator,  whose  paramount  duly, 
whose  inalienable  right  it  is  to  preserve  his  own  In- 
tegrity,* the  integral  character  of  his  own  moral 
Being.  Self-respect ;  the  reverence  which  he  owes 
to  the  presence  of  Humanity  in  the  person  of  his 
neighbor;  the  reverential  upholding  of  the  faith  of 
man  in  man  ;  gratitude  for  the  particular  act  of  con- 

*  The  best  and  most  forcible  sense  of  a  word  is  often  that, 
which  is  contained  in  its  Elymology.    The  Author  of  the 
Poems   ( The  Synagogue)   frequently   affixed    to     Herbert's 
"  Temple."  gives  the  original  purport  of  the  word  Integrity, 
in  the  following  lines  (fourth  stanza  of  the  eighth  Poem.) 
Next  to  Sincerity,  remember  still. 
Thou  must  resolve  upon  Integrity, 
God  will  have  all  thou  hast,  thy  mind,  thy  will, 
Thy  thoughts,  thy  words,  thy  works. 
And  again,  after  some  verses  on  Constnncy  and  Humility, 
the  Poem  concludes  with — 

Ho  that  desires  to  soo 
The  face  of  God,  in  his  religion  must 
Sincere,  entire,  constant  and  humble  be. 


fidence ;  and  religious  awe  for  the  divine  purposes 
in  the  gift  of  language  ;  are  duties  too  sacred  and 
important  to  be  sacrificed  to  the  guesses  of  an  indi- 
vidual concerning  the  advantages  to  be  gained  by 
the  breach  of  them.  2.  It  is  further  required,  that 
the  supposed  error  shall  not  be  such  as  will  pervert 
or  materially  vitiate  the  imperfect  truth,  in  commu- 
nicating which  we  had  unwillingly,  though  not  per- 
haps unwittingly,  occasioned  it.  A  Barbarian  so  in- 
structed in  the  power  and  intelligence  of  the  Infinite 
Being  as  to  be  left  wholly  ignorant  of  his  moral  at- 
tributes, would  have  acquired  none  but  erroneous 
notions  even  of  the  former.  At  the  very  best,  he 
would  gain  only  a  theory  to  satisfy  his  curiosity  with : 
but  more  probably,  would  deduce  the  belief  of  a 
Moloch  or  a  Baal.  (For  the  idea  of  an  irresistible 
invisible  Being  naturally  produces  terror  in  the  mind 
of  uninstructed  and  unprotected  man,  and  with  terror 
there  will  be  associated  whatever  had  been  accus- 
tomed to  excite  it,  as  anger,  vengeance,  &c. ;  as  is 
proved  by  the  Mythology  of  all  barbarous  nations.) 
This  must  be  the  case  with  all  organized  truths;  the 
component  parts  derive  their  significance  from  the 
idea  of  the  whole.  Bolinghroke  removed  Love,  Jus- 
tice, and  Choice,  from  Power  and  Intelligence,  and 
pretended  to  have  left  unimpaired  the  conviction  of 
a  Deity.  He  might  as  consistently  have  paralyzed 
the  optic  nerve,  and  then  excused  himself  by  affirm- 
ing, that  he  had,  however,  not  touched  the  eye. 

The  third  condition  of  a  right  though  inadequate 
notion  is,  that  the  error  occasioned  be  greatly  out- 
weighed by  the  importance  of  the  truth  communi- 
cated. The  rustic  would  have  little  reason  to  thank 
the  philosopher,  who  should  give  him  true  concep- 
tions of  the  folly  of  believing  in  ghosts,  omens, 
dreams,  &c.  at  the  price  of  abandoning  his  faith  in 
Providence  and  in  the  continued  existence  of  his 
fellow-creatures  after  their  death.  The  teeth  of  the 
old  serpent  planted  by  the  Cadmuses  of  French 
Literature,  under  Lewis  XV.  produced  a  plenteous 
crop  of  Philosophers  and  Truth-trumpeters  of  this 
kind,  in  the  reign  of  his  Successor.  They  taught 
many  truths,  historical,  political,  physiological,  and 
ecclesiastical,  and  diffused  their  notions  so  widely, 
that  the  very  ladies  and  hair-dressers  of  Paris  be- 
came fluent  Enci/clopadists:  and  the  sole  price 
which  their  scholars  paid  for  these  treasures  of  new 
information,  was  to  believe  Christianity  an  imposture, 
the  Scriptures  a  forgery,  the  worship  (if  not  the 
belief)  of  God  a  superstition,  hell  a  fable,  heaven  a 
dream,  our  life  without  Providence,  and  our  death 
without  hope.  They  became  as  gods  as  soon  as  the 
fruit  of  this  Upas  tree  of  knowledge  and  liberty  had 
opened  their  eyes  to  perceive  that  they  were  no 
more  than  beasts — somewhat  more  cunning  perhaps, 
and  abundantly  more  mischievous.  What  can  be 
conceived  more  natural  than  the  result, — that  self- 


Having  mentioned  Ihe  name  of  Herbert,  that  model  of  a 
man,  a  Gen'leman,  and  a  Clergyman,  iet  me  add,  that  the 
quaininess  of  some  of  his  thoughis  nol  of  bis  i  ieiion,  ihan 
which  nolhing  can  be  more  pure,  m  inly,  und  un  ifleded,  has 
blinded  modern  readers  lo  ihe  great  general  m.'rii  of  his  Po- 
ems, which  are  for  ihe  most  part  exquisi  e  in  ihcir  kind. 
386 


THE  FRIEND. 


377 


acknowledged  beasts  should  first  act,  and  next  suffer 
themselves  to  be  treated  as  beasts.  We  judge  by 
comparison.  To  exclude  the  great  is  to  magnify  the 
little.  The  disbelief  of  essential  wisdom  and  good- 
ness, necessarily  prepares  the  imagination  for  the 
supremacy  of  cunning  with  malignity.  Folly  and 
vice  have  their  appropriate  religions,  as  well  as  vir- 
tue and  true  knowledge;  and  in  some  way  or  other 
fools  will  dance  round  the  golden  calf,  and  wicked 
men  beat  their  timbrels  and  kettle-drums 

To  Moloch,  horrid  king,  besmeared  with  blood 
Of  human  sacrifice  and  parent's  tears. 

My  feelings  have  led  me  on,  and  in  my  illustration 
I  had  almost  lost  from  my  view  the  subject  to  be 
illustrated.  One  condition  yet  remains :  that  the 
error  foreseen  shall  not  be  of  a  kind  to  prevent  or 
impede  the  after  acquirement  of  that  knowledge 
which  will  remove  it.  Observe,  how  graciously 
Nature  instructs  her  human  children.  She  cannot 
give  us  the  knowledge  derived  from  sight  without 
occasioning  us  at  first  to  mistake  images  of  reflection 
for  substances.  But  the  very  consequences  of  the 
delusion  lead  inevitably  to  its  detection ;  and  out  of 
the  ashes  of  the  error  rises  a  new  flower  of  know- 
ledge. We  not  only  see,  but  are  enabled  to  discover 
by  what  means  we  see.  So  too  we  are  under  the 
necessity,  in  given  circumstances,  of  mistaking  a 
square  for  a  round  object :  but  ere  the  mistake  can 
have  any  practical  consequences,  it  is  not  only  re- 
moved, but  its  removal  gives  us  the  symbol  of  a 
new  fact,  that  of  distance.  In  a  similar  train  of 
thought,  though  more  fancifully,  I  might  have  eluci- 
dated the  preceding  condition,  and  have  referred  our 
hurrying  enlighteners  and  revolutionary  amputators 
to  the  gentleness  of  Nature,  in  the  oak  and  the 
beech,  the  dry  foliage  of  which  she  pushes  off  only 
by  the  propulsion  of  the  new  buds,  that  supply  its 
place.  My  friends !  a  clothing  even  of  withered 
leaves  is  better  than  bareness. 

Having  thus  determined  the  nature  and  conditions 
of  a  right  notion,  it  remains  to  determine  the  circum- 
stances which  tend  to  render  the  communication  of  it 
impracticable,  and  oblige  us  of  course,  to  abstain  from 
the  attempt — oblige  us  not  to  convey  falsehood  under 
the  pretext  of  saying  truth.  These  circumstances,  it 
is  plain,  must  consist  either  in  natural  or  moral  impe- 
diments. The  former,  including  the  obvious  grada- 
tions of  constitutional  insensibility  and  derangement, 
preclude  all  temptation  to  misconduct,  as  well  as  all 
probability  of  ill-consequences  from  accidental  over- 
sight, on  the  part  of  the  communicator.  Far  other- 
wise is  it  with  the  impediments  from  moral  causes. 
These  demand  all  the  attention  and  forecast  of  the 
genuine  lovers  of  truth  in  the  matter,  the  manner, 
and  the  time  of  their  communications,  public  and 
private:  and  these  are  the  ordinary  materials  of  the 
vain  and  the  factious,  determine  them  in  the  choice 
of  their  audiences  and  of  their  arguments,  and  to 
each  argument  give  powers  not  its  own.  They  are 
distinguishable  into  two  sources,  the  streams  from 
which,  however,  must  often  become  confluent,  viz. 
hindrances  from  ignorance  (I  here  use  the  word  in 


relation  to  the  habits  of  reasoning  as  well  as  to  the 
previous  knowledge  requisite  for  the  due  comprehen- 
sion of  the  subject)  and  hindrances  from  predominant 
passions.* 

From  both  these  the  law  of  conscience  commands 
us  to  abstain,  because  such  being  the  ignorance  and 
such  the  passions  of  the  supposed  auditors,  we  ought 
to  deduce  the  impracticability  of  conveying  not  only 
adequate  but  even  right  notions  of  our  own  convic- 
tions: much  less  does  it  permit  us  to  avail  ourselves  of 
the  causes  of  this  impracticability  in  order  to  procure 
nominal  proselytes,  each  of  whom  will  have  a  differ- 
ent, and  all  a  false,  conception  of  those  notions  that 
were  to  be  conveyed  for  their  truth's  sake  alone. 
Whatever  is  (or  but  for  some  defect  in  our  moral  cha- 
racter would  have  been)  foreseen  as  preventing  the 
conveyance  of  our  thoughts,  makes  the  attempt  an 
act  of  self-contradiction :  and  whether  the  faulty 
cause  exist  in  our  choice  of  unfit  words  or  our  choice 
of  unfit  auditors,  the  result  is  the  same  and  so  is  the 
guilt.  We  have  voluntarily  communicated  falsehood. 

Thus  (without  reference  to  consequences,  if  only 
one  short  digression  be  excepted)  from  the  sole  prin- 
ciple of  self-consistence  or  moral  integrity,  we  have 
evolved  the  clue  of  right  reason,  which  we  are 
bound  to  follow  in  the  communication  of  truth. 
Now  then  we  appeal  to  the  judgment  and  experi- 
ence of  the  reader,  whether  he  who  most  faithfully 
adheres  to  the  letter  of  the  law  of  conscience  will 
not  likewise  act  in  the  strictest  correspondence  to  the 
maxims  of  prudence  and  sound  policy.  I  am  at  least 
unable  to  recollect  a  single  instance,  either  in  history 
or  in  my  personal  experience,  of  a  preponderance  of 
injurious  consequences  from  the  publication  of  any 
truth,  under  the  observance  of  the  moral  conditions 
above  stated :  much  less  can  I  even  imagine  any 
case,  in  which  truth,  as  truth,  can  be  pernicious. 
But  if  the  asserter  of  the  indifferency  of  truth  and 
falsehood  in  their  own  natures,  attempt  to  justify  his 
position  by  confining  the  word  truth,  in  the  first  in- 
stance, to  the  correspondence  of  given  words  to  given 
facts,  without  reference  to  the  total  impression  left  by 
such  words ;  what  is  this  more  than  to  assert,  that 
articulated  sounds  are  things  of  moral  indifferency  ? 
and  that  we  may  relate  a  fact  accurately  and  never- 
theless deceive  grossly  and  wickedly?  Blifil  related 
accurately  Tom  Jones's  riotous  joy  during  his  bene- 
factor's illness,  only  omitting  that  this  joy  was  occa- 
sioned by  the  physician's  having  pronounced  him  out 
of  danger.  Blifil  was  not  the  less  a  liar  for  being  an 
accurate  matter-of-fact  liar.  Tcll-lrullis  in  the  service 
of  falsehood  we  find  every  where,  of  various  names 
and  various  occupations,  from  the  elderly-young 
women  that  discuss  the  love-affairs  of  their  friends 
and  acquaintance  at  the  village  tea-tables,  to  the  ano- 
nymous calumniators  of  literary  merit  in  reviews,  and 
the  more  daring  malignants,  who  dole  out  discon- 
tent, innovation  and  panic,  in  political  journals:  and 
a  most  pernicious  race  of  liars  they  are !  But  who 
ever  doubted  it  ?  Why  should  our  moral  feelings  be 
shocked,  and  the  holiest  words  with  all  their  vene- 


*  See  the  Author's  Second  Lay  Sermon. 
387 


378 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


rable  associations  be  profaned,  in  order  to  bring  forth 
a  Truism  ?  But  thus  it  is  for  the  most  part  with  the 
Venders  of  startling  paradoxes.  In  the  sense  in  which 
they  arc  to  gain  for  their  author  the  character  of  a 
bold  ami  original  thinker,  they  are  false  even  to  ab- 
surdity; and  the  sense  in  which  they  are  true  and 
harmless,  conveys  so  mere  a  Truism,  that  it  even  bor- 
ders on  Nonsense.     How  often  have  we  heard  "The 

Rights  of  Man — hurra! The  Sovereignty  of 

the  People — hurra!"  roared  out  hymen  who,  if 
called  upon  in  another  place  and  before  another  au- 
dience, to  explain  themselves,  would  give  to  the 
words  a  meaning,  in  which  the  most  monarchical  of 
their  political  opponents  would  admit  them  to  be 
true,  but  which  would  contain  nothing  new,  or 
strange,  or  stimulant,  nothing  to  flatter  the  pride  or 
kindle  the  passions  of  the  populace. 


ESSAY   VII. 


At  profanum  vulgus  lectorum  quomodo  arcendem  est?  Li- 
brisne  nostris  jubeamus,  ut  coram  indignis  obmutescant? 
Si  linguis,  ut  dicitur,  emortuis  utamur,  ehcu  !  ingenium 
quoque  nobis  emortuum  jacet:  sin  aliter,  Minerva)  secreta 
crassis  ludibrium  divulgamus,  et  Dianam  nostrum  impuris 
hujussa>culi  Act&onibusnudam  proferimus.  Respondeo : — 
ad  incommoditates  hujusmodi  evitandas,  nee  Grace  nee 
Latine  scribere  opus  est.  Sufficiet,  nos  sicca  luce  usos 
fuisse  et  stricliore  argumentandi  methodo.  Sufficiet,  inno- 
center,  uliliter  scripsisse  :  eventus  est  apud  lectorem.  Nuper 
emptum  est  a  nobis  Ciceronianum  istud  "  de  ofAcis,"  opus 
quod  semper  pa?ne  Christiano  dignum  putabamus.  Mirum  ! 
libellus  factum  fuerat.  famoBissimus.  Credisne  1  Vix :  at 
quomodo'?  Maligna  quodam,  nescio  quern,  plena  margine 
et  super  tergo,  annotatum  est  el  exemplis,  calumniis  potius, 
superfcetalum  !  Sic  et  qui  introrsum  uritur  inflammntioncs 
animi  vel  Catonianis  (ne  dicum,  sacrosanctis)  paginis  acci- 
pit.    Omni  aura  mons,  omnibus  scriptis  mens,  ignita  vesci- 

tur. RUDOLFHI  LANGIl    Epist:    ad    Jlmicum 

quemdam  Ilalicum  in  qua   Lingua  patriot  et  hodierna 
XLsum  defendit  ct  eruditis  commendat. 

Nee  me  fallit,  ut  in  eorporibus  hominum  sic  in  animis  multi- 
plici  passione  affeetis,  medicamenta  verborum  multis  ineffi- 
cacia  visum  iri.  Sed  nee  illud  quoque  me  preterit,  ut  invi- 
sibles animorum  morbus,  sic  invisibilia  esse  remedia. 
Falsis  opinionibus  circumventi  veris  sententiis  liberandi 
sunt,  ut  qui  audiendo  ceciderant  audiendo  consurgant. 

PETRARCHA: Prcfat.  in  lib.  de  re.med.  utriusquc 
fortunw. 

(Translation.)  But  how  are  we  to  guard  against  the  herd 
of  promiscuous  Readers?  Can  we  bid  our  books  be  silent  in 
the  presence  of  the  unworthy  1  If  we  employ  what  are  called 
the  dead  languages,  our  own  genius,  alas  I  becomes  flat  and 
dead  :  and  if  we  embody  our  thoughts  in  the  words  native  to 
them  or  in  which  they  were  conceived,  we  divulge  the  secrets 
of  Minerva  to  the  ridicule  of  blockheads,  and  expose  our 
Diana  to  the  Actaeons  of  a  sensual  age.  I  reply  :  that  in  order 
to  avoid  inconveniences  of  this  kind,  we  need  write  neither  in 
Greek  or  in  Latin.  It  will  be  enough,  if  we  abstain  from 
appealing  to  the  bad  passions  and  low  appetites,  and  confine 
ourselves  to  a  strictly  consequent  method,  of  reasoning. 

To  have  written  innocently,  and  for  wise  purposes,  is  all 
that  can  be  required  of  us  :  the  event  lies  with  the  Reader. 
I  purchased  lately  Cicero's  work,  de  oiriciis,  which  I  had 
always  considered  as  almost  worthy  of  a  Christian.  To  my 
surprise  it  had  become  a  most  flagrant  libel.  Nay  !  but  how  ? 
— Some  one,  I  know  not  who,  out  of  the  fruitfulnesa  of  bis 
own  malignity  had  tided  all  the  margins  and  other  blank 
spaces  with  annotations — a  true  supcrf station  of  examples, 
that  is,  of  false  and  slanderous  tales !    In  like  manner,  the 


slave  of  impure  desires  will  turn  the  pages  of  Cato,  not  to  say, 
Scripture  itself,  into  occasions  and  excitements  of  wanton 
imaginations.  There  w  no  wind  but  feeds  a  volcuno,  no  work 
but  feeds  and  fans  a  combustible  mind. 

I  am  well  aware,  that  words  will  appear  to  many  as  ineffi- 
cacious medicines  when  administered  to  minds  agitated  with 
manifold  passions,  as  when  they  are  muttered  by  way  of 
charm  over  bodily  ailments.  But  neither  does  it  escape  me. 
on  the  other  band,  that  as  the  diseases  of  the  mind  are  invisi- 
ble, invisible  must  the  remedies  likewise  be.  Those  who  have 
been  entrapped  by  false  opinions  are  to  be  liberated  by  con- 
vincing truths:  that  thus  having  imbibed  the  poison  through 
the  ear,  they  may  receive  the  antidote  by  the  same  channel. 


That  our  elder  writers,  to  Jeremy  Taylor  inclu- 
sive, quoted  to  excess,  it  would  be  the  very  blindness 
of  partiality  to  deny.  More  than  one  might  be  men- 
tioned, whose  works  might  be  characterized  in  the 
words  of  Milton,  as"a  paroxysm  of  citations,  pampered 
metaphors,  and  aphorisming  pedantry."  On  the  other 
hand,  it  seems  to  me  that  we  now  avoid  quotations 
with  an  anxiety  that  offends  in  the  contrary  extreme. 
Yet  it  is  the  beauty  and  independent  worth  of  the  ci- 
tations far  more  than  their  appropriateness  which 
have  made  Johnson's  Dictionary  popular  even  as  a 
reading  book — and  the  mottos  with  the  translations 
of  them  are  known  to  add  considerably  to  the  value 
of  the  Spectator.  With  this  conviction  I  have  taken 
more  than  common  pains  in  the  selection  of  the  mot- 
tos for  the  F'riend  :  and  of  two  mottos  equally  appro- 
priate prefer  always  that  from  the  book  which  is  least 
likely  to  have  come  into  my  Reader's  hands.  For  I 
often  please  myself  with  the  fancy,  now  that  I  may 
have  saved  from  oblivion  the  only  striking  passage  in 
a  whole  volume,  and  now  that  I  may  have  attracted 
notice  to  a  writer  undeservedly  forgotten.  If  this 
should  be  attributed  to  a  silly  ambition  in  the  display 
of  various  reading,  I  can  do  no  more  than  deny  any 
consciousness  of  having  been  so  actuated :  and  for 
the  rest,  I  must  console  myself  by  the  reflection,  that 
if  it  be  one  of  the  most  foolish,  it  is  at  the  same  time 
one  of  the  most  harmless,  of  human  vanities. 

The  passages  prefixed  lead  at  once  to  the  question, 
which  will  probably  have  more  than  once  occurred 
to  the  reflecting  readerof  the  preceding  Essay.  How 
will  these  rules  apply  to  the  most  important  mode  of 
communication  ?  to  that,  in  which,  one  man  may  ut- 
ter his  thoughts  to  myriads  of  men  at  the  same  time, 
and  to  myriads  of  myriads  at  various  times  and 
through  successions  of  generations  ?  How  do  they  ap- 
ply to  authors,  whose  foreknowledge  assuredly  does 
not  inform  them  who,  or  how  many,  or  of  what  de- 
scription their  Readers  will  be?  How  do  these  rules 
apply  to  books,  which  once  published,  are  as  likely 
to  fall  in  the  way  of  the  incompetent  as  of  the  judi- 
cious, and  will  be  fortunate  indeed  if  they  are  not 
many  times  looked  at  through  the  thick  mists  of  igno- 
rance, or  amid  the  glare  of  prejudice  and  passion? — 
We  answer  in  the  first  place,  that  this  is  not  univer- 
sally true.  The  readers  are  not  seldom  picked  and 
chosen.  Relations  of  certain  pretended  miracles  per 
formed  a  few  years  ago,  at  Holywell,  in  consequence 
of  prayers  to  the  Virgin  Mary,  on  female  servants, 
and  these  relations  moralized  by  the  old  Roman  Cath- 
olic arguments  without  the  old  protestant  answers, 
388 


THE  FRIEND. 


379 


have  to  my  knowledge  been  sold  by  travelling  ped- 
lars in  villages  and  larm-houses,  not  only  in  a  form 
which  placed  them  within  the  reach  of  the  narrowest 
means,  but  sold  at  a  price  less  than  their  prime  cost, 
and  doubtless  thrown  in  occasionally  as  the  make- 
weight in  a  bargain  of  pins  and  stay-tape.  Shall  I  he 
told,  that  the  publishers  and  reverend  anthorizers  of 
these  base  and  vulgar  delusions  had  exerted  no  rlwice 
as  to  the  purchasers  and  readers  ?  But  waiving  this, 
or  rather  having  first  pointed  it  out,  as  an  important 
exception,  we  further  reply:  that  if  the  Author  have 
clearly  and  rightly  established  in  his  own  mind  the 
class  of  readers,  to  which  he  means  to  address  his 
communications ;  and  if  both  in  this  choice,  and  in 
the  particulars  of  the  manner  and  matter  of  his  work, 
he  conscientiously  observes  all  the  conditions  which 
reason  and  conscience  have  been  shown  to  dictate, 
in  relation  to  those  for  whom  the  work  was  designed  ; 
he  will,  in  most  instances,  have  effected  his  design 
and  realized  the  desired  circumscription.  The  pos- 
thumous work  of  Spinoza  (Erhira  ordine  geometrico 
demonstrata)  may,  indeed,  accidentally  fall  into  the 
hands  of  an  incompetent  reader.  Rut,  (not  to  nien- 
tion,  that  it  is  written  in  a  dead  language)  it  will  be 
entirely  harmless,  because  it  must  needs  be  utterly 
unintelligible.  I  venture  to  assert,  that  the  whole 
first  book,  De  Deo,  might  be  read  in  literal  English 
translation  to  any  congregation  in  the  kingdom,  and 
that  no  individual,  who  had  not  been  habituated  to 
the  strictest  and  most  laborious  processes  of  reason- 
ing, would  even  suspect  its  orthodoxy  or  piety,  how- 
ever heavily  the  few  who  listened  would  complain 
of  its  obscurity  and  want  of  interest. 

This,  it  may  be  objected,  is  an  extreme  case.  But 
it  is  not  so  for  the  present  purpose.  We  are  speaking 
of  the  probability  of  injurious  consequences  from 
the  communication  of  Truth.  This  I  have  denied, 
if  the  right  means  have  been  adopted,  and  the  neces- 
sary conditions  adhered  to,  for  its  actual  communica- 
tion. Now  the  truths  conveyed  in  a  book  are  either 
evident  of  themselves,  or  such  as  require  a  train  of 
deductions  of  proof:  and  the  latter  will  be  either 
such  as  are  authorized  and  generally  received  ;  or 
such  as  are  in  opposition  to  received  and  authorized 
opinions ;  or  lastly,  truths  presented  for  the  appro- 
priate test  of  examination,  and  still  under  trial  (adhuc 
sub  lite.)  Of  this  latter  class  I  affirm,  that  in  neither 
of  the  three  sorts  can  an  instance  be  brought  of  a 
preponderance  of  ill-consequences,  or  even  of  an  I 
equilibrium  of  advantage  and  injury,  from  a  work  in 
which  the  understanding  alone  has  been  appealed  ' 
to,  by  results  fairly  deduced  from  just  premises,  in 
terms  strictly  appropriate.  Alas !  legitimate  reason- 
ing is  impossible  without  severe  thinking,  and  think- 
ing is  neither  an  easy  or  amusing  employment.  The 
reader,  who  would  follow  a  close  reasoner  to  the 
summit  and  absolute  principle  of  any  one  important 
subject,  has  chosen  a  Chamois-hunter  for  his  guide. 
Our  guide  will,  indeed,  take  us  the  shortest  way, 
will  save  us  many  a  wearisome  and  perilous  wan- 
dering, and  warn  us  of  many  a  mock  road  that  had 
formerly  led  himself  to  the  brink  of  chasms  and 
precipices,  or  at  best  in  -an  idle  circle  to  the  spot 
li 


from  whence  he  started.  But  he  cannot  carry  us 
on  his  shoulders :  we  must  strain  our  own  sinews, 
as  he  has  strained  his  ;  and  make  firm  footing  on  the 
smooth  rock  for  ourselves,  by  the  blood  of  toil  from 
our  own  feet.  Examine  the  journals  of  our  humane 
and  zealous  missionaries  in  Hindosian.  How  often 
and  how  feelingly  do  they  describe  the  difficulty  of 
making  the  simplest  chain  of  reasoning  intelligible  to 
the  ordinary  natives:  the  rapid  exhaustion  of  their 
whole  power  of  attention,  and  with  what  pain  and  dis- 
tressful effort  it  is  exerted,  while  it  lasts.  Yet  it  is 
among  this  class,  that  the  hideous  practices  of  self  tor- 
ture chiefly,  indeed  almost  exclusively,  prevail.  O  if 
folly  were  no  easier  than  wisdom,  it  being  often  so 
very  much  more  grievous,  how  certainly  might  not 
these  miserable  men  be  converted  to  Christianity  ? 
But  alas!  to  swing  by  hooks  passed  through  the 
back,  or  to  walk  on  shoes  with  nails  of  iron  pointed 
upward  on  the  soles,  all  this  is  so  much  less  difficult, 
demands  so  very  inferior  an  exertion  of  the  will 
than  to  think,  and  by  thought  to  gain  Knowledge 
and  Tranquillity ! 

It  is  not  true,  that  ignorant  persons  have  no  notion 
of  the  advantages  of  Truth  and  Knowledge.  They 
confess,  they  see  those  advantages  in  the  conduct, 
the  immunities,  and  the  superior  powers  of  the  pos- 
sessors. Were  these  attainable  by  Pilgrimages  the 
most  toilsome,  or  Penances  the  most  painful,  we 
should  assuredly  have  as  many  Pilgrims  and  as  many 
Self-tormentors  in  the  service  of  true  Religion  and 
Virtue,  as  now  exist  under  the  tyranny  of  Papal  or 
Brahman  superstition.  This  inefficacy  of  legitimate 
Reason,  from  the  want  of  fit  objects,  this  its  relative 
weakness  and  how  narrow  at  all  times  its  immediate 
sphere  of  action  must  be,  is  proved  to  us  by  the  im- 
postors of  all  professions.  What,  I  pray,  is  their  for- 
tress, the  rock  which  is  both  their  quarry  and  their 
foundation,  from  which  and  on  which  they  are  built  ? 
The  desire  of  arriving  at  the  end  without  the  effort 
of  thought  and  will,  which  are  the  appointed  means. 
Let  us  look  backwards  three  or  four  centuries. 
Then,  as  nowf,  the  great  mass  of  mankind  were 
governed  by  three  main  wishes,  the  wish  for  vigor 
of  body,  including  the  absence  of  painful  feelings: 
for  wealth,  or  the  power  of  procuring  the  internal 
conditions  of  bodily  enjoyment:  these  during  life — 
and  security  from  pain  and  continuance  of  happiness 
after  death.  Then,  as  now,  men  were  desirous  to 
attain  them  by  some  easier  means  than  those  of 
Temperance,  Industry,  and  strict  Justice.  They 
gladly  therefore  applied  to  the  Priest,  who  could 
ensure  them  happiness  hereafter  without  the  per- 
formance of  their  duties  here ;  to  the  Lawyer,  who 
could  make  money  a  substitute  for  a  right  cause;  to 
the  Physician,  whose  medicines  promised  to  take  the 
sting  out  of  the  tail  of  their  sensual  indulgences, 
and  let  them  fondle  and  play  with  vice,  as  with  a 
charmed  serpent;  to  the  Alchemist,  whose  gold- 
tincture  would  enrich  them  without  toil  or  economy; 
and  to  the  Astrologer,  from  whom  they  could  pur- 
chase foresight  without  knowledge  or  reflection. 
The  established  professions  were,  without  exception, 
no  other  than  licensed  modes  of  witchcraft.  The 
38<J 


380 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Wizards,  who  would  now  find  their  due  reward  in 
Bridewell,  and  their  appropriate  honors  in  the  pillory, 
sate  then  on  episcopal  thrones,  candidates  for  Saint- 
ship,  and  already  canonized  in  the  belief  of  their  de- 
luded contemporaries;  v\hile  the  one  or  two  real 
teachers  and  Discoverers  of  Truth  were  exposed  to 
the  hazard  of  fire  and  fagot,  a  dungeon  the  best 
shrine  that  was  vouchsafed  to  a  Roger  Bacon  and  a 
Galileo! 


ESSAY    VIII. 


Pray,  why  is  it,  that  people  say  that  men  are  not  Buch  fools 
now-a-days  as  they  were  in  the  days  of  yore?  I  would  fain 
know,  whether  you  would  have  us  understand  by  this  same 
saying,  as  indeed  you  logically  may,  that  formerly  men 
were  fools,  and  in  this  generation  are  grown  wise?  How 
many  and  what  dispositions  made  them  fools  ?  How 
many  and  what  dispositions  were  wanting  to  make  'em 
wise  ?  Why  were  those  fools?  How  should  these  be 
wise?  Pray,  how  came  you  to  know  that  men  were  for- 
merly fools?  How  did  you  find,  that  they  are  now  wise? 
Who  made  them  fools?  Who  in  Heaven's  name  made  us 
wise  ?  Who  d'ye  think  are  most,  tho-ethat  loved  mankind 
foolish,  or  those  that  love  it  wise?  How  long  has  it  been 
wise?  How  long  otherwise?  Whence  proceeded  the  fore- 
going folly?  Whence  the  following  wisdom?  Why  did 
the  old  folly  end  now  and  no  later  ?  Why  did  the  modern 
wisdom  begin  now  and  no  sooner  ?  What  were  we  the 
worse  for  the  former  folly  ?  What  the  better  for  the  suc- 
ceeding wisdom  ?  How  should  the  ancient  folly  have  come 
to  nothing?  How  should  this  same  new  wisdom  be  started 
up  and  established  ?  Now  answer  me,  an't  please  you  ! 
FR.  RABELAIS'  Preface  to  Ms  5th  Book. 


Monsters  and  Madmen  canonized,  and  Galileo 
blind  in  a  dungeon!  It  is  not  so  in  our  times.  Hea- 
ven be  praised,  that  in  this  respect,  at  least,  we  are, 
if  not  better,  yet  belter  off  than  our  forefathers.  But 
to  what,  and  to  whom  (under  Providence)  do  we  owe 
the  improvement?  To  any  radical  change  in  the 
moral  affections  of  mankind  in  general  ?  Perhaps  the 
great  majority  of  men  are  now  fully  conscious  that 
they  are  born  with  the  god-like  faculty  of  Reason, 
and  that  it  is  the  business  of  life  to  develope  and 
apply  it?  The  Jacob's  ladder  of  Truth,  let  down 
from  heaven,  with  all  its  numerous  rounds,  is  now 
the  common  highway,  on  which  we  are  content  to 
toil  upward  to  the  object  of  our  desires?  IVe  are 
ashamed  of  expecting  the  end  without  the  means? 
In  order  to  answer  these  questions  in  the  affirmative, 
I  must  have  forgotten  the  Animal  Magnetists ;  the 
proselytes  of  Brothers,  and  of  Joanna  Southcot;  and 
some  hundred  thousand  fanatics  less  original  in  their 
creeds,  but  not  a  whit  more  rational  in  their  ex- 
pectations! I  must  forget  the  infamous  Empirics, 
whose  advertisements  pollute  and  disgrace  all  our 
Newspapers,  and  almost  paper  the  walls  of  our  cities; 
and  the  vending  of  whose  poisons  and  poisonous 
drams  (with  shame  and  anguish  be  it  spoken)  support 
a  shop  in  every  market-town?  I  must  forget  that 
other  opprobrium  of  the  nation,  that  Mother-vice,  the 
Lottery!  I  must  forget  that  a  numerous  class  plead 
Prudence  for  keeping  their  fellow-men  ignorant  and 
incapable  of  intellectual  enjoyments,  and  the  Re  ve- 


nue for  upholding  such  temptations  as  men  so  igno- 
rant will  not  withstand — yes  !  that  even  senators  and 
officers  of  state  hold  forth  the  Revenue  as  a  sufficient 
plea  for  upholding,  at  every  fiftieth  door  throughout 
the  kingdom,  temptations  to  the  most  pernicious 
vices,  which  fill  the  land  with  mourning,  and  fit  the 
laboring  classes  for  sedition  and  religious  fanaticism! 
Above  all  I  must  forget  the  first  years  of  the  French 
Revolution,  and  the  millions  throughout  Europe  who 
confidently  expected  the  best  and  choicest  results  of 
Knowledge  and  Virtue,  namely,  Liberty  and  univer- 
sal Peace,  from  the  votes  of  a  tumultuous  Assembly 
— that  is,  from  the  mechanical  agitation  of  the  air  in 
a  large  room  at  Paris — and  this  too  in  the  most  light, 
unthinking,  sensual  and  profligate  of  the  European 
nations,  a  nation,  the  very  phrases  of  whose  language 
are  so  composed,  that  they  can  scarcely  speak  with- 
out lying  ! — No!  Let  us  not  deceive  ourselves.  Like 
the  man  who  used  to  pull  off  his  hat  with  great  de- 
monstration of  respect  whenever  he  spoke  of  himself, 
we  are  fond  of  styling  our  own  the  enlightened  age  : 
though  as  Jortin,  I  think,  has  wittily  remarked,  the 
golden  age  would  be  more  appropriate.  But  in  spite 
of  our  great  scientific  discoveries,  for  which  praise 
be  given  to  whom  the  praise  is  due,  and  in  spite  of 
that  general  indifference  to  all  the  truths  and  all  the 
principles  of  truth,  that  belong  to  our  permanent 
being,  and  therefore  do  not  lie  within  the  sphere  of 
our  senses,  (that  same  indifference  which  makes  tole- 
ration so  easy  a  virtue  with  us,  and  constitutes  nine- 
tenths  of  our  pretended  illumination)  it  still  remains 
the  character  of  the  mass  of  mankind  to  seek  for  the 
attainment  of  their  necessary  ends  by  any  means 
rather  than  the  appointed  ones ;  and  for  this  cause 
only,  that  the  latter  imply  the  exertion  of  the"  Reason 
and  the  Will.  But  of  all  things  this  demands  the 
longest  apprenticeship,  even  an  apprenticeship  from 
Infancy;  which  is  generally  neglected,  because  an 
excellence,  that  may  and  should  belong  to  all  men,  is 
expecicd  to  come  to  every  man  of  its  own  accord. 

To  whom  then  do  we  owe  our  ameliorated  condi- 
tion ?  To  the  successive  Few  in  every  age  (more 
indeed  in  one  generation  than  in  another,  but  rela- 
tively to  the  mass  of  mankind  always  few)  who  by 
the  intensity  and  permanence  of  their  action  have 
compensated  for  the  limited  sphere,  within  which  it 
is  at  anyone  time  intelligible;  and  whose  good  deeds 
posterity  reverence  in  their  result,  though  the  mode, 
in  which  we  repair  the  inevitable  waste  of  time,  and 
the  style  of  our  additions,  too  generally  furnish  a  sad 
proof,  how  little  we  understand  the  principles.  I 
appeal  to  the  Histories  of  the  Jewish,  the  Grecian, 
and  the  Roman  Republics,  to  the  Records  of  the 
Christian  Church,  to  the  History  of  Europe  from  the 
Treaty  of  Westphalia  (1648).  What  do  they  contain 
but  accounts  of  noble  structures  raised  by  the  wisdom 
of  the  few,  and  gradually  undermined  by  the  igno- 
rance and  profligacy  of  the  many  ?  If  therefore  the 
deficiency  of  good,  which  everywhere  surrounds  us, 
originate  in  the  general  unfitness  and  aversions  of 
men  to  the  process  of  thought,  that  is,  to  continuous 
reasoning,  it  must  surely  be  absurd  to  apprehend  a 
preponderance  of  evil  from  works  which  cannot  act 
390 


THE  FRIEND. 


381 


at  all  except  as  far  as  they  call  the  reasoning  facul- 
ties into  full  co-exertion  with  them. 

Still,  however,  there  are  truths  so  self-evident  or  so 
immediately  and  palpably  deduced  from  those  that 
are,  or  are  acknowledged  for  such,  that  they  are  at 
once  intelligible  to  all  men,  who  possess  the  common 
advantages  of  the  social  state;  although  by  sophistry, 
by  evil  habits,  by  the  neglect,  false  persuasions,  ami 
impostures  of  an  anti-christian  priesthood  joined  in 
one  conspiracy  with  the  violence  of  tyrannical  gover- 
nors, the  understandings  of  men  may  become  so  dark- 
ened and  their  consciences  so  lethargic,  that  there 
may  arise  a  necessity  for  the  republication  of  these 
truths,  and  this  too  with  a  voice  of  loud  alarm,  and 
impassioned  warning.  Such  were  the  doctrines  pro- 
claimed by  the  first  Christians  of  the  Pagan  world  ; 
such  were  the  lightnings  flashed  by  WicklifT,  Huss, 
Luther,  Calvin,  Zuinglius,  Fatimer,  &c.  across  the 
Papal  darkness;  and  such  in  our  own  times  the  agi- 
tating truths,  with  which  Thomas  Clarkson,  and  his 
excellent  confederates,  the  Quakers,  fought  and  con- 
quered the  legalized  banditti  of  men-stealers,  the  nu- 
merous and  powerful  perpetrators  and  advocates  of 
rapine,  murder,  and  (of  blacker  guilt  than  either) 
slavery.  Truths  of  this  kind  being  indispensable  to 
man,  considered  as  a  moral  being,  are  above  all  ex- 
pedience, all  accidental  consequences  :  for  as  sure  as 
God  is  holy,  and  man  immortal,  there  can  be  no  evil  so 
great  as  the  ignorance  or  disregard  of  them.  It  is  the 
very  madness  of  mock  prudence  to  oppose  the  re- 
moval of  a  poisonous  dish  on  account  of  the  pleasant 
sauces  or  nutritious  viands  which  would  be  lost  with 
it!  The  dish  contains  destruction  to  that,  for  which 
alone  we  ought  to  wish  the  palate  to  be  gratified,  or 
the  body  to  be  nourished. 

The  sole  condition,  therefore,  imposed  on  us  by 
the  law  of  conscience  in  these  cases  is,  that  we  em- 
ploy no  unworthy  and  heterogeneous  means  to  realize 
the  necessary  end,  that  we  entrust  the  event  wholly 
to  the  full  and  adequate  promulgation  of  the  truth, 
and  to  those  generous  affections  which  the  constitu- 
tion of  our  moral  nature  has  linked  to  the  full  per- 
ception of  it.  Yet  evil  may,  nay  it  will  be  occasioned. 
Weak  men  may  take  offence,  and  wicked  men  avail 
themselves  of  it ;  though  we  must  not  attribule  to  the 
promulgation,  or  to  the  truth  promulgated,  all  the  evil, 
of  which  wicked  men  (predetermined,  like  the  wolf 
in  the  fable,  to  create  some  occasion)  may  choose  to 
make  it  the  pretext.  But  that  there  ever  was  or  ever 
can  he  a  preponderance  of  evil,  T  defy  either  the  His- 
torian to  instance  or  the  philosopher  to  prove.  "  Let* 
it  fly  away,  all  that  chaff  of  light  faith  that  can  fly 
off  at  any  breath  of  temptation ;  the  cleaner  will  the 
true  grain  be  stored  up  in  the  granary  of  the  Lord," 
we  are  entitled  to  say  with  Tertullian :  and  to  ex- 
claim with  heroic  Luther,  "  Scandalt  and  offence ! 


*  Avnlent  quantum  volent  paleto  levU  fidei  quocunque 
afflata  ttntationum  !  eo  purior  massa  frumenti  in  horrea 
domini  reponetur.  TERTULLIAN. 

t  Aergernist  hin,  Aergerniss  her :  Noth  bricht  Eisen,  und 
hat  kein  Aergerniss.  Ich  soil  der  gchwachen  Gewissen 
sehonen  eo  fern  es  ohne  Gefahr  meinor  Seelen  gescheln  mas. 
Wo  nicht,  so  soil  ich  meiner  Seelen  rathen,  es  argere  sicb 
danui  die  canze  oder  halbe  Welt. 


Talk  not  to  me  of  scandal  and  offence.  Need  breaks 
through  stone  walls,  and  recks  not  of  scandal.  It  is 
my  duty  to  spare  weak  consciences  as  far  as  it  may 
be  done  without  hazard  of  my  soul.  Where  not, 
I  must  take  counsel  for  my  soul,  though  half  or  the 
whole  world  should  be  scandalized  thereby." 

Luther  felt  and  preached  and  wrote  and  acted,  as 
beseemed  a  Luther  to  feel  and  utter  and  act.  The 
truths,  which  had  been  outraged,  he  re-proclaimed  in 
the  spirit  of  outraged  truth,  at  the  behest  of  his  con- 
science and  in  the  service  of  the  God  of  truth.  He 
did  his  duty,  come  good,  come  evil:  and  made  no 
question,  on  which  side  the  preponderance  would  be. 
In  the  one  scale  there  was  gold,  and  the  impress 
thereon  the  image  and  superscription  of  the  Univer- 
sal Sovereign.  In  all  the  wide  and  ever-widening 
commerce  of  mind  with  mind  throughout  the  world, 
it  is  treason  to  refuse  it.  Can  this  have  a  counter- 
weight ?  The  other  scale  indeed  might  have  seemed 
full  up  to  the  very  balance-yard  ;  but  of  what  worth 
and  substance  were  its  contents  ?  Were  they  capable 
of  being  counted  or  weighed  against  the  former  ? 
The  conscience  indeed  is  already  violated  when  to 
moral  good  or  evil  we  oppose  things  possessing  no 
moral  interest.  Even  if  the  conscience  dared  waive 
this  her  preventive  veto,  yet  before  we  could  con- 
sider the  twofold  results  in  the  relations  of  loss  and 
gain,  it  must  be  known  whether  their  kind  is  the 
same  or  equivalent.  They  must  first  be  valued,  and 
then  they  may  be  weighed  or  counted,  if  they  are 
worth  it.  But  in  the  particular  case  at  present  before 
us,  the  loss  is  contingent,  and  alien;  the  gain  essen- 
tial and  the  tree's  own  natural  produce.  The  gain  is 
permanent,  and  spreads  through  all  times  and  places  ; 
the  loss  but  temporary,  and,  owing  its  very  being  to 
vice  or  ignorance,  vanishes  at  the  approach  of  know- 
ledge and  moral  improvement.  The  gain  reaches  all 
good  men,  belongs  to  all  that  love  light  and  desire  an 
increase  of  light:  to  all  men  of  all  times,  who  thank 
Heaven  for  the  gracious  dawn,  and  expect  the  noon- 
day ;  who  welcome  the  first  gleams  of  spring,  and 
sow  their  fields  in  confident  faith  of  the  ripening  sum- 
mer and  the  rewarding  harvest-tide!  But  the  loss  is 
confined  to  the  unenlightened  and  the  prejudiced — 
say  rather,  to  the  weak  and  the  prejudiced  of  a  sin- 
gle generation.  The  prejudices  of  one  age  are  con- 
demned even  by  the  prejudiced  of  the  succeeding 
ages:  for  endless  are  the  modes  of  folly,  and  the  fool 
joins  with  the  wise  in  passing  sentence  on  all  modes 
but  his  own.  Who  cried  out  with  greater  horror 
against  the  murderers  of  the  Prophets,  than  those 
who  likewise  cried  out,  crucify  him!  crucify  him! 
The  truth-haters  of  every  future  generation  will  call 
the  truth  haters  of  the  preceding  ages  by  their  true 
names  :  for  even  these  the  stream  of  time  carries  on- 
ward. In  fine,  Truth  considered  in  itself  and  in  the 
effects  natural  to  it,  may  be  conceived  as  a  gentle 
spring  or  water-source,  warm  from  the  genial  earth, 
and  breathing  up  into  the  snow-drift  that  is  piled  over 
and  around  its  outlet.  It  turns  the  obstacle  in  its 
own  form  and  character,  and  as  it  makes  its  way  in- 
creases its  stream.  And  should  it  be  arrested  in  its 
course  by  a  chilling  season,  it  suffers  delay,  not  loss, 
391 


382 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


and  waits  only  for  a  change  in  the  wind  to  awaken 
and  again  roll  onwards. 

I  semplici  pastori 
Sul  Vesolo  nevoso 
Fatti  curvi  e  canuti, 
D'  alto  stupor  son  muti 
Mirando  al  fonte  ombroso 

II  Po  con  pochi  umori, 
Poscia  udendo  gli  onori 
Dell'  urna  angusta  e  stretta, 
Che'l  Adda  che'l  Tesino 
Soverchia  in  suo  cammino, 
Che  ampio  al  mar's  ati'retta 
Che  si  spuma,  e  si  suona, 

Che  gli  si  da  corona!*       CHIABRERA. 

Literal  Translation.- "The  simple  shepherds  grown  bent 
and  hoary-beaded  on  the  snowy  Vesolo,  are  mute  with  deep 
astonishment,  gazing  in  the  overshadowed  fountain  on  the  Po 
with  his  scanty  waters ;  then  hearing  of  the  honors  of  his 
confined  and  narrow  urn,  how  he  receives  as  a  sovereign  the 
Adda  and  the  Tesino  in  his  course,  how  ample  he  hastens  on 
to  the  sea,  how  he  foams,  how  mighty  his  voice,  and  that  to 
him  the  crown  is  assigned.'' 


ESSAY   IX. 


Great  men  have  lived  among  us,  Heads  that  plann'd 
And  Tongues  that  utter'd  Wisdom — better  none. 


Even  so  doth  Heaven  protect  us ! 

WORDSWORTH. 

In  the  preceding  Number  I  have  explained  the 
good,  that  is,  the  natural  consequences  of  the  promul- 
gation to  all  of  truths  which  all  are  bound  to  know 
and  to  make  known.  The  evils  occasioned  by  it,  with 
few  and  rare  exceptions,  have  their  origin  in  the  at- 
tempts to  suppress  or  pervert  it;  in  the  fury  and  vio- 
lence of  imposture  attacked  or  undermined  in  her 
strong  holds,  or  in  the  extravagances  of  ignorance  and 
credulity  roused  from  their  lethargy,  and  angry  at  the 
medicinal  disturbance — awakening  not  yet  broad 
awake,  and  thus  blending  the  monsters  of  uneasy 
dreams  with  the  real  objects,  on  which  the  drowsy 
eye  had  alternately  halfopened  and  closed,  again 
half-opened  and  again  closed.  This  re-action  of  de- 
ceit and  superstition,  with  all  the  trouble  and  tumult 
incident,  I  would  compare  to  a  fire  which  bursts  forth 
from  some  stifled  and  fermenting  mass  on  the  first  ad- 
mission of  light  and  air.  It  roars  and  blazes,  and  con- 
verts the  already  spoilt  or  damaged  stuff  with  all  the 
straw  and  straw-like  near  it,  first  into  flame  and  the 
[next  moment  into  ashes.  The  fire  dies  away,  the 
ashes  are  scattered  on  all  the  winds,  and  what  began 
in  worthlessness  ends  in  nothingness.  Such  are  the 
evil,  that  is,  the  casual  consequences  of  the  same  pro- 
mulgation. 

It  argues  a  narrow  or  corrupt  nature  to  lose  the 
general  and  lasting  consequences  of  rare  and  virtu- 


*  I  give  literal  translations  of  my  poetic  as  well  as  prose 
quotations  :  because  the  propriety  of  their  introduction  often 
depends  on  the  exact  sense  and  order  of  the  words :  which  it 
u  impossible  always  to  retain  in  a  metrical  version. 


ous  energy,  in  the  brief  accidents,  which  accompa- 
nied its  first  movements — to  set  lightly  by  the  eman- 
cipation of  the  human  reason  from  a  legion  of  devils, 
in  our  complaints  and  lamentations  over  the  loss  of  a 
herd  of  swine  !  The  Cranmers,  Hampdens,  and  Sid- 
neys :  the  counsellors  of  our  Elizabeth,  and  the  friends 
of  our  other  great  Deliverer,  the  third  William, — is  it 
in  vain,  that  these  have  been  our  countrymen  ?  Are 
we  not  the  heirs  of  their  good  deeds  ?  And  what  are 
noble  deeds  but  noble  truths  realized  ?  As  Protest- 
ants, as  Englishmen,  as  the  inheriters  of  so  ample  an 
estate  of  might  and  right,  an  estate  so  strongly  fenced, 
so  richly  planted,  by  the  sinewy  arms  and  dauntless 
hearts  of  our  forefathers,  we  of  all  others  have  good 
cause  to  trust  in  the  truth,  yea,  to  follow  its  pillar  of 
fire  through  the  darkness  and  the  desert,  even  though 
its  light  should  but  suffice  to  make  us  certain  of  its 
own  presence.  If  there  be  elsewhere  men  jealous 
of  the  light,  who  prophesy  an  excess  of  evil  over  good 
from  its  manifestation,  we  are  entitled  to  ask  them, 
on  what  experience  they  ground  their  bodings  ?  Our 
own  country  bears  no  traces,  our  own  history  con- 
tains no  records,  to  justify  them.  From  the  great 
eras  of  national  illumination,  we  date  the  commence- 
ment of  our  main  national  advantages.  The  tangle 
of  delusions,  which  stifled  and  distorted  the  growing 
tree,  have  been  torn  away ;  the  parasite  weeds,  that 
fed  on  its  very  roots,  have  been  plucked  up  with  a 
salutary  violence.  To  us  there  remain  only  quiet 
duties,  the  constant  care,  the  gradual  improvement, 
the  cautious  unhazardous  labors  of  the  industrious 
though  contented  gardener — to  prune,  to  engraft,  and 
one  by  one  to  remove  from  its  leaves  and  fresh  shoots 
the  slug  and  the  caterpillar.  But  far  be  it  from  us  to 
undervalue  with  light  and  senseless  detraction  the 
conscientious  hardihood  of  our  predecessors,  or  even 
to  condemn  in  them  that  vehemence,  to  which  the 
blessings  it  won  for  us  leave  us  now  neither  tempta- 
tion or  pretext.  That  the  very  terms,  with  which  the 
bigot  or  the  hireling  would  blacken  the  first  publish- 
ers of  political  and  religious  Truth,  are,  and  deserve 
to  be,  hateful  to  us,  we  owe  to  the  effects  of  its  pub- 
lication. We  antedate  the  feelings,  in  order  to  crimi- 
nate the  authors  of  our  tranquillity,  opulence,  and  se- 
curity. But  let  us  be  aware.  Effects  will  not,  in- 
deed, immediately  disappear  with  their  causes;  but 
neither  can  they  long  continue  without  them.  If  by 
the  reception  of  Truth  in  the  spirit  of  Truth,  we  be- 
came what  we  are :  only  by  the  retention  of  it  in  the 
same  spirit,  can  we  remain  what  we  are.  The  nar- 
row seas  that  form  our  boundaries,  what  were  they  in 
times  of  old  ?  The  convenient  highway  for  Danish 
and  Norman  pirates.  What  are  they  now  ?  Still  but 
"a  Span  of  Water." — Yet  they  roll  at  the  base  of  the 
inisled  Ararat,  on  which  the  Ark  of  the  Hope  of  Eu- 
rope and  of  Civilization  rested  ! 

Even  so  doth  God  protect  us,  if  we  be 
Virtuous  and  Wise.    Wind-  blow  and  Waters  roll, 
Strength  to  the  Brave,  and   Power  and  Deity: 
Yet  in  themselves  are  nothing  !    One  Decree 
Spake  Laws  to  them,  and  said  that  by  the  Soul 
Only  the  Nations  shall  be  great  and  free ! 

WORDSWORTH. 
392 


THE  FRIEND. 


383 


ESSAY  X 


I  deny  not  but  that  it  is  of  greatest  concernment  in  the  church 
anil  commonwealth  to  have  a  vigilant  eye  how  books  de- 
mean themselves  us  well  as  men.  For  books  are  nut  abso- 
lutely dead  things,  but  do  contain  a  progeny  of  life  in  them 
to  be  as  active  as  that  soul  was  whose  progeny  they  are. 
I  know  they  are  as  lively  and  as  vigorously  productive  as 
those  fabulous  dragon's  teeth:  and  being  sown  up  and 
down  may  chance  to  spring  up  armed  men.  And  fel  <>n 
the  other  hand,  unless  wariness  be  used,  as  good  almost 
kill  a  man  as  kill  a  good  book.  Many  a  man  lives  a  bur- 
then to  the  earth  ;  but  a  good  book  is  the  precious  life- 
blood  of  a  master  spirit,  embalmed   and  treasured  up  on 

purpose  to  a  life  beyond  life. MILTON'S  Speech  fur 

the  Liberty  of  unlicensed  Printing. 


Thus  far  then  I  have  been  conducting  a  cause 
between  an  individual  and  his  own  mind.  Proceed- 
ing on  the  conviction,  that  to  man  is  entrusted  the 
nature,  not  the  result  of  his  actions,  I  have  presup- 
posed no  calculations.  I  have  presumed  no  foresight. 
— Introduce  no  contradiction  into  thy  own  conscious- 
ness. Acting  or  abstaining  from  action,  delivering 
or  withholding  thy  thoughts,  whatsoever  thou  dost, 
do  it  in  singleness  of  heart.  In  all  things  therefore, 
let  thy  means  correspond  to  thv  purpose,  and  let  the 
purpose  be  one  with  the  purport. — To  this  principle 
I  have  referred  the  supposed  individual,  and  from 
this  principle  solely  I  have  deduced  each  particular 
of  his  conduct.  As  far,  therefore,  as  the  court  of 
Conscience  extends,  (and  in  this  court  alone  I  have 
been  pleading  hitherto)  I  have  won  the  cause.  It 
has  been  decided,  that  there  is  no  just  ground  for 
apprehending  mischief  from  Truth  communicated 
conscientiously,  (i.  e.  with  a  strict  observance  of  all 
the  conditions  required  by  the  Conscience) — that 
what  is  not  so  communicated,  is  falsehood,  and  that 
to  the  Falsehood,  not  to  the  Truth,  must  the  ill  con- 
sequences be  attribuled. 

Another  and  altogether  different  cause  remains 
now  to  be  pleaded  ;  a  different  cause,  and  in  a  dif- 
ferent court.  The  parties  concerned  are  no  longer 
the  well-meaning  Individual  and  his  Conscience,  but 
the  Citizen  and  the  State — The  Citizen,  who  may  be 
a  fanatic  as  probably  as  a  philosopher,  and  the  State, 
which  concerns  itself  with  the  Conscience  only  as 
far  as  it  appears  in  the  action,  or  still  more  accurately, 
in  the  fact ;  and  which  must  determine  the  nature 
of  the  fact  not  merely  by  a  rule  of  Right  formed  from 
the  modification  of  particular  by  general  conse- 
quences, not  merely  by  a  principle  of  compromise, 
that  reduces  the  freedom  of  each  citizen  to  the  com- 
mon measure  in  which  it  becomes  compatible  with 
the  freedom  of  all ;  but  likewise  by  the  relation 
which  the  facts  bear  to  its  (the  State's;  own  instinct- 
ive principle  of  self-preservation.  For  every  deposit- 
ory n|  the  Supreme  Power  must  presume  itself  right- 
ful :  and  as  the  source  of  law  not  legally  to  be  endan- 
gered. A  form  of  government  may  indeed,  in  reality, 
be  must  pernicious  to  the  governed,  and  the  highest 
moral  honor  may  await  the  patriot  who  risks  his  life 
in  order  by  its  subversion  to  introduce  a  better  and 
juster  constitution  ;  but  it  would  be  absurd  to  blame 
26  IiS 


the  law  by  which  his  life  is  declared  forfeit.  It  were 
to  expect,  that  by  an  involved  contradiction  the  law 
should  allow  itself  not  to  be  law,  by  allowing  the 
State,  of  which  it  is  a  part,  not  to  be  a  State.  For  as 
Hooker  has  well  observed,  the  law  of  men's  actions 
is  one,  if  they  be  respected  only  as  men  ;  and  another, 
when  they  are  considered  as  parts  of  a  body  politic. 

But  though  every  government,  subsisting  in  law 
(for  pure  lawless  despotism  grounding  itself  wholly 
on  terror  precludes  all  consideration  of  duty) — though 
every  government  subsisting  in  law  must,  and  ought 
to,  regard  itself  as  the  hie  of  the  body  politic,  of 
which  it  is  the  head,  and  consequently  must  punish 
every  attempt  against  itself  as  an  act  of  assault  or 
murder,  i.  e.  sedition  or  treason;  yet  still  it  ought  so 
to  secure  the  life  as  not  to  prevent  the  conditions  of 
its  growth,  and  of  that  adaptation  to  circumstances, 
without  which  its  very  life  becomes  insecure.  In 
the  application,  therefore,  of  these  principles  to  the 
public  communication  of  opinions  by  the  most  effi- 
cient means,  the  Press — we  have  to  decide,  whether 
consistently  with  them  there  should  be  any  liberty 
of  the  press  ;  and  if  this  be  answered  in  the  affirma- 
tive, what  shall  be  declared  abuses  of  that  liberty, 
and  made  punishable  as  such;  and  in  what  way  the 
general  law  shall  be  applied  to  each  particular  case. 

First  then,  should  there  be  any  liberty  of  the 
press  ?  we  will  not  here  mean,  whether  it  should  be 
permitted  to  print  books  at  all ;  (for  our  Essay  has 
little  chance  of  being  read  in  Turkey,  and  in  any 
other  part  of  Europe  it  cannot  be  supposed  question- 
able) but  whether  by  the  appointment  of  a  Censor- 
ship the  Government  should  take  upon  itself  the 
responsibility  of  each  particular  publication.  In 
Governments  purely  monarchical  (i.  e.  oligarchies 
under  one  head)  the  balance  of  the  advantage  and 
disadvantage  from  this  monopoly  of  the  press  will 
undoubtedly  be  affected  by  the  general  state  of  in- 
formation ;  though  after  reading  Milton's  "  Speech 
for  the  liberty  of  unlicensed  Printing*"  we  shall 
probably  be  inclined  to  believe,  that  the  best  argu- 
ment in  fovor  of  licensing,  <tc.  under  any  constitution 
is  lhat,  which  supposing  the  ruler  to  have  a  different 
interest  from  that  of  his  country,  and  even  from 
himself  as  a  reasonable  and  moral  creature,  grounds 
itself  on  the  incompatibility  of  knowledge  with  folly, 
oppression,  and  degradation.  What  our  prophetic 
Harrington  said  of  religious,  applies  equally  to  liter- 
ary toleration.  "  If  it  be  said  that  in  France  there  is 
liberty  of  conscience  in  part,  it  is  also  plain  that 
while  the  hierarchy  is  standing,  this  liberty  is  falling; 
and  that  if  on  the  contrary,  it  comes  to  pull  down 
the  Hierarchy.it  pulls  down  that  Monarchy  also; 
wherefore  the  Monarchy  or  Hierarchy  will  be  be- 
forehand with  it,  if  they  see  their  true  interest." 
On  the  other  hand,  there  is  no  slight  danger  from 


*  II  y  a  un  voile  qui  doit  toujour  couvrir  tout  ce  que  l'oi 
peut  dire  et  lout  ce  qu'  on  peut  croire  du  Droit  des  peuplc. 
el  de  celui  lies  princes,  que  ne  s'  accordent  jamais  si  bien  en 
semble  que  dans  le  silence. 

Mem.  du  Card,  de  Rett. 

How  severe  a  satire  when  it  can  be  justly  applied!  how 
false  and  calumnious  if  meant  as  a  general  maxim  .' 
393 


384 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


general  ignorance ;  and  the  only  choice,  which 
Providence  has  graciously  left  to  a  vicious  Govern- 
ment, is  either  to  fall  by  the  People,  if  they  are 
suffered  to  become  enlightened,  or  with  them,  if  they 
are  kept  enslaved  and  ignorant. 

The  nature  of  our  Constitution,  since  the  revolu- 
tion, the  state  of  our  literature,  and  the  wide  diffusion, 
if  not  of  intellectual  yet  of  literary  power,  and  the 
almost  universal  interest  in  the  productions  of  litera- 
ture, have  set  the  question  at  rest  relatively  to  the 
British  press.  However  great  the  advantages  of 
previous  examination  might  be  under  other  circum- 
stances, in  this  country  it  would  be  both  impracti- 
cable and  inefficient.  I  need  only  suggest  in  broken 
sentences — the  prodigious  number  of  licensers  that 
would  be  requisite — the  variety  of  their  attainments, 
and  (inasmuch  as  the  scheme  must  be  made  consist- 
ent with  our  religious  freedom)  the  ludicrous  variety 
of  their  principles  and  creeds — the  numbers  being 
so  great,  and  each  appointed  censor  being  himself  a 
man  of  letters,  quis  custodiel  ipsos  custodes  ? — if  these 
numerous  licensers  hold  their  offices  for  life,  and  in- 
dependent of  the  ministry  pro  tempore,  a  new  heter- 
ogeneous, and  alarming  power  is  introduced,  which 
can  never  be  assimilated  to  the  constitutional  powers 
already  existing : — if  they  are  removable  at  pleas- 
ure, that  which  is  heretical  and  seditious  in  1809, 
may  become  orthodox  and  loyal  in  1810 — and  what 
man,  whose  attainments  and  moral  respectability 
gave  him  even  an  endurable  claim  to  this  awful 
trust,  would  accept  a  situation  at  once  so  invidious 
and  so  precarious  ?  And  what  institution  can  retain 
any  useful  influence  in  so  free  a  nation,  when  its 
abuses  have  made  it  contemptible  ? — Lastly,  and 
which  of  itself  would  suffice  to  justify  the  rejection 
of  such  a  plan — unless  all  proportion  between  crime 
and  punishment  were  abandoned,  what  penalties 
could  the  law  attach  to  the  assumption  of  a  liberty, 
which  it  had  denied,  more  severe  than  those  which 
it  now  attaches  to  the  abuse  of  the  liberty,  which  it 
grants  ?  In  all  those  instances  at  least,  which  it 
would  be  most  the  inclination — perhaps  the  duty — 
of  the  State  to  prevent,  namely,  in  seditious  and  in- 
cendiary publications  (whether  actually  such,  or  only 
such  as  the  existing  Government  chose  so  to  denomi- 
nate, makes  no  difference  in  the  argument)  the  pub- 
lisher, who  hazards  the  punishment  now  assigned  to 
seditious  publications,  would  assuredly  hazard  the 
penalties  of  unlicensed  ones,  especially  as  the  very 
practice  of  licensing  would  naturally  diminish  the 
attention  to  the  contents  of  the  works  published,  the 
chance  of  impunity  therefore  be  so  much  greater, 
and  the  artifice  of  prefixing  an  unauthorized  license 
so  likely  to  escape  detection.  It  is  a  fact,  that  in 
many  of  the  former  German  States  in  which  litera- 
ture flourished,  notwithstanding  the  establishment 
of  censors  or  licensers,  three-fourths  of  the  books 
printed  were  unlicensed — even  those,  the  contents 
of  which  were  unobjectionable,  and  where  the  sole 
motive  for  evading  the  law,  must  have  been  either 
the  pride  and  delicacy  of  the  author,  or  the  indolence 
of  the  bookseller.  So  difficult  was  the  detection,  so 
various  were  the  means  of  evasion,  and  worse  than 


all,  from  the  nature  of  the  law  and  the  affront  it  of- 
fers to  the  pride  of  human  nature,  such  was  the  merit 
attached  to  the  breach  of  it — a  merit  commencing 
perhaps  with  Luther's  Bible,  and  other  prohibited 
works  of  similar  great  minds,  published  with  no  dis- 
similar purpose,  and  thence  by  many  an  intermediate 
link  of  association  finally  connected  with  books,  of 
the  very  titles  of  which  a  good  man  would  wish  to 
remain  ignorant.  The  interdictory  catalogues  of  the 
Roman  Hierarchy  always  present  to  my  fancy  the 
musler-rolls  of  the  two  hostile  armies  of  Michael 
and  Satan  printed  promiscuously,  or  extracted  at  hap- 
hazard, save  only  that  the  extracts  from  the  former 
appear  somewhat  the  more  numerous.  And  yet  even 
in  Maples,  and  in  Rome  itself,  whatever  difficulty 
occurs  in  procuring  any  article  catalogued  in  these 
formidable  folios,  must  arise  either  from  the  scarcity 
of  the  work  itself,  or  the  absence  of  all  interest  in  it. 
Assuredly  there  is  no  difficulty  in  procuring  from  the 
most  respectable  booksellers  the  vilest  provocatives 
to  the  basest  crimes,  though  intermixed  with  gross 
lampoons  on  the  heads  of  the  Church,  the  religious 
orders,  and  on  religion  itself.  The  stranger  is  in- 
vited into  an  inner  room,  and  the  loathsome  wares 
presented  to  him  with  most  significant  looks  and 
gestures,  implying  the  hazard,  and  the  necessity  of 
secrecy.  A  creditable  English  bookseller  would 
deem  himself  insulted,  if  such  works  were  even  in- 
quired after  at  his  shop.  It  is  a  well-known  fact, 
that  with  the  mournful  exception  indeed  of  political 
provocatives,  and  the  titillations  of  vulgar  envy  pro- 
vided by  our  anonymous  critics;  the  loathsome  ar- 
ticles are  among  us  vended  and  offered  for  sale 
almost  exclusively  by  Foreigners.  Such  are  the 
purifying  effects  of  a  free  Press,  and  the  dignified 
habit  of  action  imbibed  from  the  blessed  air  of  Law 
and  Liberty,  even  by  men  who  neither  understand 
the  principle  or  feel  the  sentiment  of  the  dignified 
purity,  to  which  they  yield  obeisance  from  the  in- 
stinct of  character.  As  there  is  a  national  guilt 
which  can  be  charged  but  gently  on  each  individual, 
so  are  there  national  virtues,  which  can  as  little  be 
imputed  to  the  individuals, — no  where,  however,  but 
in  countries  where  Liberty  is  the  presiding  influence, 
the  universal  medium  and  menstruum  of  all  other 
excellence,  moral  and  intellectual.  Admirably  doth 
the  admirable  Petrarch*  admonish  us: 

Nee  sibi  vero  quisquam  falso  persuadeat,  eos  qui 
pro  libertate  excubant,  alienum  agere  negotium 


*  1  quote  Petrarch  often  in  the  hope  of  drawing  the  atten- 
tion of  scholars  to  his  inestimahle  Latin  Writings.  Let  me 
add,  in  the  wish  of  likewise  recommending  a  Trnnslation  of 
select  passages  from  his  Treatises  and  Letters  to  the  London 
Publishers.  If  I  except  the  German  writings  and  original 
Letters  of  the  heroic  Luther,  1  do  not  remember  a  work  from 
which  so  delightful  and  instructive  a  volume  might  be  com- 
piled. 

To  give  the  true  bent  to  the  above  extract,  it  is  necessary 
to  bear  in  mind,  that  he  who  keepB  watch  and  ward  for  Free- 
dom, has  to  guard  against  two  enemies,  the  Despoti.-m  of  the 
Few  and  the  Despotism  of  the  Many — but  especially  in  tha 
present  day  against  the  Sycophants  of  the  Populace. 

License  they  mean,  when  they  cry  Liberty  ! 
For  who  loves  that,  must  first  be  wise  and  good. 
394 


THE  FRIEND. 


385 


non  suum.  In  hac  una  reposita  sibi  omnia  norint 
omnes,  securitatem  mercator,  gioriam  miles,  utilita- 
tem  agricola.  Postremo,  in  eadem  libertate  Reli- 
giosi  caerimonias.  otium  studiosi,  requiem  senes,  rudi- 
menta  disciplinarum  pueri,  nuptias  et  castitatem  pu- 
ellae,  pudicitiam  matrons,  pietatem  et  antiqui  laris 
6acra  patres  fiimilias  spem  atque  gaudium  omnes  in- 
venient.  Iluic  uni  igitur  reliqua:  cedant  curse.  Si 
hanc  omittitis,  in  quanta  libet  occupatione  nihil  agi- 
tis  :  si  huic  incumbitis,  et  nihil  agere  videmini,  cumu- 
late tamen  et  civium  et  virorum  implevitis  officia. 
Petrarch.e  Horta. 
(Translation.) — Nor  let  any  one  falsely  persuade 
himself,  that  those  who  keep  watch  and  ward  for 
liberty,  are  meddling  with  things  that  do  not  con- 
cern them,  instead  of  minding  their  own  business. 
For  all  men  should  know  that  all  blessings  are  stored 
and  protected  in  this  one,  as  in  a  common  repository. 
Here  is  the  tradesman's  security,  the  soldier's  honor, 
the  agriculturist's  profit.  Lastly,  in  this  one  good  of 
Liberty  the  Religious  will  find  the  permission  of  their 
rites  and  forms  of  worship,  the  students  their  learn- 
ed leisure,  the  aged  their  repose,  boys  the  rudiments 
of  the  several  branches  of  their  education,  maidens 
their  chaste  nuptials,  matrons  their  womanly  honor 
and  the  dignity  of  their  modesty,  and  fathers  of  fami- 
lies the  dues  of  natural  affection  and  the  sacred  privi- 
leges of  their  ancient  home.  To  this  one  solicimde 
therefore  let  all  other  cares  yield  the  priority.  If  you 
omit  this,  be  occupied  as  much  and  sedulously  as  you 
may,  you  are  doing  nothing :  If  you  apply  your  heart 
and  strength  to  this,  though  you  seem  to  be  doing  no- 
thing, you  will,  nevertheless,  have  been  fulfilling  the 
duties  of  citizens  and  of  men,  yea  in  a  measure  press- 
ed down  and  running  over. 


ESSAY   XI. 


Nemo  vero  fallatur,  quasi  minora  sint  animorum  contagia 
quam  corpomm.  Majora  sunt ;  gravius  lcedunt;  altius  de- 
scendunt,  serpuntquc  latentius. 

PETRARCH,  de  Vit.  Solit.  L.  1.  s.  3.  c.  4. 

(Translation.)— And  let  no  man  be  deceived  as  if  the  conta- 
gions oCthe  soul  were  less  than  those  of  the  body.  They 
are  yet  greater ;  they  convey  more  direful  diseases ;  they 
sink  deeper,  and  creep  on  more  unsuspectedly. 

We  have  abundant  reason  then  to  infer,  that  the 
Law  of  England  has  done  well  and  concluded  wisely 
in  proceeding  on  the  principle  so  clearly  worded  by 
Milton  ;  that  a  book  should  be  as  freely  admitted  into 
the  world  as  any  other  birth  ;  and  if  it  prove  a  mon- 
ster, who  denies  but  that  it  may  justly  be  burnt  or 
sunk  into  the  sea  ?  We  have  reason  then,  I  repeat,  to 
res:  satisfied  with  our  Laws,  which  no  more  prevent 
a  book  from  coming  into  the  world  unlicensed,  lest  it 
should  prove  a  libel,  than  a  traveller  from  passing 
unquestioned  through  our  turn-pike  gates,  because  it 
is  possible  he  may  be  a  highwayman.  Innocence  is 
presumed  in  both  cases.  The  publication  is  a  part 
of  the  offence,  and  its  necessary  condition.    Words 


are  moral  acts,  and  words  deliberately  made  public 
the  law  considers  in  the  same  light  as  any  other  cog- 
nizable overt>act. 

Here  however  a  difficulty  presents  itself.  Theft, 
Robbery,  Murder,  and  the  like,  are  easily  defined  :  the 
degrees  and  circumstances  likewise  of  these  and  sim- 
ilar actions  are  definite,  and  constitute  specific  offences, 
described  and  punishable  each  under  its  own  name. 
We  have  only  to  prove  the  fact  and  identify  the  of- 
fender. The  intention  too,  in  the  great  majority  of 
cases,  is  so  clearly  implied  in  the  action,  that  the 
Law  can  safely  adopt  it  as  its  universal  maxim,  that 
the  proof  of  the  malice  is  included  in  the  proof  of  the 
fact :  especially  as  the  few  occasional  exceptions  have 
their  remedy  provided  in  the  prerogative  entrusted 
to  the  supreme  Magistrate.  But  in  the  case  of  Libel, 
the  degree  makes  the  kind,  the  circumstances  consti- 
tute the  criminality ;  and  both  degrees  and  circum- 
stances, like  the  ascending  shades  of  color  or  the 
shooting  hues  of  a  dove's  neck,  die  away  into  each 
other,  incapable  of  definition  or  outline.  The  eye  of 
the  understanding,  indeed,  sees  the  determinate  dif- 
ference in  each  individual  case,  but  language  is  most 
often  inadequate  to  express  what  the  eye  perceives, 
much  less  can  a  general  statute  anticipate  and  pre- 
define it.  Again ;  in  other  overt-acts  a  charge  dis- 
proved leaves  the  Defendant  either  guilty  of  a  dif- 
ferent fault,  or  at  best  simply  blameless.  A  man  hav- 
ing killed  a  fellow-citizen  is  acquitted  of  murder — the 
act  was  Manslaughter  only,  or  it  was  justifiable  Ho- 
micide. But  when  we  reverse  the  iniquitous  sen- 
tence passed  on  Algernon  Sidney,  during  our  perusal 
of  his  work  on  Government ;  at  the  moment  we  deny 
it  to  have  been  a  traitorous  Libel,  our  beating  hearts 
declare  it  to  have  been  a  benefaction  to  our  country, 
and  under  the  circumstances  of  those  times  the  per- 
formance of  an  heroic  duty.  From  this  cause  there- 
fore, as  well  as  from  a  Libel's  being  a  thing  made  up 
of  degrees  and  circumstances  (and  these  too  discrimi- 
nating offence  from  merit  by  such  dim  and  ambulant 
boundaries)  the  intention  of  the  agent,  wherever  it 
can  be  independently  or  exclusively  ascertained, 
.must  be  allowed  a  great  share  in  determining  the 
character  of  the  action,  unless  the  Law  is  not  only  to 
be  divorced  from  moral  Justice*  but  to  wage  open 
hostility  against  it. 

Add  too,  that  Laws  in  doubtful  points  are  to  be  in- 
terpreted according  to  the  design  of  the  legislator, 
where  this  can  be  certainly  inferred.  But  the  Laws 
of  England,  which  owe  their  own  present  supremacy 
and  absoluteness  to  the  good  sense  and  generous  dis- 
positions diffused  by  the  Press  more,  far  more,  than 
to  any  other  single  cause,  must  needs  be  presumed 
favorable  to  its  general  influence.  Even  in  the  pen- 
alties attached  to  its  abuse,  we  must  suppose  the  Le- 
gislature to  have  been  actuated  by  the  desire  of  pre- 
serving its  essential  privileges.  The  Press  is  indif- 
ferently the  passive  instrument  of  Evil  and  of  Good; 
nav,  there  is  some  good  even  in  its  evil.  "  Good  and 
Evil,"  says  Milton,  in  the  Speech  from  which  I  have 

*  According  to  the  old  adage  :  you  are  not  hunt'  for  steal- 
ing a  horse,  but  that  horses  may  not  be  stolen.    To  what  ex- 
tent this  is  true,  we  shall  have  occasion  to  examine  hereafter. 
395 


386 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


selected  the  Motto  of  the  preceding  Essay,  "  in  the 
field  of  this  world,  grow  up  together  almost  insepa- 
rably :  and  the  knowledge  of  Good  is  so  inlervolved 
and  interwoven  with  the  knowledge  of  Evil,  and  in 
so  many  tunning  resemblances  hardly  to  be  discern- 
ed, that  those  confused  seeds  which  were  imposed  on 
Psyche  as  an  incessant  labor  to  cull  out  and  sort 
asunder,  were  not  more  intermixed.  As,  therefore, 
the  state  of  man  now  is,  what  wisdom  can  there  be 
to  choose,  what  continence  to  forbear,  without  the 
knowledge  of  Evil  ?  He  that  can  apprehend  and 
consider  Vice  with  all  her  baits  and  seeming  plea- 
sures, and  yet  abstain,  and  yet  distinguish,  and  yet 
prefer  that  which  is  truly  better,  he  is  the  true  way- 
faring Christian.  I  cannot  praise  a  fugitive  and  clois- 
tered virtue,  that  never  sallies  out  and  sees  her  ad- 
versary : — that  which  is  but  a  youngling  in  the  con- 
templation of  Evil,  and  knows  not  the  utmost  that 
Vice  promises  to  her  followers,  and  rejects  it,  is  but  a 
blank  Virtue,  not  a  pure.  —  Since,  therefore,  the 
knowledge  and  survey  of  Vice  is  in  this  world  so  ne- 
cessary to  the  constituting  of  human  Virtue,  and  the 
scanning  of  Error  to  the  confirmation  of  Truth,  how 
can  we  more  safely  and  with  less  danger  scout  into 
the  regions  of  Sin  and  Falsity,  than  by  reading  all 
manner  of  Tractates,  and  hearing  all  manner  of  rea- 
son ?"  Again — but,  indeed  the  whole  Treatise  is  one 
strain  of  moral  wisdom  and  political  prudence  — 
"  Why  should  we  then  affect  a  rigor  contrary  to  the 
manner  of  God  and  of  Nature,  by  abridging  or  scant- 
ing those  means,  which  Books,  freely  permitted,  are 
both  to  the  trial  of  Virtue  and  the  exercise  of  Truth  ? 
It  would  be  better  done  to  learn,  that  the  Law  must 
needs  be  frivolous,  which  goes  to  restrain  things  un- 
certainly, and  yet  equally  working  to  Good  and  to 
Evil.  And  were  I  the  chooser,  a  dram  of  well-doing 
should  be  preferred  before  many  times  as  much  the 
forcible  hindrance  of  Evil-doing.  For  God  sure  es- 
teems the  growth  and  completion  of  one  virtuous 
person  more  than  the  restraint  of  ten  vicious." 

The  evidence  of  history  is  strong  in  favor  of  the 
same  principles,  even  in  respect  of  their  expediency. 
The  average  result  of  the  Press  from  Henry  VIII.  to 
Charles  I.  was  such  a  diffusion  of  religious  light  as 
first  redeemed  and  afterwards  saved  this  nation  from 
the  spiritual  and  moral  death  of  Popery;  and  in  the 
following  period  it  is  to  the  Press  that  we  owe  the 
gradual  ascendency  of  those  wise  political  maxims, 
which  casting  philosophic  truth  in  the  moulds  of  na- 
tional laws,  customs,  and  existing  orders  of  society, 
subverted  the  tyranny  without  suspending  the  go- 
vernment, and  at  length  completed  the  mild  and  sa- 
lutary revolution  by  the  establishment  of  the  House 
of  Brunswick.  To  what  must  we  attribute  this  vast 
over-balance  of  Good  in  the  general  effects  of  the 
Press,  but  to  the  over-balance  of  virtuous  intention 
in  those  who  employed  the  Press  ?  The  Law,  there- 
fore, will  not  refuse  to  manifest  good  intention  a  cer- 
tain weight  even  in  cases  of  apparent  error,  lest  it 
should  discourage  and  scare  away  those,  to  whose  ef- 
forts we  owe  the  comparative  infrequency  and  weak- 
ness of  error  on  the  whole.  The  Law  may  however, 
nay,  it  must  demand,  that  the  external  proofs  of  the 


author's  honest  intentions  should  be  supported  by  the 
general  style  and  matter  of  his  work,  and  by  the  cir- 
cumstances, and  mode  of  its  publication.  A  passage, 
which  in  a  grave  and  regular  disquisition  would  be 
blameless,  might  become  highly  libellous  and  justly 
punishable,  if  it  were  applied  to  present  measures  or 
persons  for  immediate  purposes,  in  a  cheap  and  popu- 
lar tract.  I  have  seldom  felt  greater  indignation  than 
at  finding  in  a  large  manufactory  a  sixpenny  pamph- 
let, containing  a  selection  of  inflammatory  paragraphs 
from  the  prose-writings  of  Milton,  without  a  hint 
given  of  the  time,  occasion,  state  of  government,  &c. 
under  which  they  were  written,  not  a  hint  that  the 
Freedom,  which  we  now  enjoy,  exceeds  all  that  Mil- 
ton dared  hope  for,  or  deemed  practicable;  and  that 
his  political  creed  sternly  excluded  the  populace,  and 
indeed  the  majority  of  the  population,  from  all  pre- 
tensions to  political  power.  If  the  manifest  bad  in- 
tention would  constitute  this  publication  a  seditious 
Libel,  a  good  intention  equally  manifest  cannot  justly 
be  denied  its  share  of  influence  in  producing  a  con- 
trary verdict. 

Here  then  is  the  difficulty.  From  the  very  nature 
of  a  libel  it  is  impossible  so  to  define  it,  but  that  the 
most  meritorious  works  will  be  found  included  in  the 
description.  Not  from  any  defect  or  undue  severity 
in  the  particular  Statute,  but  from  the  very  nature  of 
the  offence  to  be  guarded  against,  a  work  recom- 
mending reform  by  the  only  rational  mode  of  recom- 
mendation, that  is,  by  the  detection  and  exposure  of 
corruption,  abuse,  or  incapacity,  might,  though  it 
should  breathe  the  best  and  most  unadulterated 
English  feelings,  be  brought  within  the  definition  of 
libel  equally  with  the  vilest  incendiary  Brochure, 
that  ever  aimed  at  leading  and  misleading  the  multi- 
tude. Not  a  paragraph  in  the  Morning  Post  during 
the  peace  of  Amiens,  (or  rather  the  experimental 
truce  so  called)  though  to  the  immortal  honor  of  the 
then  editor,  that  newspaper  was  the  chief  secondary 
means  of  producing  the  unexampled  national  unani- 
mity, with  which  the  war  re-commenced  and  has 
since  been  continued — not  a  paragraph  warning  the 
nation,  as  need  was  and  most  imperious  duty  com- 
manded, of  the  perilous  designs  and  unsleeping  ambi- 
tion of  our  neighbor,  the  mimic  and  caricaturist  of 
Charlemagne,  but  was  a  punishable  libel.  The  sta- 
tute of  libel  is  a  vast  aviary,  which  incages  the 
awakening  cock  and  the  geese  whose  alarum  pre- 
served the  capitol,  no  less  than  the  babbling  magpye 
and  ominous  screech-owl.  And  yet  will  we  avoid 
this  seeming  injustice,  we  throw  down  all  fence  and 
bulwark  of  public  decency  and  public  opinion ;  poli- 
tical calumny  will  soon  join  hands  with  private  slan- 
der ;  and  every  principle,  every  feeling,  that  binds  the 
citizen  to  his  country  and  the  spirit  to  its  Creator,  will 
be  undermined — not  by  reasoning,  for  from.that  there 
is  no  danger;  but — by  the  mere  habit  of  hearing  them 
reviled  and  scoffed  at  with  impunity.  Were  we  to 
contemplate  the  evils  of  a  rank  and  unweeded  press 
only  in  its  effects  on  the  manners  of  a  people,  and  on 
the  general  tone  of  thought  and  conversation,  the 
greater  the  love,  which  we  bore  to  literature  and  .to 
all  the  means  and  instruments  of  human  improve- 
396 


THE  FRIEND. 


387 


ment,  the  greater  would  be  the  earnestness  with 
which  we  should  solicit  the  interference  of  law  :  the 
more  anxiously  should  we  wish  for  some  Ithureal 
spear,  that  might  remove  from  the  ear  of  the  public, 
and  expose  in  their  own  fiendish  shape  those  reptiles, 
which  inspiring  venom  and  forging  illusions  as  they 
list, 

thence  raise, 

At  least  distempered  discontented  thoughts, 
Vain  hopes,  vain  aims,  inordinate  desires. 

Paradise  Lost. 


ESSAY  XII, 


Quomodo  autem  id  futurum  sit.  ne  quis  incredibile  arbitretur, 
ostendam.  Jn  primis  multiplicabitur  regnum,  et  summa 
rerum  potestas  per  plurimos  dissipata  et  coneisa  minuetur. 
Tunc  discordire  civiles  serentur,  nee  ulla  requies  belles  ex- 
itialibus  erit,  dum  exercitibus  in  immensum  coactis,  reges 
disperdent  omnia,  et  comminuent :  donee  adversus  eos  dux 
potentissiruus  a  plebe  orietur,  et  assumetur  in  sneietatem  a 
ceteris,  et  princeps  omnium  constituetur.  Hie  insuslentabili 
domination,-  vexabit  orbem,  divini  et  humana  miscebit:  in- 
fanda  dictu  et  execrabilia  molietur  :  nova  consilia  in  pec- 
tore  suo  volutabit,  ut  proprium  sibi  constiluat  imperium  : 
leges  commutabit,  et  suas  sanciet,  contaminabit,  diripiet, 
spoliabit,  occidet.  Denique  immutatis  nominibus,  et  im- 
perii sede  trans'ata,  confusio  ac  perturbatio  humani  generis 
consequetur.  Turn  vere  detestabile,  et  atque  abominandum 
tempus  existet,  quo  nulli  hominum  sit  vita  jucunda. 

LACTANTIUS  dc  Vita  Beata,  Lib.  vii.  c.  16. 


But  lest  this  should  be  deemed  incredible,  I  show  the  man- 
ner in  which  it  is  to  lake  place.  First,  there  will  be  a  multi- 
tiplication  of  independent  sovereignties ;  and  the  supreme 
magistracy  of  the  Empire,  scattered  and  cut  up  into  frag- 
ments, will  be  enfeebled  in  the  exercise  of  power  by  law 
and  authority.  Then  will  be  sowed  the  seeds  of  civil  discords, 
nor  will  there  be  any  rest  or  pause  to  wasteful  and  ruinous 
wars,  while  the  soldiery  kept  together  in  immense  standing 
armies,  the  Kings  will  crash  and  lay  waste  at  their  will ; — 
until  at  length  there  will  raise  up  against  them  a  most  puis- 
tant  military  chieftain  of  low  birth,  who  will  have  acceded 
to  him  a  fellowship  with  the  other  Sovereigns  of  the  earth, 
and  will  finally  be  constituted  the  head  of  all.  This  man  will 
harass  the  civilized  world  with  an  insupportable  despotism, 
he  will  confound  and  commix  all  things  spiritual  and  tempo- 
ral. He  will  form  plans  and  preparations  of  the  most  exe- 
crable and  sacrilegious  nature.  He  will  be  for  ever  restli  Bsly 
turning  over  new  schemes  in  his  imagination,  in  order  that  he 
may  fix  the  imperial  power  over  all  in  his  own  name  and 
possessions.  He  will  change  the  former  laws,  he  will  sanction 
a  code  of  his  own,  he  will  contaminate,  pillage,  lay  waste  and 
massacre.  At  length,  when  he  has  succeeded  in  the  change 
of  names  and  titles,  and  in  the  transfer  of  the  seat  of  Empire, 
there  will  follow  a  confusion  and  perturbation  of  the  human 
race  ;  then  will  there  be  for  a  while  an  era  of  horror  and  abo- 
mination, during  which  no  man  will  enjoy  his  life  in  quiet- 
ness. 


I  interpose  this  Essay  as  an  historical  comment  on 
the  words  "  mimic  and  caricaturist  of  Charlemagne," 
as  applied  to  the  despot,  whom  since  the  time  that 
the  words  were  first  printed,  we  have,  thank  heaven ! 
succeeded  in  incaging.  The  Motto  contains  the  most 
striking  instance  of  an  uninspired  prophecy  fulfilled 
even  in  its  minutiae,  that  I  recollect  ever  to  have  met 
with  :  and  it  is  hoped,  that  as  a  curiosity  it  will  recon- 
cile my  readers  to  its  unusual  length.    But  though 


my  chief  motive  was  that  of  relieving  (by  the  variety 
of  an  historical  parallel)  the  series  of  argument  on 
this  most  important  of  all  subjects,  the  communica- 
bility  of  truth,  yet  the  Essay  is  far  from  being  a  di- 
gression. HavingJn  the  preceding  number  given 
utterance  to-quicqtadin  rem  tammalefcam  indtgnatio 
dolorque  dintarent,  concerning  the  mischiefs  of  a  law- 
less Press,  I  held  it  an  act  of  justice  to  give  a  portrait 
no  less  lively  of  the  excess  to  which  the  remorseless 
ambition  of  a  government  might  accumulate  its  op- 
pressions in  the  one  instance  before  the  discovery  of 
Printing,  and  in  the  other  during  the  suppression  of 
its  freedom. 

I  have  translated  the  following  from  a  voluminous 
German  work,  Michael  Ignuz  Schmidt's  History  of 
the  Germans;  in  which  this  Extract  forms  the  con- 
clusion of  the  second  chapter  of  the  third  book,  from 
Charles  the  Great  to  Conrade  the  First.  The  late 
Tvrant's  close  imitation  of  Charlemagne  was  suffi- 
ciently evidenced  by  his  assumption  of  the  Iron 
Crown  of  Italy ;  by  his  imperial  coronation,  with  the 
presence  and  authority  of  the  Holy  Father;  by  his 
imperial  robe  embroidered  with  bees  in  order  to  mark 
him  as  a  successor  of  Pepin  ;  and  even  by  his  osten- 
tatious revocation  of  Charlemagne's  grants  to  the 
Bishop  of  Rome.  But  that  the  differences  might  be 
felt  likewise,  I  prefaced  the  translation  here  re-print- 
ed with  the  few  following  observations. 

Let  it  be  remembered  then,  that  Charlemagne,  for 
the  greater  part,  created  for  himself  the  means  of 
which  he  availed  himself;  that  his  very  education 
was  his  own  work,  and  that  unlike  Peter  the  Great, 
he  could  find  no  assistants  out  of  his  own  realm  ;  that 
the  unconquerable  courage  and  heroic  dispositions  of 
the  nations  he  conquered,  supplied  a  proof  positive 
of  real  superiority,  indeed  the  sole  positive  proof  of 
intellectual  power  in  a  warrior :  for  howr  can  we 
measure  force  but  by  the  resistance  of  it  ?  But  all 
was  prepared  for  Buonaparte ;  Europe  weakened  in 
the  very  heart  of  all  human  strength,  namely,  in 
moral  and  religious  principle,  and  at  the  same  time 
accidentally  destitute  of  any  one  great  or  command- 
ing mind  :  the  French  people,  on  the  other  hand, 
still  restless  from  revolutionary  fanaticism  ;  their  civic 
enthusiasm  already  passed  into  military  passion  and 
the  ambition  of  conquest;  and  alike  by  disgust,  ter- 
ror, and  characteristic  unfitness  for  freedom,  ripe  for 
the  reception  of  a  despotism.  Add  too,  that  the  main 
obstacles  to  an  unlimited  system  of  conquest,  and  the 
pursuit  of  univeral  monarchy  had  been  cleared  away 
for  him  by  his  pioneers  the  Jacobins,  viz.  the  influ- 
ence of  the  great  land-holders,  of  the  privileged  and 
of  the  commercial  classes.  Even  the  naval  successes 
of  Great  Britain,  by  destroying  the  trade,  rendered 
useless  the  colonies,  and  almost  annihilating  the  navy 
of  France,  were  in  some  respects  subservient  to  his 
designs  by  concentrating  the  powers  of  the  French 
empire  in  its  armies,  and  supplying  them  out  of  the 
wrecks  of  all  other  employments,  save  that  of  agri- 
culture. France  had  already  approximated  to  the 
formidable  state  so  prophetically  described  by  Six 
James  Stuart,  in  his  Political  Economy,  in  which  the 
population  should  consist  chiefly  of  soldiers  and  pea 
397 


388 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


santry :  at  least  the  interests  of  no  other  classes  were 
regarded.  The  great  merit  of  Buonaparte  has  been 
that  of  a  skilful  steersman,  who  with  his  boat  in  the 
most  violent  storm  still  keeps  himself  on  the  summit 
of  the  waves,  which  not  he,.b$£thr  winds  had  raised. 
I  will  now  proceed  to  my^fiaawiftion.' 

That  Charles  was  an  hero.  Ins  exploits  bear  evi- 
dence. The  subjugatioiijaf  the  Lombards,  protected 
as  they  were  by  the  Alps,  by  fortresses  and  fortified 
towns,  by  numerous  armies,  and  by  a  great  name  ; 
of  the  Saxons,  secured  by  their  savage  resoluteness, 
by  an  untameable  love  of  freedom,  by  their  desert 
plains  and  enormous  forests,  and  by  their  own  pover- 
ty ;  the  humbling  of  the  Dukes  of  Bavaria,  Aquita- 
nia,  Bretagne,  and  Gascony ;  proud  of  their  ancestry 
as  well  as  of  their  ample  domains ;  the  almost  entire 
extirpation  of  the  Avars,  so  long  the  terror  of  Europe ; 
are  assuredly  works  which  demand  a  courage  and  a 
firmness  of  mind  such  as  Charles  only  possessed. 

How  great  his  reputation  was,  and  this  too  beyond 
the  limits  of  Europe,  is  proved  by  the  embassies  sent 
to  him  out  of  Persia,  Palestine,  Mauritania,  and  even 
from  the  Caliphs  of  Bagdad.  If  at  the  present  day 
an  embassy  from  the  Black  or  Caspian  Sea  comes  to 
a  prince  on  the  Baltic,  it  is  not  to  be  wondered  at, 
since  such  are  now  the  political  relations  of  the  four 
quarters  of  the  world,  that  a  blow  which  is  given  to 
any  one  of  them  is  felt  more  or  less  by  all  the  others. 
Whereas  in  the  times  of  Charlemagne,  the  inhabit- 
ants in  one  of  the  known  parts  of  the  world  scarcely 
knew  what  was  going  on  in  the  rest.  Nothing  but 
the  extraordinary,  all-piercing  report  of  Charles's  ex- 
ploits could  bring  this  to  pass.  His  greatness,  which 
set  the  world  in  astonishment,  was  likewise,  without 
doubt,  that  which  begot  in  the  Pope  and  the  Romans 
the  first  idea  of  the  re-establishment  of  their  empire. 

It  is  true,  that  a  number  of  things  united  to  make 
Charles  a  great  man — favourable  circumstances  of 
time,  a  nation  already  disciplined  to  warlike  habits, 
a  long  life,  and  the  consequent  acquisition  of  experi- 
ence, such  as  no  one  possessed  in  his  whole  realm. 
Still,  however,  the  principal  means  of  his  greatness 
Charles  found  in  himself.  His  great  mind  was  capa- 
ble of  extending  its  attention  to  the  greatest  multipli- 
city of  affairs.  In  the  middle  of  Saxony  he  thought 
on  Italy  and  Spain,  and  at  Rome  he  made  provisions 
for  Saxony,  Bavaria,  and  Pannonia.  He  gave  audi- 
ence to  the  Ambassadors  of  the  Greek  emperor  and 
other  potentates,  and  himself  audited  the  accounts  of 
his  own  farms,  where  everything  was  entered  even 
to  the  number  of  the  eggs.  Busy  as  his  mind  w'as, 
his  body  was  not  less  in  one  continued  state  of  motion. 
Charles  would  see  into  everything  himself  arid  do 
everything  himself,  as  far  as.  his  powers  extended: 
and  even  this  it  was  too,  which  gave  to  his  under- 
takings such  a  force  and  energy. 

But  with  all  this  the  government  of  Charles  was 
the  government  of  a  conqueror,  that  is  splendid  abroad 
and  fearfully  oppressive  at  home.  What  a  grievance 
must  it  not  have  been  for  the  people  that  Charles  for 
forty  years  together  dragged  them  now  to  the  Elbe, 
then  to  the  Ebro,  after  this  to  the  Po,  and  from  thence 
Dack  again  to  the  Elbe,  and  this  not  to  check  an  in- 


vading enemy,  but  to  make  conquests  which  little 
profited  the  French  nation !  This  must  prove  loo 
much,  at  length,  for  a  hired  soldier:  how  much  more 
for  conscripts,  who  did  not  live  only  to  fight,  but  who 
were  fathers  of  families,  citizens,  and  proprietors  ? 
But  above  all,  it  is  to  be  wondered  at,  that  a  nation 
like  the  French,  should  suffer  themselves  to  be  used 
as  Charles  used  them.  But  the  people  no  longer 
possessed  any  considerable  share  of  influence.  All 
depended  on  the  great  chieftains,  who  gave  their  wil- 
ling suffrage  for  endless  wars,  by  which  they  were 
always  sure  to  win.  They  found  the  best  opportunity, 
under  such  circumstances,  to  make  themselves  great 
and  mighty  at  the  expense  of  the  freemen  resident 
within  the  circle  of  their  baronial  courts;  and  when 
conquests  were  made,  it  was  far  more  for  their  ad- 
vantage than  that  of  the  monarchy.  In  the  conquer- 
ed provinces  there  was  a  necessity  for  dukes,  vassal 
kings,  and  different  high  offices:  all  this  fell  to  their 
share. 

I  would  not  say  this  if  we  did  not  possess  incontro- 
vertible original  documents  of  those  times,  which 
prove  clearly  to  us  that  Charles's  government  was  an 
unhappy  one  for  the  people,  and  that  this  great  man, 
by  his  actions,  labored  to  the  direct  subversion  of  his 
first  principles.  It  was  his  first  pretext  to  establish  a 
greater  equality  among  the  members  of  his  vast  com- 
munity, and  to  make  all  free  and  equal  subjects  un- 
der a  common  sovereign.  And  from  the  necessity 
occasioned  by  continual  war,  the  exact  contrary  took 
place.  Nothing  gives  us  a  better  notion  of  the  inte- 
rior state  of  the  French  Monarchy,  than  the  third  ca- 
pitular of  the  year  811.  {Compare  with  this  the  four 
or  Jive  quarto  vols,  of  the  present  French  Conscript 
Code.)  All  is  full  of  complaint;  the  Bishops  and 
Earls  clamoring  against  the  freeholders,  and  these  in 
their  turn  against  the  Bishops  and  Earls.  And  in 
truth  the  freeholders  had  no  small  reason  to  be  dis- 
contented and  to  resist,  as  far  as  they  dared,  even  the 
imperial  levies.  A  dependant  must  be  content  to  fol- 
low his  lord  without  further  questioning:  for  he  was 
paid  for  it.  But  a  free  citizen,  who  lived  wholly  on 
his  own  property,  might  reasonably  object  to  suffer 
himself  to  be  dragged  about  in  all  quarters  of  the 
world,  at  the  fancies  of  his  lord :  especially  as  there 
was  so  much  injustice  intermixed.  Those  who  gave 
up  their  properties  entirely,  or  in  part,  of  their  own 
accord,  were  left  undisturbed  at  home,  while  those, 
who  refused  to  do  this,  were  forced  so  often  into  ser- 
vice, that  at  length,  becoming  impoverished,  they 
were  compelled  by  want  to  give  up,  or  dispose  of 
their  free  tenures  to  the  Bishops  or  Earls.  (It  would 
require  no  great  ingenuity  to  discover  parallels,  or  at 
least,  equivalent  hardships  to  these,  in  the  treatment  if, 
and  regulations  concerning  the  reluctant  conscripts.) 

It  almost  surpasses  belief  to  what  a  height,  at  length, 
the  aversion  to  war  rose  in  the  French  nation,  from 
the  multitude  of  the  campaigns  and  the  grievances 
connected  with  them.  The  national  vanity  was  now 
satiated  by  the  frequency  of  victories;  and  the  plun- 
der which  fell  to  the  lot  of  individuals,  made  but  a 
poor  compensation  for  the  losses  and  burthens  sus- 
tained by  their  families  at  home.  Some,  in  order  to 
398 


THE  FRIEND. 


389 


become  exempt  from  military  service,  sought  for  me- 
nial employments  in  tlie  establishments  of  the  Bish- 
ops, Abbots,  Abbesses,  and  Earls.  Others  made  over 
their  free  property  to  become  tenants  at  will  of  such 
Lords,  as  from  their  age  or  other  circumstances,  they 
thought  would  be  called  to  no  further  military  ser- 
vices. Others,  even  privately  took  away  the  life  of 
their  mothers,  aunts,  or  other  of  their  relatives,  in  or- 
der that  no  family  residents  might  remain  through 
whom  their  names  might  be  known,  and  themselves 
traced  ;  others  voluntarily  made  slaves  of  themselves, 
in  order  thus  to  render  themselves  incapable  of  the 
military  rank. 

When  this  Extract  was  first  published,  namely, 
September  7,  1809, 1  prefixed  the  following  sentence. 
■  This  passage  contains  so  much  matter  for  political 
anticipation  and  well-grounded  hope,  that  I  feel  no  ap- 
prehension of  the  Reader's  being  dissatisfied  with  its 
length."  I  trust,  that  I  may  derive  the  same  confi- 
dence from  his  genial  exultation,  as  a  Christian ;  and 
from  his  honest  pride  as  a  Briton;  in  the  retrospect 
of  its  completion.  In  this  belief  I  venture  to  conclude 
the  Fssay  with  the  following  Extract  from  a  "  Com- 
parison of  the  French  Republic,  under  Buonaparte, 
with  the  Roman  Empire  under  the  first  Cffisars,"  pub- 
lished by  me  in  the  Morning  Post,  Tuesday,  21  Sept., 
1802. 

If  then  there  is  no  counterpoise  of  dissimilar  cir- 
cumstances, the  prospect  is  gloomy  indeed.  The  com- 
mencement of  the  public  slavery  in  Rome  was  in  the 
most  splendid  era  of  human  genius.  Any  unusually 
flourishing  period  of  the  arts  and  sciences  in  any 
country,  is,  even  to  this  day,  called  the  Augustan  age 
of  that  country.  The  Roman  poets,  the  Roman  his- 
torians, the  Roman  orators,  rivalled  those  of  Greece  ; 
in  military  tactics,  in  machinery,  in  all  the  conve- 
niences of  private  life,  the  Romans  greatly  surpassed 
the  Greeks.  With  few  exceptions,  all  the  emperors, 
even  the  worst  of  them,  were,  like  Buonaparte,*  the 
liberal  encouragers  of  all  great  public  works,  and  of 
every  species  of  public  merit  not  connected  with  the 
assertion  of  political  freedom. 

O  Juvenes,  circumspicit  et  agitat  vos, 

Materiamque  sibi  Ducis  indulgentia  quanit. 


*  Imitators  succeed  better  in  copying  the  vices  than  the  ex- 
cellences or  their  archetypes.  Where  shall  we  find  in  the 
First  Consul  of  France  a  counterpart  to  the  generous  and 
dreadless  clemency  of  the  first  Caesar'?  Acerbe  loquentibus 
satis  habuit  pro  condone  denunciare.  ne  persevarent.  Au- 
lique  Ctecinee  criminosissimo  libro,  et  Pitholai  carminibus  ma- 
ledicentisiimis  laceratam  exist  imationem  suam  civili  animo 
Uilit. 

It  deserves  translation,  for  our  English  readers.  "  If  any 
spoke  bitterly  against  him,  he  held  it  sufficient  to  complain  of 
it  publicly,  to  prevent  them  from  persevering  in  the  use  of 
euch  language.  His  character  had  been  mangled  in  a  most 
libellous  work  of  Aulus  Cscina,  and  he  had  been  grossly  lam- 
pooned in  snme  verses  by  Pitholaua  ;  but  he  bore  both  with 
the  tempfr  of  a  good  citizen." 

For  this  part  of  the  First  Consul's  character,  if  common  re- 
part  speaks  the  truth,  we  must  seek  a  parallel  in  the  disposi- 
tions of  the  thud  Ca-sar,  who  dreaded  the  pen  of  a  paragraph 
writer,  hinting  aught  against  his  morals  and  measures,  with 
as  great  anxiety,  and  with  as  vindictive  feelings,  as  if  it  had 
been  the  dagger  of  an  assassin  lifted  up  against  his  life.  From 
the  third  Ciesar,  too,  he  adopted  the  abrogation  of  all  popular 
elections. 


It  is  even  so,  at  this  present  moment,  in  France. 
Yet,  both  in  France  and  in  Rome,  we  have  learned, 
that  the  most  abject  dispositions  to  slavery  rapidly 
trod  on  the  heels  of  the  most  outrageous  fanaticism 
for  an  almost  anarchical  liberty.  Ruere  in  servilium 
patres  et  populum.  Peace  and  the  coadunation  of  all 
the  civilized  provinces  of  the  earth  were  the  grand 
and  plausible  pretexts  of  Roman  despotism :  the  de- 
generacy of  the  human  species  itself,  in  all  the  na- 
tions so  blended,  was  the  melancholy  effect.  To- 
morrow, therefore,  we  shall  endeavor  to  detect  all 
those  points  and  circumstances  of  dissimilarity,  which, 
though  they  cannot  impeach  the  rectitude  of  the  par- 
allel, for  the  present,  may  yet  render  it  probable,  that 
as  the  same  Constitution  of  Government  has  been 
built  up  in  France  with  incomparably  greater  rapid- 
ity, so  it  may  have  an  incomparably  shorter  duration. 
We  are  not  conscious  of  any  feelings  of  bitterness  to- 
wards the  First  Consul ;  or,  if  any,  only  that  venial 
prejudice,  which  naturally  results  from  the  having 
hoped  proudly  of  any  individual,  and  the  having  been 
miserably  disappointed.  But  we  will  not  voluntarily 
cease  to  think  freely  and  speak  openly.  We  owe 
grateful  hearts,  and  uplifted  hands  of  thanksgiving  to 
the  Divine  Providence,  that  there  is  yet  one  Europe- 
an country  (and  that  country  our  own)  in  which  the 
actions  of  public  men  may  be  boldly  analyzed,  and 
the  result  publicly  stated.  And  let  the  Chief  Consul, 
who  professes  in  all  things  to  follow  his  fate,  learn 
to  submit  to  it  if  he  finds  that  it  is  still  his  fate  to 
struggle  with  the  spirit  of  English  freedom,  and  the 
virtues  which  are  the  offspring  of  that  spirit !  If  he 
finds  that  the  Genius  of  Great  Britain,  which  blew 
up  his  ^Egyptian  navy  into  the  air,  and  blighted  his 
Syrian  laurels,  still  follows  him  with  a  calm  and 
dreadful  eye ;  and  in  peace,  equally  as  in  war,  still 
watches  for  that  liberty,  in  which  alone  the  Genius 
of  our  Isle  lives,  and  moves,  and  has  his  being ;  and  -  , 
which  being  lost,  all  our  commercial  and  naval  great- 
ness would  instantly  languish,  like  a  flower,  the''4B&'.. 
of  which  had  been  silently  eat  away  by  a  worm  ;  ana 
without  which,  in  any  country,  the  public  festivals, 
and  pompous  merriments  of  a  nation  present  no  other 
spectacle  to  the  eye  of  Reason,  than  a  mob  of  mani- 
acs dancing  in  their  fetters. 


ESSAY   XIII. 


Must  there  be  still  some  discord  mixt  among 

The  harmony  of  men,  whose  mood  accords 

Best  with  contention  tun'd  to  notes  of  wrong  1 

That  when  War  fails,  Peace  must  make  war  with  words, 

With  words  unto  destruction  arm'd  more  strong 

Than  ever  were  our  foreign  Foeman's  swords  : 

Making  as  deep,  tho'  not  yet  bleeding  wounds  f 

What  War  left  scarless,  Calumny  confounds. 

Truth  lies  entrapp'd  where  Cunning  finds  no  bar: 
I  Since  no  proportion  can  there  be  betwixt 
!  Our  actions  which  in  endless  motions  are, 
i  And  ordinanctis  which  are  always  fi.\t. 

Ten  thousand  Laws  more  cannot  reach  so  far, 

But  Malice  goes  beyond,  or  lives  commixt 

So  close  with  Goodness,  that  it  ever  will 
I  Corrupt,  disguise,  or  counterfeit  it  still. 

399 


390 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


And  therefore  would  our  glorious  Alfred,  who 
Join'd  with  the  King's  the  good  man's  Majesty, 
Not  leave  Law's  labyrinth  without  a  clue- 
Gave  to  deep  Skill  its  ju6t  authority,— 

But  the  lost  Judgment  (this  his  Jury's  plan) 
Left  to  the  natural  sense  of  Work-day  .Man. 

adapted  from  an  elder  Poet. 


We  recur  to  the  dilemma  stated  in  our  eighth  num- 
ber. How  shall  we  solve  this  problem  ?  Its  solution 
is  to  be  found  in  that  spirit  which,  like  the  universal 
menstruum  sought  for  by  the  old  Alchemists,  can 
blend  and  harmonize  the  most  discordant  elements — 
it  is  found  to  be  in  the  spirit  of  a  rational  Freedom 
diffused  and  become  national,  in  the  consequent  in- 
fluence and  control  of  public  opinion,  and  in  its  most 
precious  organ,  the  jury.  It  is  to  be  found,  where- 
ever  Juries  are  sufficiently  enlightened  to  perceive 
the  difference,  and  to  comprehend  the  origin  and  ne- 
cessity of  the  difference,  between  libels  and  other 
criminal  overt-acts,  and  are  sufficiently  independent 
to  act  upon  the  conviction,  thai  in  a  charge  of  libel, 
the  degree,  the  circumstances,  and  intention,  consti- 
tute (not  merely  modify,)  the  offence,  give  it  its  Being, 
and  determine  its  legal  name.  The  words  "  malicious- 
ly and  advisedly,"  must  here  have  a  force  of  their 
own  and  a  proof  of  their  own.  They  will  conse- 
quently consider  the  written  law  as  a  blank  power 
provided  for  the  punishment  of  the  offender,  not  as  a 
light  by  which  they  are  to  determine  and  discrimi- 
nate the  offence.  The  understanding  and  conscience 
of  the  Jury  are  the  Judges,  in  toto :  the  statute  a 
blank  congi  d'elire.  The  Statute  is  the  Clay  and 
those  the  Potter's  wheel.  Shame  fall  on  that  Man, 
who  shall  labor  to  confound  what  reason  and  nature 
have  put  asunder,  and  who  at  once,  as  far  as  in  him 
lies,  would  render  the  Press  ineffectual  and  the  Law 
odious;  who  would  lock  up  the  main  river,  the 
Thames  of  our  intellectual  commerce  ;  would  throw 
a  bar  across  the  stream,  that  must  render  its  naviga- 
tion dangerous  or  partial,  using  as  his  materials  the 
very  banks,  that  were  intended  to  deepen  its  channel 
and  guard  against  inundations.  Shame  fall  on  him, 
and  participation  of  the  infamy  of  those,  who  misled 
an  English  Jury  to  the  murder  of  Algernon  Sidney! 
But  though  the  virtuous  intention  of  the  writer 
must  be  allowed  a  certain  influence  in  facilitating 
his  acquittal,  the  degree  of  his  moral  guilt  is  not  the 
true  index  or  mete-wand  of  his  condemnation.  For 
Juries  do  not  sit  in  a  Court  of  Conscience,  but  of 
Law  ;  they  are  not  the  representatives  of  religion, 
but  the  guardians  of  external  tranquillity.  The  lead- 
ing principle,  the  Pole  Star,  of  the  judgment  in  its 
decision  concerning  the  libellous  nature  of  a  pub- 
lished writing,  is  its  more  or  less  remote  connection 
with  after  overt-acts,  as  the  cause  or  occasion  of  the 
panic.  Thus  the  publication  of  actual  facts  may  be, 
and  most  often  will  be,  criminal  and  libellous,  when 
directed  against  private  characters  :  not  only  because 
the  charge  will  reach  the  minds  of  many  who  can- 
not be  competent  judges  of  the  truth  or  falsehood  of 
facts  to  which  themselves  were  not  witnesses,  against 


a  man  whom  they  do  not  know,  or  at  best  know  im- 
perfectly  ;  but  because  such  a  publication  is  of  itself 
a  very  serious  overt-act,  by  which  the  author,  without 
authority  and  without  trial,  has  inflicted  punishment 
on  a  fellow-subject,  himself  being  witness  and  jury, 
judge  and  executioner.  Of  such  publications  there 
can  be  no  legal  justification,  though  the  wrong  may 
be  palliated  by  the  circumstance  that  the  injurious 
charges  are  not  only  true  but  wholly  out  of  the  reach 
of  the  law.  But  in  libels  on  the  government  there 
are  two  things  to  be  balanced  against  each  other: 
first,  the  incomparably  greater  mischief  of  the  overt- 
acts,  supposing  them  actually  occasioned  by  the  libel 
— (as  for  instance,  the  subversion  of  government  and 
property,  if  the  principles  taught  by  Thomas  Paine 
had  been  realized,  or  if  even  an  attempt  had  been 
made  to  realize  them,  by  the  many  thousands  of  his 
readers;)  and  second,  the  very  great  improbability 
that  such  effects  will  be  produced  by  such  writings. 
Government  concerns  all  generally,  and  no  one  in 
particular.  The  facts  are  commonly  as  well  known 
to  the  reader?,  as  to  the  writer :  and  falsehood  there- 
fore easily  detected.  It  is  proved,  likewise,  by  expe- 
rience, that  the  frequency  of  open  political  discussion, 
with  all  its  blameable  indiscretion,  indisposes  a  nation 
to  overt-acts  of  practical  sedition  or  conspiracy.  They 
talk  ill,  said  Charles  the  Fifth,  of  his  Belgian  Pro- 
vinces, but  they  suffer  so  much  the  better  for  it.  His 
successor  thought  differently:  he  determined  to  be 
master  of  their  words  and  opinions,  as  well  as  of  their 
actions,  and  in  consequence  lost  one  half  of  those  pro- 
vinces, and  retained  the  other  half  at  an  expense  of 
strength  and  treasure  greater  than  the  original  worth 
of  the  whole.  An  enlightened  Jury,  therefore,  will 
require  proofs  of  some  more  than  ordinary  malignity 
of  intention,  as  furnished  by  the  style,  price,  mode  of 
circulation,  and  so  forth  ;  or  of  punishable  indiscre- 
tion arising  out  of  the  state  of  the  times,  as  of  dearth, 
for  instance,  or  of  whatever  other  calamity  is  likely 
to  render  the  lower  classes  turbulent  and  apt  to  be 
alienated  from  the  government  of  their  country.  For 
the  absence  of  a  right  disposition  of  mind  must  be 
considered  both  in  law  and  in  morals,  as  nearly  equiv- 
alent to  the  presence  of  a  wrong  disposition.  Under 
such  circumstances  the  legal  paradox,  that  a  libel 
may  be  the  more  a  libel  for  being  true,  becomes 
strictly  just,  and  as  such  ought  to  be  acted  upon. 

Concerning  the  right  of  punishing  by  law  the  au- 
thors of  heretical  or  deistical  writings,  I  reserve  my 
remarks  for  a  future  Essay,  in  which  I  hope  to  state 
the  grounds  and  limits  of  toleration  more  accurately 
than  they  seem  to  me  to  have  been  hitherto  traced. 
There  is  one  maxim,  however,  which  I  am  tempted 
to  seize  as  it  passes  across  me.  If  I  may  trust  my 
own  memory,  it  is  indeed  a  very  old  truth  :  and  yet 
if  the  fashion  of  acting  in  apparent  ignorance  thereof 
be  any  presumption  of  its  novelty,  it  ought  to  be  new, 
or  at  least  have  become  so  by  courtesy  of  oblivion. 
It  is  this  :  that  as  far  as  human  practice  can  realize 
the  sharp  limits  and  exclusive  proprieties  of  Science, 
Law  and  Religion  should  be  kept  distinct.  There 
is,  strictly  speaking,  no  proper  opposition  but  be- 
tween THE  TWO  POLAR  FORCES  OF  ONE  AND  THE 
400 


THE  FRIEND. 


391 


same  power.*  If  I  soy  then,  that  Law  and  Religion 
are  natural  opposiies,  and  that  the  latter  is  the  requi- 
site counterpoise  of  the  former,  let  it  not  be  inter- 
preted, as  if  I  had  declared  them  to  be  contraries. 
The  Law  has  rightfully  invested  the  Creditor  with 
the  power  of  arresting  and  imprisoning  an  insolvent 
Debtor,  the  Farmer  with  the  Power  of  transporting, 
mediately  at  least,  the  Pillagers  of  his  Hedges  and 
Copses;  but  the  law  does  not  compel  him  to  exercise 
that  power,  while  it  will  often  happen,  that  Religion 
commands  him  to  forego  it.  Nay,  so  well  was  this 
understood  by  our  Grandfathers,  that  a  man  who 
squares  his  conscience  by  the  Law  was  a  common 
paraphrase  or  synonyme  of  a  wretch  without  any 
conscience  at  all.  We  have  all  of  us  learnt  from 
History,  that  there  was  a  long  and  dark  period  during 
which  the  Powers  and  the  Aimsof  Law  were  usurped 
in  the  name  of  Religion  by  the  Clergy  and  the  Courts 
Spiritual :  and  we  all  know  the  result.  Law  and 
Religion  thus  interpenetrating  neutralized  each  other; 
and  the  baleful  product,  or  tertium  Aliquid,  of  this 
union  retarded  the  civilization  of  Europe  for  Centu- 
ries. Law  splintered  into  the  minutiae  of  Religion, 
whose  awful  function  and  prerogative  it  is  to  take 
account  of  eveiy  "  idle  uord,"  became  a  busy  and 
inquisitorial  tyranny:  and  Religion  substituting  legal 
terrors  for  the  ennobling  influences  of  Conscience  re- 
mained Religion  in  name  only.  The  present  age 
appears  to  me  approaching  fast  to  a  similar  usurpa- 
tion of  the  functions  of  Religion  by  Law:  and  if  it 
were  required,  I  should  not  want  strong  presumptive 
proofs  in  favor  of  this  opinion,  whether  I  sought  for 
them  in  the  Charges  from  the  Bench  concerning 
Wrongs,  to  which  Religion  denounces  the  fearful 
penalties  of  Guilt,  but  for  which  the  Law  of  the 
Land  assigns  Damages  only:  or  in  sundry  statutes, 
and  (all  praise  to  the  late  Mr.  Windham,  Romanorum 
ultimo)  in  a  still  greater  number  of  attempts  towards 
new  statutes,  the  authors  of  which  displa3red  the 
most  pitiable  ignorance,  not  merely  of  the  distinction 
between  perfected  and  imperfected  Obligations,  but 
even  of  that  siill  more  sacred  distinction  between 
Things  and  Persons.  What  the  Son  of  Sirach  ad- 
vises  concerning    the   Soul,  every   Senator  should 

*  Every  Power  in  S"ature  and  in  Spirit  must  evolve  an 
opposite,  as  the  sole  means  and  condition  of  its  manifesta- 
tion: and  all  opposition  is  a  tendency  to  Re-union.  This 
is  the  universal  Law  of  Polarity  or  essential  Dualism,  first 
promulgated  by  Heraclitus,  L2000  years  afterwards  re-publish- 
ed, and  marie  the  foundation  both  of  Logic,  of  Physics,  and 
of  Metaphysics  by  Giordano  Bruno.  The  Principle  may  be 
thus  expressed.  The  Identity  of  Thesis  and  Antilhi  sis  is  the 
substance  of  all  Beinz ;  their  Opposition  the  condition  of  all 
Existence,  or  Being  manifested:  and  every  Thing  or  Pheno- 
menon is  the  Exponent  of  n  Synthesis  as  long  as  the  opposite 
enereies  are  retained  in  that  Synthesis.  Thus  Water  is  nei- 
ther Oxygen  nor  Hydrogen,  nor  yet  is  it  a  commixture  of 
both;  but  the  Synthesis  or  Indifference  of  the  two:  and  as 
lone  as  the  copula  endures,  by  which  it  becomes  Water,  or 
rather  which  alone  ;>  Water,  it  is  not  less  a  simple  Body  than 
either  of  the  imaginary  Elements,  improperly  called  its  In- 
gredients or  Components.  It  is  the  object  of  the  mechanical 
atomistic  Philosophy  to  confound  Synthesis  with  synartesis, 
or  rather  with  mere  jozta-position  of  Corpuscles  si  parated 
by  invisible  Interspaces.  I  find  it  difficult  to  determine,  whe- 
ther this  theory  contradicts  the  Reason  or  the  Senses  most: 
for  it  is  alike  inconceivable  and  unimaginable. 
Kk 


apply  to  his  legislative  capacity — Reverence  it  in 
meekness,  knowing  how  feeble  and  how  mighty  a 
Thing  it  is ! 

From  this  hint  concerning  Toleration,  we  may  pass 
by  an  easy  transition  to  the,  perhaps,  still  more  inte- 
resting subject  of  Tolerance.  And  here  I  fully  coin- 
ride  with  Frederic  H.  Jacobi,  that  the  only  true  spirit 
of  Tolerance  consists  in  our  conscientious  toleration 
of  each  other"s  intolerance.  Whatever  pretends  to 
be  more  than  this,  is  either  the  unthinking  cant  of 
fashion,  or  the  soul-palsying  narcotic  of  moral  and 
religious  indifference.  All  of  us  without  exception, 
in  the  same  mode  though  not  in  the  same  degree,  are 
necessarily  subjected  to  the  risk  of  mistaking  positive 
opinions  for  certainty  and  clear  insight.  From  this 
yoke  we  cannot  free  ourselves,  but  by  ceasing  to  be 
men ;  and  this  too  not  in  order  to  transcend  but  to 
sink  below  our  human  nature.  For  if  in  one  point 
of  view  it  be  the  mulct  of  our  fall,  and  of  the  corrup- 
tion of  our  will ;  it  is  equally  true,  that  contemplated 
from  another  point,  it  is  the  price  and  consequence 
of  our  progressiveness.  To  him  who  is  compelled  to 
pace  to  and  fro  within  the  high  walls  and  in  the  nar- 
row courtyard  of  a  prison,  all  objects  may  appear 
clear  and  distinct.  It  is  the  traveller  journeying  on- 
ward, full  of  heart  and  hope,  with  an  ever-varying 
horizon,  on  the  boundless  plain,  that  is  liable  to  mis- 
take clouds  for  mountains,  and  the  mirage  of  drought 
for  an  expanse  of  refreshing  waters. 

But  notwithstanding  this  deep  conviction  of  our 
general  fallibility,  and  the  most  vivid  recollection  of 
my  own,  I  dare  avow  with  the  German  philosopher, 
that  as  far  as  opinions,  and  not  motives;  principles, 
and  not  men,  are  concerned ;  I  neither  am  tolerant, 
nor  wish  to  be  regarded  as  such.  According  to  my 
judgment,  it  is  mere  ostentation,  or  a  poor  trick  that 
hypocrisy  plays  with  the  cards  of  nonsense,  when  a 
man  makes  protestation  of  being  perfectly  tolerant  in 
respect  of  all  principles,  opinions  and  persuasions, 
those  alone  excepted  which  render  the  holders  intole- 
rant. For  he  either  means  to  say  by  this,  that  he^s 
utterly  indifferent  towards  all  truth,  and  finds  nothing 
so  insufferable  as  the  persuasion  of  there  being  any 
such  mighty  value  or  importance  attached  to  the  pro- 
fession of  the  Truth  as  should  give  a  marked  prefer- 
ence to  any  one  conviction  above  any  other;  or  else 
he  means  nothing,  and  amuses  himself  with  articu- 
lating the  pulses  of  the  air  instead  of  inhabiting  it  in 
the  more  healthful  and  profitable  exercise  of  yawn- 
ing. That  which  doth  not  withstand,  hath  itself  no 
standing  place.  To  fill  a  station  is  to  exclude  or  re- 
pel others — and  this  is  not  less  the  definition  of  moral, 
than  of  material,  solidity.  We  lire  by  continued  acts 
of  defence,  that  involve  a  sort  of  offensive  warfare. 
But  a  mati's  principles,  on  which  he  grounds  his  Hope 
and  his  Faith,  are  the  life  of  his  life.  We  live  by 
Faith,  says  the  philosophic  Apostle;  and  Faith  with- 
out principles  is  but  a  flattering  phrase  for  wilful  po- 
sitiveness,  or  fanatical  bodily  sensation.  Well,  and 
of  good  right  therefore,  do  we  maintain  with  moral 
zeal,  than  we  should  defend  body  or  estate,  a  deep 
and  inwartl  conviction,  which  is  the  moon  to  us ;  and 
like  the  moon  with  all  its  massy  shadows  and  decep- 
401 


392 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


tive  gleams,  it  yet  lights  us  on  our  way,  poor  travel- 
lers as  we  are,  and  benighted  pilgrims.  With  all  its 
spots  and  changes  and  temporary  eclipses,  with  all  its 
vain  halos  and  bedimming  vapors,  it  yet  reflects  the 
light  that  is  to  rise  on  us,  which  even  now  is  rising, 
though  intercepted  from  our  immediate  view  by  the 
mountains  that  enclose  and  frown  over  the  vale  of 
our  mortal  life. 

This  again  is  the  mystery  and  the  dignity  of  our 
human  nature,  that  we  cannot  give  up  our  reason, 
without  giving  up  at  the  same  time  our  individual 
personality.  For  that  must  appear  to  each  man  to  be 
his  reason  which  produces  in  him  the  highest  sense 
of  certainty  ;  and  yet  it  is  not  reason,  except  as  far  as 
it  is  of  universal  validity  and  obligatory  on  all  man- 
kind. There  is  a  one  heart  for  the  whole  mighty 
mass  of  Humanity,  and  every  pulse  in  each  particu- 
lar vessel  strives  to  beat  in  concert  with  it.  He  who 
asserts  that  truth  is  of  no  importance  except  in  the 
sense  of  sincerity,  confounds  sense  with  madness,  and 
the  word  of  God  with  a  dream.  If  the  power  of 
reasoning  be  the  Gift  of  the  Supreme  Reason,  that 
we  be  sedulous,  yea,  and  militant  in  the  endeavor  to 
reason  aright,  is  his  implied  Command.  But  what  is 
of  permanent  and  essential  interest  to  one  man  must 
needs  be  so  to  all,  in  proportion  to  the  means  and  op- 
portunities of  each.  Woe  to  him  by  whom  these  are 
neglected,  and  double  woe  to  him  by  whom  they  are 
withheld  ;  for  he  robs  at  once  himself  and  his  neighbor. 
That  man's  Soul  is  not  dear  to  himself,  to  whom  the 
Souls  of  his  Brethren  are  not  dear.  As  far  as  they 
can  be  influenced  by  him,  they  are  parts  and  proper- 
ties of  his  own  soul,  their  iaith  his  faith,  their  errors 
his  burthen,  their  righteousness  and  bliss  his  righte- 
ousness and  his  reward — and  of  their  Guilt  and  Mis- 
ery his  own  will  be  the  echo.  As  much  as  I  love 
my  fellow-men,  so  much  and  no  more  will  I  be  intol- 
erant of  their  Heresies  and  Unbelief— and  I  will  ho- 
nor and  hold  forth  the  right  hand  of  fellowship  to 
every  individual  who  is  equally  intolerant  of  that 
which  he  conceives  such  in  me.  We  will  both  ex- 
claim— I  know  not,  what  antidotes  among  the  com- 
plex views,  impulses  and  circumstances,  that  form 
your  moral  Being,  God's  gracious  Providence  may 
have  vouchsafed  to  you  against  the  serpent  fang  of 
this  Error — but  it  is  a  viper,  and  its  poison  deadly, 
although  through  higher  influences  some  may  take 
the  reptile  to  their  bosom,  and  remain  unstung. 

Jn  one  of  these  viperous  Journals,  which  deal  out 
Profaneness,  Hate,  Fury,  and  Sedition  throughout  the 
Land,  I  read  the  following  paragraph.  "The  Brah- 
man believes  that  every  man  will  be  saved  in  his 
own  persuasion,  and  that  all  religions  are  equally 
pleasing  to  the  God  of  all.  The  Christian  confines 
salvation  to  the  Believer  in  his  own  Yedahs  and 
Shasters.  Which  is  the  more  humane  and  philoso- 
phic creed  of  the  two  ?"  Let  question  answer  ques- 
tion. Self-complacent  Scoffer!  Whom  meanest  thou 
by  God?  The  God  of  Truth  ?  and  can  He  bo  pleased 
with  falsehood  and  the  debasement  or  utter  suspen- 
sion of  the  Reason  which  he  gave  to  man  that  he 
might  receive  from  him  the  sacrifice  of  Truth  ?  Or 
the  God  of  love  and  mercy  ?   And  can  He  be  pleased 


with  the  blood  of  thousands  poured  out  under  the 
wheels  of  Juggernaut,  or  with  the  shrieks  of  children 
offered  up  as  fire  offerings  to  Baal  or  to  Moloch  ?  Or 
dost  thou  mean  the  God  of  holiness  and  infinite  puri- 
ty ?  and  can  He  be  pleased  with  abominations  unut- 
terable and  more  than  brutal  defilements?  and  equal- 
ly pleased  too  as  with  that  religion,  which  commands 
us  that  we  have  no  fellowship  with  the  unfruitful 
works  of  darkness  but  to  reprove  them  ?  With  that 
religion,  which  strikes  the  fear  of  the  Most  High  so 
deeply,  and  the  sense  of  the  exceeding  sinfulness  of 
sin  so  inwardly,  that  the  Believer  anxiously  enquires  : 
"  Shall  I  give  my  first-born  for  my  transgression,  the 
fruit  of  my  body  for  the  sin  of  my  soul  ?" — and  which 
makes  me  answer  to  him — "  He  hath  showed  thee, 
O  man,  what  is  good ;  and  what  doth  the  Lord  re- 
quire of  thee,  but  to  do  justly,  and  to  love  mercy, 
and  to  walk  humbly  with  thy  God."  But  I  check 
myself.  It  is  at  once  folly  and  profanation  of  Truth, 
to  reason  with  the  man  who  can  place  before  his  eyes 
a  minister  of  the  Gospel  directing  the  eye  of  the  wi- 
dow from  the  corse  of  her  husband  upward  to  his  and 
her  Redeemer,  (the  God  of  the  living  and  not  of  the 
dead,)  and  then  the  remorseless  Brahmin  goading  on 
the  disconsolate  victim  to  the  flames  of  her  husband's 
funeral  pile,  abandoned  by,  and  abandoning,  the  help- 
less pledges  of  their  love — and  yet  dare  ask,  which  is 
the  more  humane  and  philosophic  creed  of  the  two? 
No!  No!  when  such  opinions  are  in  question,  I  nei- 
ther am,  or  will  be,  or  wish  to  be  regarded  as,  tole- 
rant. 


ESSAY   XIV. 


Knowing  the  heart  of  Man  is  set  to  be 
The  centre  of  this  world,  about  the  which 
These  revolutions  of  disturbances 
Si  ill  roll ;  where  all  lb'  aspects  of  misery 
Predominate;  whose  strong  effects  are  such 
As  he  must  bear,  being  powerless  to  redress: 
And  that  unless  above  himself  he  can 
Erect  himself,  how  poor  a  thing  is  Man  ! 

DANIEL. 


I  have  thus  endeavored,  with  an  anxiety  which 
may  perhaps  have  misled  me  into  prolixity,  to  detail 
and  ground  the  condition  under  which  the  communi- 
cation of  truth  is  commanded  or  forbidden  to  us  as 
individuals,  by  our  conscience;  and  those  too,  under 
which  it  is  permissible  by  the  law  w hich  controls  out 
conduct  as  members  of  the  state.  But  is  the  subject 
of  sufficient  importance  to  deserve  so  minute  an  ex- 
amination'? O  that  my  readers  would  look  round  the 
world,  as  it  now  is,  and  make  to  themselves  a  faith- 
ful catalogue  of  its  many  miseries!  From  what  do 
those  proceed,  and  on  what  do  they  depend  fur  their 
continuance?  Assuredly  for  the  greater  part  on  the 
actions  of  men.  and  those  again  on  the  want  of  a  vi- 
tal principle  of  action.  We  live  by  faith.  The  es- 
sence of  virtue  consists  in  the  principle.  And  the 
reality  of  this,  as  well  as  its  importance,  is  believed 
by  all  men  in  fact,  few  as  there  mav  be  who  bring 
402 


THE  FRIEND. 


393 


the  truth  forward  into  the  light  of  distinct  conscious- 
ness. Yet  all  men  feel,  and  at  times  acknowledge  to 
themselves,  the  true  cause  of  their  misery.  There  is 
no  man  so  base,  but  at  some  time  or  other,  and  in 
some  way  or  other,  he  admits  that  he  is  not  what  lie 
ought  to  be,  though  by  a  curious  art  of  sel Inclusion, 
by  an  effort  to  keep  at  peace  with  himself  as  long 
and  as  much  as  possible,  he  will  throw  off  the  blame 
from  the  amenable  part  of  his  nature,  his  mural  prin- 
ciple, to  that  which  is  independent  of  his  will,  name- 
ly, the  degree  of  his  intellectual  faculties.  Hence,  for 
once  that  a  man  exclaims,  how  dishonest  I  am,  on 
what  base  and  unworthy  motives  I  act,  we  may  hear 
a  hundred  times,  what  a  lbol  I  am!  curse  on  my  fol- 
ly ?*  and  the  like. 

Yet  even  this  implies  an  obscure  sentiment,  that 
with  clearer  conceptions  in  the  understanding,  the 
principle  of  action  would  become  purer  in  the  will. 
Thanks  to  the  image  of  our  Maker  not  wholly  oblit- 
erated from  any  human  soul,  we  dare  not  purchase 
an  exemption  from  guilt  by  an  excuse,  which  would 
place  our  amelioration  out  of  our  own  power.  Thus 
the  very  man  who  will  abuse  himself  for  a  fool  but 
not  for  a  villain,  would  rather,  spite  of  the  usual  pro- 
fessions to  the  contrary,  be  condemned  as  a  rogue  by 
other  men,  than  be  acquitted  as  a  blockhead.  But 
be  this  as  it  may,  out  of  himself,  however,  he  sees 
plainly  the  true  cause  of  our  common  complaints. 
Doubtless,  there  seem  many  physical  causes  of  dis- 
tress, of  disease,  of  poverty,  and  of  desolation — tem- 
pests, earthquakes,  volcanoes,  wild  or  venomous  ani- 
mals, barren  soils,  uncertain  or  tyrannous  climates, 
pestilential  swamps,  and  death  in  the  very  air  we 
breathe.  Yet  when  do  we  hear  the  general  wretch- 
edness of  mankind  attributed  to  these?  In  Iceland, 
the  earth  opened  and  sent  forth  three  or  more  vast 
rivers  of  fire.  The  smoke  and  vapor  from  them 
dimmed  the  light  of  Heaven  through  all  Europe,  for 
months;  even  at  Cadiz,  the  sun  and  moon,  for  seve- 
ral weeks,  seemed  turned  to  blood.  What  was  the 
amount  of  the  injury  to  the  human  race  >.  sixty  men 
were  destroyed,  and  of  these  the  greater  part  in  con- 
sequence of  their  own  imprudence.  Natural  calami- 
ties that  do  indeed  spread  devastation  wide,  (for  in- 
stance, the  Marsh  Fever,)  are  almost  without  excep- 
tion, voices  of  Nature  in  her  all-intelligible  language 
— do  this !  or  cease  to  do  that !  By  the  mere  absence 
of  one  superstition,  and  of  the  sloth  engendered  by 
it,  the  Plague  would  cease  to  exist  throughout  Asia 
and  Africa.  Pronounce  meditatively  the  name  of 
Jenner,  and  ask  what  might  we  not  hope,  what  need 
we  deem  unattainable,  if  all  the  time,  the  effort,  the 
skill,  which  we  waste  in  making  ourselves  miserable 
through  vice,  and  vicious  through  misery,  were  em- 
bodied and  marshalled  to  a  systematic  war  against 
the  existing  evils  of  nature?  No,  "It  is  a  wicked 
world !"    This  is  so  generally  the  solution,  that  this 

*  We  do  not  consider  as  exceptions  the  thousands  that 
abuse  themselves  by  rote  with  lip-penitence,  or  the  wild  rav- 
ings of  fanaticism:  for  these  persons  at  the  very  time  they 
speak  so  vehemently  of  the  wickednes  and  rottenness  of  their 
hearts,  are  then  commonly  the  warmest  in  their  own  good 
opinion,  covered  round  and  comfortable  in  the  wrap-rascal 
of  self-hypocrisy. 


very  wickedness  is  assigned  by  selfish  men,  as  their 
excuse  for  doing  nothing  to  render  it  better,  and  for 
opposing  those  who  would  make  the  attempt.  What 
have  not  (  larks. m,  Granville  Sharp,  Wilberibrce,  and 
the  Society  ofthe  Friends,  effected  for  the  honor,  and 
if  we  believe  in  a  retributive  providence,  for  the  con- 
tinuance of  the  prosperity  of  the  English  nation,  im- 
perfectly as  the  intellectual  and  moral  faculties  ofthe 
people  at  large  are  developed  at  present  ?  What  may 
not  be  effected,  if  the  recent  discovery  of  the  means 
of  educating  nations,  (freed,  however,  from  the  vile 
sophistications  and  mutilations  of  ignorant  mounte- 
banks.) shall  have  been  applied  to  its  full  extent? 
Would  I  frame  to  myself  the  most  inspiriting  repre- 
sentation of  future  bliss,  which  my  mind  is  capable 
of  comprehending,  it  would  be  embodied  to  me  in 
the  idea  of  Bell  receiving,  at  some  distant  period, 
the  appropriate  reward  of  his  earthly  labors,  when 
thousands  and  ten  thousands  of  glorified  spirits,  whose 
reason  and  conscience  had,  through  his  efforts,  been 
unfolded,  shall  sing  the  song  of  their  own  redemp- 
tion, and  pouring  forth  praises  to  God  and  to  their  Sa- 
viour, shall  repeat  his  "  New  name"  in  Heaven,  give 
thanks  for  his  earthly  virtues,  as  the  chosen  instru- 
ments of  divine  mercy  to  themselves,  and  not  seldom 
perhaps,  turn  their  eyes  toward  him,  as  from  the  sun 
to  its  image  in  the  fountain,  with  secondary  gratitude 
and  the  permitted  utterance  of  a  human  love!  Were 
but  a  hundred  men  to  combine  a  deep  conviction  that 
virtuous  habits  may  be  formed  by  the  very  means  by 
which  knowledge  is  communicated,  that  men  may  be 
made  better,  not  only  in  consequence,  but  hi/  the 
mode  and  in  the  process,  of  instruction  :  were  but  an 
hundred  men  to  combine  that  clear  conviction  of  this, 
which  I  myself  at  this  moment  feel,  even  as  I  feel 
the  certainty  of  my  being,  with  the  perseverance  of  a 
Clarksox  or  a  Bell,  the  promises  of  ancient  pro- 
phecy would  disclose  themselves  to  our  faith,  even 
as  when  a  noble  castle  hidden  from  us  by  an  inter- 
vening mist,  discovers  itself  by  its  reflection  in  the 
tranquil  lake,  on  the  opposite  shore  of  which  we  stand 
gazing.  What  an  awful  duty,  what  a  nurse  of  all 
other,  the  fairest  virtues,  does  not  hope  become!  We 
are  bad  ourselves,  because  we  despair  of  the  good- 
ness of  others. 

If  then  it  be  a  truth,  attested  alike  by  common  feel- 
ing and  common  sense,  that  the  greater  part  of  human 
misery  depends  directly  on  human  vices  and  the  re- 
mainder indirectly,  by  what  means  can  we  act  on 
men  so  as  to  remove  or  preclude  these  vices  and  pu- 
rify their  principle  of  moral  election?  The  question 
is  not  by  what  means  each  man  is  to  alter  his  own 
character — in  order  to  this,  all  the  means  prescribed 
and  all  the  aidances  given  by  religion,  may  be  neces- 
sary for  him.     Vain,  of  themselves,  may  be, 

the  sayings  of  the  wise 


In  ancient  and  in  modern  books  enrolled 

******* 

Unless  he  feel  within 

Sume  source  ofcon^olation  from  above — 

Secret  refreshings,  that  repair  his  strength 

And  fainting  spirits  uphold. 

SAMSON  AGONTSTES. 

This  is  not  the  question.    Virtue  would  not  be 
403 


394 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


virtue,  could  it  be  given  by  one  fellow-creature  to 
another.  To  make  use  of  all  the  means  and  appli- 
ances in  our  power  to  the  actual  attainment  of  Rec- 
titude, is  the  abstract  of  the  Duty  which  we  owe  to 
ourselves;  to  supply  those  means  as  far  as  we  can, 
comprises  our  Duty  to  others.  The  question  then  is, 
what  are  these  means  ?  Can  they  be  any  other  than 
the  communication  of  knowledge,  and  the  removal  of 
those  evils  and  impediments  which  prevent  its  recep- 
tion ?  It  may  not  be  in  our  power  to  combine  both, 
but  it  is  in  the  power  of  every  man  to  contribute  to 
the  former,  who  is  sufficiently  informed  to  feel  that 
it  is  his  duty.  If  it  be  said,  that  we  should  endeavor 
not  so  much  to  remove  ignorance,  as  to  make  the  ig- 
norant religious :  Religion  herself,  through  her  sacred 
oracles,  answers  for  me,  that  all  effective  faith  pre- 
supposes knowledge  and  individual  conviction.  If 
the  mere  acquiescence  in  truth,  uncomprehended  and 
unfathomed,  were  sufficient,  few  indeed  would  be 
the  vicious  and  the  miserable,  in  this  country  at  least 
where  speculative  inlidelity  is,  Heaven  be  praised, 
confined  to  a  small  number.  Like  bodily  deformity, 
there  is  one  instance  here  and  another  there;  but  ' 
three  in  one  place  are  already  an  undue  proportion. 
It  is  highly  worthy  of  observation,  that  the  inspired 
writings  received  by  Christians  are  distinguishable 
from  all  other  books  pretending  to  inspiration,  from 
the  scriptures  of  the  Bramins,  and  even  from  the  Ko- 
ran, in  their  strong  and  frequent  recommendations  of 
truth.  I  do  not  here  mean  veracity,  which  cannot 
but  be  enforced  in  every  code  which  appeals  to  the 
religious  principle  of  man  ;  but  knowledge.  This  is 
not  only  extolled  as  the  crown  and  honor  of  a  man, 
but  to  seek  after  it  is  again  and  again  commanded  us 
as  one  of  our  most  sacred  duties.  Yea,  the  very  per- 
fection and  final  bliss  of  the  glorified  spirit  is  repre- 
sented by  the  Apostle  as  a  plain  aspect,  or  intuitive 
beholding  of  truth  in  its  eternal  and  immutable  source. 
Not  that  knowledge  can  of  itself  do  all!  The  light 
of  religion  is  not  that  of  the  moon,  light  without  heat ; 
but  neither  is  its  warmth  that  of  the  stove,  warmth 
without  light.  Religion  is  the  sun,  whose  warmth 
indeed  swells,  and  stirs,  and  actuates  the  life  of  na- 
ture, but  who  at  the  same  time  beholds  all  the  growth 
of  life  with  a  master  eye,  makes  all  objects  glorious 
on  which  he  looks,  and  by  that  glory  visible  to  all 
others. 

But  though  knowledge  be  not  the  only,  yet  that  it 
is  an  indispensable  and  most  effectual  agent  in  the 
direction  of  our  actions,  one  consideration  will  con- 
vince us.  It  is  -an  undoubted  fact  of  human  nature, 
that  the  sense  of  impossibility  quenches  all  will. 
Sense  of  utter  inaptitude  does  the  same.  The  man 
shuns  the  beautiful  flame,  which  is  eagerly  grasped 
at  by  the  infant.  The  sense  of  a  disproportion  of 
certain  after-harm  to  present  gratification — produces 
effects  almost  equally  uniform:  though  almost  perish- 
ing with  thirst,  we  should  dash  to  the  earlh  a  goblet 
of  wine  in  which  we  had  seen  a  poison  infused, 
though  the  poison  were  without  taste  or  odour,  or 
even  added  to  the  pleasures  of  both.  Are  not  all  our 
vices  equally  inapt  to  the  universal  end  of  human 
actions,  the  satisfaction  of  the  agent?    Are  not  their 


pleasures  equally  disproportionate  to  the  after-harm? 
Yet  many  a  maiden,  who  will  not  grasp  at  the  fire, 
will  yet  purchase  a  wreath  of  diamonds  at  the  price 
of  her  health,  her  honor,  nay  (and  she  herself  knows 
it  at  the  moment  of  her  choice)  at  the  sacrifice  of  her 
peace  and  happiness.  The  sot  would  reject  the  poi- 
soned cup,  yet  the  trembling  hand  with  which  he 
raises  his  daily  or  hourly  draught  to  his  lips,  has  not 
left  him  ignorant  that  this  too  is  altogether  a  poison. 
I  know  it  will  be  objected,  that  the  consequences  fore- 
seen are  less  immediate;  that  they  are  diffused  over 
a  larger  space  of  time;  and  that  the  slave  of  vice  hopes 
where  no  hope  is.  This,  however,  only  removes 
the  question  one  step  further:  for  why  should  the 
distance  or  diffusion  of  known  consequences  produce 
so  great  a  difference  ?  Why  are  men  the  dupes  of  the 
present  moment  ?  Evidently  because  the  conceptions 
are  indistinct  in  the  one  case,  and  vivid  in  the 
other;  because  all  confused  conceptions  render  us 
restless ;  and  because  restlessness  can  drive  us  to 
vices  that  promise  no  enjoyment,  no,  not  even  the  ces- 
sation of  that  restlessnes.  This  is  indeed  the  dread 
punishment  attached  by  nature  to  habitual  vice,  that 
its  impulses  wax  as  its  motives  wane.  No  object,  not 
even  the  light  of  a  solitary  taper  in  the  far  distance, 
tempts  the  benighted  mind  from  before;  but  its  own 
restlessness  dogs  it  from  behind,  as  with  the  iron  goad 
of  Destiny.  What  then  is  or  can  be  the  preventive, 
the  remedy,  the  counteraction,  but  the  habituation  of 
the  intellect  to  clear,  distinct,  and  adequate  concep- 
tions concerning  all  things  that  are  the  possible  ob- 
jects of  clear  conception,  and  thus  to  reserve  the  deep 
feelings  which  belong,  as  by  natural  right,  to  those 
obscure  ideas*  that  are  necessary  to  the  moral  perfec- 
tion of  the  human  being,  notwithstanding,  yea,  even 
in  consequence  of,  their  obscurity — to  reserve  these 
feelings,  I  repeat,  for  objects,  which  their  very  sub- 
limity renders  indefinite,  no  less  than  their  indefinite- 
ness  renders  them  sublime:  namely,  to  the  Ideas  of 
Being,  Form,  Life,  the  Reason,  the  Law  of  Conscience, 
Freedom,  Immortality,  God !  To  connect  with  the 
objects  of  our  senses  the  obscure  notions  and  conse- 
quent vivid  feelings,  which  are  due  only  to  immate- 
rial and  permanent  things,  is  profanation  relatively  to 
the  heart,  and  superstition  in  the  understanding.  It 
is  in  this  sense,  that  the  philosophic  Apostle  calls 
Covetousness  Idolatry.  Could  we  emancipate  our- 
selves from  the  bedimming  influences  of  custom,  and 
the  transforming  witchcraft  of  early  associations,  we 
should  see  as  numerous  tribes  of  Fetish-Worshijypers 
in  the  streets  of  London  and  Paris,  as  we  hear  of  on 
the  coasts  of  Africa. 

*  1  have  not  expressed  myself  as  clenrly  as  I  could  wish. 
But  the  truth  of  the  assertion,  that  deep  feeling  has  a  tenden- 
cy to  combine  with  obscure  ideas,  in  preference  to  distinct  and 
clear  notions,  may  be  proved  by  the  history  of  Fanatics  and 
Fanaticism  in  all  aees  and  countries.  The  odium  theologi- 
cum  is  even  proverbial:  and  it  is  the  common  complaint  of 
Philosophers  and  philosophic  Historians,  that  the  passions  of 
the  disputants  are  commonly  violent  in  proportion  to  the  sub- 
tlety and  obscurity  of  the  questions  in  dispute.  Nor  is  this 
fact  confined  to  professional  theologians:  for  whole  nations 
have  displayed  the  same  agitations,  and  have  sacrificed  na- 
tional policy  to  the  more  powerful  interest  of  a  controverted 
obscurity. 

404 


THE  FRIEND. 


395 


ESSAY  XV. 


A  palace  when  'tis  that  which  it  should  be 
Leaves  growing,  and  stands  such,  or  else  decays. 
With  hun  who  dwells  there,  'tis  not  so  :  for  he 
Should  still  urge  upward,  and  his  fortune  raise. 

Our  bodies  had  their  morning,  have  their  noon. 
And  shull  not  better — the  next  change  is  night; 
But  their  fair  larger  guest,  l'  whom  sun  and  moon 
Are  sparks  and  short-lived,  claims  another  right. 

The  noble  soul  by  age  grows  lustier. 
Her  nppptite  and  her  digestion  mend  : 
We  must  DOl  starve  nor  hope  to  pamper  her 
With  woman's  milk  and  pap  unto  the  end. 


Provide  you  manlier  diet ! 


DONNE. 


I  am  fully  aware,  that  what  I  am  writing  and  have 
written  (in  these  latter  Essays  at  least)  will  expose  me 
to  the  censure  of  some,  as  bewildering  myself  and 
readers  with  Metaphysics ;  to  the  ridicule  of  others 
as  a  school-hoy  declaimer  on  old  and  worn-out  tru- 
isms or  exploded  fancies ;  and  to  the  objection  of 
most  as  obscure.  The  last  real  or  supposed  defect 
has  already  received  an  answer  both  in  the  preced- 
ing lumbers,  and  in  page  34  of  the  Appendix  to  the 
Author's  First  Lay-Sermon,  entitled  the  Statesman's 
Manual.  Of  the  two  former.  I  shall  take  the  pres- 
ent opportunity  of  declaring  my  sentiments;  espe- 
cially as  I  have  already  received  a  hint  that  my 
"idol,  Milton,  has  represented  Metaphysics  as  the 
subjects  which  the  bad  spirits  in  hell  delight  in  dis- 
cussing." And  truly,  if  I  had  exerted  my  subtlety 
and  invention  in  persuading  myself  and  others  that 
we  are  but  living  machines,  and  that  (as  one  of  the 
late  followers  of  Hobbes  and  Hartley  has  expressed 
the  system)  the  assassin  and  his  dagger  are  equally 
fit  objects  of  moral  esteem  and  abhorrence  ;  or  if  with 
a  writer  of  wider  influence  ami  higher  authority,  I 
had  reduced  all  virtue  to  a  selfish  prudence  eked 
out  by  superstition,  (for  assuredly,  a  creed  which 
takes  its  central  point  in  conscious  selfishness,  what- 
ever be  the  forms  or  names  that  act  on  the  selfish 
passion,  a  ghost  or  a  constable,  can  have  but  a  dis- 
tant relationship  to  that  religion,  which  places  its  es- 
sence in  our  loving  our  neighbor  as  ourselves,  and 
God  above  all)  I  know  not,  by  what  arguments  I 
could  repel  the  sarcasm.  But  what  are  my  meta- 
physics ?  merely  the  referring  of  the  mind  to  its  own 
consciousness  for  truths  indispensable  to  its  own  hap- 
piness !  To  what  purposes  do  I,  or  am  I  about  to 
employ  them?  To  perplex  our  clearest  notions  and 
living  moral  instincts?  To  deaden  the  feelings  of 
will  and  free  power,  to  extinguish  the  light  of  love 
and  conscience,  to  make  myself  and  others  worthless, 
soul-less,  God-less?  No!  to  expose  the  folly  and  the 
legerdemain  of  those  who  have  thus  abused  the 
blessed  machine  of  language;  to  support  all  old  and 
venerable  truths;  and  by  them  to  support,  to  kindle, 
to  project  the  spirit;  to  make  the  reason  spread  light 
over  our  feelings,  to  make  our  feelings,  with  their  vital 
warmth,  actualize  our  reason : — these  are  my  objects, 
Kk2 


these  are  my  subjects,  and  are  these  the  metaphysics 
which  the  bad  spirits  in  hell  delight  in? 

But  how  shall  I  avert  the  scorn  of  those  critics  who 
laugh  at  the  oldness  of  my  topics,  Evil  and  Good,  Ne- 
cessity and  Arbitrament,  Immortality  and  the  Ulti- 
roate  Aim  ?  By  what  shall  1  regain  their  favor?  My 
themes  must  be  new.  a  French  Constitution;  a  bal- 
loon; a  change  of  ministry  ;  a  fresh  batch  of  kings  on 
the  Continent,  or  of  peers  in  our  happier  island  ;  or 
who  had  the  best  of  it  of  two  parliamentary  gladia- 
tors, and  whose  speech,  on  the  subject  of  Europe 
bleeding  at  a  thousand  wounds,  or  our  own  country 
struggling  for  herself  and  all  human  nature,  was 
cheered  by  the  greatest  number  of  laughs,  loud  laughs, 
and  very  loud  laughs:  (which,  carefully  marked  by 
italics,  form  most  conspicuous  and  strange  parenthe- 
ses in  the  newspaper  reports.)  Or  if  I  must  be  phi- 
losophical, the  last  chemical  discoveries,  provided  I 
do  not  trouble  my  reader  with  the  principle  which 
gives  them  their  highest  inlerest,  and  the  character 
of  intellectual  grandeur  to  the  discoverer;  or  the  last 
shower  of  stones,  and  that  they  were  supposed,  by 
certain  philosophers,  to  have  been  projected  by  some 
volcano  in  the  moon,  taking  care,  however,  not  to  add 
any  of  the  cramp  reasons  for  this  opinion  !  Something 
new,  however,  it  must  be,  quite  new  and  quite  out 
of  themselves!  for  whatever  is  within  them,  what- 
ever is  deep  within  them,  must  be  as  old  as  the  first 
dawn  of  human  reason.  But  to  find  no  contradiction 
in  the  union  of  old  and  new,  to  contemplate  the  an- 
cient of  days  with  feelings  as  fresh,  as  if  they  then 
sprung  forth  at  his  own  fiat,  this  characterizes  the 
minds  that  feel  the  riddle  of  the  world,  and  may  help 
to  unravel  it !  To  carry  on  the  feelings  of  childhood 
into  the  powers  of  manhood,  to  combine  the  child's 
sense  of  wonder  and  novelty  with  the  appearances 
which  every  day  for  perhaps  forty  years  had  render- 
ed familiar, 

t 

With  Sun  and  Moon  and  Stars  throughout  the  year. 
And  Man  and  Woman 

this  is  the  character  and  privilege  of  genius,  and  one 
of  the  marks  which  distinguish  genius  from  talents. 
And  so  to  present  familiar  objects  as  to  awaken  the 
minds  of  others  to  a  like  freshness  of  sensation  con- 
cerning them  (that  constant  accompaniment  of  men- 
ial, no  less  than  of  bodily,  convalescence) — to  the 
same  modest  questioning  of  a  self-discovered  and  in- 
telligent ignorance,  which,  like  the  deep  and  massy 
foundations  of  a  Roman  bridge,  forms  half  of  the 
whole  structure  (prudens  inlerrogalio  dimidium  sci- 
entice,  says  Lord  Bacon) — this  is  the  prime  merit  of 
genius,  and  its  most  unequivocal  mode  of  manifesta- 
tion. Who  has  not,  a  thousand  times,  seen  it  snow 
upon  water?  who  has  not  seen  it  with  a  new  feeling, 
since  he  has  read  Burns 's  comparison  of  sensual  plea- 
sure, 

To  snow  that  falls  upon  a  river, 

A  moment  white — then  gone  for  ever  .' 

In  philosophy  equally,  as  in  poetry,  genius  produces 
the  strongest  impressions  of  novelty,  while  it  rescues 
the  stalest  and  most  admitted  truths  from  the  impo- 
tence caused  by  the  very  circumstance  of  their  uni- 
405 


396 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


versal  admission.  Extremes  meet — a  proverb,  by-the- 
bye,  to  collect  and  explain  all  the  instances  and  ex- 
emplifications of  which,  would  constitute  and  ex- 
haust all  philosophy.  Truths,  of  all  others  the  most 
awful  and  mysterious,  yet  being  at  the  same  time  of 
universal  interest,  are  too  often  considered  as  so  true 
that  they  lose  all  the  powers  of  truth,  and  lie  bed- 
ridden in  the  dormitory  of  the  soul,  side  by  side  with 
the  most  despised  and  exploded  errors. 

But  as  the  class  of  critics,  whose  contempt  I  have 
•  anticipated,  commonly  consider  themselves  as  men 
of  the  world,  instead  of  hazarding  additional  sneers 
by  appealing  to  the  authorities  of  recluse  philosophers, 
(for  such  in  spite  of  all  hislory,  the  men  who  have 
distinguished  themselves  by  profound  thought,  are 
generally  deemed,  from  Plato  and  Aristotle  to  Tully, 
and  from  Bacon  to  Berkeley)  I  will  refer  them  to  the 
Darling  of  the  polished  Court  of  Augustus,  to  the 
man,  whose  works  have  been  in  all  ages  deemed  the 
models  of  good  sense,  and  are  still  the  pocket-com- 
panion of  those  who  pride  themselves  on  uniting  the 
scholar  with  the  gentleman.  This  accomplished  man 
of  the  world  has  given  us  an  account  of  the  subjects 
of  conversation  between  himself  and  the  illustrious 
statesman  who  governed,  and  the  brightest  lumina- 
ries who  then  adorned  the  empire  of  the  civilized 
world  : 

Sermo  oritur  non  de  villis  domibusve  alienis 

Nee,  male,  nee  ne  lepus  saltet.    Sed  quod  magis  ad  no3 

Pertinet,  et  nescire  malum  est,  agitamus  :  utrumne 

Divitiis  homines,  an  sint  virtute  beati  ? 

Et  quo  sit  natura  boni  ?  summumque  quid  eius  ? 

IIOB.AT,  SERM.  L.  II.  Sat.  6.  v.  78* 

Berkeley  indeed  asserts,  and  is  supported  in  his 
assertion  by  the  great  statesmen,  Lord  Bacon  and  Sir 
Walter  Raleigh,  that  without  an  habitual  interest  in 
these  subjects,  a  man  may  be  a  dexterous  intriguer, 
but  never  can  be  a  statesman.  Would  to  Heaven 
that  the  verdict  to  be  passed  on  my  labors  depended 
on  those  who  least  needed  them !  The  water  lily  in 
the  midst  of  waters  lifts  up  its  broad  leaves,  and  ex- 
pands its  petals  at  the  first  pattering  of  the  shower, 
and  rejoices  in  the  rain  with  a  quicker  sympathy, 
than  the  parched  shrub  in  a  sandy  desert. 

God  created  man  in  his  own  image.  To  be  the 
image  of  his  own  eternity  created  he  man  !  Of  eter- 
nity and  self-existence  what  other  likeness  is  possible 
in  a  finite  being,  but  immortality  and  moral  self-de- 
termination! In  addition  to  sensation,  perception, 
and  practical  judgment  (instinctive  or  acquirable) 
concerning  the  notices  furnished  by  the  organs  of 
perception,  all  which  in  kind  at  least,  the  dog  pos- 
sesses in  common  with  his  master ;  in  addition  to 
these,  God  gave  us  reason,  and  with  reason  he  gave 
ns  reflective  self-consciousness  ;  gave  us  princi- 
ples, distinguished  from  the  maxims  and  generaliza- 
tions of  outward  experience  by  their  absolute  and 

*  (Literal  Translation.)  Conversation  arises  not  con- 
cerning the  country-seats  or  families  of  strangers,  nor  whether 
the  dancing  hare  performed  well  or  ill.  But  we  discuss  what 
more  nearly  concerns  us,  and  which  it  is  an  evil  not  to  know  : 
whether  men  are  made  happy  by  riches  or  by  virtue  1  And 
in  what  consists  the  nature  of  good  ?  and  what  is  the  ultimate 
or  supreme'!  (i.  c.  the  Summum  Bonum.) 


essential  universality  and  necessity ;  and  above  all, 
by  superadding  to  reason  the  mysterious  faculty  of 
free-will  and  consequent  personal  amenability,  he 
gave  us  conscience — that  law  of  conscience,  which 
in  the  power,  and  as  the  indwelling  word,  of  an  holy 
and  omnipotent  legislator,  commands  us — from  among 
the  numerous  ideas  mathematical  and  philosophical, 
which  the  reason  by  the  necessity  of  its  own  excel- 
lence creates  for  itself,  unconditionally  commands  us 
to  attribute  reality,  and  actual  existence,  to  those  ideas 
and  to  those  only,  without  which  the  conscience  it- 
self would  be  baseless  and  contradictory,  to  the  ideas 
of  Soul,  of  Free-will,  of  Immortality,  and  of  God  ? 

To  God,  as  the  reality  of  the  conscience  and  the 
source  of  all  obligation  ;  to  Free-will,  as  the  power 
of  the  human  being  to  maintain  the  obedience,  which 
God  through  the  conscience  has  commanded,  against 
all  the  might  of  nature  ;  and  to  the  Immortality  of 
the  Soul,  as  a  state  in  which  the  weal  and  woe  of 
man  shall  be  proportioned  to  his  moral  worth. 

With  this  faith,  all  nature, 

all  the  mighty  world 


Of  eye  and  ear- 


presents  itself  to  us,  now  as  the  aggregate  material. 
of  duty,  and  now  as  a  vision  of  the  Most  High  reveal- 
ing to  us  the  mode,  and  time,  and  particular  instance 
of  applying  and  realizing  that  universal  rule,  pre-es- 
tablished in  the  heart  of  our  reason! 

"  The  displeasure  of  some  Readers  may,  perhaps, 
be  incurred  by  my  having  surprised  them  into  cer- 
tain reflections  and  inquiries,  for  which  they  have  no 
curiosity.  But  perhaps  some  others  may  be  pleased 
to  find  themselves  carried  into  ancient  times,  even 
though  they  should  consider  the  hoary  maxims,  de- 
fended in  these  Essays,  barely  as  Hints  to  awaken 
and  exercise  the  inquisitive  Reader,  on  points  not 
beneath  the  attention  of  the  ablest  men.  Those  great 
men,  Pythagoras,  Plato,  and  Aristotle,  men  the  most 
consummate  in  politics,  who  founded  states,  or  in- 
structed princes,  or  wrote  most  accurately  on  public 
government,  were  at  the  same  time  the  most  acute 
at  all  abstracted  and  sublime  speculations  :  the  clear- 
est light  being  ever  necessary  to  guide  the  most  im- 
portant actions.  And  whatever  the  world  may  opine, 
he  v;ho  hath  not.  much  meditated  upon  God,  the  Human 
Mind,  and  the  Summum  Bonum,  may  possibly  male  a 
thriving  Earth-worm,  but  icill  most  indubitably  make 
a  blundering  Patriot  and  a  sorry  statesman." 

Siris,  $  350. 


ESSAY   XVI. 


Blind  is  that  soul  which  from  this  truth  can  swerve. 
No  stale  stands  sure,  but  on  the  grounds  of  right, 
Of  virtue,  knowledge  ;  judgment  to  preserve, 
And  all  the  powers  of  learning  requisite  ! 
Though  other  shifts  a  present  turn  may  serve, 
Yet  in  the  trial  they  will  weigh  too  light. 

DANIEL 


I  earnestly  entreat  the  reader  not  to  be  dissatis- 
fied either  with  himself  or  with  the  author,  if  he 

406 


THE  FRIEND. 


397 


should  not  at  once  understand  every  part  of  the  pre- 
ceding Number  ;  but  rather  to  consider  it  as  a  mere 
annunciation  of  a  magnificent  theme,  the  different 
parts  of  which  are  to  be  demonstrated  and  developed, 
explained,  illustrated,  and  exemplified  in  the  progress 
of  the  work.  I  likewise  entreat  him  to  peruse  with 
attention  and  with  candor,  the  weighty  extract  from 
the  judicious  Hooker,  prefixed  as  the  motto  to  a  fol- 
lowing Number  of  the  Friend.  In  works  of  reasoning, 
as  distinguished  from  narration  of  events  or  statements 
of  facts ;  but  more  particularly  in  works,  the  object 
of  winch  is  to  make  us  better  acquainted  with  our 
own  nature,  a  writer,  whose  meaning  is  everywhere 
comprehended  as  quickly  as  his  sentences  can  be 
read,  may  indeed  have  produced  an  amusing  compo- 
sition, nay,  by  awakening  and  re-enlivening  our  re- 
collections, a  useful  one  ;  but  most  assuredly  he  will 
not  have  added  either  to  the  stock  of  our  knowledge, 
or  to  the  vigor  of  our  intellect.  For  how  can  we 
gather  strength,  but  by  exercise  ?  How  can  a  truth, 
new  to  us,  be  made  our  own  without  examination 
and  self-questioning  —  any  new  truth,  I  mean,  that 
relates  to  the  properties  of  the  mind,  and  its  various 
faculties  and  affections  !  But  whatever  demands  ef- 
fort, requires  time.  Ignorance  seldom  vaults  into 
knowledge,  but  passes  into  it  through  an  intermediate 
state  of  obscurity,  even  as  night  into  day  through 
twilight.  All  speculative  Truths  begin  with  a  Pos- 
tulate, even  the  Truths  of  Geometry.  They  all  sup- 
pose an  act  of  ihe  Will ;  for  in  the  moral  being  lies 
the  source  of  the  intellectual.  The  first  step  to  know- 
ledge, or  rather  the  previous  condition  of  all  insight 
into  truth,  is  to  dare  commune  with  our  very  and 
permanent  self.  It  is  Warburton's  remark,  not  the 
Friend's,  that  "  of  all  literary  exercitations,  whether 
designed  for  the  use  or  entertainment  of  the  world, 
there  are  none  of  so  much  importance,  or  so  imme- 
diately our  concern,  as  those  which  let  us  into  the 
knowledge  of  our  own  nature.  Others  may  exercise 
the  understanding  or  amuse  the  imagination;  but 
these  only  can  improve  the  heart  and  form  the  human 
mind  to  wisdom." 

The  recluse  Hftrmit  oft-times  more  doth  know 

Of  the  world's  inmost  wheels,  than  worldlings  can. 

As  Man  is  of  the  World,  the  Heart  of  Man 

Is  an  Epitome  of  God's  great  Book 

Of  Creatures,  and  Men  need  no  further  look. 

DONNE. 

The  higher  a  man's  station,  the  more  arduous  and 
full  of  peril  his  duties,  the  more  comprehensive 
should  his  Foresight  be,  the  more  rooted  his  tranquil- 
lity concerning  Life  and  Death.  But  these  are  gifts 
which  no  experience  can  bestow,  but  the  experience 
from  within :  and  there  is  a  nobleness  of  the  whole  ! 
personal  being,  to  which  the  contemplation  of  all 
events  and  phenomena  in  the  Light  of  the  three  ' 
Master  Ideas,  announced  in  the  foregoing  pages,  can 
alone  elevate  the  spirit.  Anima  Sapiens,  (says  Gior- 
dano Bruno,  and  let  the  sublime  piely  of  the  passage 
excuse  some  intermixture  of  error,  or"  rather  let  the 
words,  as  they  well  may,  be  interpreted  in  a  safe 
sense)  Anima  sapiens  non  timet  mortem,  immo  inter- 
dum  illam  ultro  appetit,  illi  ultro  occurrit.    Manet 


quippe  substantiam  omnem  pro  Duratione  Eternitas, 
pro  Loco  Immensitas,  pro  Actu  Omniformitas.  Non 
levem  igitur  ac  futilem,  atqui  gravissimam  perfecto- 
que  Homine  dignissimam  Contemplationis  Partem 
persequimur  ubi  divinitatis,  naturoeque  splendorem, 
fusionem,  et  communicationem,  non  in  Cibo,  Potu,  et 
ignobiliore  quadam  materia  cum  attonitorum  seculo 
perquirimus;  sed  in  augusta  Omnipotentis  Regia, 
immenso  nctheris  spacio,  in  infinita  naturae  geminas 
omnia  fienlis  et  omnia  facientis  potentia,  unde  tot  as- 
trorum,  murulorum  inquam  et  numinum,  uni  altissimo 
concinentium  atque  saltantium  absque  numero  atque 
fine  juxta  propositos  ubique  fines  atque  ordines,  con- 
templamur.  Sic  ex  visibilium  ffiterno,  immenso  et 
innumerabili  effectu,  sempiterna  immensa  ilia  Majes- 
tas  atque  bonitas  intellecta  conspicitur,  proque  sua 
dignitate  innumerabilium  Deorum  (mundorum  dico) 
adsistentia,  concinentia,  et  glorias,  ipsius  enarratione, 
immo  ad  oculos  expressa  concione  glorificatur.  Cui 
Immenso  mensum  non  quadrabit  Domicilium  atque 
Templum — ad  cujus  majestatis  plenitudinem  agnos- 
cendam  atque  percolendam,  numcrabilium  ministo- 
rum  nullus  esset  ordo.  Eia  igitur  ad  omniformis  Dei 
omniformem  Tmaginem  conjectemus  oculos,  vivum 
et  magnum  illius  admiremar  simulacrum! — Hinc  mi- 
raculum  magnum  a  Trismegisto  appellabatur  Homo, 
qui  in  Deum  transeat  quasi  ipse  sit  Deus  qui  conatur 
omnia  fieri  sicut  Deus  est  omnia ;  ad  objectum  sine 
fine,  ubique  tamem  finiendo,  contendit,  sicut  infinitua 
est  Deus  immensus,  ubique  totus.* 


*  Translation.  —  A  wise  spirit  does  not  fear  death,  nay, 
sometimes,  (as  in  cases  of  voluntary  martyrdom)  seeks  and 
goes  forth  to  meet  it,  of  its  own  accord.  For  there  await9 
all  actual  beings,  for  duration  and  eternity,  for  place  immen- 
sity, for  action  omniformity.  We  pursue,  therefore,  a  species 
of  contemplation  not  light  or  futile,  but  the  weiehtiest  and 
most  worthy  of  an  accomplished  man,  while  we  examine  and 
seek  for  the  splendor,  the  interfusion,  and  communication  of 
the  Divinity  and  of  Nature,  not  in  meats  or  drink,  or  in  any 
yet  ignobler  matter,  with  the  race  of  the  thunder-stricken  ; 
but  in  the  august  palace  of  the  Omnipotent,  in  the  illimitable 
etherial  space,  in  the  infinite  power,  that  creales  all  things, 
and  is  the  abiding  being  of  all  things. 

There  we  may  contemplate  the  Host  of  Siars,  of  Worlds 
and  their  guardian  Deities,  numbers  without  number,  each  in 
its  appointed  sphere,  singing  together,  and  dancing  in  adora- 
tion of  the  One  Most  High.  Thus  from  the  perpetual,  im- 
mense, and  innumerable  goings  on  of  the  visible  world,  that 
sempiternal  and  absolutely  infinite  Majesty  is  intellectually 
beheld,  and  is  glorified  according  to  his  glory,  by  the  attend- 
ance and  choral  symphonies  of  innumerable  gods,  who  utter 
forth  the  glory  of  their  ineffable  Creator  in  the  expressive  lan- 
guage of  Vision!  To  Aim  illimitable,  a  limited  temple  will 
not  correspond— to  the  acknowledgement  and  due  worship  of 
the  Plenitude  of  his  Majesty  there  would  be  no  proportion  in 
any  numerable  army  of  ministrant  spirits.  Let  us  then  cast 
our  eyes  upon  the  omniform  image  of  the  Attributes  of  Ihe 
all-creating  Supreme,  nor  admit  any  representation  of  his 
Excellency  but  the  living  Universe,  which  he  has  created  ! — 
Thence  was  man  entitled  by  Trismegistus,  "  the  great  Mira- 
cle," inasmuch  as  he  has  been  made  capable  of  entering  into 
union  with  God,  as  if  he  were  himself  a  divine  nature  !  tries 
to  become  all  things,  even  as  in  God  all  things  arc  ;  and  in 
limitless  progression  of  limited  States  of  Being,  urges  onward 
to  the  ultimate  aim,  even  as  God  is  simultaneously  infinite, 
and  everywhere  All ! 

In  the  last  volume  of  the  work,  announced  and  its  nature 
and  objects  explained,  at  the  close  of  the  present,  I  purpose, 
to  give  an  account  of  Ihe  life  of  Giordano  Bruno,  the  friend 
of  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  who  was  burnt  under  pretence  of  Athe- 
ism, at  Rome,  in  the  year  1600  ;  and  of  his  works,  which  are 

407 


398 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


If  this  be  regarded  as  the  fancies  of  an  enthusiast, 
by  such  as 

deem  themselves  most  free, 
When  they  within  this  gross  and  visible  sphere 
Chain  down  the  winged  soul,  scoffing  assent. 
Proud  in  their  meanness, 

by  such  as  pronounce  every  man  out  of  his  senses 
who  has  not  lost  his  reason  ;  even  such  men  may  find 
some  weight  in  the  historical  fact  that  from  persons, 
who  had  previously  strengthened  their  intellecls  and 
feelings  by  the  contemplation  of  Principles — Prin- 
ciples, the  actions  correspondent  to  which  involve 
one  half  of  their  consequences,  by  their  ennobling 
influence  on  the  agent's  own  soul,  and  have  omnipo- 
tence, as  the  pledge  for  the  remainder — we  have  de- 
rived the  surest  and  most  general  maxims  of  pru- 
dence. Of  high  value  are  they  all.  Yet  I  here  is  one 
among  them  worth  all  the  rest,  which  in  the  fullest 
and  primary  sense  of  the  word,  is  indeed  the  Maxim, 
(i.  e.  the  Maximum)  of  human  Prudence ;  and  of 
which  History  itself  in  all  that  makes  it  most  worth 
studying,  is  one  continued  comment  and  exemplifica- 
tion. It  is  this :  that  there  is  a  Wisdom  higher  than 
Prudence,  to  which  Prudence  stands  in  the  same  re- 
lation as  the  Mason  and  Carpenter  to  the  genial  and 
scientific  Architect;  and  from  the  habits  of  thinking 
and  feeling,  that  in  this  Wisdom  had  their  first  forma- 
tion, our  Nelsons  and  Wellingtons  inherit  that  glori- 
ous hardihood,  which  completes  the  undertaking,  ere 
the  contemptuous  calculator  (who  has  left  nothing 
omitted  in  his  scheme  of  probabilities,  except  the 
might  of  the  human  mind)  has  finished  his  pretended 
proof  of  its  impossibility.  You  look  to  Fads  and 
profess  to  take  Experience  for  your  guide.  Well !  I 
too  appeal  to  Experience  :  and  let  Fads  be  the  ordeal 
of  my  position  !  Therefore,  although  I  have  in  this 
and  the  preceding  Numbers  quoted  more  frequently 
and  copiously  than  I  shall  permit  myself  to  do  in  fu- 
ture, I  owe  it  to  the  cause  I  am  pleading,  not  to  deny 
myself  the  gratification  of  supporting  this  connexion 
of  practical  heroism  with  previous  habits  of  philoso- 
phic thought,  by  a  singularly  appropriate  passage 
from  an  author  whose  works  can  be  called  rare  only 
from  their  being,  I  fear,  rarely  read,  however  com- 
monly talked  of.  It  is  the  instance  of  Xenophon  as 
stated  by  Lord  Bacon,  who  would  himself  furnish 
an  equal  instance,  if  there  could  be  found  an  equal 
commentator. 
"It  is  of  Xenophon  the  Philosopher,  who  went 


perhaps  the  scarcest  books  ever  printed.  They  are  singularly 
interesting  as  portraits  of  a  vigorous  mind  struggling  after 
truth,  amid  many  prejudices,  which  from  the  state  of  the  Ro- 
man Church,  in  which  he  was  born,  have  a  claim  to  much 
indulgence.  One  of  them  (entitled  Ember  Week)  is  curious 
for  its  lively  accounts  of  the  rude  state  of  London,  at  that 
time,  both  as  to  the  streets  and  the  manners  of  the  citizens. 
The  most  industrious  Historians  of  speculative  Philosophy, 
have  not  been  able  to  procure  more  than  a  few  of  his  works. 
Accidentally  I  have  been  more  fortunate  in  this  respect,  than 
those  who  have  written  hitherto  on  the  unhappy  Philosopher 
ofJVola:  as  out  of  eleven  works,  the  titles  of  which  are  pre- 
served to  us,  I  have  had  an  opportunity  of  perusing  six.  I 
was  told,  when  in  Germany,  that  there  is  a  complete  collec- 
tion of  them  in  the  Royal  Library  at  Copenhagen.  If  so,  it 
is  unique. 


from  Socrates's  School  into  Asia,  in  the  expedition  of 
Cyrus  the  younger,  against  King  Artaxerxes.  This 
Xenophon,  at  that  time,  was  very  young,  and  never 
had  seen  the  wars  before  ;  neither  had  any  command 
in  the  army,  but  only  followed  the  war  as  a  volun- 
teer, for  the  love  and  conversation  of  Proxenus,  his 
friend.  He  was  present  when  Falinus  came  in  mes- 
sage from  the  king  to  the  Grecians,  after  that  Cyrus 
was  slain  in  the  Field,  and  they,  a  handful  of  men, 
left  to  themselves  in  the  midst  of  the  King's  territo- 
ries, cut  off  from  their  country  by  many  navigable 
rivers,  and  many  hundred  miles.  The  message  im- 
ported, that  they  should  deliver  up  their  arms  and 
submit  themselves  to  the  King's  mercy.  To  which 
message,  before  answer  was  made,  divers  of  the  army 
conferred  familiarly  with  Falinus,  and  amongst  the 
rest  Xenophon  happened  to  say:  Why,  Falinus!  we 
have  now  but  two  things  left,  our  arms  and  our  vir- 
tue ;  and  if  we  yield  up  our  arms,  how  shall  we  make 
use  of  our  virtue?  Whereto  Falinus,  smiling  on  him, 
said,  '  If  I  be  not  deceived,  Young  Gentleman,  you 
are  an  Athenian,  and  I  believe,  you  study  Philoso- 
phy, and  it  is  pretty  that  you  say ;  but  you  are  much 
abused,  if  you  think  your  virtue  can  withstand  the 
King's  power.'  Here  was  the  scorn:  the  wonder 
followed — which  was,  that  this  young  Scholar  or 
Philosopher,  after  all  the  Captains  were  murdered 
in  parley,  by  treason,  conducted  those  ten  thousand 
foot  through  the  heart  of  all  the  King's  high  coun- 
tries from  Babylon  to  Grecia,  in  safety,  in  despite  of 
all  the  King's  forces,  to  the  astonishment  of  the  world, 
and  the  encouragement  of  the  Grecians,  in  times  suc- 
ceeding, to  make  invasion  upon  the  kings  of  Persia; 
as  was  afterwards  purposed  by  Jason  the  Thessalian, 
attempted  by  Agesilaus  the  Spartan,  and  achieved 
by  Alexander  the  Macedonian,  all  upon  the  ground 
of  (he  act  of  that  young  Scholar." 

Often  have  I  reflected  with  awe  on  the  great  and 
disproportionate  power,  which  an  individual  of  no  ex- 
traordinary talents  or  attainments  may  exert,  by  mere- 
ly throwing  off  all  restraint  of  conscience.  What 
then  must  not  be  the  power,  where  an  individual,  of 
consummate  wickedness,  can  organize  into  the  unity 
and  rapidity  of  an  individual  will  all  the  natural  and 
artificial  forces  of  a  populous  and  wicked  nation? 
And  could  we  bring  within  the  field  of  imagination., 
the  devastation  effecled  in  the  moral  world,  by  the 
violent  removal  of  old  customs,  familiar  sympathies, 
willing  reverences,  and  habits  of  subordination  almost 
naturalized  into  instinct ;  of  the  mild  influences  of 
reputation,  and  the  other  ordinary  props  and  aidances 
of  our  infirm  virtue,  or  at  least,  if  virtue  be  too  high 
a  name,  of  our  well-doing  ;  and  above  all,  if  we  could 
give  form  and  body  to  all  the  effects  produced  on  the 
principles  and  dispositions  of  nations  by  the  infectious 
feelings  of  insecurity,  and  the  soul-sickening  sense  of 
unsteadiness  in  the  whole  edifice  of  civil  society;  the 
horrors  of  battle,  though  the  miseries  of  a  whole  war 
were  brought  together  before  our  eyes  in  one  disas- 
trous field,  would  present  but  a  tame  tragedy  in  com- 
parison. Nay,  it  would  even  present  a  sight  of  com- 
fort and  of  elevation,  if  this  field  of  carnage  were 
the  sign  and  result  of  a  national  resolve,  of  a  general 

408 


THE  FRIEND. 


399 


will,  so  to  die,  that  neither  deluge  nor  fire  should 
lake  away  the  name  of  Country  from  their  graves, 
rather  than  to  tread  the  clods  of  earth,  no  longer  a 
country,  and  themselves  alive  in  nature,  but  dead  in 
infamy.  What  is  Greece  at  this  present  moment  ? 
It  is  the  Country  of  the  heroes  from  Codrus  to  Phi- 
lopcemen ;  and  so  it  would  be,  though  all  the  sands 
of  Africa  should  cover  its  corn-fields  and  olive  gar- 
dens, and  not  a  (lower  were  left  on  Hymettus  for  a 
bee  to  murmur  in. 

If  then  the  |>owor  with  which  wickedness  can  in- 
vest the  human  being  be  thus  tremendous,  greatly 
does  it  behove  us  to  enquire  into  its  source  and  causes. 
So  doing  we  shall  quickly  discover  that  it  is  not  vice, 
as  vice,  which  is  thus  mighty;  but  systematic  vice! 
Vice  self-consistent  and  entire;  crime  corresponding 
to  crime  ;  villany  entrenched  and  barricadoed  by  vil- 
lany ;  this  is  the  condition  and  main  constituent  of  its 
power.  The  abandonment  of  all  principle  of  right 
enables  the  soul  to  choose  and  act  upon  a  principle 
of  wrong,  and  to  subordinate  to  this  one  principle  all 
the  various  vices  of  human  nature.  For  it  is  a  mourn- 
ful truth,  that  as  devastation  is  incomparably  an  easier 
work  than  production,  so  may  all  its  means  and  in- 
struments lie  more  easily  arranged  into  a  scheme  and 
system.  Even  as  in  a  siege  every  building  and  gar- 
den, which  the  faithful  governor  must  destroy,  as  im- 
peding the  defensive  means  of  the  garrison,  or  fur- 
nishing means  of  offence  to  the  besieger,  occasions  a 
wound  in  feelings  which  virtue  herself"  has  fostered  ; 
and  virtue,  because  it  is  virtue,  loses  perforce  part  of 
her  energy  in  the  reluctance  with  which  she  proceeds 
to  a  business  so  repugnant  to  her  wishes,  as  a  choice 
of  evils.  But  He,  who  has  once  said  with  his  whole 
heart,  Evil,  be  thou  my  Good !  has  removed  a  world 
of  obstacles  by  the  very  decision,  that  he  will  have 
no  obstacles  but  those  of  force  and  brute  matter.  The 
road  of  Justice 

"Curves  round  the  corn-field  and  the  hill  of  vines 
Honoring  the  holy  bounds  of  property  !" 

But  the  path  of  the  lightning  is  straight:  and  straight 
the  fearful  path 

"Of  the  cannon-ball.    Direct  it  flies  and  rapid, 
Shatt'ring  that  it  may  reach,  and  shatt'ring  what  it  reach- 
es."* 

Happily  for  mankind,  however,  the  obstacles  which 
a  consistently  evil  mind  no  longer  finds  in  itself,  it 
finds  in  its  own  unsuitableness  to  human  nature.  A 
limit  is  fixed  to  its  power:  but  within  that  limit,  both 
as  to  the  extent  and  duration  of  its  influence,  there  is 
little  hope  of  checking  its  career,  if  giant  and  united 
vices  are  opposed  only  by  mixed  and  scattered  vir- 

*  Wallcnstein,  from  Schiller,  by  S.  T.  Coleridge.  I  return 
my  thanks  to  the  unknown  Author  of  Waverley,  Guy  Man- 
nering,  &c,  for  having  quoted  this  free  Translation  from 
Schiller's  best  (and  therefore  most  neglected)  Drama  with  ap- 
plause :  and  am  not  ashamed  to  avow,  that  I  have  derived  a 
peculiar  gratification,  that  the  first  men  of  our  age  have  uni- 
ted in  giving,  no  ordinary  praise  to  a  work,  which  our  anony- 
mous critics  were  equally  unanimous  in  abusing  as  below  all 
criticism  :  though  they  charitably  added,  that  the  fault  was, 
doubtless,  chiefly  if  not  wholly,  in  the  Translator's  dullness 
and  incapacity. 

27 


tues  :  and  those  too,  probably,  from  the  want  of  some 
combining  Principle,  which  assigns  to  each  its  due 
place  and  rank,  at  civil  war  with  themselves,  or  at 
best  perplexing  and  counteracting  each  other.  In  our 
late  agony  of  glory  and  of  peril,  did  we  not  too  often 
hoar  even  good  men  declaiming  on  the  horrors  and 
crimes  of  war,  and  softening  or  staggering  the  minds 
of  their  brethren  by  details  of  individual  wretched- 
ness ?  Thus  under  pretence  of  avoiding  blood,  they 
were  withdrawing  the  will  from  the  defence  of  the 
very  source  of  those  blessings  without  which  the  blood 
would  flow  idly  in  our  veins!  thus  lest  a  few  should 
fall  on  the  bulwarks  in  glory,  they  were  preparing  us 
to  give  up  the  whole  state  to  baseness,  and  the  child- 
ren of  free  ancestors  to  become  slaves,  and  the  fathers 
of  slaves ! 

Machiavelli  has  well  observed,  "  Sono  di  tre  gene- 
razione  Cervelli:  I'uno  intende  per  se;  Valtro  inlende 
quanto  da  altri  gli  e  mostro ;  il  terzo  won  intende  n6 
per  se  slesso  ne  per  demonstrazione  d'allri."  "  There 
are  brains  of  three  races.  The  one  understands  of 
itself;  the  second  understands  as  much  as  is  shown 
it  by  others;  the  third  neither  understands  of  itself 
nor  what  is  shown  it  by  others."  I  should  have  no 
hesitation  in  placing  that  man  in  the  third  Class  of 
Brains,  for  whom  the  History  of  the  last  twenty  years 
has  not  supplied  a  copious  comment  on  the  preceding 
Text.  The  widest  maxims  of  prudence  are  like  arms 
without  hearts,  disjoined  from  those  feelings  which 
flow  forth  from  principle  as  from  a  fountain.  So  little 
are  even  the  genuine  maxims  of  expedience  likely  to 
be  perceived  or  acted  upon  by  those  who  have  been 
habituated  to  admit  nothing  higher  than  expedience, 
that  I  dare  hazard  the  assertion,  that  in  the  whole 
Chapter-of-Contents  of  European  Ruin,  every  article 
might  be  unanswerably  deduced  from  the  neglect  of 
some  maxim  that  had  been  repeatedly  laid  down,  de- 
monstrated, and  enforced  with  a  host  of  illustrations, 
in  some  one  or  other  of  the  works  of  Machiavelli,  Ba- 
con, or  Harrington.t  Indeed  I  can  remember  no  one 
event  of  importance  which  was  not  distinctly  fore- 
told, and  this  not  by  a  lucky  prize  drawn  among  a 
thousand  blanks  out  of  the  lottery-wheel  of  conjec- 
ture, but  legitimately  deduced  as  certain  consequences 
from  established  premises.  It  would  be  a  melancho- 
ly, but  a  very  profitable  employment,  for  some  vigo- 
rous mind,  intimately  acquainted  with  the  recent  his- 
tory of  Europe,  to  collect  the  weightiest  Aphorisms 
of  Machiavelli  alone,  and  illustrating  by  appropriate 
facts  the  breach  or  observation  of  each,  to  render  less 
mysterious  the  present  triumph  of  lawless  violence. 
The  apt  motto  to  such  a  work  would  be,  — "  The 
Children  of  Darkness  are  wiser  in  their  Generation 
than  the  Children  of  Light." 

So  grievously,  indeed,  have  men  been  deceived  by 
the  showy  mock  theories  of  unlearned  mock  thinkers, 
that  there  seems  a  tendency  in  the  public  mind  to 
shun  all  thought,  and  to  expect  help  from  any  quar- 
ter rather  than  from  seriousness  and  reflection  :  as  if 
some  invisible  power  would  think  for  us,  when  we 


t  See  The  Statesman's  Manual:  a  Lny-Sermon  by  the 
Author. 

409 


400 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


gave  up  the  pretence  of  thinking  for  ourselves.  But 
in  the  first  place,  did  those,  who  opposed  the  theories 
of  invocators,  conduct  their  unlheorelic  opposition  with 
more  wisdom  or  to  a  happier  result?  And  secondly, 
are  societies  now  constructed  on  principles  so  few 
and  so  simple,  that  we  could,  even  if  we  wished  it, 
act  as  it  were  by  insti7ict,  like  our  distant  Forefathers 
in  the  infancy  of  States  ?  Doubtless,  to  act  is  nobler 
than  to  think :  but  as  the  old  man  doth  not  become  a 
child  by  means  of  his  second  childishness,  as  little 
can  a  nation  exempt  itself  from  the  necessity  of  think- 
ing, which  has  once  learned  to  think.  Miserable  was 
the  delusion  of  the  late  mad  Realizer  of  mad  Dreams, 
in  his  belief  that  he  should  ultimately  succeed  in 
transforming  the  nations  of  Europe  into  the  unreason- 
ing hordes  of  a  Babylonian  or  Tartar  Empire,  or  even 
in  reducing  the  age  to  the  simplicity,  (so  desirable  for 
tyrants)  of  those  times,  when  the  sword  and  the 
plough  were  the  sole  implements  of  human  skill. 
Those  are  epochs  in  the  history  of  a  people  which 
having  been  can  never  more  recur.  Extirpate  all 
civilization  and  all  its  arts  by  the  sword,  trample 
down  all  ancient  Institutions,  Rights,  Distinctions,  and 
Privileges,  drag  us  backward  to  our  old  Barbarism, 
as  beasts  to  the  den  of  Cacus — deemed  you  that  thus 
you  could  re-create  the  unexamining  and  boisterous 
youth  of  the  world  when  the  sole  questions  were — 
"  What  is  to  be  conquered  ?  and  who  is  the  most  fa- 
mous leader  ?" 

In  an  age  in  which  artificial  knowledge  is  received 
almost  at  the  birth,  intellect  and  thought  alone  can 
be  our  upholder  and  judge.  Let  the  importance  of 
this  Truth  procure  pardon  for  its  repetition.  Only  by 
means  of  seriousness  and  meditation  and  the  free  in- 
fliction of  censure  in  the  spirit  of  love,  can  the  true 
philanthropist  of  the  present  time,  curb-in  himself 
and  his  contemporaries ;  only  by  these  can  he  aid  in 
preventing  the  evils  which  threaten  us,  not  from  the 
terrors  of  an  enemy  so  much  as  from  our  fears  of  our 
own  thoughts,  and  our  aversion  to  all  the  toils  of  re- 
flection ?  For  all  must  now  be  taught  in  sport — Sci- 
ence, Morality,  yea,  Religion  itself.  And  yet  few 
now  sport  from  the  actual  impulse  of  a  believing  fancy 
and  in  a  happy  delusion.  Of  the  most  influensive 
class,  at  least,  of  our  literary  guides,  (the  anonymous 
authors  of  periodical  publications)  the  most  part  as- 
sume this  character  from  cowardice  or  malice,  till 
having  begun  with  studied  ignorance  and  a  premedi- 
tated levity,  they  at  length  realize  the  lie,  and  end 
indeed  in  a  pitiable  destitution  of  all  intellectual 
power. 

To  many  I  shall  appear  to  speak  insolently,  be- 
cause the  public,  (for  that  is  the  phrase  which  has 
succeeded  to  "  The  Town,"  of  the  wits  of  the  reign 
of  Charles  the  second) — the  public  is  at  present  ac- 
customed to  find  itself  appealed  to  as  the  infallible 
Judge,  and  each  reader  complimented  with  excellen- 


cies, which  if  he  really  possessed,  to  what  purpose  is 
he  a  reader,  unless,  perhaps,  to  remind  himself  of  his 
own  superiority !  I  confess  that  I  think  widely  dif- 
ferent. I  have  not  a  deeper  conviction  on  earth,  than 
that  the  principles  both  of  Taste,  Morals,  and  Reli- 
gion, which  are  taught  in  the  commonest  books  of  re- 
cent composition,  are  false,  injurious,  and  debasing. 
If  these  sentiments  should  be  just,  the  consequences 
must  be  so  important,  that  every  well-educated  man, 
who  professes  them  in  sincerity,  deserves  a  patient 
hearing.  He  may  fairly  appeal  even  to  those  whose 
persuasions  are  most  opposed  to  his  own,  in  the  words 
of  the  Philosopher  of  Nola:  "  Ad  ist  here  qumso  vns, 
qnaliacunque  primo  videanlur  aspechi,  adtendi/e,  lit 
qui  vobis  forsan  insanire  videar,  saltern  quibus  insa- 
niam  rationibus  cognosralis."  What  I  feel  deeply, 
freely  will  I  utter.  Truth  is  not  detraction ;  and  as- 
suredly we  do  not  hate  him,  to  whom  we  tell  the 
Truth.  But  with  whomsoever  we  play  the  deceiver 
and  flatterer,  him  at  the  bottom  we  despise.  We  are, 
indeed,  under  a  necessity  to  conceive  a  vileness  in 
him,  in  order  to  diminish  the  sense  of  the  wrong  we 
have  committed  by  the  worthlessness  of  the  object. 

Through  no  excess  of  confidence  in  the  strength  of 
my  talents,  but  with  the  deepest  assurance  of  the  jus- 
tice of  my  cause,  I  bid  defiance  to  all  the  flatterers  of 
the  folly  and  foolish  self-opinion  of  the  half-instructed 
Many ;  to  all  who  fill  the  air  with  festal  explosions 
and  false  fires  sent  up  against  the  lightnings  of  Hea- 
ven, in  order  that  the  people  may  neither  distinguish 
the  warning  flash  nor  hear  the  threatening  thunder! 
How  recently  did  we  stand  alone  in  the  world  !  And 
though  the  one  storm  has  blown  over,  another  may 
even  now  be  gathering :  or  haply  the  hollow  murmur 
of  the  Earthquake  within  the  Bowels  of  our  own 
Commonweal  may  strike  a  direr  terror  than  ever  did 
the  Tempest  of  foreign  Warfare.  Therefore,  though 
the  first  quatrain  is  no  longer  applicable,  yet  the  mo- 
ral truth  and  the  sublime  exhortation  of  the  following 
Sonnet  can  never  be  superannuated.  With  it  I  con- 
clude this  Number,  thanking  Heaven !  that  I  have 
communed  with,  honored,  and  loved  its  wise  and 
high-minded  author.  To  know  that  such  men  are 
among  us,  is  of  itself  an  antidote  against  despondence. 

Another  year: — another  deadly  blow  ! 
Another  mighty  Empire  overthrown  ! 
And  we  are  left,  or  shall  be  left,  alone; 
The  last  that  dares  to  struggle  with  the  Foe. 
'Tis  well !  from  this  day  forward  we  shall  know 
That  in  ourselves  our  safety  must  be  sought; 
That  by  our  own  right  hands  it  must  be  wrought ; 
That  we  must  stand  unpropt  or  be  laid  low. 
O  Dastard  !  whom  such  foretaste  doth  not  cheer' 
We  shall  exult,  if  They,  who  rule  the  land, 
Be  Men  who  hold  its  many  blessings  dear, 
Wise,  upright,  valiant;  not  a  venal  Band, 
Who  are  to  judge  of  danger  which  they  fear, 
And  honor,  which  they  do  not  understand. 

WORDSWORTH. 
410 


srfte  ILattfcfuflHiace: 


OR 


ESSAYS    INTERPOSED   FOR  AMUSEMENT,  RETROSPECT,  AND   PREPARATION. 


MISCELLANY    THE    FIRST. 


Etiam  a  musis  si  quando  animum  paulisper  abducarnus,  apud  Musas  nihilominus  feriamur :  at  reclines  quidem,  at  otiosaa, 
at  de  bis  et  illas  inter  se  libere  colloquentea. 


ESSAY   I. 


O  blessed  Letters '.  that  combine  in  one 
All  ages  past,  and  make  one  live  with  all : 
By  you  we  do  confer  with  who  are  gone 
And  the  Dead-living  unto  Council  call! 
By  you  the  Unborn  shall  have  communion 
Of  what  we  feel  and  what  doth  us  befall. 

Since  Writings  are  the  Veins,  the  Arteries, 
And  undecaying  Life-strings  of  those  Hearts, 
That  still  shall  pant  and  still  shall  exercise 
Their  mightiest  powers  when  Nature  none  imparts  . 
And  the  strong  constitution  of  their  Praise 
Wear  out  the  infection  of  distemper'd  days. 

DANIEL'S  Musophilus. 


The  Intelligence,  which  produces  or  controls  hu- 
man actions  and  occurrences,  is  often  represented  by 
the  Mystics  under  the  name  and  notion  of  the  su- 
preme Harmonist.  I  do  not  myself  approve  of  these 
metaphors  :  they  seem  to  imply  a  restlessness  to  un- 
derstand that  which  is  not  among  the  appointed 
objects  of  our  comprehension  or  discursive  faculty. 
But  certainly  there  is  one  excellence  in  good  music, 
to  which,  without  mysticism,  we  may  find  or  make 
an  analogy  in  the  records  of  History.  I  allude  to 
that  sense  of  recognition,  which  accompanies  our 
sense  of  novelty  in  the  most  original  passages  of  a 
great  composer.  If  we  listen  to  a  Symphony  of 
Cimarosa,  the  present  strain  still  seems  not  only  to 
recal,  but  almost  to  renew,  some  past  movement, 
another  and  yet  the  same  !  Each  present  movement 
bringing  back,  as  it  were,  and  embodying  the  spirit 
of  some  melody  that  had  gone  before,  anticipates  and 
seems  trying  to  overtake  something  that  is  to  come  : 
and  the  musician  has  reached  the  summit  of  his  art, 
when  having  thus  modified  the  Present  by  the  Past, 
he  at  the  same  time  weds  the  Past  in  the  Present 
to  some  prepared  and  corresponsive  Future.  The 
auditor's  thoughts  and  feelings  move  under  the  same 
influence  :  retrospect  blends  with  anticipation,  and 
Hope  and  Memory  (a  female  Janus)  become  one 
power  with  a  double  aspect.  A  similar  effect  the 
reader  may  produce  for  himself  in  the  pages  of  His- 
tory, if  he  will  be  content  to  substitute  an  intellec- 


tual complacency  for  pleasurable  sensation.  The 
events  and  characters  of  one  age,  like  the  strains  in 
music,  recal  those  of  another,  and  the  variety  by 
which  each  is  individualized,  not  only  gives  a  charm 
and  poignancy  to  the  resemblance,  but  likewise  ren- 
ders the  whole  more  intelligible.  Meantime  ample 
room  is  afforded  for  the  exercise  both  of  the  judgment 
and  the  fancy,  in  distinguishing  cases  of  real  resem- 
blance from  those  of  intentional  imitation,  the  analo- 
gies of  nature,  revolving  upon  herself,  from  the 
masquerade  figures  of  cunning  and  vanity. 

It  is  not  from  identity  of  opinions,  or  from  similar- 
ity of  events  and  outward  actions,  that  a  real  resem- 
blance can  be  deduced.  On  the  contrary,  men  of 
great  and  stirring  powers,  who  are  destined  to  mould 
the  age  in  which  they  are  born,  must  first  mould 
themselves  upon  it.  Mahomet  born  twelve  centuries 
later,  and  in  the  heart  of  Europe,  would  not  have 
been  a  false  Prophet ;  nor  would  a  false  Prophet  of 
the  present  generation  have  been  a  Mahomet  in  the 
sixth  century.  I  have  myself,  therefore,  derived  the 
deepest  interest  from  the  comparison  of  men,  whose 
characters  at  the  first  view  appear  widely  dissimilar, 
who  yet  have  produced  similar  effects  on  their  differ- 
ent ages,  and  this  by  the  exertion  of  powers  which 
on  examination  will  be  found  far  more  alike,  than 
the  altered  drapery  and  costume  would  have  led  us 
to  suspect.  Of  the  heirs  of  fame  few  are  more  re- 
spected by  me,  though  for  very  different  qualities, 
than  Erasmus  and  Luther :  scarcely  any  one  has  a 
larger  share  of  my  aversion  than  Voltaire ;  and  even 
of  the  better-hearted  Rousseau  I  was  never  more 
than  a  very  lukewarm  admirer.  I  should  perhaps 
too  rudely  affront  the  general  opinion,  if  I  avowed 
my  whole  creed  concerning  the  proportions  of  real 
talent  between  the  two  purifiers  of  revealed  Religion, 
now  neglected  as  obsolete,  and  the  two  modern  con- 
spirators against  its  authority,  who  are  still  the  Alpha 
and  Omega  of  Continental  Genius.  Yet  when  I  ab- 
stract the  questions  of  evil  and  good,  and  measure 
only  the  effects  produced  and  the  mode  of  producing 
them,  I  have  repeatedly  found  the  idea  of  Voltaire, 
Rousseau,  and  Robespierre,  recal  in  a  similar  cluster 
and  connection  that  of  Erasmus,  Luther,  and  Mon- 
ster. 

411 


402 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Those  who  are  familiar  with  the  works  of  Erasmus, 
and  who  know  the  influence  of  his  wit,  as  the  pio- 
neer of  the  reformation ;  and  who  likewise  know, 
that  by  his  wit,  added  to  the  vast  variety  of  know- 
ledge communicated  in  his  works,  he  had  won  over 
by  anticipation  so  large  a  part  of  the  polite  and  let- 
tered world  to  the  Protestant  party  ;  will  be  at  no  loss 
in  discovering  the  intended  counterpart  in  the  life 
and  writings  of  the  veteran  Frenchman.  They  will 
see,  indeed,  that  the  knowledge  of  the  one  was  solid 
through  its  whole  extent,  and  that  of  the  other  exten- 
sive at  a  cheap  rate,  by  its  superficiality ;  that  the  wit 
of  the  one  is  always  bottomed  on  sound  sense,  peo- 
ples and  enriches  the  mind  of  the  reader  with  an 
endless  variety  of  distinct  images  and  living  inte- 
rests: and  that  his  broadest  laughter  is  every  where 
translatable  into  grave  and  weighty  truth;  while  the 
wit  of  the  Frenchman,  without  imagery,  without  cha- 
racter, and  without  that  pathos  which  gives  the  ma- 
gic charm  to  genuine  humor,  consists,  when  it  is  most 
perfect,  in  happy  turns  of  phrase,  but  far  too  often 
in  fantastic  incidents,  outrages  of  the  pure  imagina- 
tion, and  the  poor  low  trick  of  combining  the  ridicu- 
lous with  the  venerable,  where  he,  who  does  not 
laugh,  abhors.  Neither  will  they  have  forgotten,  that 
the  object  of  the  one  was  to  drive  the  thieves  and 
mummers  out  of  the  temple,  while  the  other  was 
propelling  a  worse  banditti,  first  to  profane  and  pil- 
lage, and  ultimately  to  raze  it.  Yet  not  the  less  will 
they  perceive,  that  the  effects  remain  parallel,  the  cir- 
cumstances analogous,  and  the  instruments  the  same. 
In  each  case  the  effects  extended  over  Europe,  were 
attested  and  augmented  by  the  praise  and  patronage 
of  thrones  and  dignities,  and  are  not  to  be  explained 
but  by  extraordinary  industry  and  a  life  of  literature  ; 
in  both  instances  the  circumstances  were  supplied  by 
an  age  of  hopes  and  promises — the  age  of  Erasmus 
restless  from  the  first  vernal  influences  of  real  know- 
ledge, that  of  Voltaire  from  the  hectic  of  imagined 
superiority.  In  the  voluminous  works  of  both,  the 
instruments  employed  are  chiefly  those  of  wit  and 
amusive  erudition,  and  alike  in  both  the  errors  and 
evils  (real  or  imputed)  in  Religion  and  Politics  are 
the  objects  of  the  battery.  And  here  we  must  stop. 
The  two  Men  were  esseyitially  different.  Exchange 
mutually  their  dates  and  spheres  of  action,  yet  Vol- 
taire, had  he  been  ten-fold  a  Voltaire,  could  not  have 
made  up  an  Erasmus;  and  Erasmus  must  have  emp- 
tied himself  of  half  his  greatness  and  all  his  good- 
ness, to  have  become  a  Voltaire. 

Shall  we  succeed  better  or  worse  with  the  next 
pair,  in  this  our  new  dance  of  death,  or  rather  of  the 
shadows  which  we  have  brought  forth — two  by  two 
— from  the  historic  ark  ?  In  our  first  couple  we  have 
at  least  secured  an  honorable  retreat,  and  though  we 
failed  as  to  the  agents,  we  have  maintained  a  fair 
analogy  in  the  actions  and  the  objects.  But  the  he- 
roic Luther,  a  Giant  awaking  in  his  strength !  and 
the  crazy  Rousseau,  the  Dreamer  of  love-sick  Tales, 
and  the  spinner  of  speculative  Cobwebs  ;  shy  of  light 
as  the  Mole,  but  as  quick-eared  too  for  every  whisper 
of  the  public  opinion  ;  the  Teacher  of  stoic  Pride  in 
his  principles,  yet  the  victim  of  morbid  Vanity  in  his 


feelings  and  conduct.  From  what  point  of  likeness 
can  we  commence  the  comparison  between  a  Luther 
and  a  Rousseau  ?  And  truly  had  I  been  seeking  for 
characters  that,  taken  as  they  really  existed,  closely 
resemble  each  other,  and  this  too  to  our  first  appre- 
hensions, and  according  to  the  common  rules  of  bio- 
graphical comparison,  I  could  scarcely  have  made  a 
more  unlucky  choice :  unless  I  had  desired  that  my 
parallel  of  the  German  "  Son  of  Thunder"  and  the 
Visionary  of  Geneva,  should  sit  on  the  same  bench 
with  honest  Fluellen's  of  Alexander  the  Great  and 
Harry  of  Monmouth.  Still,  however,  the  same  ana- 
logy would  hold  as  in  my  former  instance ;  the  ef- 
fects produced  on  their  several  ages  by  Luther  and 
Rousseau,  were  commensurate  with  each  other,  and 
were  produced  in  both  cases  by  (what  their  contem- 
poraries felt  as)  serious  and  vehement  eloquence,  and 
an  elevated  tone  of  moral  feeling:  and  Luther,  not 
less  than  Rousseau,  was  actuated  by  an  almost  super- 
stitious hatred  of  superstition,  and  a  turbulent  preju- 
dice against  prejudices.  In  the  relation  too  which 
their  writings  severally  bore  to  those  of  Erasmus  and 
Voltaire,  and  the  way  in  which  the  latter  co-operated 
with  them  to  the  same  general  end,  each  finding  its 
own  class  of  admirers  and  Proselytes,  the  parallel  is 
complete. 

I  cannot,  however,  rest  here !  Spite  of  the  apparent 
incongruities,  I  am  disposed  to  plead  for  a  resem- 
blance in  the  Men  themselves,  for  that  similarity  in 
their  radical  natures,  which  I  abandoned  all  pretence 
and  desire  of  showing  in  the  instances  of  Voltaire 
and  Erasmus.  But  then  my  readers  must  think  of 
Luther  not  as  he  really  was,  but  as  he  might  have 
been,  if  he  had  been  born  in  the  age  and  under  the 
circumstances  of  the  Swiss  Philosopher.  For  this 
purpose  I  must  strip  him  of  many  advantages  which 
he  derived  from  his  own  times,  and  must  contemplate 
him  in  his  natural  weaknesses  as  well  as  in  his  origi- 
nal strength.  Each  referred  all  things  to  his  own 
ideal.  The  ideal  was  indeed  widely  different  in  the 
one  and  in  the  other:  and  this  was  not  the  least  of 
Luther's  many  advantages,  or  (to  use  a  favorite 
phrase  of  his  own)  not  one  of  his  least  favors  of  pre- 
venting grace.  Happily  for  him  he  had  derived  his 
standard  from  a  common  measure  already  received 
by  the  good  and  wise  :  I  mean  the  inspired  writings, 
the  study  of  which  Erasmus  had  previously  restored 
among  the  learned.  To  know  that  we  are  in  sympa- 
thy with  others,  moderates  our  feelings,  as  well  as 
strengthens  our  convictions :  and  for  the  mind,  which 
opposes  itself  to  the  faith  of  the  multitude,  it  is  more 
especially  desirable,  that  there  should  exist  an  object 
out  of  itself,  on  which  it  may  fix  its  attention,  and 
thus  balance  its  own  energies. 

Rousseau,  on  the  contrary,  in  the  inauspicious  spi- 
rit of  his  age  and  birth-place,*  had  slipped  the  cable 


*  Infidelity  was  so  common  in  Geneva  about  that  time,  that 
Voltaire  in  one  of  his  Letters  exults,  that  in  this,  Calvin's 
own  City,  some  half  dozen  only  of  the  most  ignorant  believ- 
ed in  Christianity  under  any  form.  This  was,  no  duubt,  one 
of  Voltaire'B  usual  lies  of  exaggeration  :  it  is  not  however  to 
be  denied,  that  hero,  and  throughout  Switzerland,  he  and  the 
dark  Master  in  whose  service  he  employed  himself,  had  am- 
ple grounds  of  triumph. 

412 


THE  FRIEND. 


403 


of  his  faith,  and  steered  by  the  compass  of  unaided 
reason,  ignorant  of  the  hidden  currents  that  were 
bearing  him  out  of  his  course,  and  too  proud  to  con- 
sult the  faithful  charts  prized  and  held  sacred  by  his 
forefathers.  But  the  strange  influences  of  his  bodily 
temperament  on  his  understanding;  his  constitutional 
melancholy  pampered  into  a  morbid  excess  by  soli- 
tude; his  wild  dreams  of  suspicion;  his  hypochon- 
driacal fancies  of  hosts  of  conspirators  all  leagued 
against  him  and  his  cause,  and  headed  by  some  arch- 
enemy, to  whose  machinations  he  attributed  every 
trifling  mishap,  (all  as  much  the  creatures  of  his  ima- 
gination, as  if  instead  of  Men  he  had  conceived  them 
to  be  infernal  Spirits  and  Beings  preternatural)  — 
these,  or  at  least  the  predisposition  to  them,  existed  in 
the  ground-work  of  his  nature :  they  were  parts  of 
Rousseau  himself.  And  what  corresponding  in  kind 
to  these,  not  to  speak  of  degree,  can  we  detect  in  the 
character  of  his  supposed  parallel  ?  This  difficulty 
will  suggest  itself  at  the  first  thought,  to  those  who 
derive  all  their  knowledge  of  Luther  from  the  mea- 
gre biography  met  with  in  "  The  Lives  of  eminent 
Reformers,"  or  even  from  the  ecclesiastical  Histories 
of  Mosheim  or  Milner:  for  a  life  of  Luther,  in  extent 
and  style  of  execution  proportioned  to  the  grandeur 
and  interest  of  the  subject,  a  Life  of  the  Man  Luther, 
as  well  as  of  Luther  the  Theologian,  is  still  a  deside- 
ratum in  English  Literature,  though  perhaps  there  is 
no  subject  for  which  so  many  unused  materials  are 
extant,  both  printed  and  in  manuscript.* 


ESSAY   II. 


Is  it,  1  ask,  most  important  to  the  best  interests  of  Man- 
kind, temporal  as  well  as  spiritual,  that  certain  Works,  the 
names  and  number  of  which  are  fixed  and  unalterable,  should 
be  distinguished  from  all  other  Works,  not  in  a  degree  only 
but  even  in  kind  ?  And  that  these  collectively  should  form 
the  book,  to  which  in  all  the  concerns  of  Faith  and  Morality 
the  last  recourse  is  to  be  made,  and  from  the  decisions  of 
which  no  man  dare  appeal  1  If  the  mere  existence  of  a  Book 
so  called  and  charactered  be.  as  the  Koran  itself  suffices  to 
evince,  a  mighty  Bond  of  Union,  among  nation=  whom  all 
other  cause9  tend  to  separate;  if  moreover  the  Book  revered 
by  us  and  our  forefathers  has  been  the  Foster-nurse  of  Learn- 
ing in  the  darkest,  and  of  Civilization  in  the  rudest,  times: 
and  lastly,  if  this  so  vast  and  wide  a  Blessing  is  not  to  be 
founded  in  a  Delusion,  and  doomed  therefore  to  the  Imper- 
manence  and  Scorn  in  which  sooner  or  later  all  delusions 
must  end  ;  how,  I  pray  you,  is  it  conceivable  that  this  should 
be  brought  about  and  secured,  otherwise  than  by  a  special 
vouchsafement  to  this  one  Book,  exclusively,  of  that  Divine 
Mean,  that  uniform  and  perfect  middle  way,  which  in  all 
points  is  at  safe  and  equal  distance  from  all  errors  whether 
of  excess  or  defect?  But  again  if  this  be  true,   (and    what 


Protestant  Christian  worthy  of  his  baptismal  dedication  will 
deny  its  truth)  surely  we  ought  not  to  be  hard  and  over-stem 
in  our  censures  of  the  mistakes  and  infirmities  of  those,  who 
pretending  to  no  warrant  of  extraordinary  Inspiration  have 
been  raised  up  by  God's  providence  to  be  of  highest  power 
and  eminence  in  the  reformation  of  his  Church.  Far  rather 
does  it  behove  us  to  consider,  in  how  many  instances  the  pec- 
cant Immor  native  to  the  man  had  been  wrought  upon  by  the 
faithful  study  of  that  only  faultless  Model,  and  corrected  into 
an  unsinninL',  or  at  least  a  venial,  Predominance  in  the 
Writer  or  Preacher.  Yea,  that  not  seldom  the  Infirmity  of 
a  zealous  Soldier  in  the  Warfare  of  Christ  has  been  made 
the  very  mould  and  ground-work  of  that  man's  peculiar  gifts 
and  virtues.  Grateful  too  we  should  be,  that  the  very  Faults 
of  famous  Men  have  been  fitted  to  the  age  on  which  they 
were  to  act  :  and  that  thus  the  folly  of  man  has  proved  the 
wisdom  of  God,  and  been  made  the  instrument  of  his  mercy 
to  mankind.  ANON. 


*  The  affectionate  respect  in  which  I  hold  the  name  of  Dr. 
Jortin  (one  of  the  many  illustrious  Nurslings  of  the  College 
to  which  I  deem  it  no  small  honor  to  have  belonged — Jesus, 
Cambridge)  renders  it  painful  to  me  to  assert,  that  the  above 
remark  holds  almost  equally  true  of  a  Life  of  Erasmus.  But 
every  Scholar  well  read  in  the  writings  of  Erasmus  and  his 
illustrious  Contemporaries,  must  have  discovered,  that  Jortin 
had  neither  collected  sufficient,  nor  the  best,  materials  for  his 
work :  and  (perhaps  from  that  very  cause)  he  grew  weary 
of  his  task,  before  he  had  made  a  full  use  of  the  scanty  ma- 
terials which  he  had  collected. 

LI 


Whoever  has  sojourned  in  Eisenach,*  will  as- 
suredly have  visited  the  Warteburg,  interesting  by 
so  many  historical  associations,  which  stands  on  a 
high  rock,  about  two  miles  to  the  south  from  the  City 
Gate.  To  this  Castle  Luther  was  taken  on  his  re- 
turn from  the  Imperial  Diet,  where  Charles  the  Fifth 
had  pronounced  the  ban  upon  him,  and  limited  his 
safe  convoy  to  one-and-twenty  days.  On  the  last  but 
one  of  these  days,  as  he  was  on  his  way  to  Walter- 
shausen  (a  town  in  the  dutchy  of  Saxe  Gotha,  a  few 
leagues  to  the  south-east  of  Eisenach)  he  was  stop- 
ped in  a  hollow  behind  the  Castle  Altenstein,  and 
carried  to  the  Warteburg.  The  Elector  of  Saxony, 
who  could  not  have  refused  to  deliver  up  Luther,  as 
one  put  in  the  ban  by  the  Emperor  and  the  Diet,  had 
ordered  John  of  Berleptsch  the  governor  of  the  War- 
teburg and  Burckhardt  von  Hundt,  the  governor  of 
Altenstein,  to  take  Luther  to  one  or  other  of  these 
Castles,  without  acquainting  him  which ;  in  order 
that  he  might  be  able,  with  safe  conscience,  to  de- 
clare, that  he  did  not  know  where  Luther  was.  Ac- 
cordingly they  took  him  to  the  Warteburg,  under  the 
name  of  the  Chevalier  (Ritter)  George. 

To  this  friendly  imprisonment  the  reformation 
owes  manv  of  Luther's  most  important  labors.  In 
this  place  he  wrote  his  works  against  auricular  con- 
fession, against  Jacob  Latronum,  the  tract  on  the 
abuse  of  Masses,  that  against  clerical  and  monastic 
vows,  composed  his  Exposition  of  the  22,  27,  and  68 
Psalms,  finished  his  Declaralion  of  the  Magnificat, 
began  to  write  his  Church  Homilies,  and  translated 
the  New  Testament.  Here  too,  and  during  this  time, 
he  is  said  to  have  hurled  his  ink-stand  at  the  Devil, 
the  black  spot  from  which  yet  remains  on  the  stone 
wall  of  the  room  he  studied  in  ;  which  surely,  no 
one  will  have  visited  the  Warteburg  without  having 
had  pointed  out  to  him  by  the  good  Catholic  who  is, 
or  at  least  some  few  years  ago  was,  the  Warden  of 
the  Castle.  He  must  have  been  either  a  very  super- 
cilious or  a  very  incurious  traveller  if  he  did  not,  for 
the  gratification  of  his  guide  at  least,  inform  himself 
by  means  of  his  pen-knife,  that  the  said  marvellous 
blot  bids  defiance  to  all  the  toils  of  the  scrubbing 
brush,  and  is  to  remain  a  sign  for  ever  ;  and  with 


*  Durchfluge  durch  Duetchland,  die  Niederlande  und  Frank - 
reich  :  zweit.— Theil.  p.  I'M. 

413 


404 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


this  advantage  over  most  of  its  kindred,  that  being 
capable  of  a  double  interpretation,  it  is  equally  flat- 
tering to  the  Protestant  and  the  Papist,  and  is  regard- 
ed by  the  wonder-loving  zealots  of  both  parties,  with 
equal  faith. 

Whether  the  great  man  ever  did  throw  his  ink- 
stand at  his  Satanic  Majesty,  whether  he  ever  boasted 
of  the  exploit,  and  himself  declared  the  dark  blotch 
on  his  Study-Wall  in  the  Warteburg,  to  be  the  result 
and  relict  of  this  author-like  hand  grenado,  (happily 
for  mankind  he  used  his  ink-stand  at  other  times  to 
better  purpose,  and  with  more  effective  hostility 
against  the  arch-fiend)  I  leave  to  my  reader's  own 
judgment;  on  condition,  however,  that  he  has  previ- 
ously perused  Luther's  table-talk,  and  other  writings 
of  the  same  stamp,  of  some  of  his  most  illustrious 
contemporaries,  which  contain  facts  still  more  strange 
and  whimsical,  related  by  themselves  and  of  them- 
selves, and  accompanied  with  solemn  protestations 
of  the  Truth  of  their  statements.  Luther's  table-talk, 
which  to  a  truly  philosophic  mind,  will  not  be  less 
interesting  than  Rousseau's  confessions,  I  have  not 
myself  the  means  of  consulting  at  present,  and  cannot 
therefore  say,  whether  this  ink-pot  adventure  is,  or  is 
not,  told  or  referred  to  in  it ;  but  many  considerations 
incline  me  to  give  credit  to  the  story. 

Luther's  unremitting  literary  labor  and  his  seden- 
tary mode  of  life,  during  his  confinement  in  the 
Warteburg,  where  he  was  treated  with  the  greatest 
kindness,  and  enjoyed  every  liberty  consistent  with 
his  own  safety,  had  begun  to  undermine  his  former 
unusually  strong  health.  He  suffered  many  and 
most  distressing  effects  of  indigestion  and  a  deranged 
state  of  the  digestive  organs.  Melancthon,  whom  he 
had  desired  to  consult  the  Physicians  at  Erfurth,  sent 
him  some  de-obstruent  medicines,  and  the  advice  to 
take  regular  and  severe  exercise.  At  first  he  fol- 
lowed the  advice,  sate  and  laboured  less,  and  spent 
whole  days  in  the  chase;  but  like  the  young  Pliny, 
he  strove  in  vain  to  form  a  taste  for  this  favorite 
amusement  of  the  "  Gods  of  the  earth,"  as  appears 
from  a  passage  in  a  letter  to  George  Spalatin,  which 
i  translate  for  an  additional  reason  :  to  prove  to  the 
admirers  of  Rousseau,  (who  perhaps  will  not  be  less 
affronted  by  this  biographical  parallel,  than  the  zeal- 
ous Lutherans  will  be  offended)  that  if  my  comparison 
should  turn  out  groundless  on  the  whole,  the  failure 
will  not  have  arisen  either  from  the  want  of  sensibil- 
ity in  our  great  reformer,  or  of  angry  aversion  to  those 
in  high  places,  whom  he  regarded  as  the  oppressors 
of  their  rightful  equals.  "I  have  been,"  he  writes, 
"  employed  for  two  days  in  the  sports  of  the  field,  and 
was  willing  myself  to  taste  this  bitter-sweet  amuse- 
ment of  the  great  heroes:  we  have  caught  two  hares, 
and  one  brace  of  poor  little  parlridges.  An  employ- 
ment this  which  does  not  ill  suit  quiet  leisurely  folks : 
for  even  in  the  midst  of  the  ferrets  and  dogs,  I  have 
had  theological  fancies.  But  as  much  pleasure  as  the 
general  appearance  of  the  scene  and  the  mere  look- 
ing on  occasioned  me,  even  so  much  it  pitied  me  to 
think  of  the  mystery  and  emblem  which  lies  beneath 
it.  For  what  does  this  symbol  signify,  but  that  the 
Devil,  through  his  godless  huntsman  and  dogs,  the 


Bishops  and  Theologians  to  wit,  doth  privily  chase 
and  catch  the  poor  little  innocent  beasts?  Ah!  the 
simple  and  credulous  souls  came  therebyfar  too  plain 
before  my  eyes.  Thereto  comes  a  yet  more  frightful 
mystery :  as  at  my  earnest  entreaty  we  had  saved 
alive  one  poor  little  hare,  and  I  had  concealed  it  in 
the  sleeve  of  my  great  coat,  and  had  strolled  off*  a 
short  distance  from  it,  the  dogs  in  the  mean  time  found 
the  poor  hare.  Such,  too,  is  the  fury  of  the  Pope  with 
Satan,  that  he  destroys  even  the  souls  that  had  been 
saved,  and  troubles  himself  little  about  my  pains  and 
entreaties.  Of  such  hunting  then  I  have  had  enough." 
In  another  passage  he  tells  his  correspondent,  "you 
know  it  is  hard  to  be  a  Prince,  and  not  in  some  de- 
gree a  Robber,  and  the  greater  a  Prince  the  more  a 
Robber."  Of  our  Henry  the  Eighth,  he  says,  "  I 
must  answer  the  grim  Lion  that  passes  himself  off  for 
King  of  England.  The  ignorance  in  the  Book  is 
such  as  one  naturally  expects  from  a  King  ;  but  the 
bitterness  and  impudent  falsehood  is  quite  leonine." 
And  in  his  circular  letter  to  the  Princes,  on  occasion 
of  the  Peasant's  War,  he  uses  a  language  so  inflam- 
matory, and  holds  forth  a  doctrine  which  borders  so 
near  on  the  holy  right  of  insurrection,  that  it  may  as 
well  remain  untranslated. 

Had  Luther  been  himself  a  Prince,  he  could  not 
have  desired  better  treatment  than  he  received  during 
his  eight  months'  stay  in  the  Warteburg;  and  in  con- 
sequence of  a  more  luxurious  diet  than  he  had  been 
accustomed  to,  he  was  plagued  with  temptations  both 
from  the  "Flesh  and  the  Devil."  It  is  evident  from 
his  letters*  that  ho  suffered  under  great  irritability  of 
his  nervous  system,  the  common  effect  of  deranged 
digestion  in  men  of  sedentary  habits,  who  are  at  the 
same  time  intense  thinkers:  and  this  irritability 
added  to,  and  revivifying,  the  impressions  made  upon 
him  in  early  life,  and  fostered  by  the  theological  sys- 
tems of  his  manhood,  is  abundantly  sufficient  to  ex- 
plain all  his  apparitions  and  all  his  nightly  combats 
with  evil  spirits.  I  see  nothing  improbable  in  the 
supposition,  that  in  one  of  those  unconscious  half 
sleeps,  or  rather  those  rapid  alternations  of  the  sleep- 
ing with  the  half-waking  state,  which  is  the  true 
witching  time. 


"  the  season 


Wherein  the  spirits  hold  their  wont  to  walk," 

the  fruitful  matrix  of  Ghosts — I  see  nothing  improba- 
ble, that  in  some  one  of  those  momentary  slumbers, 
into  which  the  suspension  of  all  Thought  in  the  per- 
plexity of  intense  thinking  so  often  passes ;  Luther 
should  have  had  a  full  view  of  the  Room  in  which 
he  was  sitting,  of  his  writing  Table  and  all  the  Im- 
plements of  Study,  as  they  really  existed,  and  at  the 
same  time  a  brain  image  of  the  Devil,  vivid  enough 
to  have  acquired  apparent  Outness,  and  a  distance 

*  I  can  scarcely  conceive  a  more  delightful  Volume  than 
might  be  made  from  Luther's  Letters,  especially  from  thoso 
that  were  written  from  the  Warteburg,  if  they  were  trans- 
lated in  the  simple,  6inewy,  idiomatic,  hearty  mother-tongue 
of  the  original.  A  difficult  task  I  admii— and  scarcely  possi- 
ble for  any  man,  however  great  his  talents  in  other  respects, 
whose  favorite  rending  has  not  lain  long  among  the  English 
writers  from  Edward  the  Sixth  to  Charles  the  First. 
414 


THE  FRIEND. 


405 


regulated  by  the  proportion  of  its  distinctness  to  that 
of  the  objects  really  impressed  on  the  outward  senses. 
If  this  Christian  Hercules,  this  heroic  Cleanser  of 
the  Augean  Stable  of  Apostasy,  had  been  born  and 
educated  in  the  present  or  the  preceding  generation, 
he  would,  doubtless,  have  held  himself  for  a  man  of 
genius  and  original  power.  But  with  this  faith  alone 
he  would  scarcely  have  removed  the  mountains 
which  he  did  remove.  The  darkness  and  supersti- 
tion of  the  age,  which  required  such  a  Reformer,  had 
moulded  his  mind  for  the  reception  of  ideas  concern- 
ing himself,  better  suited  to  inspire  the  strength  and 
enthusiasm  necessary  for  the  task  of  reformation, 
ideas  more  in  sympathy  with  the  spirits  whom  he  was 
to  influence,  fie  deemed  himself  gifted  with  super- 
natural influxes,  an  especial  servant  of  Heaven,  a 
chosen  Warrior,  fighting  as  the  General  of  a  small 
but  faithful  troop,  against  an  Army  of  evil  Beings 
headed  by  the  Prince  of  the  Air.  These  were  no 
metaphorical  Beings  in  his  apprehension.  He  was  a 
Poet  indeed,  as  great  a  Poet  as  ever  lived  in  any  age 
or  country ;  but  his  poetic  images  were  so  vivid,  that 
they  mastered  the  Poet's  own  mind  !  He  was  pos- 
sessed with  them,  as  wiih  substances  distinct  from 
himself:  Luther  did  not  lurile,  he  acted  Poems. 
The  Bible  was  a  spiritual  indeed  but  not  a  figurative 
armoury  in  his  belief;  it  was  the  magazine  of  his 
warlike  stores,  and  from  thence  he  was  to  arm  him- 
self, and  supply  both  shield  and  sword,  and  javelin, 
to  the  elect.  Methinks  I  see  him  sitting,  the  heroic 
Student,  in  his  Chamber  in  the  VVarteburg,  with  his 
midnight  Lamp  before  him,  seen  by  the  late  Travel- 
ler in  the  distant  Plain  of  Bischofsroda,  as  a  Star  on 
the  Mountain  !  Below  it  lies  the  Hebrew  Bible  open, 
on  which  he  gazes,  his  brow  pressing  on  his  palm, 
brooding  over  some  obscure  Text,  which  he  desires 
to  make  plain  to  the  simple  Boor  and  to  the  humble 
Artizan,  and  to  transfer  its  whole  force  into  their  own 
natural  and  living  Tongue !  And  he  himself  does 
not  understand  it!  Thick  darkness  lies  on  the  origi- 
nal Text,  he  counts  the  letters,  he  calls  up  the  roots 
of  each  separate  word,  and  questions  them  as  the  fa- 
miliar Spirits  of  an  Oracle.  In  vain!  thick  darkness 
continues  to  cover  it !  not  a  ray  of  meaning  dawns 
through  it.  With  sullen  and  angry  hope  he  reaches 
for  the  Vulgate,  his  old  and  sworn  enemy,  the 
treacherous  confederate  of  the  Roman  Antichrist, 
which  he  so  gladly,  when  he  can,  re-rebukes  for 
idolatrous  falsehoods,  that  had  dared  place 

"  Within  the  sanctuary  itself  their  shrines. 
Abominations  !" 

Now — O  thought  of  humiliation — he  must  intreat  its 
aid.  See !  there  has  the  sly  spirit  of  apostasy  vvork- 
ed-in  a  phrase  which  favors  the  doctrine  of  purgatory, 
the  intercession  of  Saints,  or  the  efficacy  of  Prayers 
for  the  Dead.  And  what  is  worst  of  all,  the  interpre- 
tation is  plausible.  The  original  Hebrew  might  be 
forced  into  this  meaning :  and  no  other  meaning 
seems  to  lie  in  it,  none  to  hover  above  it  in  the  heights 
of  Allegory,  none  to  lurk  beneath  it  even  in  the  depths 
of  Cabala!  This  is  the  work  of  the  Tempter!  it  is  a 
cloud  of  darkness  conjured  up  between  the  truth  of 


the  sacred  letters  and  the  eyes  of  his  understanding, 
by  the  malice  of  the  evil  one,  and  for  a  trial  of  his 
faith!  Must  he  then  at  length  confess,  must  he  sub- 
scribe the  name  of  Luther  to  an  Exposition  which 
consecrates  a  weapon  for  the  hand  of  the  idolatrous 
Hierarchy?     Never!  never! 

There  still  remains  one  auxiliary  in  reserve,  the 
translation  of  the  seventy.  The  Alexandrine  Greeks, 
anterior  to  the  Church  itself,  could  extend  no  support 
to  its  corruptions — the  Septuagint  will  have  profaned 
the  Altar  of  Truth  with  no  incense  for  the  Nostrils 
of  the  universal  Bishop  to  snuff  up.  And  here  again 
his  hopes  are  baffled  !  Exactly  at  this  perplexed 
passage  had  the  Greek  Translator  given  his  under- 
standing a  holiday,  and  made  his  pen  supply  its  place. 
O  honored  Luther!  as  easily  mightest  thou  convert 
the  whole  City  of  Rome,  with  the  Pope  and  the  con- 
clave of  Cardinals  inclusive,  as  strike  a  spark  of  light 
from  the  words,  and  nothing  but  uords,  of  the  Alex- 
andrine Version.  Disappointed,  despondent,  enraged, 
ceasing  to  think,  yet  continuing  his  brain  on  the 
stretch  in  solicitation  of  a  thought;  and  gradually 
giving  himself  up  to  angry  fancies,  to  recollections  of 
past  persecutions,  to  uneasy  fears  and  inward  defi- 
ances and  floating  Images  of  the  evil  Being,  their 
supposed  personal  author;  he  sinks,  without  perceiv- 
ing it,  into  a  trance  of  slumber:  during  which  his 
brain  retains  its  waking  energies,  excepting  that  w  hut 
would  have  been  mere  thoughts  before  now  (the  action 
and  counterweight  of  his  senses  and  of  their  impres- 
sions being  withdrawn)  shape  and  condense  them- 
selves into  things,  into  realities !  Repeatedly  half- 
wakening,  and  his  eye-lids  as  often  re-closing,  the 
objects  which  really  surrounded  him  form  the  place 
and  scenery  of  his  dream.  All  at  once  he  sees  the 
Arch-fiend  coming  forth  on  the  wall  of  the  room, 
from  the  very  spot  perhaps,  on  which  his  eyes  had 
been  fixed  vacantly  during  the  perplexed  moments 
of  his  former  meditation :  the  Ink-stand,  which  he 
had  at  the  same  time  been  using,  becomes  associated 
with  it:  and  in  that  struggle  of  rage,  which  in  these 
distempered  dreams  almost  constantly  precedes  the 
helpless  terror  by  the  pain  of  which  we  are  fully 
awakened,  he  imagines  that  he  hurls  it  at  the  intru- 
der, or  not  improbably  in  the  first  instant  of  awaken- 
ing, while  yet  both  his  imagination  and  his  eyes  are 
possessed  by  the  dream,  he  actually  hurls  it.  Some 
weeks  after,  perhaps,  during  which  interval  he  had 
often  mused  on  the  incident,  undetermined  whether 
to  deem  it  a  visitation  of  Satan  to  him  in  the  body  or 
out  of  the  body,  he  discovers  for  the  first  time  the 
dark  spot  on  his  wall,  and  receives  it  as  a  sign  and 
pledge  vouchsafed  to  him  of  the  event  having  ac- 
tually taken  place. 

Such  was  Luther  under  the  influences  of  the  age 
and  country  in  and  for  which  he  was  born.  Conceive 
him  a  citizen  of  Geneva,  and  a  contemporary  of  Vol- 
taire :  suppose  the  French  language  his  mother- 
tongue,  and  the  political  and  moral  philosophy  of  En- 
glish Free-thinkers  re-modelled  by  Parisian  Fort 
Esprits,  to  have  been  the  objects  of  his  study  ; — con- 
ceive this  change  of  circumstances,  and  Luther  will 
no  longer  dream  of  Fiends  or  of  Antichrist  —  but 
415 


406 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


will  we  have  no  dreams  in  their  place  ?  His  melan- 
choly will  have  changed  its  drapery;  but  will  it  find 
no  new  costume  wherewith  to  clothe  itself?  His 
impetuous  temperament,  his  deep-working  mind,  his 
busy  and  vivid  imaginations — would  they  not  have 
been  a  trouble  to  him  in  a  world,  where  nothing  was 
to  obey  his  power,  to  cease  to  be  that  which  had 
been,  in  order  to  realize  his  pre-eonceptions  of  what 
it  ought  to  be  ?  His  sensibility,  which  found  objects 
for  itself,  and  shadows  of  human  suffering  in  the 
harmless  Brute,  and  even  the  Flowers  which  he  trod 
upon — might  it  not  naturally,  in  an  unspiritualized 
age,  have  wept,  and  trembled,  and  dissolved,  over 
scenes  of  earthly  passion,  and  the  struggles  of  love 
with  duty  ?  His  pity,  that  so  easily  passed  into  rage, 
would  it  not  have  lbund  in  the  inequalities  of  man- 
kind, in  the  oppressions  of  governments  and  the  mi- 
series of  the  governed,  an  entire  instead  of  a  divided 
object  ?  And  might  not  a  perfect  constitution,  a  gov- 
ernment of  pure  reason,  a  renovation  of  the  social 
contract,  have  easily  supplied  the  place  of  the  reign 
of  Christ  in  the  new  Jerusalem,  of  the  restoration  of 
the  visible  Church,  and  the  union  of  all  men  by  one 
faith  in  one  charity  ?  Henceforward  then,  we  will 
conceive  his  reason  employed  in  building  up  anew 
the  edifice  of  earthly  society,  and  his  imagination  as 
pledging  itself  for  the  possible  realization  of  the 
structure.  We  will  lose  the  great  reformer,  who 
was  born  in  an  age  which  needed  him,  in  the  Philo- 
sopher of  Geneva,  who  was  doomed  to  misapply  his 
energies  to  materials  the  properties  of  which  he  mis- 
understood, and  happy  only  that  he  did  not  live  to 
witness  the  direful  effects  of  his  system. 


ESSAY   III. 

Pectora  cui  credam  ?  quis  me  lenire  docibit 
Morduces  curas,  quis  longas  fallcre  nocte9 
Ex  quo  summa  dies  tulerit  Damona  sub  umbras? 
Omnia  paulalim  consumit  lonsior  ieias, 
Vivendoque  simul  morimur,  rapimurque  manendo. 
lie  tamen,  lacryma? !  purum  colis  eelbera,  Damon  ! 
Nee  mihi  conveniunt  lacrynue.     Non  omnia  terrae 
Obruta  !  vivit  amor,  vivit  dolor!  ora  ncgatur 
Dulcia  conspicere:  Here  et  meminissc  relictum  est. 

The  two  following  Essays  I  devote  to  elucidation, 
the  first  of  the  theory  of  Luther's  Apparitions  stated 
perhaps  too  briefly  in  the  preceding  Number :  the 
second  for  the  purpose  of  removing  the  only  difficul- 
ty, which  I  can  discover  in  the  next  section  of  the 
Friend  to  the  Reader's  ready  comprehension  of  the 
principles,  on  which  the  arguments  are  grounded. 
First,  I  will  endeavor  to  make  my  Ghost-Theory 
more  clear  to  those  of  my  readers,  who  are  fortunate 
enough  to  find  it  obscure  in  consequence  of  their  own 
good  health  and  unshattered  nerves.  The  windovy 
of  my  library  at  Keswick  is  opposite  to  the  fire-place, 
and  looks  out  on  the  very  large  garden  that  occupies 
the  whole  slope  of  the  hill  on  which  the  house 
stands.  Consequently,  the  rays  of  the  light  transmit- 
ted through  the  glass,  (i.  e.  the  rays  from  the  garden, 
the  opposite  mountains,  and  the  bridge,  river,  lake, 
and  vale   interjacent)  and  the  rays  reflected  from 


it,  (of  the  fire-place,  &c.)  enter  the  eye  at  the  same 
moment.  At  the  coming  on  of  evening,  it  was  my 
frequent  amusement  to  watch  the  image  or  reflection 
of  the  fire,  that  seemed  burning  in  the  bushes  or  be- 
tween the  trees  in  different  parts  of  the  garden  or  the 
fields  beyond  it,  according  as  there  was  more  or  less 
light;  and  which  still  arranged  itself  among  the  real 
objects  of  vision,  with  a  distance  and  magnitude 
proportioned  to  its  greater  or  lesser  faintness.  For 
still  as  the  darkness  increased,  the  image  of  the  fire 
lessened  and  grew  nearer  and  more  distinct ;  till  the 
twilight  had  deepened  into  perfect  night,  when  all 
outward  objects  being  excluded,  the  window  became 
a  perfect  looking-glass :  save  only  that  my  books  on 
the  side  shelves  of  the  room  were  lettered,  as  it  were, 
on  their  backs  with  stars,  more  or  fewer  as  the  sky 
was  more  or  less  clouded,  (the  rays  of  the  stars  being 
at  that  time  the  only  ones  transmitted.)  Now  substi- 
tute the  Phantom  from  Luther's  brain  for  the  images 
of  reflected  light  (the  fire  for  instance)  and  the  forms  of 
his  room  and  his  furniture  for  the  transmitted  rays, 
and  you  have  a  fair  resemblance  of  an  apparition, 
and  a  just  conception  of  the  manner  in  which  it  is 
seen  together  with  real  objects.  1  have  long  wished 
to  devote  an  entire  work  to  the  subject  of  Dreams, 
Visions,  Ghosts,  Witchcraft,  &c.  in  which  I  might 
first  give,  and  then  endeavor  to  explain  the  most  in- 
teresting and  best  attested  fact  of  each,  which  has 
come  within  my  knowledge,  either  from  books  or 
from  personal  testimony.  I  might  then  explain  in  a 
more  satisfactory  way  the  mode  in  which  our  thoughts 
in  states  of  morbid  slumber,  become  at  times  perfect- 
ly dramatic  (for  in  certain  sorts  of  dreams  the  dullest 
Wight  becomes  a  Shakspeare)  and  by  what  law  the 
Form  of  the  vision  appears  to  talk  to  us  its  own 
thoughts  in  a  voice  as  audible  as  the  shape  is  visible; 
and  this  too  oftentimes  in  connected  trains,  and  not 
seldom  even  with  a  concentration  of  power  which 
may  easily  impose  on  the  soundest  judgments,  unin- 
structed  in  the  Optics  and  Acoustics  of  the  inner 
sense,  for  Revelations  and  gifts  of  Prescience.  In  aid 
of  the  present  case,  I  will  only  remark,  that  it  would 
appear  incredible  to  persons  not  accustomed  to  these 
subtle  notices  of  self-observation,  what  small  and  re- 
mote resemblances,  what  mere  hints  of  likeness  from 
some  real  external  object,  especially  if  the  shape  be 
aided  by  color,  will  suffice  to  make  a  vivid  thought 
consubslantiate  with  the  real  object,  and  derive  from 
it  an  outward  perceptibility.  Even  when  we  are 
broad  awake,  if  we  are  in  anxious  expectation,  how 
often  will  not  the  most  confused  sounds  of  nature  be 
heard  by  us  as  inarticulate  sounds?  For  instance, 
the  babbling  of  a  brook  will  appear  for  a  moment  the 
voice  of  a  Friend,  for  whom  we  are  wailing,  calling 
out  our  own  names,  &c.  A  short  mediiation.  there- 
fore, on  the  great  law  of  the  imaginalion.  that  a  like- 
ness in  part  tends  to  become  a  likeness  of  the  whole, 
will  make  it  not  only  conceivable  but  probable,  that 
the  ink-eland  itself,  and  the  dark-colored  stone  on  the 
wall,  which  Luther  perhaps  had  never  till  then  no- 
ticed, might  have  a  considerable  influence  in  the  pro- 
duction of  the  Fiend,  and  of  the  hostile  act  by  which 
his  obtrusive  visit  was  repelled. 

416 


THE  FRIEND. 


407 


A  lady  once  asked  me  if  I  believed  in  ghosts  and 
apparitions.     I  answered  with  truth  and  simplicity : 
No,  madam  !  I  have  seen  far  too  many  mytelf.  I  have 
indeed  a  whole  memorandum  book  filled  with  records 
of  these  Phenomena,  many  of  them  interesting  as  facts 
and  data  for  Psychology,  and  affording  some  valuable 
materials  for  a  theory  of  perception  and  its  depend- 
ence on  the  inimory  and  imagination.     "  In  omnem 
actum    Perceptionis    imaginalio  influet   efficienter," 
Wolfe.    But  He  is  no  more,  who  would  have  real- 
ized this  idea  :  who  had  already  established  the  found- 
ations and  the  law  of  the  theory  ;  and  for  whom  I  had 
so  often  found  a  pleasure  and  a  comfort,  even  during 
the  wretched  and  restless  nights  of  sickness,  in  watch- 
ing and  instantly  recording  these  experiences  of  the 
world  within  us,  of  the  "gemina  natura,  quae  fit  et 
facit,  et  creat  et  creatur !"     He  is  gone,  my  friend ! 
my  munificent  co-patron,  and  not  less  the  benefactor 
of  my  intellect! — He  who,  beyond   all  other  men 
known  to  me,  added  a  fine  and  ever-wakeful  sense 
of  beauty  to  the  most  patient  accurary  in  experimental 
Philosophy  and  the  prouder  researches  of  metaphys- 
ical science;  he  who  united  all  the  play  and  spring 
of  fancy  with  the  subtlest  discrimination  and  inexora- 
ble judgment;  and  who  controlled  an  almost  painful 
exquisiteness  of  taste  by  a  warmth  of  heart,  which  in 
the  practical  relations  of  life  made  allowances  for 
faults  as  quick  as  the  moral  taste  detected  them  ;  a 
warmth  of  heart,  which  was  indeed  noble  and  pre- 
eminent, for  alas !  the  genial  feelings  of  health  con- 
tributed no  spark  toward  it!   Of  these  qualities  I  may 
speak,  for  they  belonged  to  all  mankind. — The  high- 
er virtues,  that  were  blessings  to  his  friends,  and  the 
still  higher  that  resided  in  and  for  his  own  soul,  are 
themes  for  the  energies  of  solitude,  for  the  awfulness 
of  prayer! — virtues  exercised  in  the  barrenness  and 
desolation  of  his  animal  being ;  while  he  thirsted  with 
the  full  stream  at  his  lips,  and  yet  with  unwearied 
goodness  poured  out  to  all  around  him,  like  the  mas- 
ter of  a  feast  among  his  kindred  in  the  day  of  his  own  I 
gladness!    Were  it  but  for  the  remembrance  of  him  j 
alone  and  of  his  lot  here  below,  the  disbelief  of  a  fu- 
ture state  would  sadden  the  earth  around  me,  and  i 
blight  the  very  grass  in  the  field. 


ESSAY   IV, 


Xa\cvo*v,  u>~  Sai/to'vte,  fitj"  Trapa&ciyfiaat  ^poj'fitvov 
tKavo)~s  ivlcUvvc&al  ti  ru>  v  fi£t£o'v(i)v.  Ktv&vvcv'ei 
yap  v'fiwv  ixa^o;  otov  "ovap,  (i^ui^s  "arrai'ra,  iravir' 
a~v  ra'Xiv  u>"<nrep  "vnap  a'yvotiv. 

Plato,  Polit.  p.  47.  Ed.  Bip. 

Translation. — ft  is  difficult,  excellent  friend  !  to  make  any 
comprehensive  truth  completely  intelligible,  unless  we  avail 
ourselves  of  an  example.  Otherwise  we  may  as  in  a  dream, 
seem  to  know  all,  and  then  as  it  were,  awaking  find  that 
we  know  nothing. PLATO. 


name  of  The  Great  House,  its  exterior  having  oeen 
long  connected  in  my  childish  imagination  with  the 
feelings  and  fancies  stirred  up  in  me  by  the  perusal 
of  the  Arabian  Nights'  Entertainments.*  Beyond 
all  other  objects,  I  was  most  struck  with  the  magnifi- 
cent staircase,  relieved  at  well  proportioned  intervals 
by  spacious  landing-places,  this  adorned  with  grand  or 
showy  plants,  the  next  looking  out  on  an  extensive 
prospect  through  the  stately  window  with  its  side- 
panes  of  rich  blues  and  saturated  amber  or  orange 
tints:  while  from  the  last  and  highest  the  eye  com- 
manded the  whole  spiral  ascent  with  the  marbled 
pavement  of  the  great  hall  from  which  it  seemed  to 
spring  up  as  if  it  merely  vsed  the  ground  on  which  it 
rested.  My  readers  will  find  no  difficulty  in  trans- 
lating these  forms  of  the  outward  senses  into  their  in- 
tellectual analogies,  so  as  to  understand  the  purport 
of  the  Friend's  Landing-Places,  and  the  objects,  he 
proposed  to  himself,  in  the  small  groups  of  Essays  in- 
terposed under  this  title  between  the  main  divisions 
of  the  work. 

My  best  powers  would  have  sunk  within  me,  had 
I  not  soothed  my  solitary  toils  with  the  anticipation 
of  many  readers — (whether  during  the  Writer's  life, 
or  when  his  grave  shall  have  shamed  his  detractors 
into  a  sympathy  with  its  own  silence,  formed  no  part 
in  this  self-flattery)  who  would  submit  to  any  reason- 
able trouble  rather  than  read  "  as  in  a  dream  seeming 
to  know  all,  to  find  on  awaking  that  they  know- 
nothing."  Having,  therefore,  in  the  three  preceding 
numbers  selected  from  my  conservatory  a  few  plants, 
of  somewhat  gayer  petals  and  a  livelier  green,  though 
like  the  Geranium  tribe  of  a  sober  character  in  the 
whole  physiognomy  and  odor,  I  shall  first  devote  a 
few  sentences  to  a  catalogue  raisonne  of  my  intro- 
ductory lucubrations,  and  the  remainder  of  the 
Essay  to  the  prospect,  as  far  as  it  can  be  seen  distinct- 
ly from  our  present  site.  Within  a  short  distance 
several  ways  meet :  and  at  that  point  only  does  it 
appear  to  me  that  the  reader  will  be  in  danger  of 
mistaking  the  road.  Dropping  (he  metaphor,  I  would 
say  that  there  is  one  term,  the  meaning  of  which  has 
become  unsettled.  To  different  persons  it  conveys  a 
different  idea,  and  not  seldom  to  the  same  person  at 
different  times;  while  the  force,  and  to  a  certain  ex- 
tent, the  intelligibility  of  the  following  seciions  de- 
pend on  its  being  interpreted  in  one  sense  exclusively. 
Essays  from  1.  to  IV.  inclusive  convey  the  design 
and  contents  of  the  work:  the  Friend's  judgment 
respecting  the  style,  and  his  defence  of  himself  from 
the  charges  of  Arrogance  and  presumption.  Say 
rather,  that  such  are  the  personal  threads  of  ihe  dis- 
course ;  for  it  will  not  have  escaped  the  Reader's 


Among  my  earliest  impressions  I  still  distinctly  re- 
member that  of  my  first  entrance  into  the  mansion  of 
a  neighboring  Baronet,  awfully  known  to  me  by  the 
LI2 


*  As  I  had  read  one  volume  of  these  tales  over  and  over 
again  before  my  fifth  birth-day,  it  may  be  readily  conjectured 
of  what  sort  these  fancies  and  feelings  must  have  been.  The 
book,  I  well  remember,  used  to  lie  in  a  certain  corner  of  the 
parlour-window  at  my  dear  Father's  Vicarage-house:  and  1 
can  never  forget  with  what  a  strange  mixture  of  obscure  dreari 
and  intense  desire  I  used  to  look  at  the  volume  and  watch  it, 
till  the  morning  sunshine  had  reached  and  nearly  covered  it, 
when,  and  not  before.  1  felt  the  courage  givon  me  to  seize  the 
precious  treasure  and  hurry  off  with  it  to  some  sunny  corner 
in  our  play-ground. 

417 


408 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


observation,  that  even  in  these  prefatory  pages  prin- 
ciples and  truths  of  general  interest  form  the  true 
contents,  and  that  amid  all  the  usual  compliments 
and  courtesies  of  The  Friend's  first  presentation  of 
himself  to  the  Reader's  acquaintance  the  substantial 
object  is  still  to  assert  the  practicability,  without  dis- 
guising the  difficulties,  of  improving  the  morals  of 
mankind  by  a  direct  appeal  to  their  Understandings : 
and  to  show  the  distinction  between  Attention  and 
Thought,  and  the  necessity  of  the  former  as  a  habit 
or  discipline  without  which  the  very  word,  Thinking, 
must  remain  a  thoughtless  substitute  for  dreaming 
with  our  eyes  open ;  and  lastly,  the  tendency  of  a 
certain  fashionable  style  with  all  its  accommodations 
to  paralyse  the  very  faculties  of  manly  intellect  by  a 
series  of  petty  stimulants.  After  this  preparation. 
The  Friend  proceeds  at  once  to  lay  the  foundations 
common  to  the  whole  work  by  an  inquiry  into  the 
duty  of  communicating  Truth,  and  the  conditions 
under  which  it  may  be  communicated  with  safety, 
from  the  Fifth  to  the  Sixteenth  Essay  inclusive. 
Each  Essay  will,  he  believes,  be  found  complete  in 
itself,  yet  an  organic  part  of  the  whole  considered  as 
one  disquisition.  First,  the  inexpediency  of  pious 
Frauds  is  proved  from  History,  the  shameless  asser- 
tion of  the  indifference  of  Truth  and  Falsehood  ex- 
posed to  its  deserved  infamy,  and  an  answer  given 
to  the  objection  derived  from  the  impossibility  of 
conveying  an  adequate  notion  of  the  truths  we  may 
attempt  to  communicate.  The  conditions  are  then 
detailed,  under  which,  right  though  inadequate  no- 
tions may  be  taught  without  danger,  and  proofs  given, 
both  from  facts  and  from  reason,  that  he,  who  fulfils 
the  conditions  required  by  Conscience,  takes  the 
surest  way  of  answering  the  purposes  of  Prudence. 
This  is,  indeed,  the  main  characteristic  of  the  moral 
system  taught  by  the  Friend  throughout,  that  the  dis- 
tinct foresight  of  Consequences  belongs  exclusively 
to  that  infinite  Wisdom  which  is  one  with  that  Al- 
mighty Will,  on  which  all  consequences  depend ; 
but  that  for  Man — to  obey  the  simple  unconditional 
commandment  of  eschewing  every  act  that  implies 
a  self-contradiction,  or  in  other  words,  to  produce  and 
maintain  the  greatest  possible  Harmony  in  the  com- 
ponent impulses  and  faculties  of  his  nature,  involves 
the  effects  of  Prudence.  It  is,  as  it  were,  Prudence 
in  short-hand  or  cypher.  A  pure  Conscience,  that 
inward  something,  that  Seos  oUaog,  which  being  ab- 
solute unique  no  man  can  describe,  because  every 
man  is  bound  to  know,  and  even  in  the  eye  of  the 
Law  is  held  to  be  a  person  no  longer  than  he  may 
be  supposed  to  know  it — the  Conscience,  I  say,  bears 
the  same  relation  to  God,  as  an  accurate  Time-piece 
bears  to  the  Sun.  The  Time-piece  merely  indicates 
the  relative  path  of  the  Sun,  yet  we  can  regulate  our 
plans  and  proceedings  by  it  with  the  same  confidence 
as  if  it  was  itself  the  efficient  cause  of  light,  heat, 
and  the  revolving  seasons ;  on  the  self-evident  axiom, 
that  in  whatever  sense  two  things  (for  instance,  A. 
and  C.  D.  E.)  are  both  equal  to  a  third  thing  (B.) 
they  are  in  the  same  sense  equal  to  each  other. 
Cunning  is  circuitous  folly.  In  plain  English,  to  act 
the  knave,  is  but  a  roundabout  way  of  playing  the 


fool ;  and  the  man,  who  will  not  permit  himself  to 
call  an  action  by  its  proper  name  without  a  previous 
calculation  of  all  its  probable  consequences,  may  be 
indeed  only  a  coxcomb,  who  is  looking  at  his  fingers 
through  an  opera-glass  ;  but  he  runs  no  small  risk  of 
becoming  a  knave.  The  chances  are  against  him. 
Though  he  should  begin  by  calculating  the  conse- 
quences in  regard  to  others,  yet  by  th^mere  habit  of 
never  contemplating  an  action  in  its  own  proportions 
and  immediate  relations  to  his  moral  being,  it  is 
scarcely  possible  but  that  he  must  end  in  selfishness  : 
for  the  you,  and  the  they  will  stand  on  different  oc- 
casions for  a  thousand  different  persons,  while  the  I 
is  one  only,  and  recurs  in  every  calculation.  Or 
grant  that  the  principle  of  expediency  should  prompt 
to  the  same  outward  deeds  as  are  commanded  by  the 
law  of  reason  ;  yet  the  doer  himself  is  debased. 
But  if  it  be  replied,  that  the  re-action  on  the  agent's 
own  mind  is  to  form  a  part  of  the  calculation,  then 
it  is  a  rule  that  destroys  itself  in  the  very  propound- 
ing, as  will  be  more  fidly  demonstrated  in  the  second 
or  ethical  division  of  the  F'riend,  when  we  shall  have 
detected  and  exposed  the  equivoque  between  an 
action  and  the  series  of  motions  by  which  the  determi- 
nations of  the  Will  are  to  be  realized  in  the  world 
of  the  senses.  What  modification  of  the  latter  cor- 
responds to  the  former,  and  is  entitled  to  be  called  by 
the  same  name,  will  often  depend  on  time,  place, 
persons,  and  circumstances,  the  consideration  of 
which  requires  an  exertion  of  the  judgment ;  but 
the  action  itself  remains  the  same,  and  like  all  other 
ideas  pre-exists  in  the  reason,*  or  (in  the  more  ex 
pressive  and  perhaps  more  precise  and  philosophical 
language  of  St.  Paul)  in  the  spirit,  unalterable  be- 
cause unconditional,  or  with  no  other  than  that  most 
awful  condition,  as  sure  as  God  liveth,  it  is  so! 
These  remarks  are  inserted  in  this  place,  because 
the  principle  admits  of  easiest  illustration  in  the  in- 
stance of  veracity  and  the  actions  connected  with  the 
same,  and  may  then  be  intelligibly  applied  to  other 
departments  of  morality,  all  of  which  Wollaston  in- 
deed considers  as  only  so  many  different  forms  of 
truth  and  falsehood.  So  far  the  Friend  has  treated 
of  oral  communication  of  the  truth.  The  applicabil- 
ity of  the  same  principle  is  then  tried  and  affirmed  in 
publications  by  the  Press,  first  as  between  the  indi- 
vidual and  his  own  conscience  and  then  between  the 
publisher  and  the  state:  and  under  this  head  the 
Friend  has  considered  at  large  the  questions  of  a  free 
Press  and  the  law  of  libel,  the  anomalies  and  pecu- 
liar difficulties  of  the  latter,  and  the  only  possible  so- 
lution compatible  with  the  continuance  of  the  former: 
a  solution  rising  out  of  and  justified  by  the  necessarily 
anomalous  and  unique  nature  of  the  law  itself.  He 
confesses,  that  he  looks  back  on  this  discussion  con- 
cerning the  Press  and  its  limits  with  a  satisfaction 
unusual  to  him  in  the  review  of  his  own  labors :  and 
if  the  date  of  their  first  publication  (September,  1809) 
be  remembered,  it  will  not  perhaps  be  denied  on  an 
impartial  comparison,  that  he  has  treated  this  most 
important  subject  (so  especially  interesting  in  the  pre- 

*  See  the  Statesman's  Manual,  p.  23. 
418 


THE  FRIEND. 


409 


sent  times)  more  fully  and  more  systematically  than 
it  had  hitherto  been.  Interum  turn  recti  conscientia, 
turn  illo  me  consolor,  quod  octimis  quibusque  certe 
non  improbamur,  fbrtassis  omnibus  placituri,  simul 
atque  livor  obitu  conquieverit. 

Lastly,  the  subject  is  concluded  even  as  it  com- 
menced, and  as  beseemed  a  disquisition  placed  as  the 
steps  and  vestibule  of  the  whole  work,  with  an  en- 
forcement of  the  absolute  necessity  of  principles 
grounded  in  reason  as  the  basis  or  rather  as  the  living 
root  of  all  genuine  expedience.  Where  these  are 
despised  or  at  best  regarded  as  aliens  from  the  actual 
business  of  life,  and  consigned  to  the  ideal  world  of 
speculative  philosophy  and  Utopian  politics,  instead 
of  state- wisdom  we  shall  have  state-craft,  and  for  the 
talent  of  the  governor  the  cleverness  of  an  embar- 
rassed spendthrift — which  consists  in  tricks  to  shift 
off  difficulties  and  dangers  when  they  close  upon  us, 
and  to  keep  them  at  arm's  length,  not  in  solid  and 
grounded  courses  to  preclude  or  subdue  them.  We 
must  content  ourselves  with  expedient-makers — with 
fire-engines  against  fires,  Life-boats  against  inunda- 
tions; but  no  houses  built  fire-proof,  no  dams  that  rise 
above  the  water-mark.  The  reader  will  have  ob- 
served that  already  has  the  term,  reason,  been  fre- 
quently contradistinguished  from  the  understanding, 
and  the  judgment.  If  the  Friend  could  succeed  in 
fully  explaining  the  sense  in  which  the  word  Reason, 
is  employed  by  him,  and  in  satisfying  the  reader's 
mind  concerning  the  grounds  and  importance  of  the 
distinction,  he  would  feel  little  or  no  apprehension 
concerning  the  intelligibility  of  these  Essays  from 
first  to  last.  The  following  section  is  in  part  founded 
on  this  distinction  :  the  which  remaining  obscure,  all 
else  will  be  so  as  a  system,  however  clear  the  com- 
ponent paragraphs  may  be,  taken  separately.  In  the 
appendix  to  his  first  Lay  Sermon,  the  Author  has  in- 
deed treated  the  question  at  considerable  length,  but 
chiefly  in  relation  to  the  heights  of  Theology  and 
Metaphysics.  In  the  next  number  he  attempts  lo 
explain  himself  more  popularly,  and  trusts  that  with 
no  great  expenditure  of  attention  the  reader  will  sat- 
isfy his  mind,  that  our  remote  ancestors  spoke  as  men 
acquainted  with  the  constituent  parts  of  their  own 
moral  and  intellectual  being,  when  they  described 
one  man  as  being  out  of  his  sei>ses,  another  as  out  of 
his  wits,  or  deranged  in  his  understanding,  and  a  third 
as  having  lost  his  reason.  Observe,  the  understand- 
ing may  be  deranged,  iceakened,  or  perverted  ;  but  the 
reason  is  either  lost  or  not  lost,  that  is,  wholly  present 
or  wholly  absent. 


ESSAY     V. 


Man  may  rather  be  defined  a  relieious  lhan  a  rational  charac- 
ter, in  regard  that  in  other  creatures  there  may  be  some- 
thing of  Reason,  but  there  is  nothing  of  Religion. 

HARRINGTON. 


If  the  Reader  will  substitute  the  word  "Under- 
standing" for  "Reason,"  and  the  word  "Reason"  for 
"  Religion,"   Harrington    has    here   completely  ex- 


pressed the  Truth  for  which  the  Friend  is  contend- 
ing. But  that  this  was  Harrington's  meaning  is 
evident.  Otherwise  instead  of  comparing  two  facul- 
ties with  each  other,  he  would  contrast  a  faculty  with 
one  of  its  own  objects,  which  would  involve  the  same 
absurdity  as  if  he  had  said,  that  man  might  rather  be 
defined  an  astronomical  than  a  seeing  animal,  because 
other  animals  possessed  the  sense  of  Sight,  but  were 
incapable  of  beholding  the  satellites  of  Saturn,  or  the 
nebula;  of  fixed  stars.  If  further  confirmation  be 
necessary,  it  may  be  supplied  by  the  following  reflec- 
tions, the  leading  thought  of  which  I  remember  to 
have  read  in  the  works  of  a  continental  Philosopher. 
It  should  seem  easy  to  give  the  definite  distinction  of 
the  Reason  from  the  Understanding,  because  we  con- 
stantly imply  it  when  we  speak  of  the  difference  be- 
tween ourselves  and  the  brute  creation.  No  one, 
except  as  a  figure  of  speech,  ever  speaks  of  an  animal 
reason  ;*  but  that  many  animals  possess  a  share  of 
Understanding,  perfectly  distinguishable  from  mere 
Instinct,  we  all  allow.  Few  persons  have  a  favorite 
dog  without  making  instances  of  its  intelligence  an 
occasional  topic  of  conversation.  They  call  for  our 
admiration  of  the  individual  animal,  and  not  with  ex- 
clusive reference  to  the  Wisdom  in  Nature,  as  in  the 
case  of  the  storge  or  maternal  instinct  of  beasts ;  or 
of  the  hexangular  cells  of  the  bees,  and  the  wonder- 
ful coincidence  of  this  form  with  the  geometrical  de- 
monstration of  the  largest  possible  number  of  rooms 
in  a  given  space.  Likewise,  we  distinguish  various 
degrees  of  Understanding  there,  and  even  discover 
from  inductions  supplied  by  the  Zoologists,  that  the 
Understanding  appears  (as  a  general  rule)  in  an  in- 
verse proportion  to  the  Instinct.  We  hear  little  or 
nothing  of  the  instincts  of  "  the  half-reasoning  ele- 
phant," and  as  little  of  the  Understanding  of  Cater- 
pillars and  Butterflies.  (N.  B.  Though  reasoning 
does  not  in  our  language,  in  the  lax  use  of  words  na- 
tural in  conversation  or  popular  writings,  imply  sci- 
entific conclusion, yet  the  phrase  "half-reasoning"  is 
evidently  used  by  Pope  as  a  poetic  hyperbole.)  But 
Reason  is  wholly  denied,  equally  to  the  highest  as  to 
the  lowest  of  the  brutes;  otherwise  it  must  be  wholly 
attributed  to  them,  and  with  it  therefore  Self-consci- 
ousness, and  personality,  or  Moral  Being. 

I  should  have  no  objection  to  define  Reason  with 
Jacobi,  and  with  his  friend  Hemsterhuis,  as  an  organ 

*  I  have  this  moment  looked  over  a  Translation  of  lilumcn- 
bach's  Physiology  by  Dr.  Elliotson,  which  forms  a  glaring 
exception,  p.  45.  I  do  not  know  Dr.  Elliotson,  but  I  do  know 
Professor  Blumenbach,  and  was  an  assiduous  attendant  on 
the  Lectures,  of  which  this  classical  work  was  the  text-book  : 
and  I  know  that  that  good  and  great  man  would  start  back 
with  surprise  and  indignation  at  the  gross  materialism  mor- 
ticed on  to  his  work  :  the  more  so  because  during  the  whole 
period,  in  which  the  identification  of  Man  with  the  Brute  in 
kind  was  the  fashion  of  Naturalists,  Blumenbach  remained 
ardent  and  instant  in  controverting  the  opinion,  and  exposing 
its  fallacy  and  falsehood,  both  as  a  man  of  sense  and  aa  a 
Naturalist.  I  may  truly  say,  that  it  was  uppermost  in  his 
heart  and  foremost  in  his  speech.  Therefore,  and  from  no 
hostile  feeling  to  Dr.  Elliotson  (whom  I  hear  spoken  of  with 
great  regard  and  respect,  and  to  whom  I  myself  give  credit 
for  his  manly  openness  in  the  avowal  of  his  opinions)  I  have 
felt  the  present  animadversion  a  duty  of  justice  as  well  as 
gratitude.  S.  T.  C.  8  April,  1817. 

419 


410 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


bearing  the  same  relation  to  spiritual  objects,  the 
Universal,  the  Eternal,  and  the  Necessary,  as  the 
eye  bears  to  material  and  contingent  phenomena. 
But  then  it  must  be  added,  that  it  is  an  organ  identi- 
cal with  its  appropriate  objects.  Thus,  God,  the  Soul, 
eternal  Truth,  &c,  are  the  objects  of  Reason;  but 
they  are  themselves  reason.  We  name  God  the  Su- 
preme Reason ;  and  Milton  says,  "  Whence  the  Soul 
Reason  receives,  and  Reason  is  her  Being."  What- 
ever is  conscious  SeZ/-knowledge  is  Reason;  and  in 
this  sense  it  may  be  safely  defined  the  organ  of  the 
Supersensuous ;  even  as  the  Understanding  wherever 
it  does  not  possess  or  use  the  Reason,  as  another  and 
inward  eye,  may  be  defined  the  conception  of  the 
Sensuous,  or  the  faculty  by  which  we  generalize  and 
arrange  the  phenomena  of  perception :  that  faculty, 
the  functions  of  which  contain  the  rules  and  consti- 
tute the  possibility  of  outward  Experience.  In  short, 
the  Understanding  supposes  something  that  is  wider- 
stood.  This  may  be  merely  its  own  acts  or  forms, 
that  is,  formal  Logic ;  but  real  objects,  the  materials 
of  substantial  knowledge,  must  be  furnished,  we 
might  safely  say  revealed,  to  it  by  Organs  of  Sense. 
The  understanding  of  the  higher  Brutes  has  only  or- 
gans of  outward  sense,  and  consequently  material  ob- 
jects only ;  but  man's  understanding  has  likewise  an 
organ  of  inward  sense,  and  therefore  the  power  of 
acquainting  itself  with  invisible  realities  or  spiritual 
objects.  This  organ  is  his  Reason.  Again,  the  Un- 
derstanding and  Experience  may  exist*  without  Rea- 
son. But  Reason  cannot  exist  without  Understand- 
ing; nor  does  it  or  can  it  manifest  itself  but  in  and 
through  the  understanding,  which  in  our  elder  wri- 
ters is  often  called  discourse,  or  the  discursive  faculty, 
as  by  Hooker,  Lord  Bacon,  and  Hobbes :  and  an  un- 
derstanding enlightened  by  reason  Shakspeare  gives 
as  the  contra-distinguishing  character  of  man,  under 
the  name  discourse  of  reason.  In  short,  the  human 
understanding  possesses  two  distinct  organs,  the  out- 
ward sense,  and  "  the  mind's  eye,"  which  is  reason : 
wherever  we  use  that  phrase  (the  mind's  eye)  in  its 
proper  sense,  and  not  as  a  mere  synonyme  of  the  me- 
mory or  the  fancy.  In  this  way  we  reconcile  the  pro- 
mise of  Revelation,  that  the  blessed  will  see  God, 
with  the  declaration  of  St.  John,  God  hath  no  one 
seen  at  any  time. 

We  will  add  one  other  illustration  to  prevent  any 
misconception,  as  if  we  were  dividing  the  human  soul 
into  different  essences,  or  ideal  persons.  In  this  piece 
of  steel  I  acknowledge  the  properties  of  hardness,  brit- 
tleness,  high  polish,  and  the  capability  of  forming  a 
mirror.  I  find  all  these  likewise  in  the  plate  glass  of 
a  friend's  carriage ;  but  in  addition  to  all  these,  I  find 
the  quality  of  transparency,  or  the  power  of  transmit- 

*  Of  this  no  one  would  feel  inclined  to  doubt,  who  had  seen 
the  poodle  dog  whom  the  celebrated  Blumenbach,  a  name  so 
dear  to  science,  as  a  physiologist  and  Comparative  Anatomist, 
and  not  1p98  dear  as  a  man,  to  all  Englishmen  who  have  ever 
resided  at  Gottingen  in  the  course  of  their  education,  trained 
up,  not  only  to  hatch  the  eggs  of  the  hen  with  all  the  mother's 
care  and  patience,  but  to  attend  the  chicken  afterwards,  and 
find  the  food  for  them.  1  have  myself  known  a  Newfound- 
land dog,  who  watched  and  guarded  a  family  of  young  child- 
ren with  all  the  intelligence  of  a  nurse,  during  their  walks. 


ting  as  well  as  of  reflecting  the  rays  of  light.    The 
application  is  obvious. 

If  the  reader  therefore  will  take  the  trouble  of 
bearing  in  mind  these  and  the  following  explanations, 
he  will  have  removed  beforehand  every  possible  dif- 
ficulty from  the  Friend's  political  section.  For  there 
is  another  use  of  the  word,  Reason,  arising  out  of  the 
former  indeed,  but  less  definite,  and  more  exposed  to 
misconception.  In  this  latter  use  it  means  the  under- 
standing considered  as  using  the  Reason,  so  far  as  by 
the  organ  of  Reason  only  we  possess  the  ideas  of  the 
Necessary  and  the  Universal ;  and  this  is  the  more 
common  use  of  the  word,  when  it  is  applied  with  any 
attempt  at  clear  and  distinct  conceptions.  In  this 
narrower  and  derivative  sense  the  best  definition  of 
Reason  which  I  can  give,  will  be  found  in  the  third 
member  of  the  following  sentence,  in  which  the  un- 
derstanding is  described  in  its  three-fold  operation, 
and  from  each  receives  an  appropriate  name.  The 
sense,  (vis  sensitiva  vel  intuitiva)  perceives :  Vis  re- 
gulatrix  (the  understanding,  in  its  own  peculiar  ope- 
ration) conceives:  Vis  rationalis  (the  Reason  or  ra- 
tionalized understanding)  comprehends.  The  first  is 
impressed  through  the  organs  of  sense,  the  second 
combines  these  multifarious  impressions  into  individ- 
ual Notions,  and  by  reducing  these  notions  to  Rules, 
according  to  the  analogy  of  all  its  former  notices, 
constitutes  Experience:  the  third  subordinates  both 
these  notions  and  the  rules  of  experience  to  absolute 
Principles  or  necessary  Laws :  and  thus  concerning 
objects,  which  our  experience  has  proved  to  have 
real  existence,  it  demonstrates  moreover,  in  what 
way  they  are  possible,  and  in  doing  this  constitutes 
Science.  Reason  therefore,  in  this  secondary  sense, 
and  used  not  as  a  spiritual  Organ  but  as  a  Faculty 
(namely,  the  Understanding  or  Soul  enlightened  by 
that  organ) — Reason,  I  say,  or  the  scientific  Faculty, 
is  the  Intellection  of  the  possibility  or  essential  pro- 
perties of  things  by  means  of  the  Laws  that  consti- 
tute them.  Thus  the  rational  idea  of  a  Circle  is  that 
of  a  figure  constituted  by  the  circumvolution  of  a 
straight  line  with  its  one  end  fixed. 

Every  man-  must  feel,  that  though  he  may  not  be 
exerting  his  faculties  in  a  different  way,  when  in  one 
instance,  he  begins  with  some  one  self-evident  truth, 
(that  the  r4dii  of  a  circle,  for  instance;  are  all  equal,) 
and  in  cpr^equence  of  this  being  true  sees  at  once, 
without  Jftjiy  actual  experience,  that  some  other  thing 
must  be  true  likewise,  and  that,  this  being  true,  some 
third  thing  must  be  equally  true,  and  so  on  till  he 
comes,  we  will  say,  to  the  properties  of  the  lever, 
considered  as  the  spoke  of  a  circle :  which  is  capable 
of  having  all  its  marvellous  powers  demonstrated 
even  to  a  savage  who  had  never  seen  a  lever,  and 
without  supposing  any  other  previous  knowledge  in 
his  mind,  but  this  one,  that  there  is  a  conceivable 
figure,  all  possible  lines  from  the  middle  to  the  cir- 
cumference of  which  are  of  the  same  length :  or 
when,  in  the  second  instance,  he  brings  together  the 
facts  of  experience,  each  of  which  has  its  own  sepa- 
rate value,  neither  increased  nor  diminished  by  the 
truth  of  any  other  fact  which  may  have  preceded  it; 
and  making  these  several  facts  bear  upon  some  parti- 
£  420 


THE  FRIEND. 


411 


cular  project,  and  finding  some  in  favor  of  it,  and 
some  against  the  project,  according  as  one  or  the 
other  class  of  facts  preponderate :  as,  for  instance, 
whether  it  would  be  better  to  plant  a  particular  spot 
of  ground  with  larch,  or  with  Scotch  fir,  or  with  oak 
in  preference  to  either.  Surely  every  man  will  ac- 
knowledge, that  his  mind  was  very  differently  em- 
ployed in  the  first  case  from  what  it  was  in  the  se- 
cond, and  all  men  have  agreed  to  call  the  results  of 
the  first  class  the  truths  of  science,  such  as  not  only 
are  true,  but  which  it  is  impossible  to  conceive  other- 
wise: while  the  results  of  the  second  class  are  called 
facts,  or  things  of  experience :  and  as  to  these  latter 
we  must  often  content  ourselves  with  the  greater 
probability,  that  they  are  so,  or  so,  rather  than  other- 
wise— nay,  even  when  we  have  no  doubt  that  they 
are  so  in  the  particular  case,  we  never  presume  to 
assert  that  they  must  continue  so  always,  and  under 
all  circumstances.  On  the  contrary,  our  conclusions 
depend  altogether  on  contingent  circumstances.  Now 
when  the  mind  is  employed,  as  in  the  case  first  men- 
tioned, I  call  it  Reasoning,  or  the  use  of  the  pure 
Reason ;  but  in  the  second  case,  the  Understanding 
or  Prudence. 

This  reason  applied  to  the  motives  of  our  conduct, 
and  combined  with  the  sense  of  our  moral  responsi- 
bility, is  the  conditional  cause  of  Conscience,  which 
is  a  spiritual  sense  or  testifying  state  of  the  coinci- 
dence or  discordance  of  the  free  will  with  the 
Reason-.  But  as  the  Reasoning  consists  wholly  in  a 
man's  power  of  seeing,  whether  any  two  ideas, 
which  happen  to  be  in  his  mind,  are,  or  are  not  in 
contradiction  with  each  other,  it  follows  of  necessity, 
not  only  that  all  men  have  reason,  but  that  every 
man  has  it  in  the  same  degree.  For  Reasoning  (or 
Reason,  in  this  its  secondary  sense)  does  not  consist  in 
the  Ideas,  or  in  their  clearness,  but  simply,  when 
they  are  in  the  mind,  in  seeing  whether^  they  contra- 
dict each  other  or  no. 

And  again,  as  in  the  determinations  of 'Conscience 
the  only  knowledge  required  is  that  of  my  own  inten- 
tion— whether  in  doing  such  a  thing,  instead  of  leav- 
ing it  undone,  I  did  what  I  should  think  right  if  any 
other  person  had  done  it;  it  follows  that  in  the  mere 
question  of  guilt  or  innocence,  all  men  have  not  only 
Reason  equally,  but  likewise  all  the  materials  on 
which  the  reason,  considered  as  Conscience,  is  to 
work.  But  when  we  pass  out  of  ourselves,  and  speak, 
not  exclusively  of  the  agent  as  meaning  well  or  ill, 
but  of  the  action  in  its  consequences,  then  of  course 
experience  is  required,  judgment  is  making  use  of  it, 
and  all  those  other  qualities  of  the  mind  which  are 
so  differently  dispensed  to  different  persons,  both  by 
nature  and  education.  And  though  the  reason  itself 
is  the  same  in  all  men,  yet  the  means  of  exercising 
it,  and  the  materials  (i.  e.  the  facts  and  ideas)  on 
which  it  is  exercised,  being  possessed  in  very  differ- 
ent degrees  by  different  persons,  the  practical  Result 
is,  of  course,  equally  different — and  the  whole  ground 
work  of  Rousseau's  Philosophy  ends  in  a  mere  No- 
thingism.  —  Even  in  that  branch  of  knowledge,  on 
which  the  ideas,  on  the  congruity  of  which  with  each 


other,  the  Reason  is  to  decide,  are  all  possessed  alike 
by  all  men,  namely,  in  Geometry,  (for  all  men  in  their 
senses  possess  all  the  component  images,  viz.  simple 
curves  and  straight  lines)  yet  the  power  of  attention 
required  for  the  perception  of  linked  Truths,  even 
of  such  Truths,  is  so  very  different  in  A  and  in  B, 
that  Sir  Isaac  Newton  professed  that  it  was  in  this 
power  only  that  he  was  superior  to  ordinary  men. 
In  short,  the  sophism  is  as  gross  as  if  I  should  say — 
The  Souls  of  all  men  have  the  faculti/  of  sight  in  an 
equal  degree — forgetting  to  add,  that  this  faculty  can- 
not be  exercised  without  eyes,  and  that  some  men  are 
blind  and  others  short-sighted,  &c. — and  should  then 
take  advantage  of  this  my  omission  to  conclude 
against  the  use  or  necessity  of  spectacles,  micro- 
scopes, &c. — or  of  choosing  the  sharpest  sighted  men 
for  our  guides. 

Having  exposed  this  great  sophism,  I  must  warn 
against  an  opposite  error  —  namely,  that  if  Reason, 
distinguished  from  Prudence,  consists  merely  in 
ktiowing  that  Black  cannot  be  White — or  when  a 
man  has  a  clear  conception  of  an  inclosed  figure,  and 
another  equally  clear  conception  of  a  straight  line,  his 
Reason  teaches  him  that  these  two  conceptions  are 
incompatible  in  the  same  object,  i.  e.  that  two  straight 

lines  cannot  include  a  space the  said  Reason  must 

be  a  very  insignificant  faculty.  But  a  moment's 
steady  self-reflection  will  show  us,  that  in  the  simple 
determination  "  Black  is  not  White" — or  "  that  two 
straight  lines  cannot  include  a  space" — all  the  pow- 
ers are  implied,  that  distinguish  Man  from  Animals — 
first,  the  power  of  reflection — 2d.  of  comparison — 3d. 
and  therefore  of  suspension  of  the  mind — 4th.  there- 
fore of  a  controlling  will,  and  the  power  of  acting 
from  notions,  instead  of  mere  images  exciting  appe- 
tites;  from  motives,  and  not  from  mere  dark  instincts. 
Was  it  an  insignificant  thing  to  weigh  the  Planets,  to 
determine  all  their  courses,  and  prophesy  every  pos- 
sible relation  of  the  Heavens  a  thousand  years  hence  ? 
Yet  all  this  mighty  claim  of  science  is  nothing  but  a 
linking  together  of  truths  of  the  same  kind,  as  the 
whole  is  greater  than  its  part : — or,  if  A  and  B  =  C, 
then,  A  =  B—  or  3  +  4=  7,  therefore  7  +  5  =  12, 
and  so  forth.  X  is  to  be  found  either  in  A  or  B,  or 
C  or  D :  It  is  not  found  in  A,  B,  or  C,  therefore  it  is 
to  be  found  in  D. — What  can  be  simpler?  Apply 
this  to  an  animal — a  Dog  misses  his  master  where 
four  roads  meet — he  has  come  up  one,  smells  to  two 
of  the  others,  and  then  with  his  head  aloft  darts  for- 
ward to  the  fourth  road  without  any  examination.  If 
this  was  done  by  a  conclusion,  the  Dog  would  have 
Reason — how  comes  it  then,  that  he  never  shows  it 
in  his  ordinary  habits  ?  Why  does  this  story  excite 
either  wonder  or  incredulity? — If  the  story  be  a  fact, 
and"not-a  fiction,  I  should  say — the  Breeze  brought 
his  Master's  scent  down  the  fourth  Road  to  the  Dog's 
nose,  and  that  therefore  he  did  not  put  it  down  to  the 
Road,  as  in  the  two  former  instances.  So  awful  and 
almost  miraculous  does  the  simple  act  of  concluding, 
that  take  3  from  4,  there  remains  one,  appear  to  us 
when  attributed  to  the  most  sagacious  of  all  ani- 
mals. 

421 


£foe  jFtientr. 


SECTION      THE      FIRST, 


ON   THE  PRINCIPLES  OF   POLITICAL   KNOWLEDGE. 


Hoc  potissimum  pacto  felicem  ac  magnum  regem  se  fore  judicans:  non  si  quam  plurimis  sed  si  quam  optimis  imperet. 
Proinde  parum  esse  putat  justis  praesidiis  regnum  suum  muniisse,  nisi  idem  viris  eruditione  juxta  ac  viUe  integritate  praecellen- 
tibus  ditet  atque  honestet.    Nimirum  intelligil,  haec  demum  esse  vera  regni  decora,  has  veras  opes. 


ESSAY  I, 


Dum  Politici  saepiuscule  hominibusmagis  insidiantur  quam 
consulunt,  potiuscallidi  quam  sapientes  ;  Theoretici  e  con- 
trario  se  rem  divinam  facere  et  sapientiae  culmen  attingere 
credunt,  quando  humanam  naturam,  quae  nullibi  est,  multis 
modis  laudare,  et  earn,  quae  re  vera  est,  dictis  lacessere  no- 
runt.  Unde  factum  est,  ut  nunquam  Polilicam  concepennt 
quaepossit  ad  usum  revocari;  sed  quae  in  Utopia  vel  in  illo 
poetarum  aureo  saeculo,  ubi  scilicet  minime  necesse  erat, 
institui  potuisset.  At  mihi  plane  persuadeo,  Experientiam 
omnia  civitatum  genera,  quae  concipi  possunt  ut  homines 
concorditer  vivant,  etsimul  media,  quibus  multitudo  dirigi, 
seu  quibus  intra  certos  limiles  contineri  debeat,  ostendisse  : 
ita  ut  non  credam,  nos  posse  aliquid,  quod  ab  experientia 
Bive,  praxi  non  abhorreat,  cogitatione  de  hac  re  assequi, 
quod  nondum  expertum  compertumque  sit. 
Cum  igitur  animum  ad  Politicam  applicuerim,  nihil  quod 
novum  vel  inauditum  est ;  eed  tantum  ea  quae  cum  praxi 
optime  conveniunt,  certa  et  indubitala  ratione  demonstrare 
aut  ex  ipsa  humanae  naturae  conditione  deducere,  intendi. 
Et  ut  ea  qufe  ad  hanc  scientiam  spectant,  eadem  animi 
libertate,  qua  res  mathematicas  solemus,  inquirerem,  sedulo 
curavi  humanas  actioncs  non  riderc,  non  luge-re,  neque 
detestari  ;  sed  intelligere.  Nee  ad  imperii  securitatem  re- 
fert  quo  animo  homines  inducantur  ad  res  recte  adminis- 
trandum,  modo  res  recte  administrentur.  Animi  enim 
libertas,  seu  fortitudo,  privata  virtus  est ;  at  imperii  virtus 
securitas.  SPINOZA,  op.  Post.  p.  267. 

Translation. — While  the  mere  practical  Statesman  too 
often  rather  plots  against  mankind,  than  consults  their  interest, 
crafty  not  wise  ;  the  mere  Theorists,  on  the  other  hand,  im- 
agine that  they  are  employed  in  a  glorious  work,  and  believe 
themselves  at  the  very  summit  of  earthly  Wisdom,  when 
they  are  able,  in  set  and  varied  language,  to  extol  that  Human 
Nature,  which  exists  no  where  (except  indeed  in  their  own 
fancy)  and  to  accuse  and  vilify  our  nature  as  it  really  is. 
Hence  it  has  happened,  that  these  men  have  never  conceived 
a  practicable  Bcheme  of  civil  policy,  but,  at  best,  such  forms 
of  Government  only,  as  might  have  been  instituted  in  Utopia, 
or  during  the  golden  age  of  the  poets :  that  is  to  say,  forms 
of  government  excellently  adapled  for  those  who  need  no 
government  at  all.  But  1  am  fully  persuaded,  that  experience 
has  already  brought  to  light  all  conceivable  sorts  of  political 
Institutions  under  which  human  society  can  be  maintained 
in  concord,  and  likewise  the  chief  means  of  directing  the 
multitude,  or  retaining  them  within  given  boundaries:  so  that 
I  can  hardly  believe,  that  on  this  subject  the  deepest  research 
would  arrive  at  any  result,  not  abhorrent  from  experience  and 
practice,  which  has  not  already  been  tried  and  proved. 

When,  Iherefore,  I  applied  my  thoughts  to  the  study  of 
Political  Economy,  I  proposed  to  myself  nothing  original  or 
strange  as  the  fruits  of  my  reflections  ;  but  simply  to  demon- 
strate from  plain  and  undoubted  principles,  or  to  deduce  from 


the  very  condition  and  necessities  of  human  nature,  those 
plans  and  maxims  which  square  the  best  with  practice.  And 
that  in  all  things  which  relate  to  this  province,  I  might  con- 
duct my  investigations  with  the  same  freedom  of  intellect 
with  which  we  proceed  in  questions  of  pure  science,  I  sedu- 
lously disciplined  my  mind  neither  to  laugh  at,  or  bewail,  or 
detest,  the  actions  of  men  ;  but  to  understand  them.  For  to 
the  safety  of  the  state  it  is  not  of  necessary  importance,  what 
motives  induce  men  to  administer  public  affairs  rightly,  pro- 
vided only  that  public  affairs  be  rightly  administered.  For 
moral  strength,  or  freedom  from  the  selfish  passions,  is  the 
virtue  of  individuals ;  but  security  is  the  virtue  of  a  state. 


ON  THE  PRINCIPLES  OF  POLITICAL 
PHILOSOPHY. 

All  the  different  philosophical  systems  of  political 
justice,  all  the  Theories  on  the  rightful  Origin  of 
Government,  are  reducible  in  the  end  to  three  class- 
es, correspondent  to  the  three  different  points  of  view, 
in  which  the  Human  Being  itself  may  be  contem- 
plated. The  first  denies  all  truth  and  distinct  mean- 
ing to  the  words,  Right  and  Duty,  and  affirming 
that  the  human  mind  consists  of  nothing  but  manifold 
modifications  of  private  sensation,  considers  men  as 
the  highest  sort  of  animals  indeed,  but  at  the  same 
time  the  most  wretched  ;  inasmuch  as  their  defence- 
less nature  forces  them  into  society,  while  such  is  the 
multiplicity  of  wants  engendered  by  the  social  state, 
that  the  wishes  of  one  are  sure  to  be  in  contradiction 
with  those  of  some  other.  The  asserters  of  this 
system  consequently  ascribe  the  origin  and  continu- 
ance of  Government  to  fear,  or  the  power  of  the 
stronger,  aided  by  the  force  of  custom.  This  is  the 
system  of  Hobbes.  Its  statement  is  its  confutation. 
It  is,  indeed,  in  the  literal  sense  of  the  word,  prepos- 
terous:  for  fear  pre-supposes  conquest,  and  conquest 
a  previous  union  and  agreement  between  the  con- 
querors. A  vast  Empire  may  perhaps  be  governed 
by  fear ;  at  least  the  idea  is  not  absolutely  incon- 
ceivable, under  circumstances  which  prevent  the 
consciousness  of  a  common  strength.  A  million  of 
men  united  by  mutual  confidence  and  free  intercourse 
of  thoughts  form  one  power,  and  this  is  as  much  a 
real  thing  as  a  steam-engine  ;  but  a  million  of  insu- 
lated individuals  is  only  an  abstraction  of  the  mind, 

422 


THE  FRIEND. 


413 


and  but  one  told  so  many  times  over  without  addi- 
tion, as  an  idiot  would  tell  the  clock  at  noon — one, 
one,  one,  &c.  But  when,  in  the  first  instances,  the 
descendants  of  one  family  joined  together  to  attack 
those  of  another  family,  it  is  impossible  that  their 
chief  or  leader  should  have  appeared  to  them  strong- 
er than  all  the  rest  together:  they  must  therefore 
have  chosen  him,  and  this  as  for  particular  purposes, 
so  doubtless  under  particular  conditions,  expressed  or 
understood.  Such  we  know  to  be  the  case  with  the 
North  American  tribes  at  present ;  such  we  are  in- 
formed by  History,  was  the  case  with  our  own  remote 
ancestors.  Therefore,  even  on  the  system  of  those 
who,  in  contempt  of  the  oldest  and  most  authentic 
records,  consider  the  savage  as  the  first  and  natural 
state  of  man,  government  must  have  originated 
in  choice  and  an  agreement.  The  apparent  ex- 
ceptions in  Africa  and  Asia  are,  if  possible,  still 
more  subversive  of  this  system :  for  they  will  be 
found  to  have  originated  in  religious  imposture,  and 
the  first  chiefs  to  have  secured  a  willing  and  enthu- 
-  siastic  obedience  to  themselves,  as  Delegates  of  the 
Deity. 

But  the  whole  Theory  is  baseless.  We  are  told  by 
History,  we  learn  from  our  experience,  we  know  from 
our  own  hearts,  that  fear,  of  itself,  is  utterly  incapa- 
ble of  producing  any  regular,  continuous  and  calcu- 
lable effect,  even  on  an  individual ;  and  that  the  fear, 
which  does  act  systematically  upon  the  mind  always 
presupposes  a  sense  of  duty,  as  its  cause.  The  most 
cowardly  of  the  European  nations,  the  Neapolitans 
and  Sicilians,  those  among  whom  the  fear  of  death 
exercises  the  most  tyrannous  influence  relatively  to 
their  own  persons,  are  the  very  men  who  least  fear 
to  take  away  the  life  of  a  fellow-citizen  by  poison  or 
assassination :  while  in  Great  Britain,  a  tyrant  who 
has  abused  the  power,  which  a  vast  property  has 
given  him,  to  oppress  a  whole  neighborhood,  can  walk 
in  safety  unarmed,  and  unattended,  amid  a  hundred 
men,  each  of  whom  feels  his  heart  burn  with  rage 
and  indignation  at  the  sight  of  him.  "  It  was  this 
Man  who  broke  my  Father's  heart " — or  "  it  is 
through  Him  that  my  Children  are  clad  in  rags,  and 
cry  for  the  Food  which  I  am  no  longer  able  to  pro- 
vide for  them."  And  yet  they  dare  not  touch  a  hair 
of  his  head  !  Whence  does  this  arise  I  Is  it  from  a 
cowardice  of  sensibility  that  makes  the  injured  man 
shudder  at  the  thought  of  shedding  blood  ?  Or  from 
a  cowardice  of  selfishness  which  makes  him  afraid 
of  hazarding  his  own  life!  Neither  the  one  or  the 
other !  The  Field  of  Waterloo,  as  the  most  recent 
of  an  hundred  equal  proofs,  has  borne  witness, 

That  "bring  a  Briton  fra  hia  hill, 
*  *  *  *  * 

Say,  such  is  Royal  George's  will, 
And  there's  the  foe, 
He  has  nae  thought  but  how  to  kill 

Twa  at  a  blow. 
Nae  CHuld,  faint-hearted  doublings  tease  him  ; 
Death  comes,  wi'  fearless  eye  he  sees  him, 
Wi'  bloody  hand,  a  welcome  gies  him: 

And  when  he  fa's 
His  latest  draught  o'  breathin  leaves  him 
In  faint  huzzas." 
Whence  then  arises  the  difference  of  feeling  in  the 


former  case  ?  To  what  does  the  oppressor  owe  his 
safety  ?  To  the  spirit-quelling  thought,  the  laws  of 
God  and  of  my  country  have  made  his  life  sacred ! 
I  dare  not  touch  a  hair  of  his  head! — "Tis  Con- 
science that  makes  Cowards  of  us  all," — but!  oh!  it 
is  Conscience  too  which  makes  Heroes  of  us  all. 


ESSAY   II. 


Le  plus  fort  n'est  jamais  assez  fort  pour  etre  toujours  le 
maitre,  s'il  ne  transforme  sa  force  en  droit  et  l'obcissance 
en  devoir. ROUSSEAU. 

I'iribtis  parantur  provincial  jure  retinentur.  Igitur  breve  id 
gaudium,  quippe  Gcrmani  victi  magis,  quam  domiti. 

FLOR.  iv.  12. 

Translation.~Tbe  strongest  is  never  strong  enough  to  be 
always  the  master,  unless  he  transform  his  Power  into 
Right  and  Obedience  into  Duty. ROUSSEAU. 

Provinces  are  taken  by  force,  but  they  are  kept  by  right.  This 
exultation  therefore  was  of  brief  continuance,  inasmuch  as 
the  GermanB  had  been  overcome,  but  not  subdued. 

FLORUS. 


A  truly  great  man,  (the  best  and  greatest  public 
character  that  I  had  ever  the  opportunity  of  making 
myself  acquainted  with)  on  assuming  the  command 
of  a  man-of-war,  found  a  mutinous  crew,  more  than 
one  half  of  them  uneducated  Irishmen,  and  of  the 
remainder  no  small  portion  had  become  sailors  by 
compromise  of  punishment.    What  terror  could  effect 
by  severity  and  frequency  of  acts  of  discipline,  had 
been  already  effected.    And  what  was  this  effect? 
Something  like  that  of  a  polar  winter  on  a  flask  of 
brandy.    The  furious  spirit  concentered  itself  with 
tenfold   strength  at  the  heart;  open  violence  was 
changed  into  secret  plots  and  conspiracies ;  and  the 
consequent  orderliness  of  the  crew,  as  far  as  they 
were  orderly,  was  but  the  brooding  of  a  tempest. 
The  new  commander  instantly  commenced  a  system 
j  of  discipline  as  near  as  possible  to  that  of  ordinary 
law — as  much  as  possible,  he  avoided,  in  his  own 
I  person,  the  appearance  of  any  will  or  arbitrary  power 
j  to  vary,  or  to  remit,  punishment.     The  rules  to  be 
observed  were  affixed  to  a  conspicuous  part  of  the 
■  ship,  with  the  particular  penalties  for  the  breach  of 
each  particular  rule;  and  care  was  taken  that  every 
individual  of  the  ship  should  know  and  understand 
this  code.     With  a  single  exception  in  the  case  of 
mutinous  behavior,  a  space  of  twenty-four  hours  waa 
i  appointed  between  the  first  charge  and  the  second 
;  hearing  of  the  cause,  at  which  time  the  accused  per- 
;  son  was   permitted  and  required  to  bring  forward 
whatever  he  thought  conducive  to  his  defence  or  pal- 
liation.   If,  as  was  commonly  the  case  (for  the  officers 
well  knew  that  the  commander  would  seriously  re- 
sent in  them  all  caprice  of  will,  and  by  no  means 
permit  to  others  what  he  denied  to  himself)  if  no 
answer  could  be  returned  to  the  three  questions — Did 
you  not  commit  the  act  ?    Did  you  not  know  that  it 
was  in  contempt  of  such  a  rule,  and  in  defiance  of 
such  a  rule,  and  in  defiance  of  such  a  punishment  ? 
423 


414 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


And  was  it  not  wholly  in  your  own  power  to  have 
obeyed  the  one  and  avoided  the  other? — the  sentence 
was  then  passed  with  the  greatest  solemnity,  and 
another,  but  shorter,  space  of  time  was  again  inter- 
posed between  it  and  its  actual  execution.  During 
this  space  the  feelings  of  the  commander,  as  a  man, 
were  so  well  blended  with  his  inflexibility,  as  the 
organ  of  the  law ;  and  how  much  he  suffered  previ- 
ous to  and  during  the  execution  of  the  sentence  was 
so  well  known  to  the  crew,  that  it  became  a  common 
saying  with  them,  when  a  sailor  was  about  to  be  pun- 
ished, "  The  captain  takes  it  more  to  heart  than  the 
fellow  himself."  But  whenever  the  commander  per- 
ceived any  trait  of  pride  in  the  offender,  or  the  germs 
of  any  noble  feeling,  he  lost  no  opportunity  of  saying, 
"It  is  not  the  pain  that  you  are  about  to  suffer  which 
grieves  me!  You  are  none  of  you,  I  trust,  such  cow- 
ards as  to  turn  faint-hearted  at  the  thought  of  that ! 
but  that,  being  a  man  and  one  who  is  to  fight  for  his 
king  and  country,  you  should  have  made  it  necessary 
to  treat  you  as  a  vicious  beast,  it  is  this  that  grieves 
me." 

I  have  been  assured,  both  by  a  gentleman  who  was 
a  lieutenant  on  board  that  ship  at  the  time  when  the 
heroism  of  its  captain,  aided  by  his  characteristic 
calmness  and  foresight,  greatly  influenced  the  deci- 
sion of  the  most  glorious  battle  recorded  in  the  annals 
of  our  naval  glory ;  and  very  recently  by  a  gray- 
headed  sailor,  who  did  not  even  know  my  name,  or 
could  have  suspected  that  I  was  previously  acquaint- 
ed with  the  circumstances — I  have  been  assured,  I 
say,  that  the  success  of  this  plan  was  such  as  aston- 
ished the  oldest  officers,  and  convinced  the  most  in- 
credulous. Ruffians,  who  like  the  old  Buccaneers, 
had  been  used  to  inflict  torture  on  themselves  for 
sport,  or  in  order  lo  harden  themselves  beforehand, 
were  tamed  and  overpowered,  how  or  why  they 
themselves  knew  not.  From  the  fiercest  spirits  were 
heard  the  most  earnest  entreaties  for  the  forgiveness 
of  their  commander;  not  before  the  punishment,  for 
it  was  too  well  known  that  then  they  would  have 
been  to  no  purpose,  but  days  after  it,  when  the  bodily 
pain  was  remembered  but  as  a  dream.  An  invisible 
power  it  was,  that  quelled  them,  a  power,  which  was 
therefore  irresistible,  because  it  took  away  the  very 
will  of  resisting.  It  was  the  awful  power  of  Law, 
acting  on  natures  pre-eon figured  to  its  influences.  A 
faculty  was  appealed  to  in  the  Offender's  own  being; 
a  Faculty  and  a  Presence,  of  which  he  had  not  been 
previously  made  aware — but  it  answered  to  the  ap- 
peal! its  real  existence  therefore  could  not  be  doubt- 
ed, or  its  reply  rendered  inaudible!  and  the  very 
struggle  of  the  wilder  passions  to  keep  uppermost 
counteracted  its  own  purpose,  by  wasting  in  internal 
contest  that  energy,  which  before  had  acted  in  its 
entireness  on  external  resistance  or  provocation. 
Strength  may  be  met  with  strength;  the  power  of  in- 
flicting pain  may  be  baffled  by  the  pride  of  endu- 
rance; the  eye  of  rage  may  be  answered  by  the  stare 
of  defiance,  or  the  downcast  look  of  dark  and  re- 
vengeful resolve;  and  with  all  this  there  is  an  out- 
ward and  determined  object  to  which  the  mind  can 
attach  its  passions  and  purposes,  and  bury  its  own 


disquietudes  in  the  full  occupation  of  the  senses. 
But  who  dares  struggle  with  an  invisible  combatant  ? 
with  an  enemy  which  exists  and  makes  us  know  its 
existence,  but  where  it  is,  we  ask  in  vain. — No  space 
contains  it — time  promises  no  control  over  it— -it  has 
no  ear  for  my  threats — it  has  no  substance,  that  my 
hands  can  grasp,  or  my  weapons  find  vulnerable — it 
commands  and  cannot  be  commanded — it  acts  and  is 
insusceptible  of  my  reaction — the  more  I  strive  to 
subdue  it,  the  more  am  I  compelled  to  think  of  it — 
and  the  more  I  think  of  it,  the  more  do  I  find  it  to 
possess  a  reality  out  of  myself,  and  not  to  be  a  phan- 
tom of  my  own  imagination ;  that  all,  but  the  most 
abandoned  men,  acknowledge  its  authority,  and  that 
the  whole  strength  and  majesty  of  my  country  are 
pledged  to  support  it ;  and  yet  that  for  me  its  power 
is  the  same  with  that  of  my  own  permanent  Self,  and 
that  all  the  choice,  which  is  permitted  to  me,  consists 
in  having  it  for  my  Guardian  Angel  or  my  avenging 
Fiend!  This  is  the  Spirit  of  Law!  The  Lute  of 
Amphion,  the  Harp  of  Orpheus !  This  is  the  true 
necessity,  which  compels  man  into  the  social  state, 
now  and  always,  by  a  still-beginning,  never-ceasing 
force  of  moral  cohesion. 

Thus  is  man  to  be  governed,  and  thus  only  can  he 
be  governed.  For  from  his  creation  the  objects  of  his 
senses  were  to  become  his  subjects,  and  the  task  al- 
lotted to  him  was  to  subdue  the  visible  world  within 
the  sphere  of  action  circumscribed  by  those  senses, 
as  far  as  they  could  act  in  concert.  What  the  eye 
beholds  the  hand  strives  to  reach  ;  what  it  reaches, 
it  conquers  and  makes  the  instrument  of  further  con- 
quest. We  can  be  subdued  by  that  alone  which  is 
analogous  in  kind  to  that  by  which  we  subdue: 
therefore  by  the  invisible  powers  of  our  nature,  whose 
immediate  presence  is  disclosed  to  our  inner  sense, 
and  only  as  the  symbols  and  language  of  which  all 
shapes  and  modifications  of  matter  become  formidable 
to  us. 

A  machine  continues  to  move  by  the  force  which 
first  set  it  in  motion.  If  only  the  smallest  number  in 
any  state,  properly  so  called,  hold  together  through 
the  influence  of  any  fear  that  does  not  itself  presup- 
pose the  sense  of  duty,  it  is  evident  that  the  state  it- 
self could  not  have  commenced  through  animal  fear. 
We  hear,  indeed,  of  conquests;  but  how  does  History 
represent  these?  Almost  without  exception  as  the 
substitution  of  one  set  of  governors  for  another :  and 
so  far  is  the  conqueror  from  relying  on  fear  alone  to 
secure  the  obedience  of  the  conquered,  that  his  first 
step  is  to  demand  an  oath  of  fealty  from  them,  by 
which  he  would  impose  upon  them  the  belief,  that 
they  become  subjects :  for  who  would  think  of  ad- 
ministering an  oath  to  a  gang  of  slaves  ?  But  what 
can  make  the  difference  between  slave  and  subject, 
if  not  the  existence  of  an  implied  contract  in  the  one 
case,  and  not  in  the  other  ?  And  to  what  purpose 
would  a  contract  serve  if,  however  it  might  be  entered 
into  through  fear,  it  were  deemed  binding  only  in 
consequence  of  fear?  To  repeat  my  former  illustra- 
tion— where  fear  alone  is  relied  on,  as  in  a  slave  ship, 
the  chains  that  bind  the  poor  victims  must  be  mate- 
rial chains :  for  these  only  can  act  upon  feelings 
424 


THE  FRIEND. 


415 


which  have  their  source  wholly  in  the  material  or- 
ganization. Hobbes  has  said  that  Laws  without  the 
sword  are  but  bits  of  parchment.  How  far  this  is 
true,  every  honest  man's  heart  will  best  tell  him,  if 
he  will  content  himself  with  asking  his  own  heart, 
and  not  falsify  the  answer  by  his  notions  concerning 
the  hearts  of  other  men.  But  were  it  true,  still  the 
fair  answer  would  be — Well!  but  without  the  Laws 
The  sword  is  but  a  piece  of  iron.  The  wretched  ty- 
rant, who  disgraces  the  present  age  and  human  na- 
ture itself,  had  exhausted  the  whole  magazine  of  ani- 
mal terror,  in  order  to  consolidate  his  truly  satanic 
Government.  But  look  at  the  new  French  catechism, 
and  in  it  read  the  misgivings  of  the  monster's  mind, 
as  to  the  insufficiency  of  terror  alone !  The  system, 
which  I  have  been  confuting,  is  indeed  so  inconsist- 
ent with  the  facts  revealed  to  us  by  our  own  mind, 
and  so  utterly  unsupported  by  any  facts  of  History, 
that  I  should  be  censurable  in  wasting  my  own  time 
and  my  Reader's  patience  by  the  exposure  of  its 
falsehood,  but  that  the  arguments  adduced  have  a 
value  of  themselves  independent  of  their  present  ap- 
plication. Else  it  would  have  been  an  ample  and 
satisfactory  reply  to  an  asserter  of  this  bestial  Theory 
— Government  is  a  thing  which  relates  to  men,  and 
what  you  say  applies  only  to  beasts. 

Before  I  proceed  to  the  second  of  the  three  Sys- 
tems, let  me  remove  a  possible  misunderstanding  that 
may  have  arisen  from  the  use  of  the  word  Contract: 
as  if  I  had  asserted,  that  the  whole  duty  of  obedience 
to  Governors  is  derived  from,  and  dependent  on,  the 
fact  of  an  original  Contract.  I  freely  admit,  that  to 
make  this  the  cause  and  origin  of  political  obligation, 
is  not  only  a  dangerous  but  an  absurd  Theory ;  for 
what  could  give  moral  force  to  the  Contract  ?  The 
same  sense  of  Duty  which  binds  us  to  keep  it,  must 
have  pre-existed  as  impelling  us  to  make  it.  For 
what  man  in  his  senses  would  regard  the  faithful  ob- 
servation of  a  contract  entered  into  to  plunder  a 
neighbor's  house  but  as  a  treble  crime  ?  First  the 
act,  which  is  a  crime  of  itself; — secondly,  the  enter- 
ing into  a  contract  which  it  is  a  crime  to  observe,  and 
yet  a  weakening  of  one  of  the  main  pillars  of  human 
confidence  not  to  observe,  and  thus  voluntarily 
placing  ourselves  under  the  necessity  of  choosing 
between  two  evils;  —  and  thirdly,  the  crime  of 
choosing  the  greater  of  two  evils,  by  the  unlawful 
observance  of  an  unlawful  promise.  But  in  my 
sense,  the  word  Contract  is  merely  synonymous  with 
the  sense  of  duty  acting  in  a  specific  direction,  i.  e. 
determining  our  moral  relations,  as  members  of  a  body 
politic.  If  I  have  referred  to  a  supposed  origin  of 
Government,  it  has  been  in  courtesy  to  a  common 
notion:  for  I  myself  regard  the  supposition  as  no 
more  than  a  means  of  simplifying  to  our  apprehen- 
sion the  ever-continuing  causes  of  social  union,  even 
as  tire  conservation  of  the  world  may  be  represented 
as  an  act  of  continued  Creation.  For,  what  if  an 
original  Contract  had  really  been  entered  into,  and 
formally  recorded  ?  Still  it  could  do  no  more  than 
bind  the  contracting  parties  to  act  for  the  general 
good  in  the  best  manner,  that  the  existing  relations 
among  themselves,  (state  of  property,  religion,  &e.) 
28  M  m 


on  the  one  hand,  and  the  external  circumstances  on 
the  other  (ambitious  or  barbarous  neighbors,  &c.)  re- 
quired or  permitted.  In  after  times  it  could  be  ap- 
pealed to  only  for  the  general  principle,  and  no  more 
than  the  ideal  Contract,  could  it  affect  a  question  of 
ways  and  means.  As  each  particular  age  brings 
with  it  its  own  exigencies,  so  must  it  rely  on  its  own 
prudence  for  the  specific  measures  by  which  they 
are  to  be  encountered. 

Nevertheless,  it  assuredly  cannot  be  denied,  that 
an  original  (in.  reality,  rather  an  ever-originating) 
Contract  is  a  very  natural  and  significant  mode  of 
expressing  the  reciprocal  duties  of  subject  and  sove- 
reign. We  need  only  consider  the  utility  of  a  real 
and  formal  State  Contract,  the  Bill  of  Rights  for  in- 
stance, as  a  sort  of  est  demonstratum  in  politics;  and 
the  contempt  lavished  on  this  notion,  though  suffici- 
ently compatible  with  the  tenets  of  a  Hume,  will 
seem  strange  to  us  in  the  writings  of  a  Protestant 
clergyman,  who  surely  owed  some  respect  to  a  mode 
of  thinking  which  God  himself  had  authorized  by  his 
own  example,  in  the  establishment  of  the  Jewish 
constitution.  In  this  instance  there  was  no  necessity 
for  deducing  the  will  of  God  from  the  tendency  of 
the  Laws  to  the  general  happiness  :  his  will  was  ex- 
pressly declared.  Nevertheless,  it  seemed  good  to 
the  divine  wisdom,  that  there  should  be  a  covenant, 
an  original  contract,  between  himself  as  sovereign, 
and  the  Hebrew  nation  as  subjects.  This,  I  admit, 
was  a  written  and  formal  Contract ;  but  the  relations 
of  mankind,  as  members  of  a  body  spiritual,  or  reli- 
gious commonwealth,  to  the  Saviour,  as  its  head  or 
regent  —  is  not  this  too  styled  a  covenant,  though  it 
would  be  absurd  to  ask  for  the  material  instrument 
that  contained  it,  or  the  time  when  it  was  signed  or 
voted  by  the  members  of  the  church  collectively* 

With  this  explanation,  the  assertion  of  an  original 
(still  better,  of  a  perpetual)  Contract  is  rescued  from 
all  rational  objection  ;  and  however  speciously  it  may 
be  urged,  that  History  can  scarcely  produce  a  single 
example  of  a  state  dating  its  primary  establishment 
from  a  free  and  mutual  covenant,  the  answer  is 
ready:  if  there  be  any  difference  between  a  Govern- 
ment and  a  band  of  robbers,  an  act  of  consent  must 
be  supposed  on  the  part  of  the  people  governed. 


ESSAY    III. 


Human  institutions  cannot  be  wholly  constructed  on  princi- 
ples of  Science,  winch  is  pieper  to  immutable  objects.  In 
the  government  of  the  visible  world  the  supreme  Wisdom 
■(self  submits  to  be  the  Author  of  the  Better:  not  of  the 
II.  si.  Inn  of  the  Best  possible  in  the  subsisting  Relations. 
Much  more  must  all  human  Legislators  give  way  to  many 
Evils  rather  than  encourage  the  Discontent  that  would  lead 
to  worse  Remedies.    If  it  is  not  in  the  power  of  man  to 

*  It  is  perhaps  to  be  regretted,  that  the  words.  Old  and  N  ew 
Testament,  tiny  havins  lost  the  sense  intended  by  the  trans- 
lators of  the  Bible,  have  not  been  changed  into  the  Old  and 
New  Covenant.  We  cannot  too  carefully  keep  in  sight  a  no- 
tion, which  appeared  to  the  primitive  church  the  fittest  and 
most  scriptural  mode  of  representing  the  sum  of  the  contents 
of  the  sacred  writings. 

425 


416 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


construct  even  the  arch  of  a  Bridge  that  shall  exactly  cor- 
respond in  its  strength  to  the  calculations  of  Geometry,  how 
much  less  can  human  Science  construct  a  Constitution  ex- 
cept by  rendering  itself  flexible  to  Experience  and  Expedi- 
ency :  where  so  many  things  must  fall  out  accidentally,  and 
come  not  into  any  compliance  with  the  preconceived  ends; 
hut  men  are  forced  to  comply  subsequently,  anil  to  stiike 
in  with  things  as  they  fall  out,  by  after  applications  of  them 
to  their  purposes,  or  by  framing  their  purposes  to  them. 

SOUTH. 


The  second  system  corresponds  to  the  second  point 
of  view  under  which  the  human  being  may  be  con- 
sidered, namely,  as  an  animal  gifted  with  under- 
standing, or  the  faculty  of  suiting  measures  to  circum- 
stances. According  to  this  theory,  every  institution 
of  national  origin  needs  no  other  justification  than  a 
proof,  that  under  the  particular  circumstances  it  is 
expedient.  Having  in  my  former  Numbers  ex- 
pressed myself  (so  at  least  I  am  conscious  I  shall  have 
appeared  to  do  to  many  persons)  with  comparative 
siight  of  the  understanding  considered  as  the  sole 
guide  of  human  conduct,  and  even  with  something 
like  contempt  and  reprobation  of  the  maxims  of  ex- 
pedience, when  represented  as  the  only  steady  light 
of  the  conscience,  and  the  absolute  foundation  of  all 
morality;  I  shall  perhaps  seem  guilty  of  an  inconsis- 
tency, in  declaring  myself  an  adherent  of  this  second 
system,  a  zealous  advocate  for  deriving  the  origin  of 
all  government  from  human  prudence,  and  of  deeming 
that  to  be  just  which  experience  has  proved  to  be 
expedient.      From   this   charge   of  inconsistency*  1 

*  Distinct  notions  do  not  suppose  different  things.  When 
we  make  a  threefold  distinction  in  human  nature,  we  are 
fully  aware,  that  it  is  a  distinction  not  a  division,  and  that  in 
every  act  of  Mind  the  Jllan  unites  the  properties  of  Sense, 
Understanding,  and  Reason.  Nevertheless,  it  is  of  great 
practical  importance,  that  these  distinctions  should  be  made 
and  understood,  the  ignorance  or  perversion  of  them  being 
alike  injurious  ;  as  the  first  French  Constitution  has  most  la- 
mentably proved.  It  was  fashion  in  the  profligate  times  of 
Charles  the  Second,  to  laugh  at  the  Presbyterians,  for  distin- 
guishing between  the  Person  and  the  King  ;  while  in  fact  they 
were  ridiculing  the  most  venerable  maxims  of  English  law  ;— 
vthe  King  never  dies — the  King  can  do  no  wrong,  &c.)  and 
subverting  the  principles  of  genuine  loyalty,  in  order  to  pre- 
pare the  minds  of  the  people  for  despotism. 

Under  the  term  Sense,  I  comprise,  whatever  is  passive  in 
our  being,  without  any  reference  to  the  questions  of  Material- 
ism or  Immatcrialism  ;  all  that  man  is  in  common  with  ani- 
mals, in  kind  at  least — his  sensations,  and  impressions,  whe- 
ther of  his  outward  senses,  or  the  inner  sense  of  imagination. 
This  in  the  language  of  the  Schools,  was  called  the  vis  recep- 
tiva,  or  recipient  property  of  the  soul,  from  the  original  con- 
stitution of  which  we  perceive  and  imagine  all  things  under 
the  forms  of  space  and  time.  By  the  understanding,  I  mean 
the  faculty  of  thinking  and  forming. judgments  on  the  notices 
furnished  by  the  sense,  according  to  certain  rules  existing  in 
itt>elf,  which  rules  constitute  its  distinct  nature.  By  the  pure 
Reason,  I  mean  the  power  by  which  we  become  possessed 
of  principle,  (the  eternal  verities  of  Plato  and  Descartes)  and 
of  ideas,  (N.  B.  not  images)  as  the  ideas  of  a  point,  a  line,  a 
circle,  in  Mathematics;  and  of  Justice,  Holiness,  Free- Will, 
&c.  in  Morals.  Hence  in  works  of  pure  science  the  defini- 
tions of  necessity  precede  the  reasoning,  in  other  works  they 
more  aptly  form  the  conclusion. 

To  many  of  my  readers  it  will,  I  trust,  be  some  recommen- 
dation of  these  distinctions,  that  they  are  more  than  once 
expressed,  and  everywhere  supposed,  in  the  writings  of  St. 
Paul.  I  have  no  hesitation  in  undertaking  to  prove,  that 
every  Heresy  which  has  disquieted  the  Christian  Church, 
from  Teilheism  to  Socinianism,  has  originated  in,  and  sup- 
purled  itself  by,  arguments  rendered   plausible  only  by  the 


shall  best  exculpate  myself  by  the  full  statement  of 
the  third  system,  and  by  the  exposition  of  its  grounds 
and  consequences. 

The  third  and  last  system  then  denies  all  rightful 
origin  to  government,  except  as  far  as  they  are  deriv- 
able from  principles  contained  in  the  reason  of  Man, 
and  judges  all  the  relations  of  men  in  Society  by  the 
Laws  of  moral  necessity,  according  to  ideas  (1  here 
use  the  word  in  its  highest  and  primitive  sense,  and 
as  nearly  synonymous  with  the  modem  word  ideal) 
according  to  archetypal  ideas  co-essential  with  the 
Reason,  and  the  consciousness  of  which  is  the  sign 
and  necessary  product  of  its  full  development.  The 
following  then  is  the  fundamental  principle  of  this 
theory:  Nothing  is  to  be  deemed  rightful  in  civil  so- 
ciety, or  to  be  tolerated  as  such,  but  what  is  capable 
of  being  demonstrated  out  of  the  original  laws  of  the 
pure  Reason.  Of  course,  as  there  is  but  one  system 
of  Geometry,  so  according  to  this  theory  there  can  be 
but  one  constitution  and  one  system  of  legislation,  and 
this  consists  in  the  freedom,  which  is  the  common 
right  of  all  men,  under  the  control  of  that  moral  ne- 
cessity, which  is  the  common  duty  of  all  men.  What- 
ever is  not  every  where  necessary,  is  no  where  right. 
On  this  assumption  the  whole  theory  is  built.  To 
state  it  nakedly  is  to  confute  it  satisfactorily.  So  at 
least  it  should  seem !  But  in  how  winning  and  spe- 
cious a  manner  this  system  may  be  represented  even 
to  minds  of  the  loftiest  order,  if  undisciplined  and  un- 
humbled  by  practical  experience,  has  been  proved 
by  the  general  impassioned  admiration  and  moment- 
ous effects  of  Rousseau's  Du  Contrat  Social,  and  the 
writings  of  the  French  economists,  or  as  they  more 
appropriately  entitled  themselves,  Physiocratic  Phi- 
losophers :  and  in  how  tempting  and  dangerous  a 
manner  it  may  be  represented  to  the  populace,  has 
been  made  too  evident  in  our  own  country  by  the 
temporary  effects  of  Paine's  Rights  of  Man.  Rela- 
tively, however,  to  this  latter  work  it  should  be  ob- 
served, that  it  is  not  a  legitimate  offspring  of  any  one 
theory,  but  a  confusion  of  the  immorality  of  the  first 
system  with  the  misapplied  universal  principles  of 
the  last:  and  in  this  union,  or  rather  lawless  alterna- 
tion, consisls  the  essence  of  Jacobinism,  as  far  as  Ja- 
cobinism is  any  thing  but  a  term  of  abuse,  or  has  any 
meaning  of  its  own  distinct  from  democracy  and  sedi- 
tion. 

A  constitution  equally  suited  to  China  and  Ameri- 

confusion  of  these  faculties,  and  thus  demanding  for  the  ob- 
jects of  one,  a  sort  of  evidence  appropriated  to  those  of 
another  faculty. — These  disquisitions  have  the  misfortune  of 
being  in  ill-report,  as  dry  and  unsatisfactory  :  but  I  hope,  in 
the  course  of  the  work,  to  gain  them  a  better  character— and 
if  elucidations  of  their  practical  importance  from  the  most 
momentous  events  of  History,  can  render  them  interesting,  to 
give  them  that  interest  at  least.  Besides,  there  is  surely 
some  good  in  the  knowledge  of  Truth,  as  Truth — (we  were 
not  made  to  live  by  Bread  alone)  and  in  the  strengthening  of 
the  intellect.  It  is  an  excellent  Kemark  of  Scalingers — "  Ha- 
riun  indagatio  Subtilitalum,  ctsi  non  est  utitis  ad  machinas 
farinarias  conficiendas,  exuit  animum  tamen  inscitia  ru- 
bigine  acuitque  ad  alia."  SCALIG.  Exerc.  307.  §§  3.  i.e. 
The  investigation  of  these  subtleties,  though  it  is  of  no  use 
:  to  the  construction  of  machines  to  grind  corn  with,  yet  clears 
1  the  mind  from  the  rust  of  ignorance,  and  sharpens  it  for  other 
|  things. 

426 


THE  FRIEND. 


417 


ca,  or  to  Russia  and  Great  Britain,  must  surely  he 
equally  unfit  for  both,  and  deserve  as  little  respect  in 
political,  as  a  quack's  panacea  in  medical  practice. 
Yet  there  are  three  weighty  motives  (or  a  distinct  expo- 
sition of  this  theory,*  and  of  the  ground  on  which  its 
pretensions  are  bottomed  :  and  I  dare  affirm,  that  for 
the  same  reasons  there  are  few  subjects  which  in  the 
present  state  of  the  world  have  a  fairer  claim  to  the 
attention  of  every  serious  Englishman,  who  is  likely, 
directly  or  indirectly,  as  partizan  or  as  opponent,  to 
interest  himself  in  schemes  of  Reform. 

The  first  motive  is  derived  from  the  propensity  of 
mankind  to  mistake  the  feelings  of  disappointment, 
disgust,  and  abhorrence  occasioned  by  the  unhappy 
effects  or  accompaniments  of  a  particular  system  for 
an  insight  into  the  falsehood  of  its  principles  which 
alone  can  secure  its  permanent  rejection.  P'or  by  a 
wise  ordinance  of  nature  our  feelings  have  no  abid- 
ing-place in  our  memory,  nay  the  more  vivid  they 
are  in  the  moment  of  their  existence  the  more  dim 
and  difficult  to  be  remembered  do  they  make  the 
thoughts  which  accompanied  them.  Those  of  my 
readers  who  at  any  time  of  their  life  have  been  in 
the  habit  of  reading  novels  may  easily  convince  them- 
selves of  this  Truth  by  comparing  their  recollections 
of  those  stories,  which  most  excited  their  curiosity 
and  even  painfully  affected  their  feelings,  with  their 
recollections  of  the  calm  and  meditative  pathos  of 
Shakspeare  and  Milton.  Hence  it  is  that  human  ex- 
perience, like  the  stem-lights  of  a  ship  at  sea,  illu- 
mines only  the  path  which  we  have  passed  over. 
The  horror  of  the  Peasants'  War  in  Germany,  and 
the  direful  effects  of  the  Anabaptist  tenets,  which 
were  only  nominally  different  from  those  of  Jacobin- 
ism by  the  substitution  of  religious  for  philosophical 
jargon,  struck  all  Europe  for  a  time  with  affright. 
Yet  little  more  than  a  century  was  sufficient  to  ob- 
literate all  effective  memory  of  those  events :  the 
same  principles  budded  forth  anew  and  produced  the 
same  fruits  from  the  imprisonment  of  Charles  the 
First  to  the  restoration  of  his  Son.  In  the  succeeding 
generations,  to  the  follies  and  vices  of  the  European 
Courts,  and  to  the  oppressive  privileges  of  the  nobil- 
ity, were  again  transferred  those  feelings  of  disgust 
and  hatred,  which  for  a  brief  while  the  multitude  had 
attached  to  the  crimes  and  extravagances  of  political 
and  religious  fanaticism  :  and  the  same  principles  aid- 
ed by  circumstances,  and  dressed  out  in  the  ostenta- 
tious garb  of  a  fashionable  philosophy,  once  more  rose 
triumphant,  and  effected  the  French  Revolution. 
That  man  has  reflected  little  on  human  nature  who 
does  not  perceive  that  the  detestable  maxims  and  cor- 
respondent crimes  of  the  existing  French  despotism, 
have  already  dimmed  the  recollections  of  the  demo- 

*  As  "Metaphysics''  are  the  ecience  which  determines 
what  can,  and  what  cannot,  be  known  of  Being  and  the  Laws 
of  Being,  a  priori  (lhat  is  from  those  necessities  of  the  mind 
or  forms  of  thinking,  which,  though  first  revealed  to  us  by  ex- 
perience, must  yet  have  pre-existed  in  order  to  make  experi- 
ence itself  possible,  even  as  the  eye  must  exist  previous  to  any 
particular  act  of  seeing,  though  by  sight  only  can  we  know 
that  we  have  eyes) — so  might  the  philosophy  of  Rousseau  and 
his  followers  not  inaptly  be  entitled  Melapolitics,  and  the 
Doctors  of  this  School,  Metapoliticians. 


cratic  phrenzy  in  the  minds  of  men  ;  by  little  and  lit- 
tle, have  drawn  off  to  other  objects  the  electric  force 
of  the  feelings,  which  had  massed  and  upheld  those 
recollections;  and  that  a  favorable  concurrence  of 
occasions  is  alone  wanting  to  awaken  the  thunder 
and  precipitate  the  lightning  from  the  opposite  quar- 
ter of  the  political  Heaven. t  The  true  origin  of  hu- 
man  events  is  so  little  susceptible  of  that  kind  of  evi- 
dence which  can  compel  our  belief  even  against  our 
will;  and  so  many  are  the  disturbing  forces  which 
modify  the  motion  given  by  the  first  projection  ;  and 
every  age  has,  or  imagines  it  has,  its  own  circum- 
stances which  render  past  experience  no  longer  ap- 
plicable to  the  present  case;  that  there  will  never 
be  wanting  answers  and  explanations,  and  specious 
flatteries  of  hope.  I  well  remember,  that  when  the 
examples  of  former  Jacobins,  Julius  Caesar,  Cromwell, 
&c.,  were  adduced  in  France  and  England  at  the 
commencement  of  the  French  Consulate,  it  was  ridi 
culed  as  pedantry  and  pedants'  ignorance,  to  fear  a 
repetition  of  such  usurpation  at  the  close  of  the  en- 
lightened eighteenth  century.  Those  who  possess  the 
Moniteurs  of  that  date  will  find  set  proofs,  thai  such 
results  were  little  less  than  impossible,  and  that  it 
was  an  insult  to  so  philosophical  an  age,  and  so  en- 
lightened a  nation,  to  dare  direct  the  public  eve  to- 
wards them  as  lights  of  admonition  and  warning. 

It  is  a  common  foible  with  official  statesmen,  and 
with  those  who  deem  themselves  honored  by  their 
acquaintance)  to  attribute  great  national  events  to  the 
influence  of  particular  persons,  to  the  errors  of  one 
man  and  to  the  intrigues  of  another,  to  any  possible 
spark  of  a  particular  occasion,  rather  than  to  the  true 
cause,  the  predominant  state  of  public  opinion.  I 
have  known  men  who,  with  the  most  significant  nods, 
and  the  civil  contempt  of  pitying  half  smiles,  have 
declared  the  natural  explanation  of  the  French  Revo- 
lution, to  be  the  mere  fancies  of  Garretteers,  and  then 
with  the  solemnity  of  Cabinet  Ministers,  have  pro- 
ceeded to  explain  the  whole  by  anecdotes.  It  is  so 
stimulant  to  the  pride  of  a  vulgar  mind,  to  be  per- 
suaded that  it  knows  what  few  others  know,  and  that 
it  is  the  important  depository  of  a  sort  of  state  secret, 
by  communicating  which  it  confers  an  obligation  on 
others !  But  I  have  likewise  met  with  men  of  intel- 
ligence, who  at  the  commencement  of  the  Revolution 
were  travelling  on  foot  through  the  French  provinces, 
and  they  bear  witness,  that  in  the  remotest  villages 
every  tongue  was  employed  in  echoing  and  enforcing 
the  doctrines  of  the  Parisian  Journalists,  that  the  pub- 
lic highways  were  crowded  with  enthusiasts,  some 
shouting  the  watch-words  of  the  revolution,  others 
disputing  on  the  most  abstract  principles  of  the  uni- 
versal constitution,  which  they  fully  believed,  that 
all  the  nations  of  the  earth  were  shortly  to  adopt ;  the 
most  ignorant  among  them  confident  of  his  fitness  for 
the  highest  duties  of  a  legislator ;  and  all  prepared 
to  shed  their  blood  in  defence  of  the  inalienable  sove- 
reignty of  the  self-governed  people.  The  more  ab- 
stract the  notions  were,  with  the  closer  affinity  did 
they  combine  with  the  most  fervent  feelings  and  all 


t  The  Reader  will  recollect  that  these  Essays  were  first  pub 
lished  in  1809. 

427 


418 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


the  immediate  impulses  to  action.  The  Lord  Chan- 
cellor Bacon  lived  in  an  age  of  court  intrigues,  and 
was  familiarly  acquainted  with  all  the  secrets  of  per- 
sonal influence.  He,  if  any  man,  was  qualified  to 
lake  the  gauge  and  measurement  of  their  compara- 
tive power,  and  he  has  told  us,  that  there  is  one,  and 
but  one  infallible  source  of  political  prophecy,  the 
knowledge  of  the  predominant  opinions  and  thespecu- 
lalive  principles  of  men  in  general,  between  the  age 
of  twenty  and  thirty.  Sir  Philip  Sidney,  the  favorite 
of  Queen  Elizabeth,  the  paramount  gentleman  of  Eu- 
rope, the  nephew,  and  (as  far  as  a  good  man  could 
be)  the  confidant  of  the  intriguing  and  dark-minded 
Earl  of  Leicester,  was  so  deeply  convinced  that  the 
principles  diffused  through  the  majority  of  a  nation 
are  the  true  oracles  from  whence  statesmen  are  to 
learn  wisdom,  and  that  "  when  the  people  speak 
loudly  it  is  from  their  being  strongly  possessed  eilher 
by  the  godhead  or  the  demon,"  that  in  the  revolution 
of  the  Netherlands  he  considered  the  universal  adop- 
tion of  one  set  of  principles,  as  a  proof  of  the  divine 
presence.  "  If  her  majesty,''  says  he,  "  were  the 
fountain,  I  would  fear,  considering  what  I  daily  find, 
that  we  should  wax  dry.  But  she  is  but  a  means 
which  God  useth."  But  if  my  Readers  wish  to  see 
the  question  of  the  efficacy  of  principles  and  popular 
opinions  for  evil  and  for  good  proved  and  illustrated 
with  an  eloquence  worthy  of  the  subject,  I  can  refer 
them  with  the  hardiest  anticipation  of  their  thanks, 
to  the  lafe  work  "  concerning  the  relations  of  Great 
Britain,  Spain,  and  Portugal,  by  my  honored  friend, 
William  Wordsworth*  quern  quolies  lego,  non  verba 
mihi  vicleor  audire,  sed  lonitrua  ! 


*  I  consider  this  reference  to,  and  strong  recommendation 
of  the  Work  above  mentioned,  not  as  a  voluntary  tribute  of 
admiration,  but  as  an  act  of  mere  justice  both  to  myself  and 
to  the  readers  of  The  Friend.  My  own  heart  bears  me  wit- 
ness, that  I  am  actuated  hy  the  deepest  sense  of  the  truth  of 
the  principles,  which  it  has  been  and  still  more  will  be  my  en- 
deavor to  enforce,  and  of  their  paramount  importance  to  the 
well-being  of  Society  at  the  present  juncture  ;  and  that  the 
duty  of  making  the  attempt,  and  the  hope  of  not  wholly  fall- 
ing in  it,  are,  far  more  than  the  wish  for  the  doubtful  good  of 
literary  reputation,  or  any  yet  meaner  object,  my  great  and 
ruling  motives.  Mr.  Wordsworth  I  deem  a  fellow-laborer  in 
the  same  vineyard,  actuated  by  the  same  motives  and  teach- 
ing the  same  principles,  but  with  far  greater  powers  of  mind, 
and  an  eloquence  more  adequate  to  the  importance  and  ma- 
jesty of  the  cause.  I  am  strengthened  too  by  the  knowledge, 
that  I  am  not  unauthorized  by  the  sympathy  of  many  wise  and 
good  men,  and  men  acknowledged  as  such  by  the  Public,  in 
my  admiration  of  his  pamphlet, — jYrquc  eniw  ilrbet  operibus 
ejus  obesse,  quod  vivit.  An  si  inter  eos,  guns  nunquam  vidi- 
mus, fiuruisset,  non  solum  libros  ejus,  verum  ctiam  imagijies 
conquireremus ,  cjusdem  nunc  honor  prmsentis,  el  gratia  qua- 
si satietale  languescet?  rft  hoc  prariim,  malignumque  est, 
non  aduiirari  hominem  admirations  dignissimurn ,  quia  vi- 
dcre,  complecti,  ncc  laudare  tantum,  verum  etium  amare  con- 
tingit. PL1N.  Epist.  Lib.  I. 

It  is  hardly  possible  for  a  man  of  ingenuous  mind  to  act  un- 
der the  fear  that  it  shall  be  suspected  by  honest  men  of  the 
vileness  of  praising  a  work  to  the  public,  merely  because  lie 
happens  to  be  personally  acquainted  with  the  Author.  That 
this  is  so  commonly  done  in  Reviews,  furnishes  only  an  addi- 
tional proof  of  the  morbid  hardness  produced  in  the  moral 
sense  by  the  habit  of  writing  anonymous  criticisms,  especially 
under  the  further  disguise  of  a  pretended  board  or  association 
of  Critics,  each  man  expressing  himself,  to  use  the  words  of 
Andrew  Marvel,  as  a  siinodical  individuum.  With  regard 
however,  to  the  probability  of  the  judgment  being  warped  by 


That  erroneous  political  notions  (they  having  be- 
come general  and  a  part  of  the  popular  creed)  have 
practical  consequences,  and  these,  of  course,  of  a 
most  fearful  nature,  is  a  truth  as  certain  as  historic 
evidence  can  make  it:  and  that  when  the  feelings 
excited  by  these  calamities  have  passed  away,  and 
the  interest  in  them  has  been  displaced  by  more  re- 
cent events,  the  same  errors  are  likely  to  be  started 
afresh,  pregnant  with  the  same  calamities,  is  an  evil 
rooted  in  Human  Nature  in  the  present  stale  of  gen- 
eral information,  for  which  we  have  hitherto  found 
no  adequate  remedy.  (It  may  perhaps,  in  the  scheme 
of  Providence,  be  proper  and  conducive  to  its  ends, 
that  no  adequate  remedy  should  exist:  for  the  folly 
of  men  is  the  wisdom  of  God.)  But  if  there  be  any 
means,  if  not  of  preventing,  yet  of  palliating  the  dis- 
ease, and,  in  the  more  favored  nations,  of  checking 
its  progress  at  the  first  symptoms  ;  and  if  these  means 
are  to  be  all  compatible  wilh  the  civil  and  intellec- 
tual freedom  of  mankind ;  they  are  to  be  found  only 
in  an  intelligible  and  thorough  exposure  of  the  error, 
and,  through  that  discovery,  of  the  source,  from 
which  it  derives  its  speciousness  and  powers  of  in- 
fluence on  the  human  mind.  This  therefore  is  my 
first  motive  for  undertaking  the  disquisition. 

The  second  is,  that  though  the  French  code  of 
revolutionary  principles  is  generally  rejected  as  a 
system,  yet  every  where  in  the  speeches  and  writings 
of  the  English  reformers,  nay,  not  seldom  in  those  of 
their  opponents,  I  find  certain  maxims  asserted  or 
appealed  to,  which  are  not  tenable,  except  as  con- 
stituent parts  of  that  system.  Many  of  the  most 
specious  arguments  in  proof  o'f  the  imperfection  and 
injustice  of  the  present  constitution  of  our  legislature 
will  be  found,  on  closer  examination,  lo  pre-suppose 
the  truth  of  certain  principles,  from  which  the  ad- 
ducers  of  these  arguments  loudly  profess  their  dis- 
sent. But  in  political  changes  no  permanence  can 
be  hoped  for  in  the  edifice,  without  consistency  in 
the  foundation. 

The  third  motive  is,  that  by  detecting  the  true 
source  of  the  influence  of  these  principles,  we  shall 
at  the  same  time  discover  their  natural  place  and 
object :  and  that  in  themselves  they  are  not  only 
Truths,  but  most  important  and  sublime  Truths  ;  and 
that  their  falsehood  and  their  danger  consist  alto- 
gether in  their  misapplication.     Thus  fhe  dignity  of 


partiality,  I  can  only  say  that  I  judge  of  all  Works  indiffer- 
ently by  certain  fixed  rules  previously  formed  in  my  mind  wilh 
all  the  power  and  vigilance  of  my  judgment ;  and  that  I  should 
certainly  of  the  two  apply  them  with  greater  rigor  to  the  pro- 
duction of  a  friend  than  that  of  a  person  indifferent  to  me. 
But  wherever  I  find  in  any  Work  all  the  conditions  of  excel- 
lence in  its  kind,  it  is  not  the  accident  of  the  Author's  being 
my  contemporary  or  even  my  friend,  or  the  sneers  of  bad-heart- 
ed men,  that  shall  prevent  me  from  speaking  of  il,  as  in  my 
inmost  convictions  I  deem  it  deserves. 

no,  friend : 

Though  it  be  now  the  fashion  to  commend, 
As  men  of  strong  minds,  those  alone  who  can 
Censure  with  judgment,  no  such  piece  of  man 
Makes  up  my  spirit :  where  desert  does  live. 
There  will  I  plant  my 'wonder,  and  there  give 
My  best  endeavors  to  build  up  his  glory. 
That  truly  merits ! 

Recommendatory  Verses  to  one  of  the  old  Plays. 
428 


THE  FRIEND. 


419 


Human  Nature  will  be  secured,  and  at  the  same 
time  a  lesson  of  humility  taught  to  each  individual, 
when  we  are  made  to  see  that  the  universal  neces- 
sary Laws,  and  pure  ideas  of  Reason,  were  given  us, 
not  for  the  purpose  of  flattering  our  Pride  and  en- 
abling us  to  become  national  legislators  ;  but  that  by 
an  energy  of  continued  sell-conquest,  we  might  es- 
tablish a  free  and  yet  absolute  government  in  our 
own  spirits. 


ESSAY   IV. 


Albeit  therefore,  much  of  what  we  are  to  speak  in  this 
present  cause,  may  seem  to  a  number  perhaps  tedious,  per- 
haps obscure,  dark  and  intricate,  (for  many  talk  of  the  Truth, 
which  never  sounded  the  depth  from  whence  it  springeth  : 
and  therefore,  when  they  are  led  thereunto,  they  are  soon 
weary,  as  men  drawn  from  those  beaten  paths,  wherewith 
they  have  been  insured  :)  yet  this  may  not  so  far  prevail,  as 
to  cut  off  that  which  the  matter  itself  required),  howsoever 
the  nice  humor  of  some  be  therewith  pleased  or  no.  They 
unto  whom  we  shall  seem  tedious,  are  in  no  wise  injured  by 
us,  because  it  is  in  their  own  hands  to  spate  that  labor  which 
they  are  not  willing  to  endure.  And  if  any  complain  of  ob- 
scurity, they  must  consider,  that  in  these  matters  it  cometh  no 
otherwise  to  pass,  than  in  sundry  the  works  both  of  Art,  and 
also  of  Nature,  where  that  which  hath  greatest  force  in  the 
very  things  we  see,  is,  notwithstanding,  itself  oftentimes  not 
seen.  The  staleliness  of  houses,  the  goodliness  of  trees,  when 
we  behold  them,  delighteth  the  eye:  but  the  foundation 
which  beareth  up  the  one,  that  root  which  ministereth  unto 
the  other  nourishment  and  life,  is  in  the  bosom  of  the  earth 
concealed,  and  if  there  be  occasion  at  any  lime  to  search 
into  i',  such  labor  is  then  more  necessary  than  pleasant,  both 
to  them  which  undertake  it  and  for  the  lookers-on.  In  like 
manner,  the  use  and  benefit  of  good  laws,  all  that  live  under 
them,  may  enjoy  with  delight  and  comfort,  albeit  the  grounds 
and  first  original  causes  from  whence  they  have  sprung,  be 
unknown,  as  to  the  greatest  part  of  men  they  are.  But  when 
they  who  withdraw  their  obedience,  pretend  that  the  laws 
which  they  should  obey  are  corrupt  and  vicious:  for  better 
examination  of  their  quality,  it  behoveth  the  very  foundation 
and  root,  the  highest  wall-spring  and  fountain  of  them  to  be 
discovered.  Which  because  we  are  not  oftentimes  accustom- 
ed to  do,  when  we  do  it,  the  pains  we  take  are  more  needful 
a  great  deal  than  acceptable,  and  the  matters  which  we 
handle,  seem  by  reason  of  newness,  (till  the  mind  grow  better 
acquainted  with  them)  dark,  intricate,  and  unfamiliar.  For 
as  much  help  whereof,  as  may  be  in  this  case,  I  have  en- 
deavored throughout  the  body  of  this  whole  Discourse,  that 
every  former  part  might  give  strength  to  all  that  follow,  and 
every  latter  bring  some  light  to  all  before :  so  that  if  the 
judgments  of  men  do  but  hold  themselves  in  suspense,  as 
touching  these  first  more  general  Meditations,  till  in  order 
they  have  perused  the  rest  that  ensue,  what  may  seem  dark 
at  the  first,  will  afterwards  be  found  more  plain,  even  as  the 
latter  particular  decisions  will  appear,  I  doubt  not,  more 
strong  when  the  other  have  been  read  before. 

HOOKER'S  Eccksiast.  Polity. 


ON  THE  GROUNDS  OF  GOVERNMENT  AS  LAID  EXCLU- 
SIVELY IN  THE  PURE  REASON;  OR  A  STATEMENT 
AND  CRITIQUE  OF  THE  THIRD  SYSTEM  OF  POLITI- 
CAL PHILOSOPHY,  VIZ.  THE  THEORY  OF  ROUSSEAU 
AND   THE   FRENCH   ECONOMISTS. 

I  return  to  my  promise  of  developing  from  its  em- 
bryo principles  the  Tree  of  French  Liberty,  of  which 
the  declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man,  and  the  Con- 
stitution of  1791  were  the  leaves,  and  the  succeeding 

M  m  S 


and  present  state  of  France  the  fruits.  Let  me  not 
be  blamed,  if,  in  the  interposed  Essays,  introductory 
to  this  Section,  I  have  connected  this  system,  though 
only  in  the  imagination,  though  only  as  a  possible 
case,  with  a  name  so  deservedly  reverenced  as  that 
of  Luther.  Jt  is  some  excuse,  that  to  interweave 
with  the  Reader's  recollection  a  certain  life  and  dra- 
matic interest,  during  the  perusal  of  the  abstract  rea- 
sonings that  are  to  follow,  is  the  only  means  I  possess 
of  bribing  his  attention.  We  have  most  of  us,  at 
some  period  or  other  of  our  lives,  been  amused  with 
dialogues  of  the  dead.  Who  is  there  that  wishing  to 
form  a  probable  opinion  on  the  grounds  of  hope  and 
fear  for  an  injured  people  warring  against  mighty  ar- 
mies, would  not  be  pleased  with  a  spirited  fiction, 
which  brought  before  him  an  old  i\umantian  dis- 
coursing on  that  subject  in  Elysium,  with  a  newly- 
arrived  spirit  from  the  streets  of  Saragossa  or  the 
walls  of  Gerona  ? 

But  1  have  a  better  reason.  1  wished  to  give  every 
fair  advantage  to  the  opinions,  which  I  deemed  it  of 
importance  to  confute.  It  is  bad  policy  to  represent 
a  political  system  as  having  no  charms  but  for  rob- 
bers and  assassins,  and  no  natural  origin  but  in  the 
brains  of  fools  or  madmen,  when  experience  has  pro 
ved,  that  the  great  danger  of  the  system  consists  in 
the  peculiar  fascination  it  is  calculated  to  exert  on 
noble  and  imaginative  spirits;  on  all  those,  who  in 
the  amiable  intoxication  of  youthful  benevolence,  are 
apt  to  mistake  their  own  best  virtues  and  choicest 
powers  for  the  average  qualities  and  attributes  of  the 
human  character.  The  very  minds,  which  a  good 
man  would  most  wish  to  preserve  or  disentangle  from 
the  snare,  are  by  these  angry  misrepresentations  ra- 
ther lured  into  it.  Is  it  wonderful,  that  a  man  should 
reject  the  arguments  unheard,  when  his  own  heari 
proves  the  falsehood  of  the  assumptions  by  which 
they  are  prefaced  ?  or  that  he  should  retaliate  on  the 
aggressors  their  own  evil  thoughts  ?  I  am  well  aware, 
that  the  provocation  was  great,  the  temptation  almost 
inevitable;  yet  still  I  cannot  repel  the  conviction 
from  my  mind,  that  in  part  to  this  error  and  in  part  to 
a  certain  inconsistency  in  his  fundamental  principles, 
we  are  to  attribute  the  small  number  of  converts 
made  bv  Burke  during  his  life-time.  Let  me  not  be 
misunderstood.  I  do  not  mean,  that  this  great  man 
supported  different  principles  at  different  eras  of  his 
political  life.  On  the  contrary,  no  man  was  ever 
more  like  himself!  From  his  first  published  speech 
on  the  American  colonies  to  his  last  posthumous 
Tracts,  we  see  the  same  man,  the  same  doctrines,  the 
same  uniform  wisdom  of  practical  councils,  the  same 
reasoning  and  the  same  prejudices  against  all  ab- 
stract grounds,  against  all  deduction  of  Practice  from 
Theory.  The  inconsistency  to  which  I  allude,  is  of  a 
different  kind:  it  is  the  want  of  congruity  in  the 
principles  appealed  to  in  different  parts  of  the  sam^ 
Work,  it  is  an  apparent  versatility  of  the  principh 
with  the  occasion.  If  his  opponents  are  Theorists, 
then  every  thing  is  to  be  founded  on  Prudence,  on 
mere  calculations  of  Expediency:  and  every  man  is 
represented  as  acting  according  to  the  state  of  his 
own  immediate  self-interest.  Are  his  opponents  caJ- 
429 


420 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


culators  ?  Then  calculation  itself  is  represented  as  a 
sort  of  crime.  God  has  given  us  Feelings,  and  we 
are  to  obey  them!  and  the  most  absurd  prejudices 
become  venerable,  to  which  these  Feelings  have 
given  consecration.  I  have  not  forgotten,  that  Burke 
himself  defended  these  half  contradictions,  on  the 
pretext  of  balancing  the  too  much  on  the  one  side  by 
a  too  much  on  the  other.  But  never  can  I  believe, 
but  that  the  straight  line  must  needs  be  the  nearest ; 
and  that  where  there  is  the  most,  and  the  most  unal- 
loyed truth,  there  will  be  the  greatest  and  most  per- 
manent power  of  persuasion.  But  the  fact  was,  that 
Burke  in  his  public  character  found  himself,  as  it 
were,  in  a  Noah's  Ark,  with  a  very  few  men  and  a 
great  many  beasts!  He  felt  how  much  his  immedi- 
ate power  was  lessened  by  the  very  circumstance  of 
his  measureless  superiority  to  those  about  him:  he 
acted,  therefore,  under  a  perpetual  system  of  compro- 
mise— a  compromise  of  greatness  with  meanness ;  a 
compromise  of  comprehension  with  narrowness;  a 
compromise  of  the  philosopher  (who  armed  with  the 
twofold  knowledge  of  History  and  the  Laws  of  Spi- 
rit, as  with  a  telescope,  looked  far  around  and  into 
the  far  distance)  with  the  mere  men  of  business,  or 
with  yet  coarser  intellects,  who  handled  a  truth, 
which  they  were  required  to  receive,  as  they  would 
handle  an  ox,  which  they  were  desired  to  purchase. 
But  why  need  I  repeat  what  has  been  already  said 
in  so  happy  a  manner  by  Goldsmith  of  this  great  man  : 

"  Who,  born  for  the  universe,  narrow'd  his  mind, 
And  to  party  gave  up  what  was  meant  for  mankind. 
Tho'  fraught  with  all  learning,  yet  straining  his  throat. 
To  persuade  Tommy  Townsend  to  give  him  a  vote ; 
Who  too  deep  for  his  hearers,  et ill  went  on  refining, 
And  thought  of  convincing,  while  they  thought  of  dining." 

And  if  in  consequence  it  was  his  fate  to  "  cut  blocks 
with  a  razor,"  1  may  be  permitted  to  add,  that  in  re- 
spect of  Truth  though  not  of  Genius,  the  weapon  was 
injured  by  the  misapplication. 

The  Friend,  however,  acts  and  will  continue  to 
act  under  the  belief,  that  the  whole  truth  is  the  best 
antidote  to  falsehoods  which  are  dangerous  chiefly 
because  they  are  half-truths:  and  that  an  erroneous 
system  is  best  confuted,  not  by  an  abuse  of  Theory  in 
general,  nor  by  an  absurd  opposition  of  Theory  to  Prac- 
tice, but  by  a  detection  of  the  errors  in  the  particular 
Theory.  For  the  meanest  of  men  has  his  Theory : 
and  to  think  at  all  is  to  theorize.  With  these  convic- 
tions I  proceed  immediately  to  the  system  of  the 
economists  and  to  the  principles  on  which  it  is  con- 
structed, and  from  which  it  must  derive  all  its 
strength. 

The  system  commences  with  an  undeniable  truth, 
and  an  important  deduction  therefrom  equally  unde- 
niable. All  voluntary  actions,  say  they,  having  for 
their  objects  good  or  evil,  are  moral  actions.  But  all 
morality  is  grounded  in  the  reason.  Every  man  is 
born  with  the  faculty  of  Reason:  and  whatever  is 
without  it,  be  the  shape  what  it  may,  is  not  a  man  or 
terson,  but  a  thing.  Hence  the  sacred  principle, 
recognized  by  all  Laws,  human  and  divine,  the  prin- 
ciple, indeed,  which  is  Die  ground-work  of  all  law  and 
justice,  that  a  person  can  never  become  a  thing,  nor  be 


treated  as  such  without  wrong.  But  the  distinction 
between  person  and  thing  consists  herein,  that  the 
latter  may  rightfully  be  used,  altogether  and  merely, 
as  a  means ;  but  the  former  must  always  be  included 
in  the  end,  and  form  a  part  of  the  final  cause.  We 
plant  the  tree  and  we  cut  it  down,  we  breed  the  sheep 
and  we  kill  it,  wholly  as  means  to  our  own  e7ids.  The 
wood-cutter  and  the  hind  are  likewise  employed  as 
means,  but  on  an  agreement  of  reciprocal  advantage, 
which  includes  them  as  well  as  their  employer  in  the 
end.  Again :  as  the  faculty  of  Reason  implies  free- 
agency,  morality,  (i.  e.  the  dictate  of  Reason)  gives  to 
every  rational  being  the  right  of  acting  as  a  free 
agent,  and  of  finally  determining  his  conduct  by  his 
own  will,  according  to  his  own  conscience:  and  this 
right  is  inalienable  except  by  guilt,  which  is  an  act 
of  self-forfeiture,  and  the  consequences  therefore  to 
be  considered  as  the  criminal's  own  moral  election. 
In  respect  of  their  Reason*  all  men  are  equal.  The 
measure  of  the  Understanding  and  of  all  other  facul- 
ties of  man,  is  different  in  different  persons:  but  Rea- 
son is  not  susceptible  of  degree.  For  since  it  merely 
decides  whether  any  given  thought  or  action  is  or  is 
not  in  contradiction  with  the  rest,  there  can  be  no 
reason  better,  or  more  reason,  than  another. 

Reason!  best  and  holiest  gift  of  Heaven  and  bond 
of  union  with  the  Giver!  The  high  title  by  which 
the  majesty  of  man  claims  precedence  above  all 
other  living  creatures !  Mysterious  faculty,  the  mother 
of  conscience,  of  language,  of  tears,  and  of  smiles ! 
Calm  and  incorruptible  legislator  of  the  soul,  without 
whom  all  its  other  powers  would  "  meet  in  mere  op- 
pugnancy."  Sole  principle  of  permanence  amid  end- 
less change !  in  a  world  of  discordant  appetites  and 
imagined  self-interests  the  one  only  common  measure! 
which  taken  away, 

"  Force  should  be  right ;  or,  rather  right  and  wrong 
(Between  whose  endless  jar  justice  resides) 
Should  lose  their  names,  and  so  should  justice  too. 
Then  every  thing  includes  itself  in  powef, 
Power  into  will,  will  into  appetite; 
And  appetite,  an  universal  wolf, 
So  doulily  seconded  with  will  and  power, 
Must  make  perforce  an  universal  prey!" 

Thrice  blessed  faculty  of  Reason !  all  other  gifts, 
though  goodly  and  of  celestial  origin,  health,  strength, 
talents,  all  the  powers  and  all  the  means  of  enjoy- 
ment, seem  dispensed  by  chance  or  sullen  caprice — 
thou  alone,  more  than  even  the  sunshine,  more  than 
the  common  air,  art  given  to  all  men,  and  to  every 
man  alike !  To  thee,  who  being  one  art  the  same  in 
all,  we  owe  the  privilege,  that  of  all  we  can  become 
one,  a  living  whole!  that  we  have  a  Country!  Who 
then  shall  dare  prescribe  a  law  of  moral  action  for 
any  rational  Being,  which  does  not  flow  immediately 
from  that  Reason,  which  is  the  fountain  of  all  moral- 
ity? Or  how  without  breach  of  conscience  can  we 
limit  or  coerce  the  powers  of  a  free  agent,  except  by 
coincidence  with  that  law  in  his  own  mind,  which  is 
at  once  the  cause,  the  condition,  and  the  measure,  of 
his  free  agency?    Man  must  be  free ;  or  to  what  pur- 

*  This  position  has  been  already  explained,  and  the  sophis- 
try grounded  on  it  detected  and  exposed,  in  the  last  Essay  of 
the  Landing-Place,  in  this  volume. 

430 


THE  FRIEND. 


421 


pose  was  he  made  a  Spirit  of  Reason,  and  not  a  Ma- 
chine of  Instinct  ?  Man  must  obey ;  or  wherefore 
has  he  a  conscience  ?  The  powers,  which  create  this 
difficulty,  contain  its  solution  likewise:  for  their  ser- 
vice is  perfect  freedom.  Anil  whatever  law  or  sys- 
tem of  law  compels  any  other  service,  disennobles 
our  nature,  leagues  itself  with  the  animal  against  the 
godlike,  kills  in  us  the  very  principle  of  joyous  well- 
doing, and  fights  against  humanity. 

By  the  application  of  these  principles  to  the  social 
state  there  arises  the  following  system,  which  as  far 
as  respects  its  first  grounds  is  developed  the  most 
fully  by  J.  J.  Rousseau  in  his  work  Du  Control  Social. 
If  then  no  individual  possesses  the  right  of  prescrib- 
ing any  thing  to  another  individual,  the  rule  of  which 
is  not  contained  in  their  common  Reason,  Society, 
which  is  but  an  aggregate  of  individuals,  can  com- 
municate this  right  to  no  one.  It  cannot  possibly  make 
that  rightful  which  the  higher  and  inviolable  law  of 
human  nature  declares  contradictory  and  unjust. 
But  concerning  Right  and  Wrong,  the  Reason  of 
each  and  every  man  is  the  competent  judge :  for  how 
else  could  he  be  an  amenable  Being,  or  the  proper 
subject  of  any  law  ?  This  Reason,  therefore,  in  any 
one  man,  cannot  even  in  the  social  state  be  rightfully 
subjugated  to  the  Reason  of  any  other.  Neither  an 
individual,  nor  yet  the  whole  multitude  which  con- 
stitutes the  state,  can  possess  the  right  of  compelling 
him  to  do  any  thing,  of  which  it  cannot  be  demon- 
strated that  his  own  Reason  must  join  in  prescribing 
it.  If  therefore  society  is  to  be  under  a  rightful  con- 
stitution of  government,  and  one  that  can  impose  on 
rational  Beings  a  true  and  moral  obligation  to  obey 
it,  it  must  be  framed  on  such  principles  that  every 
individual  follows  his  own  Reason  while  he  obeys 
the  laws  of  the  constitution,  and  performs  the  will 
of  the  state  while  he  follows  the  dictates  of  his  own 
Reason.  This  is  expressly  asserted  by  Rousseau, 
who  states  the  problem  of  a  perfect  constitution  of 
government  in  the  following  words :  Trouver  une 
forme  a" Association — par  laquelle  chacun  s'  unissanl 
a tous,n 'obeisse  pourtant  qu'd  lui  mime,  et  reste  aussi 
libere  qu'auparavant,  i.  e.  To  find  a  form  of  society 
according  to  which  each  one  uniting  with  the  whole 
shall  yet  obey  himself  only  and  remain  as  free  as 
before.  This  right  of  the  individual  to  retain  his 
whole  natural  independence,  even  in  the  social  state, 
is  absolutely  inalienable.  He  cannot  possibly  concede 
or  compromise  it :  for  this  very  Right  is  one  of  his 
most  sacred  Duties.  He  would  sin  against  himself, 
and  commit  high  treason  against  the  Reason  which 
the  Almighty  Creator  has  given  him,  if  he  dared 
abandon  its  exclusive  right  to  govern  his  actions. 

Laws  obligatory  on  the  conscience,  can  only  there- 
fore proceed  from  that  Reason  which  remains  always 
one  and  the  same,  whether  it  speaks  through  this  or 
that  person  :  like  the  voice  of  an  external  Ventrilo- 
quist, it  is  indifferent  from  whose  lips  it  appears  to 
come,  if  only  it  be  audible.  The  individuals  indeed 
are  subject  to  errors  and  passions,  and  each  man  has 
his  own  defects.  But  when  men  are  assembled  in 
person  or  by  real  representatives,  the  actions  and  re- 
actions of  individual  Self-love  balance  each  other; 


errors  are  neutralized  by  opposite  errors ;  and  the 
winds  rushing  from  all  quarters  at  once  with  equal 
force,  produce  for  the  time  a  deep  calm,  during  which 
the  general  will  arising  from  the  general  Reason  dis- 
plays itself.  "  It  is  fittest,"  says  Burke  himself,  (see 
his  Note  on  his  Motion  relative  to  the  Speech  from 
the  Throne,  Vol.  II.  Page  647,  4to.  Edit.)  "  It  is  fit- 
test that  sovereign  authority  should  be  exercised 
where  it  is  most  likely  to  be  attended  with  the  most 
effectual  correctives.  These  correctives  are  furnish- 
ed by  the  nature  and  course  of  parliamentary  pro- 
ceedings, and  by  the  infinitely  diversified  characters 
who  compose  the  two  Houses.  The  fulness,  the 
freedom,  and  publicity  of  discussion,  leave  it  easy  to 
distinguish  what  are  acts  of  power,  and  what  the 
determinations  of  equity  and  reason.  There  preju- 
dice corrects  prejudice,  and  the  different  asperities 
of  party  zeal  mitigate  and  neutralize  each  other." 

This,  however,  as  my  readers  will  have  already 
detected,  is  no  longer  a  demonstrable  deduction  from 
Reason.  It  is  a  mere  probability,  against  which  other 
probabilities  may  be  weighed  :  as  the  lust  of  authority, 
the  contagious  nature  of  enthusiasm,  and  other  of 
the  acute  or  chronic  diseases  of  deliberative  assem- 
blies. But  which  of  these  results  is  the  more  proba- 
ble, the  correction  or  the  contagion  of  evil,  must 
depend  on  circumstances  and  grounds  of  expediency  ; 
and  thus  we  already  find  ourselves  beyond  the 
magic  circle  of  the  pure  Reason,  and  within  the 
sphere  of  the  understanding  and  the  prudence.  Of 
this  important  fact  Rousseau  was  by  no  means  una- 
ware in  his  theory,  though  with  gross  inconsistency 
he  takes  no  notice  of  it  in  his  application  of  the 
theory  to  practice.  He  admits  the  possibility,  he  is 
compelled  by  History  to  allow  even  the  probability, 
that  the  most  numerous  popular  assemblies,  nay  even 
whole  nations,  may  at  times  be  hurried  away  by  the 
same  passions,  and  under  the  dominion  of  a  covnmon 
error.  This  will  of  all  is  then  of  no  more  value, 
than  the  humors  of  any  one  individual:  and  must 
therefore  be  sacredly  distinguished  from  the  pure 
will  which  flows  from  universal  Reason.  To  this 
point  then  I  entreat  the  Reader's  particular  attention  : 
for  in  this  distinction,  established  by  Rousseau  him- 
self between  the  Volonte"  de  Tons  and  the  Yolonte 
generate,  (i.  e.  between  the  collective  will,  and  a 
casual  overbalance  of  wills)  the  falsehood  or  nothing- 
ness of  the  whole  system  becomes  manifest.  For 
hence  it  follows,  as  an  inevitable  consequence,  that 
all  which  is  said  in  the  Contrat  Social  of  that  sove- 
reign will,  to  which  the  right  of  universal  legislation 
appertains,  applies  to  no  one  Human  Being,  to  no 
Society  or  assemblage  of  Human  Beings,  and  least 
of  all  to  the  mixed  multitude  that  makes  up  the 
people  :  but  entirely  and  exclusively  to  Reason 
itself,  which,  it  is  true,  dwells  in  every  man  poten- 
tially, but  actually  and  in  perfect  purity  is  found  in  no 
man  and  in  no  body  of  men.  This  distinction  the 
latter  disciples  of  Rousseau  chose  completely  to  for- 
get and,  (a  far  more  melancholy  case  !)  the  constituent 
legislators  of  France  forgot  it  likewise.  With  a 
wretched  parrotry  they  wrote  and  harangued  with- 
out ceasing  of  the  Volonte"  generate — the  inalienable 

431 


422 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


sovereignly  of  the  people  :  and  by  these  high-sound- 
ing  phrases  led  on  the  vain,  ignorant,  and  intoxicated 
populace  to  wild  excesses  and  wilder  expectations, 
which  entailing  on  them  the  bitterness  of  disappoint- 
ment cleared  the  way  for  military  despotism,  for  the 
satanic  Government  of  Horror  under  the  Jacobins, 
and  of  Terror  under  the  Corsican. 

Luther  lived  long  enough  to  see  the  consequences 
of  the  doctrines  into  which  indignant  pity  and  abstract 
ideas  of  right  had  hurried  him — to  see,  to  retract,  and 
to  oppose  them.  If  the  same  had  been  the  lot  of 
Rousseau,  I  doubt  not  that  his  conduct  would  have 
been  the  same.  In  his  whole  system  there  is  be- 
yond controvery  much  that  is  true  and  well  reasoned, 
if  only  its  application  be  not  extended  farther  than 
the  nature  of  the  case  permits.  But  then  we  shall 
find  that  little  or  nothing  is  won  by  it  for  the  institu- 
tions of  society :  and  least  of  all  for  the  constitution 
of  Governments,  the  Theory  of  which  it  was  his  wish 
to  ground  on  it.  Apply  his  principles  to  any  case,  in 
which  the  sacred  and  inviolable  Laws  of  Morality 
are  immediately  interested,  all  becomes  just  and  per- 
tinent. No  power  on  earth  can  oblige  me  to  act 
against  my  conscience.  No  magistrate,  no  monarch, 
no  legislature,  can  without  tyranny  compel  me  to  do 
anything  which  the  acknowledged  laws  of  God  have 
forbidden  me  to  do.  So  act  that  thou  mayest  be  able, 
without  involving  any  contradiction,  to  will  that  the 
maxim  of  thv  conduct  should  be  the  law  of  all  intel- 
ligent Beings  —  is  the  one  universal  and  sufficient 
principle  and  guide  of  morality.  And  why  ?  Be- 
cause the  object  of  morality  is  not  the  outward  act, 
but  the  internal  maxim  of  our  actions.  And  so  far  it 
is  infallible.  But  with  what  show  of  Reason  can  we 
pretend,  from  a  principle  by  which  we  are  to  deter- 
mine the  purity  of  our  motives,  to  deduce  the  form 
and  matter  of  a  rightful  Government,  the  main  office 
of  which  is  to  regulate  the  outward  actions  of  parti- 
cular bodies  of  men,  according  to  their  particular  cir- 
cumstances ?  Can  we  hope  better  of  constitutions 
framed  by  ourselves,  than  of  that  which  was  given 
by  Almighty  Wisdom  itself?  The  laws  of  the  He- 
brew commonwealth,  which  flowed  from  the  pure 
Reason,  remain  and  are  immutable  ;  but  the  regula- 
tions dictated  by  Prudence,  though  by  the  Divine 
prudence,  and  though  given  in  thunder  from  the 
Mount,  have  passed  away  ;  and  while  they  lasted, 
were  binding  only  for  that  one  state,  the  particular 
circumstances  of  which  rendered  them  expedient. 

Rousseau  indeed  asserts,  that  there  is  an  inaliena- 
ble sovereignty  inherent  in  every  human  being  pos- 
sessed of  Reason  :  and  from  this  the  framers  of  the 
constitution  of  1791  deduce,  that  the  people  itself  is 
its  own  sole  rightful  legislator,  and  at  most  dare  only 
recede  so  far  from  its  right  as  to  delegate  to  chosen 
deputies  the  power  of  representing  and  declaring  the 
general  will.  But  this  is  wholly  without  proof:  for 
it  has  already  been  fully  shown,  that  according  to  the 
principle  out  of  which  this  consequence  is  attempted 
to  be  drawn,  it  is  not  the  actual  man,  but  the  abstract 
Reason  alone,  that  is  the  sovereign  and  rightful  Law- 
giver. The  confusion,  of  two  things  so  different  is  so 
gross  an  error,  that  the  Constituent  Assembly  could 


scarce  proceed  a  step  in  their  declaration  of  rights, 
without  some  glaring  inconsistency.  Children  are 
excluded  from  all  political  power — are  they  not  hu- 
man beings  in  whom  the  faculty  of  Reason  resides  ! 
Yes !  but  in  them  the  faculty  is  not  yet  adequately- 
developed.  But  are  not  gross  ignorance,  inveterate 
superstition,  and  the  habitual  tyranny  of  passion  and 
sensuality,  equal  preventives  of  the  developement, 
equal  impediments  to  the  rightful  exercise  of  the 
Reason,  as  childhood  and  early  youth  ?  Who  would 
not  rely  on  the  judgment  of  a  well-educated  English 
lad,  bred  in  a  virtuous  and  enlightened  family,  in 
preference  to  that  of  a  brutal  Russian,  who  believes 
that  he  can  scourge  his  wooden  idol  into  good  humor, 
or  attributes  to  himself  the  merit  of  perpetual  prayer, 
when  he  has  fastened  the  petitions,  which  his  priest 
has  written  for  him,  on  the  wings  of  a  windmill  ? 
Again:  women  are  likewise  excluded — a  full  half, 
and  that  assuredly  the  most  innocent,  the  most  amia- 
ble half,  of  the  whole  human  race,  is  excluded,  and 
this  too  by  a  constitution  which  boasts  to  have  no 
other  foundations  but  those  of  universal  Reason  ?  Is 
Reason  then  an  affair  of  sex  ?  No  !  but  women  are 
commonly  in  a  state  of  dependence,  and  are  not  likely 
to  exercise  their  Reason  with  freedom.  Well !  and 
does  not  this  ground  of  exclusion  apply  with  equal  or 
greater  force  to  the  poor,  to  the  infirm,  to  men  in  em- 
barrassed circumstances,  to  all  in  short  whose  main- 
tenance, be  it  scanty  or  be  it  ample,  depends  on  the 
will  of  others?  How  far  are  we  to  go?  Where 
must  we  stop  ?  What  classes  should  we  admit  ? 
Whom  must  we  disfranchise  ?  The  objects,  concern- 
ing whom  we  are  to  determine  these  questions,  are 
all  human  beings  and  differenced  from  each  other  by 
degrees  only,  these  degrees  too  oftentimes  changing. 
Yet  the  principle  on  which  the  whole  system  rests  is, 
that  Reason  is  not  susceptible  of  degree.  Nothing 
therefore,  which  subsists  wholly  in  degrees,  the 
changes  of  which  do  not  obey  any  necessary  law,  can 
be  subjects  of  pure  science,  or  determinable  by  mere 
Reason.  For  these  things  we  must  rely  on  our  Un- 
derstandings, enlightened  by  past  experience  and 
immediate  observation,  and  determining  our  choice 
by  comparisons  of  expediency. 

It  is  therefore  altogether  a  mistaken  notion,  that 
the  theory  which  would  deduce  the  social  Rights  of 
Man  and  the  sole  rightful  form  of  government  from 
principles  of  Reason,  involves  a  necessary  preference 
of  the  democratic,  or  even  the  representative,  consti- 
tutions. Accordingly,  several  of  the  French  econo- 
mists, although  devotees  of  Rousseau  and  the  physio- 
cratic  system,  and  assuredly  not  the  least  respectable 
of  their  party  either  in  morals  or  in  intellect;  and 
these  too,  men  who  lived  and  wrote  under  the  un- 
limited monarchy  of  France,  and  who  were  therefore 
well  acquainted  with  the  evils  connected  with  that 
system  ;  did  yet  declare  themselves  for  a  pure  mon- 
archy in  preference  to  the  aristocratic,  the  popular, 
or  the  mixed  form.  These  men  argued,  that  no  other 
laws  being  allowable  but  those  which  are  demonstra- 
bly just,  and  founded  in  the  simplest  ideas  of  Reason, 
and  of  which  every  man's  reason  is  the  competent 
judge,  it  is  indifferent  whether  one  man,  or  one  or 
432 


THE  FRIEXD. 


423 


more  assemblies  of  men,  give  form  and  publicity  to 
them.  For  being  matters  of  pure  and  simple  science, 
they  require  no  experience  in  order  to  see  their  Truth, 
and  among  an  enlightened  people,  by  whom  this  sys- 
tem had  been  once  solemnly  adopted,  no  sovereign 
would  dare  to  make  other  laws  than  those  of  Reason. 
They  further  contend,  that  if  the  people  were  not  en- 
lightened, a  purely  popular  govenment  could  not  co- 
exist with  this  system  of  absolute  justice:  and  if  it 
were  adequately  enlightened,  the  influence  of  public 
opinion  would  supply  the  place  of  formal  representa- 
tion, while  the  form  of  the  government  would  be  in 
harmony  with  the  uniiv  and  simplicity  of  its  princi- 
ples. This  they  entitle  le  Despolisme  legal  sous  i Em- 
pire de  i Evidence.  ;The  best  statement  of  the  the- 
ory thus  modified,  may  be  found  in  Mercier  de  la  Ri- 
riere,  I'ordre  nature!  tt  essentiel  des  sodelis  politique*.) 
From  the  proofs  adduced  in  the  preceding  paragraph, 
to  which  manv  others  might  be  added,  I  have  no  hesi- 
tation in  a/firming  that  this  latter  party  are  the  more 
consistent  reasoners. 

It  is  worthy  of  remark,  that  the  influence  of  these 
writings  contributed  greatly,  not  indeed  to  raise  the 
present  emperor,  but  certainly  to  reconcile  a  numer- 
ous class  of  politicians  to  his  unlimited  authority  :  and 
as  far  as  hjs  lawless  passion  for  war  and  conquest  al- 
lows him  to  govern  according  to  any  principles,  he 
favors  those  of  the  physiocratic  philosophers.  His 
early  education  must  have  given  him  a  predilection 
for  a  theory  conducted  throughout  with  mathematical 
precision  ;  its  very  simplicity  promised  the  readiest 
and  most  commodious  machine  for  despotism,  for  it 
moulds  a  nation  into  as  calculable  a  power  as  an 
army ;  while  the  stern  and  seeming  greatness  of  the 
whole,  and  its  mock-elevation  above  human  feelings, 
flattered  his  pride,  hardened  his  conscience,  and  aid- 
ed the  efforts  of  self-delusion.  Reason  is  the  sole 
sovereign,  the  only  rightful  legislator:  but  Reason  to 
act  on  man  must  be  impersonated.  The  Providence 
which  had  so  marvellously  raised  and  supported  him, 
had  marked  him  out  for  the  representative  of  Reason, 
and  had  armed  him  with  irresistible  force,  in  order  to 
realize  its  laws.  In  Him  therefore  Might  becomes 
Right,  and  his  cause  and  that  of  destiny  (or  as  the 
wretch  now  chooses  to  word  it,  exchanging  blind 
nonsense  for  staring  blasphemy)  his  cause  and  the 
cause  of  God  are  one  and  the  same.  Excellent  pos- 
tulate for  a  choleric  and  self-willed  tyrant .'  What 
avails  the  impoverishment  of  a  few  thousand  mer- 
chants and  manufacturers  ?  What  even  the  general 
wretchedness  of  millions  of  perishable  men,  for  a 
short  generation  ?  Should  these  stand  in  the  way  of 
the  chosen  conqueror,  the  "  Innovator  Mundi.  et  Stu- 
por Sceculorum,"  or  prevent  a  constitution  of  things, 
which  erected  on  intellectual  and  perfect  foundations, 
"groweth  not  old,"  but  like  the  eternal  Justice,  of 
which  it  is  the  living  image, 


-"may  despise 


The  strokes  of  Fate,  and  see  the  World's  last  hoar:" 
For  Justice,   austere   unrelenting  Justice,  is  even- 
where  held  up  as  the  one  thing  needful:  and  the 
onlv  duty  of  the  citizen,  in  fulfilling  which  he  obeys 
all  the  laws,  is  not  to  encroach  on  another's  sphere 


of  action.  The  greatest  possible  happiness  of  a  peo- 
ple is  not,  according  to  this  system,  the  object  of  a 
governor;  but  to  preserve  the  freedom  of  all,  by  co- 
ercing within  the  requisite  bounds  the  freedom  of 
each.  Whatever  a  government  does  more  than  this, 
comes  of  evil:  and  its  best  employment  is  the  repeal 
of  laws  and  regulations,  not  the  establishment  of  them. 
Each  man  is  the  best  judge  of  his  own  happiness, 
and  to  himself  must  it  therefore  be  entrusted.  Re- 
move all  the  interferences  of  positive  statutes,  all  mo- 
nopoly, all  bounties,  all  prohibitions,  and  all  encour- 
agements of  importation  and  exportation,  of  particular 
growth  and  particular  manufactures:  let  the  Reve- 
nues of  the  State  be  taken  at  once  from  the  Produce 
of  the  Soil;  and  all  things  will  find  their  level,  all 
irregularities  will  correct  each  other,  and  an  inde- 
structible cycle  of  harmonious  motions  take  place  in 
the  moral  equally  as  in  the  natural  world.  The  bu- 
siness of  the  Governor  is  to  watch  incessantly,  that 
the  State  shall  remain  composed  of  individuals,  act- 
ing as  individuals,  by  which  alone  the  freedom  of  all 
can  be  secured.  Its  duty  is  to  take  care  that  itself 
remain  the  sole  collective  power,  and  that  all  the 
citizens  should  enjoy  the  same  rights,  and  without 
distinction  be  subject  to  the  same  duties. 

Splendid  promises !  Can  any  thing  appear  more 
equitable  than  the  last  proposition,  the  equality  of 
rights  and  duties  ?  Can  any  thing  be  conceived  more 
simple  in  the  idea?  But  the  execution — ?  let  the 
four  or  five  quarto  volumes  of  the  Conscript  Code  be 
the  comment!  But  as  briefly  as  possible  I  shall  prove, 
that  this  system,  as  an  exclusive  total,  is  under  any 
form  impracticable;  and  that  if  it  were  realized,  and 
as  far  as  it  were  realized,  it  would  necessarily  lead 
to  general  barbarism  and  the  most  grinding  oppres- 
sion; and  that  the  final  result  of  a  general  attempt  to 
introduce  it,  must  be  a  military  despotism  inconsistent 
with  the  peace  and  safely  of  mankind.  That  Reason 
should  be  our  guide  and  governor  is  an  undeniable 
Truth,  and  all  our  notion  of  right  and  wrong  is  built 
thereon :  for  the  whole  moral  nature  of  man  originated 
and  subsists  in  his  Reason.  From  Reason  alone  can 
we  derive  the  principles  which  our  Understandings 
are  to  apply,  the  Ideal  to  which  by  means  of  our  Un- 
derstandings we  should  endeavor  to  approximate. 
This  however  gives  no  proof  that  Reason  alone  ought 
to  govern  and  direct  human  beings,  either  as  Individ- 
uals or  as  States.  It  ought  not  to  do  this,  because  it 
cannot.  The  Laws  of  Reason  are  unable  to  satisfy 
the  first  conditions  of  Human  Society.  We  will  ad- 
mit that  the  shortest  code  of  law  is  the  best,  and  that 
the  citizen  finds  himself  most  at  ease  where  the  Go- 
vernment least  intermeddles  with  his  affairs,  and 
confines  its  efforts  to  the  preservation  of  public  tran- 
quillity— we  will  suffer  this  to  pass  at  present  undis- 
puted, though  the  examples  of  England,  and  before 
the  late  events,  of  Holland  and  Switzerland,  surely 
the  three  happiest  nations  of  the  world)  to  which  per- 
haps we  might  add  the  major  part  of  the  former  Ger- 
man free  tosvns,  furnish  stubborn  facts  in  presump- 
tion of  the  contrary — yet  still  the  proof  is  wanting 
that  the  first  and  most  general  applications  and  exer- 
tions of  the  power  of  man  can  be  definitely  regulated 
433 


424 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


by  Reason  unaided  by  the  positive  and  conventional 
laws  in  the  formation  of  which  the  Understanding 
must  be  our  guide,  and  which  become  just  because 
they  happen  to  be  expedient. 

The  chief  object  for  which  men  first  formed  them- 
selves into  a  State  was  not  the  protection  of  their 
lives  but  of  their  property.  Where  the  nature  of  the 
soil  and  climate  precludes  all  property  but  personal, 
and  ]>ermits  that  only  in  its  simplest  forms,  as  in 
Greenland,  men  remain  in  the  domestic  state  and 
form  Neighborhoods,  but  not  Governments.  And  in 
North  America,  the  Chiefs  appear  to  exercise  govern- 
ment in  those  tribes  only  which  possess  individual 
landed  property.  Among  the  rest  the  Chief  is  their 
General ;  but  government  is  exercised  only  in  Fami- 
lies by  the  Fathers  of  Families.  But  w  here  individ- 
ual landed  property  exists,  there  must  be  inequality 
of  property:  the  nature  of  the  earth  and  the  nature 
of  the  mind  unite  to  make  the  contrary  impossible. 
But  to  suppose  the  Land  the  property  of  the  State, 
and  the  labor  and  the  produce  to  be  equally  divided 
among  all  the  Members  of  the  State,  involves  more 
than  one  contradiction  :  for  it  could  not  subsist  with- 
out gross  injustice,  except  where  the  Reason  of  all 
and  of  each  was  absolute  master  of  the  selfish  pas- 
sions of  sloth,  envy,  &c. :  and  yet  the  same  state 
would  preclude  the  greater  part  of  the  means  by 
which  the  Reason  of  man  is  developed.  In  what- 
ever state  of  society  you  would  place  it,  from  the 
most  savage  to  the  most  refined,  it  would  be  found 
equally  unjust  and  impossible  ;  and  were  there  a  race 
of  men,  a  country,  and  a  climate,  that  permitted  such 
an  order  of  things,  the  same  causes  would  render  all 
Government  superfluous.  To  properly,  therefore,  and 
to  its  inequalities,  all  human  laws  directly  or  indi- 
rectly relate,  which  would  not  be  equally  laws  in  the 
state  of  Nature.  Now  it  is  impossible  to  deduce  the 
Right  of  Property*  from  pure  Reason.  The  utmost 
which  Reason  could  give  would  be  a  property  in  the 
fornix  of  things,  as  far  as  the  forms  were  produced  by 
individual  power.  In  the  matter  it  could  give  no 
property.  We  regard  angels,  and  glorified  spirits  as 
Beings  of  pure  Reason:  and  whoever  thought  of  pro- 
perty in  Heaven?  Even  the  simplest  and  most  moral 
form  of  it,  namely,  Marriage,  (we  know  from  the 
highest  authority)  is  excluded  from  the  state  of  pure 
reason.  Rousseau  himself  expressly  admits,  that  Pro- 
perty cannot  be  deduced  from  the  Laws  of  Reason 
and  Nature  ;  and  he  ought  therefore  to  have  admitted 
at  the  same  time,  that  his  whole  theory  was  a  thing 
of  air.  In  the  most  respectable  point  of  view  he 
could  regard  his  system  as  analogous  to  Geometry. 
(If  indeed  it  be  purely  scientific,  how  could  it  be 
otherwise?)  Geometry  holds  forth  an  Ideal  which 
can  never  be  fully  realized  in  Nature,  even  because 


*  I  mean,  practically  and  with  the  inequalities  inseparable 
from  the  actual  existence  of  Property.  Abstractedly,  the 
Right  to  Property  is  deducible  from  the  Free-agency  of  man. 
If  to  act  freely  be  a  Right,  a  sphere  of  action  must  be  so  too. 


it  is  Nature  :  because  bodies  are  more  than  extension, 
and  to  pure  extension  of  space,  only  the  mathematical 
theorems  wholly  correspond.  In  the  same  manner  the 
moral  laws  of  the  intellectual  world,  as  far  as  they  are 
deducible  from  pure  Intellect,  are  never  perfectly  ap- 
plicable to  our  mixed  and  sensitive  nature,  because 
Man  is  something  besides  Reason  ;  because  his  Reason 
never  acts  by  itself,  but  must  clothe  itself  in  the  sub- 
stance of  individual  Understanding  and  specific  Incli- 
nation, in  order  to  become  a  reality  and  an  object  of 
consciousness  and  experience.  It  will  be  seen  here- 
after that  together  with  this,  the  key-stone  of  the  arch, 
the  greater  part  and  the  most  specious  of  the  popular 
arguments  in  favor  of  universal  suffrage,  fall  in  and 
are  crushed.  I  will  mention  one  only  at  present. 
Major  Cartwright,  in  his  deduction  of  the  Rights  of 
the  Subject  from  Principles,  "  not  susceptible  of  proof, 
being  self-evident — if  one  of  which  be  violated  all 
are  shaken,"  affirms  (Principle  98th ;  though  the 
greater  part  indeed  are  moral  aphorisms,  or  blank 
assertions,  not  scientific  principles)  "that  a  power 
which  ought  never  to  be  used  ought  never  to  exist." 
Again  he  affirms  that  "  Laws  to  bind  all  must  be  as- 
sented to  by  all,  and  consequently  every  man,  even 
the  poorest,  has  an  equal  right  to  suffrage:"  and  this 
for  an  additional  reason,  because  "  all  without  excep- 
tion are  capable  of  feeling  happiness  or  misery,  ac- 
cordingly as  they  are  well  or  ill-governed."  But  are 
they  not  then  capable  of  feeling  happiness  or  misery 
according  as  they  do  or  do  not  possess  the  means  of  a 
comfortable  subsistence  ?  and  who  is  the  judge,  what 
is  a  comfortable  subsistence,  but  the  man  himself? 
Might  not  then,  on  the  same  or  equivalent  principles, 
a  Leveller  construct  a  right  to  equal  property  ?  The 
inhabitants  of  this  country  without  property  form, 
doubtless,  a  great  majority :  each  of  these  has  a  right 
to  a  suffrage,  and  the  richest  man  to  no  more :  and  the 
object  of  this  suffrage  is,  that  each  individual  may 
secure  himself  a  true  efficient  Representative  of  his 
Will.  Here  then  is  a  legal  power  of  abolishing  or 
equalizing  property :  and  according  to  himself,  a 
power  which  ought  never  to  be  used  ouglii  not  to 
exist. 

Therefore,  unless  he  carries  his  system  to  the 
whole  length  of  common  labor  and  common  posses- 
sion, a  right  to  universal  suffrage  cannot  exist ;  but  if 
not  to  universal  suffrage,  there  can  exist  no  natural 
right  to  suffrage  at  all.  In  whatever  way  he  would 
obviate  this  objection,  he  must  admit  expedience 
founded  on  experience  and  particular  circumstances, 
which  will  vary  in  every  different  nation,  and  in  the 
same  nation  at  different  times,  as  the  maxim  of  all 
Legislation  and  the  ground  of  all  Legislative  Power. 
For  his  universal  principles,  as  far  as  they  are  princi- 
ples and  universal,  necessarily  suppose  uniform  and 
perfect  subjects,  which  are  to  be  found  in  the  Ideas 
of  pure  Geometry  and  (I  trust)  in  the  Realities  of 
Heaven,  but  never,  never  in  creatures  of  flesh  and 
blood. 


434 


Cftc  ffvitntf. 


ESSAY   I.* 

ON  THE   ERRORS  OF  PARTY  SPIRIT:  OR 
EXTREMES   MEET 


"And  it  was  no  wonder  if  some  good  and  innocent  men,  es- 
pecially such  as  he  (Lishtfoot)  who  was  generally  more 
ccmct-rned  about  what  was  done  in  Judea  many  centuries 
ago,  than  what  was  transacted  in  his  own  time  in  his  own 
country — it  is  no  wonder  if  some  such  were  for  awhile 
borne  away  to  the  approval  of  opinions  which  they  after 
more  sedate  reflection  disowned.  Yet  his  innocency  from 
any  self-interest  or  design,  together  with  his  learning,  se- 
cured him  from  the  extravagancies  of  demagogues,  the  peo- 
ple's oracles." L1GHTFOOTS   Works,  Publisher's 

Preface  to  the  Reader. 


I  have  never  seen  Major  Cartwright,  much  less  en- 
joy llie  honor  of  his  acquaintance ;  but  I  know 
enough  of  his  character  from  the  testimony  of  others 
and  from  his  own  writings,  to  respect  his  talents,  and 
revere  the  purity  of  his  motives.  I  am  fully  per- 
suaded, that  there  are  few  belter  men.  few  more  fer- 
vent or  disinterested  adherents  of  their  country  or 
the  laws  of  their  country,  of  whatsoever  things  are 
lovely,  of  whatsoever  things  are  honorable  !  It  would 
give  me  great  pain  should  I  be  supposed  to  have  in- 
troduced, disrespectfully,  a  name,  which  from  my 
earlv  vouth  I  never  heard  mentioned  without  a  feel- 
ing of  affectionate  admiration.  I  have  indeed  quoted 
from  this  venerable  patriot,  as  from  the  most  respect- 
able English  advocate  for  the  Theory  which  derives 
the  rights  of  government,  and  the  duties  of  obedi- 
ence to  it,  exclusively  from  principles  of  pure  Rea- 
son. It  was  of  consequence  to  my  cause  that  I 
should  not  be  thought  to  have  been  waging  war 
against  a  straw  image  of  my  own  setting  up,  or  even 
against  a  foreign  idol  that  had  neither  worshippers 
nor  advocates  in  our  own  country;  and  it  was  not 
less  my  object  to  keep  my  discussion  aloof  from  those 
passions,  which  more  unpopular  names  might  have 
excited.  I  therefore  introduce  the  name  of  Cart- 
wright,  as  I  had  previously  done  that  of  Luther,  in 
order  to  give  every  fair  advantage  to  a  theory,  which 
I  thought  it  of  importance  to  confute  ;  and  as  an  in- 
stance that  though  the  system  might  be  made  tempt- 
ing to  the  Vulgar,  yet  that,  taken  unmixed  and  entire, 
it  was  chiefly  fascinating  for  lofty  and  imaginative 
spirits,  who  mistook  their  own  virtues  and  powers  for 
the  average  character  of  men  in  general. 


*  With  this  Essay  commences  the  second  volume  of  the 
English  edition  of  The  Fritnd,  to  which  the  following  quo- 
tation i*  prefixed  as  a  motto  : 

Insolent,  mehercule  foret,  omnia  urbis  alicujus  rclificia  rii- 
ruere,  ad  hoc  solum  ut,  iisdem  postea  meliori  ordwift  et  forma 
extrnctis,  ejus  plateee  pulchiores  evaderent.  At  certe  non  in- 
§olens  est  dominum  unius  domus  ad  illam  destrueudam  adhor- 
isri,  ut  ejus  loco  meliorem  a?iiticet.  Immo  s.tpe  multi  hoc 
facere  cognnter  nempe  cum  aedes  habent  retastate  jam  fatis- 
cenies.  vel  quip  infirmis  fundament!?  superslructce  rumum 
.minamur. C.\RTEtIU5  de  Meihodo. 


Neither  by  fair  statements  nor  by  fair  reasoning, 
should  I  ever  give  offence  to  Major  Cartwright  him- 
self, nor  to  his  judicious  friends.  If  I  am  in  danger 
of  offending  them,  it  must  arise  from  one  or  other  of 
two  causes;  either  that  I  have  falsely  represented  his 
principles,  or  his  motives  and  the  tendencv  of  his 
writings.  In  the  book  from  which  I  quoted  (  "  The 
People's  Barrier  against  undue  Influence,  &c."  ihe 
only  one  of  Major  Cartwright's  which  I  possess  I  am 
I  conscious  that  there  are  six  foundations  stated  of  con- 
j  stitutional  Government.  Therefore,  it  may  be  urged, 
I  the  Author  cannot  be  justly  classed  with  those  who 
j  deduce  our  social  Rights  and  correlative  Duties  ex- 
i  clusively  from  principles  of  pure  Reason,  or  unavoid- 
.  able  conclusions  from  such.  My  answer  is  ready. 
:  Of  these  six  foundations  three  are  but  different  words 
for  one  and  the  same,  viz.  the  Law  of  Reason,  the 
Law  of  God,  and  first  Principles :  and  the  three  that 
remain  cannot  be  taken  as  different,  inasmuch  as  they 
are  afterwards  affirmed  to  be  of  no  validity  except  as 
far  as  they  are  evidently  deduced  from  the  former  ; 
that  is,  from  the  Principles  implanted  by  God  in  the 
universal  Reason  of  man.  These  three  latter  foun- 
dations are,  the  general  customs  of  the  realm,  parti- 
cular customs,  and  acts  of  Parliament.  It  might  be 
supposed  that  the  Author  had  not  used  his  terms  in 
the  precise  and  single  sense  in  which  they  are  defined 
in  my  former  Essay  :  and  that  self-evident  Principles 
may  be  meant  to  include  the  dictates  of  manifest 
Expedience,  the  Inductions  of  the  Understanding  as 
well  as  the  Prescripts  of  the  pure  Reason.  But  no  ! 
Major  Cartwright  has  guarded  against  the  possibility 
of  this  interpretation,  and  has  expressed  himself  as  de- 
cisively, and  with  as  much  warmth,  against  founding 
Governments  on  grounds  of  Expedience,  as  the  Edi- 
tor of  The  Friend  has  done  against  founding  Morality 
on  the  same.  Euclid  himself  could  not  have  defined 
his  words  more  sternly  within  the  limit  of  pure  Sci- 
ence :  For  instance,  see  the  1st,  2d,  3d,  and  4th  pri- 
mary Rules.  "  A  Principle  is  a  manifest  and  simple 
proposition  comprehending  a  certain  Truth.  Princi- 
ples are  the  proof  of  every  thing  :  but  are  not  sus- 
ceptible of  external  proof,  being  self-evident  If  one 
Principle  be  violated,  all  are  shaken.  Against  him, 
who  denies  Principles,  all  dispute  is  useless,  and  rea- 
son unintelligible,  or  disallowed,  so  far  as  he  denies 
them.  The  Laws  of  Nature  are  immutable."  Nei- 
ther could  Rousseau  himself  (or  his  predecessors,  the 
fifth-Monarchy  Men)  have  more  nakedly  or  emphati- 
cally identified  the  foundations  of  government  in  the 
concrete  with  those  of  religion  and  morality  in  the 
abstract  i  see  Major  Cartwright's  Primary  Rules  from 
31  to  39,  and  from  44  to  83.  In  these  it  is  affirmed  : 
that  the  legislative  Rights  of  Even-  Citizen  are  in- 
herent in  his  nature:  that  being  natural  Rights  they 
must  be  equal  in  all  men ;  that  a  natural  right  is  that 
right  which  a  Citizen  claims  as  being  a  Man,  and 
435 


426 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


that  it  hath  no  other  foundation  but  his  Personality  or 
Reason ;  that  Property  can  neither  increase  or  modify 
any  legislative  Right ;  that  every  one  Man,  however 
rich,  to  have  any  more  than  one  Vote,  is  against  na- 
tural Justice,  and  an  evil  measure;  that  it  is  better 
for  a  nation  to  endure  all  adversities,  than  to  assent 
to  one  evil  measure  ;  that  to  be  free  is  to  be  governed 
by  Laws,  to  which  we  have  ourselves  assented,  either 
in  Person  or  by  Representatives,  for  whose  election 
we  have  actually  voted  ;  that  all  not  having  a  right 
of  Suffrage  are  Slaves,  and  that  a  vast  majority  of 
the  People  of  Great  Britain  are  Slaves !  To  prove 
the  total  coincidence  of  Major  Cartwright's  Theory 
with  that  which  I  have  stated  (and  I  trust  confuted) 
in  the  preceding  Number,  it  only  remains  for  me  to 
prove,  that  the  former,  equally  with  the  latter,  con- 
founds the  sufficiency  of  the  conscience  to  make 
every  person  a  moral  and  amenable  Being,  with  the 
sufficiency  of  judgment  and  experience  requisite  to 
the  exercise  of  political  Right.  A  single  quotation 
will  place  this  out  af  all  doubt,  which  from  its  length 
I  shall  insert  in  a  Note.* 

Great  stress,  indeed,  is  laid  on  the  authority  of  our 
ancient  Laws,  both  in  this  and  the  other  works  of  our 
patriotic  author;  and  whatever  his  system  may  be,  it 
is  impossible  not  to  feel,  that  the  author  himself  pos- 
sesses the  heart  of  a  genuine  Englishman.  But  still 
his  system  can  neither  be  changed  nor  modified  by 
these  appeals :  for  among  the  primary  maxims,  which 
form  the  ground-work  of  it,  we  are  informed  not  only 


*  "  But  the  equality  (observe,  that  Major  Cartwright  is  here 
speaking  of  the  natural  right  to  universal  Suffrage  and  con- 
sequently of  the  universal  right  of  eligibility,  as  well  as  of 
election,  independent  of  character  or  property)— the  equality 
and  dignity  of  human  nature  in  all  men,  whether  rich  or  poor, 
is  placed  in  the  highest  point  of  view  by  St.  Paul,  when  he 
reprehends  the  Corinthian  believers  for  their  litigations  one 
with  another,  in  the  Courts  of  Law  where  unbelievers  pre- 
sided ;  and  as  an  argument  of  the  competency  of  all  men  to 
judge  for  themselves,  he  alludes  to  that  elevation  in  the  king- 
dom of  heaven  which  is  promised  to  every  man  who  shall  be 
virtuous,  in  the  language  of  that  time,  a  Saint.  '  Do  ye  not 
know,'  says  he,  '  that  the  Saints  shall  judge  the  world  1  And 
if  the  world  shall  be  judged  by  you,  are  ye  unworthy  to 
judge  the  smallest  matters  ?  Know  ye  not  that  ye  shall  judge 
the  angels  1  How  much  more  tkings  that  pertain  to  this 
lifeV  If  after  such  authorities,  such  manifestations  of  truth 
as  these,  any  Christian,  through  those  prejudices  which  are 
the  effects  of  long  habits  of  injustice  and  oppression,  and  teach 
us  to  '  despise  the  poor,'  shall  still  think  it  right  to  exclude 
that  part  of  the  commonalty,  consisting  of  '  Tradesmen,  Ar- 
tificers, and  Laborers,'  or  any  of  them,  from  voting  in  elec- 
tions of  members  to  serve  in  parliament,  I  must  sincerely 
lament  such  a  persuasion  as  a  misfortune  both  to  himself  and 
his  country.  And  if  any  man,  (not  having  given  himself  the 
trouble  to  consider  whether  or  not  the  Scripture  be  an  author- 
ity, but  who,  nevertheless,  is  a  friend  to  the  rights  of  mankind) 
upon  grounds  of  mere  prudence,  policy,  or  expediency,  shall 
think  it  advisable  to  go  against  the  whole  current  of  our  con- 
stitutional and  law  maxims,  by  which  it  is  self-evident  that 
every  man,  as  being  a  man,  is  created  free,  born  to  freedom, 
and,  without  it,  a  Thing,  a  Slave,  a  Beast ;  and  shall  contend 
for  drawing  a  line  of  exclusion  at  freeholders  of  forty  pounds 
a  year,  or  forty  shillings  a  year,  or  house-holders,  or  pot- 
boilers, so  that  all  who  are  below  that  line  shall  not  have  a 
vote  in  the  election  of  a  legislative  guardian. — which  is  taking 
from  a  citizen  the  power  even  of  self-preservation,— such  a 
man,  I  venture  to  say,  is  bolder  than  he  who  wrestled  with  the 
angel;  for  he  wrestles  with  God  himself,  who  established 
those  principles  in  the  eternal  laws  of  nature,  never  to  be 
violated  by  any  of  his  Creatures." 


that  Law  in  the  abstract  is  the  perfection  of  Reason  : 
but  that  the  Law  of  God  and  the  Law  of  the  Land 
are  all  one !  What  ?  The  statutes  against  Witches  ? 
Or  those  bloody  Statutes  against  Papists,  the  abolition 
of  which  gave  rise  to  the  infamous  Riots  in  1780/ 
Or  (in  the  author's  own  opinion)  the  Statutes  of  Di& 
franchisement  and  for  making  Parliaments  septen- 
nial?— Nay!  but  (Principle  28)  "an  unjust  Law  is  no 
Law :"  and  (P.  22.)  against  the  Law  of  Reason  neither 
prescription,  statute,  nor  custom,  may  prevail ;  and  if 
any  such  be  brought  against  it,  they  be  not  prescrip- 
tions, statute,  nor  customs,  but  things  void :  and  (P. 
29.)  "What  the  Parliament  doth  shall  be  holdenfor 
naught,  whensoever  it  shall  enact  that  which  is  con- 
trary to  a  natural  Right!"  We  dare  not  suspect  a 
grave  writer  of  such  egregious  trifling,  as  to  mean  no 
more  by  these  assertions,  than  that  what  is  wrong  is 
not  right ;  and  if  more  than  this  be  meant,  it  must  be 
that  the  subject  is  not  bound  to  obey  any  Act  of  Par- 
liament, which  according  to  his  own  conviction  en- 
trenches on  a  Principle  of  Natural  Right;  which  na- 
tural Rights  are,  as  we  have  seen,  not  confined  to  the 
man  in  his  individual  capacity,  but  are  made  to  con- 
fer universal  legislative  privileges  on  every  subject 
of  every  state,  and  of  the  extent  of  which  every  man 
is  competent  to  judge,  who  is  competent  to  be  the 
object  of  Law  at  all,  i.  e.  every  man  who  has  not  lost 
his  Reason. 

In  the  statement  of  his  principles  therefore,  I  have 
not  misrepresented  Major  Cartwright.  Have  I  then 
endeavored  to  connect  public  odium  with  his  honored 
name,  by  arraigning  his  motives,  or  the  tendency  of 
his  Writings  ?  The  tendency  of  his  Writings,  in  my 
inmost  conscience  I  believe  to  be  perfectly  harmless, 
and  I  dare  cite  them  in  confirmation  of  the  opinions 
which  it  was  the  object  of  my  introductory  Essays  to 
establish,  and  as  an  additional  proof,  that  no  good  man 
communicating  what  he  believes  to  be  the  Truth  for 
the  sake  of  Truth  and  according  to  the  rules  of  Con- 
science, will  be  found  to  have  acted  injuriously  to  the 
peace  or  interests  of  Society.  The  venerable  State- 
Moralist  (for  this  is  his  true  character,  and  in  this 
title  is  conveyed  the  whole  error  of  his  system)  is  in- 
capable of  aiding  his  arguments  by  the  poignant  con- 
diment of  personal  slander,  incapable  of  appealing  to 
the  envy  of  the  multitude  by  bitter  declamation 
against  the  follies  and  oppressions  of  the  higher 
classes!  He  would  shrink  with  horror  from  the 
thought  of  adding  a  false  and  unnatural  influence  to 
the  cause  of  Truth  and  Justice,  by  details  of  present 
calamity  or  immediate  suffering,  fitted  to  excite  the 
fury  of  the  multitude,  or  by  promises  of  turning  the 
current  of  the  public  Revenue  into  the  channelst  of 
individual  Distress  and  Poverty,  so  as  to  bribe  the 
populace  by  selfish  hopes  !    It  does  not  belong  to  men 


t  I  must  again  remind  the  Reader,  that  these  Essays  were 
written  October,  l.Q0U  If  Major  Cartwright,  however,  since 
then  acted  in  a  different  spirit,  and  tampered  personally  with 
the  distresses,  and  consequent  irritability  of  the  ignorant,  the 
inconsistency  is  his,  not  the  Author's.  If  what  I  then  be- 
lieved and  avowed  should  now  appear  a  severe  satire  in  the 
shape  of  a  false  prophecy,  anyshume  I  might  feel  for  my  lack 
of  penetration  would  be  lost  in  the  sincerity  of  my  regret. 
436 


THE  FRIEND. 


427 


of  his  character  to  delude  the  uninstructed  into  the 
belief  that  their  shortest  way  of  obtaining  the  good 
things  of  this  life,  is  to  commence  busy  Politicians, 
instead  of  remaining  industrious  Laborers.  lie 
knows,  raid  acts  on  the  knowledge,  thai  it  is  the  duty 
of  the  enlightened  Philanthropist  to  plead  for  the 
the  poor  and  ignorant,  not  to  thera. 

No! — From  Works  written  and  published  under 
the  control  of  austere  principles,  and  at  the  impulse 
of  a  lofty  and  generous  enthusiasm,  from  Works  ren- 
dered attractive  only  by  the  fervor  of  sincerity,  and 
imposing  only  by  the  Majesty  of  Plain  Dealing,  DO 
danger  will  be  apprehended  by  a  wise  man,  no  of- 
fence received  by  a  good  man.  I  could  almost  ven- 
ture to  warrant  our  Patriot's  publications  innoxious, 
from  the  single  circumstance  of  their  perfect  freedom 
from  personal  themes  in  this  age  of  personality, 
this  age  of  literary  and  political  Gostipi/mr,  when 
the  meanest  insects  are  worshipped  with  a  sort  of 
Egyptian  superstition,  if  only  the  brainless  head  be 
atoned  for  by  the  sting  of  personal  malienilv  in  the 
tail ;  when  the  most  vapid  satires  have  become  the 
objects  of  a  keen  public  interest  purely  from  the 
number  of  contemporary  characters  named  in  the 
patch-work  Notes  (which  possess,  however,  the  com- 
parative merit  of  being  more  poetical  than  the  Text,) 
and  because,  to  increase  the  stimulus,  the  Author  has 
sagaciously  left  his  own  name  for  whispers  and  con- 
jectures!— In  an  age,  when  even  Sermons  are  pub- 
lished with  a  double  Appendix  stuffed  with  names — 
in  a  generation  so  transformed  from  the  characteris- 
tic reserve  of  Brilons,  that  from  the  ephemeral  sheet 
of  a  London  Newspaper  to  the  everlasting  Scotch 
Professorial  Quarto,  almost  every  publication  exhibits 
or  flatters  the  epidemic  distemper :  that  the  very 
"  Last  year's  Rebuses"  in  the  Lady's  Diarv,  are  an- 
swered in  a  serious  Elegy  "  On  my  Father's  Death," 
with  the  name  and  habitat  of  the  elegiac  (Edipus 
subscribed:  —  and  "other  ingenious  solutions  u-ere 
likewise  given"  to  the  said  Rebuses — not,  as  heretofore, 
by  Crito,  Philander,  A  B,  X  Y,  Sec.,  but  by  fifty  or 
sixty  plain  English  surnames  at  full  length,  with  their 
several  places  of  abode  !  In  an  age,  when  a  bashful 
Philulethes  or  Philcleulheros  is  as  rare  on  the  title- 
pages  and  among  the  signatures  of  our  Magazines,  as 
a  real  name  used  to  be  in  the  days  of  our  shy  and 
notice-shunning  grandfathers !  When  (more  exquisite 
than  all)  I  see  an  Epic  Poem  (Spirits  of  Maro  and 
Mteomdes,  make  ready  to  welcome  vour  new  com- 
peer!) advertised  with  the  special  recommendation, 
that  the  said  Epic  Poem  contains  more  than  a  hun- 
dred names  of  lining  persons!  No  —  if  Works  as 
abhorrent,  as  those  of  Major  Cartwright,  from  all  un- 
worthy provocatives  to  the  vanity,  ihe  envy,  and  the 
selfish  passions  of  mankind,  could  acquire  a  sufficient 
influence  on  the  public  mind  to  be  mischievous,  the 
plans  proposed  in  his  pamphlets  would  cease  to  be 
altogether  visionary  :  though  even  then  they  could 
not  ground  their  claims  to  actual  adoption  on  self-evi- 
dent principles  of  pure  Reason,  but  on  the  happy  ac- 
cident of  the  virtue  and  good  sense  of  that  public, 
for  whose  suffrages  they  were  presented.  (Indeed 
with  Major  Cart  Wright's  plans  I  have  no   present 


concern ;    but   with    the    principles,  on   which  he 
grounds  the  obligations  to  adopt  them.) 

But  I  must  not  sacrifice  Truth  to  my  reverence  for 
individual  purity  of  intention.  The  tendency  of  one 
good  in. m's  writings  is  altogether  a  different  thing 
from  the  tendency  of  the  system  itself,  when  seasoned 
and  served  up  for  the  unreasoning  multitude,  as  it 
has  been  by  men  whose  names  I  would  not  honor  by 
writing  them  in  the  same  sentence  with  Major  Cart- 
wright's.  For  this  Bystem  has  two  sides,  and  holds 
out  very  different  attractions  to  its  admirers  that  ad- 
vance towards  it  from  different  points  of  the  com- 
pass. It  possesses  qualities,  that  can  scarcely  fail  of 
winning  over  to  its  banners  a  numerous  host  of  shal- 
low heads  and  restless  tempers,  men  who  without 
learning  (or,  as  one  of  my  Friends  has  forcibly  ex- 
pressed it,  "  Strong  Book-mindedness")  live  as  alms- 
folks  on  the  opinions  of  their  contemporaries,  and  who, 
(well  pleased  to  exchange  the  humility  of  regret  for 
the  self-complacent  feelings  of  contempt)  reconcile 
themselves  to  the  sans-culo'.terie  of  their  Ignorance, 
bv  scoffing  at  the  useless  fox-brush  of  Pedantry* 
The  attachment  of  this  numerous  class  is  owing  nei- 
ther to  the  solidity  and  depth  of  foundation  in  this 
theorv,  or  to  the  strict  coherence  of  its  arguments; 
and  still  less  to  any  genuine  reverence  of  humanity 
in  the  abstract.  The  physiocratic  system  promises 
to  deduce  all  things,  and  everything  relative  to  law 
and  government,  with  mathematical  exactness  and 
certainty,   from   a   few  individual   and   self-evident 

'  principles.  But  who  so  dull,  as  not  to  be  capable  of 
apprehending  a  simple  self-evident  principle,  and  of 
following  a  short  demonstration  ?      By  this   system, 

:  the  system,  as  its  admirers  were  wont  to  call  it,  even 
as  they  named  the  writer  who  first  applied  it  in  sys- 
tematic detail  to  the  whole  constitution  and  adminis- 
tration of  civil  policy,  D.  Quesnoy  to  wit,  le  Docteur, 
or  the  Teacher;  by  this  system  the  observation  of 
Times,  Places,  relative  Bearings,  History,  national 

!  Customs  and  Character,  is  rendered  superfluous  :  all, 
in  short,  which  according  to  the  common  notion  makes 
I  he  attainment  of  legislative  prudence  a  work  of  dif- 
ficultyand  long-continued  effort,  even  for  the  acutest 

|  and  most  comprehensive  minds.     The  cautious  bal- 

:  ancing  of  comparative  advantages,  the  painful  cal- 
culation of  forces  and  counter-forces,  the  preparation 
of  circumstances,  the  lynx-eyed  watching  for  oppor- 
tunities, are  all  superseded  ;  and  by  the  magic  ora- 
cles of  certain  axioms  and  definitions  it  is  revealed 
how  the  world  with  all  its  concerns  should  be  mech- 
anized, and  then  let  go  on  of  itself.     All  the  positive 


*  "  He  (Charles  Brandon,  Duke  of  Suffolk)  knowing  that 
bath  no  enemy  but  Ignorance,  did  suspect   always 
th>"  want  oi"  it  in  lliose  men  who  derided  the  habit  of  it  in 
others:  like  the  Fox  in  the  Fable,  who  being  without  a  Tail, 
fibers  to  cut  off  theirs  as  a  burthen.    But  ha 
the  Philosopher's  division  of  men  into  three  rank9 
;   i  knew  good  and  wire  willing  to  teach  others  ; 
these  he  said  were  like  Gods  among  men — others  who  though 
I  do)  much  yet  were  willing  to  learn  :  these  he  said 
were  like  Me.i  among  Beasts — and  some  who  knew  not  good 
and  yet  demised  such  as  should  teach  them;  these  he  es- 
teemed as  Beasts  among  Men." 

Lloyd's  State  Worthies,  p.  33. 
437 


428 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Institutions  and  Regulations,  which  the  prudence  of  i  the  noblest  minds:  and  I  should  act  the  port  of  a 


our  ancestors  had  provided,  are  declared  to  be  erro- 
neous or  interested  perversions  of  the  natural  rela- 
tions of  man  :  and  the  whole  is  delivered  over  to  the 
faculty,  which  all  men  possess  equally,  i.  e.  the  com- 
mon sense  or  universal  Reason.  The  science  of  Poli- 
tics, it  is  said,  is  but  the  application  of  the  common 


coward,  if  I  disguised  my  convictions,  that  the  errors 
of  the  Aristocratic  party  were  full  as  gross,  and  far 
less  excusable.  Instead  of  contenting  themselves 
with  opposing  the  real  blessings  of  English  law  to  the 
splendid  promises  of  untried  theory,  too  large  a  part 
of  those,  who  (tailed  themselves  Anti-Jacobins,  did  all 


sense,  which  every  man  possesses,  to  a  subject  in  i  in  their  power  to  suspend  those  blessings;  and  thus 


which  every  man  is  concerned.  To  be  a  Musician, 
an  Orator,  a  Painter,  a  Poet,  an  Architect,  or  even  to 
be  a  good  Mechanist,  presupposes  Genius ;  to  be  an 
excellent  Artizan  or  Mechanic,  requires  more  than 
an  average  degree  of  Talent ;  but  to  be  a  legislator 
requires  nothing  but  common  Sense.  The  commonest 
human  intellect  therefore  suffices  for  a  perfect  insight 
in  the  wdiole  science  of  civil  Polity,  and  qualifies  the 
possessor  to  sit  in  judgment  on  the  constitution  and 
administration  of  his  own  country,  and  of  all  other 
nations.  This  must  needs  be  agreeable  tidings  to  the 
great  mass  of  mankind.  There  is  no  subject,  which 
men  in  general  like  better  to  harangue  on,  than  Poli- 
tics :  none,  the  deciding  on  which  more  flatters  the 
sense  of  self-importance.  For  as  to  what  Doctor 
Johnson  calls  plebeian  envy,  I  do  not  believe  that  the 
mass  of  men  are  justly  chargeable  with  it  in  their 
political  feelings ;  not  only  because  envy  is  seldom 
excited  except  by  definite  and  individual  objects,  but 
still  more  because  it  is  a  painful  passion,  and  not 
likely  to  co-exist  with  the  high  delight  and  self-com- 
placency with  which  the  harangues  on  States  and 
Statesmen,  Princes  and  Generals,  are  made  and  lis- 
tened to  in  ale-house  circles  or  promiscuous  public 
meetings.  A  certain  portion  of  this  is  not  merely  de- 
sirable, but  necessary  in  a  free  country.  Heaven 
forbid!  that  the  most  ignorant  of  my  countrymen 
should  be  deprived  of  a  subject  so  well  fitted  to 

■ "  impart 

An  hour's  importance  to  the  poor  man's  heart !" 

But  a  system  which  not  only  flatters  the  pride  and 
vanity  of  men,  but  which  in  so  plausible  and  intelli- 
gible a  manner  persuades  them,  not  that  this  is  wrong 
and  that  that  ought  to  have  been  managed  otherwise ; 
or  that  Mr.  X.  is  worth  a  hundred  of  Mr.  Y.  as  a  Min- 
ister or  Parliament  Man,  &c.  &c. ;  but  that  all  is 
wrong  and  mistaken,  nay,  all  most  unjust  and  wick- 
ed, and  that  every  man  is  competent,  and  in  contempt 
of  all  rank  and  property,  on  the  mere  title  of  his  Per- 
sonality, possesses  the  Right,  and  is  under  the  most 
solemn  moral  obligation,  to  give  a  helping  hand  to- 
ward overthrowing  it:  this  confusion  of  political  with 
religious  claims,  this  transfer  of  the  rights  of  Religion 
disjoined  from  the  austere  duties  of  self-denial,  with 
which  religious  rights  exercised  in  their  proper  sphere 


furnished  new  arguments  lo  the  advocates  of  innova- 
tion, when  they  should  have  been  answering  the  old 
ones.    The  most  prudent,  as  well  as  the  most  honest 
mode  of  defending  the  existing  arrangements,  would 
have  been,  to  have  candidly  admitted  what  could  not 
with  truth  be  denied,  and  then  to  have  shown  that, 
though   the   things  complained  of  were  evils,  they 
were  necessary  evils;  or  if  they  were  removable,  yet 
that  the  consequences  of  the  heroic  medicines  recom- 
mended  by  the  Revolutionists  would    be  far  more 
dreadful  than  the  disease.    Now  either  the  one  or 
the  other  point,  by  the  double  aid  of  History  and  a 
sound  Philosophy,  they  might  have  established  with 
a  certainty  little  short  of  demonstration,  and  with  such 
colors  and  illustrations  as  would  have  taken  strong 
hold  of  the  very  feelings  which  had  attached  to  the 
democratic  system  all  the  good  and  valuable  men  of 
the  party.     But  instead  of  this  they  precluded  the 
possibility  of  being  listened  to  even  by  the  gentlest 
and  most  ingenuous  among  the  friends  of  the  French 
Revolution,  denying  or  attempting  to  palliate  facts, 
that  were  equally  notorious  and  unjustifiable,  and 
supplying  the  lack  of  brain  by  an  overflow  of  gall. 
While  they  lamented  with  tragic  outcries  the  injured 
Monarch  and   the  exiled  Noble,  they  displayed  the 
most  disgusting  insensibility  to  the  privations,  suffer- 
ings, and  manifold  oppressions  of  the  great  mass  of 
the  Continental  population,  and  a  blindness  or  cal- 
lousness still  more  offensive  to  the  crimes*  and  unut- 
terable abominations  of  their  oppressors.     Not  only 
was  the  Bastile  justified,  but  the  Spanish  Inquisition 
itself— and  this  in  a  pamphlet  passionately  extolled 
and  industriously  circulated  by  the  adherents  of  the 
then  ministry.     Thus,  and  by  their  infatuated  pane- 
gyrics on  the  former  state  of  France,  they  played  into 
the  hands  of  their  worst  and  most  dangerous  antago- 
nists.    In  confounding  the  conditions  of  the  English 
and  the  French  peasantry,  and  in  quoting  the  author- 
ities of  Milton,  Sidney,  and  their  immortal  compeers, 
as  applicable  to  the.  present  times  and  the  existing  go- 
vernment, the  Demagogues  appeared  to  talk  only  the 
same  language  as  the  Anti-jacobins  themselves  em- 
ployed.    For  if  the  vilest  calumnies  of  obsolete  big- 
ots were  applied  against  these  great  men  by  the  one 
party,  with  equal  plausibility  might  their  authorities 
be  adduced,  and  their  arguments  for  increasing  the 


cannot  fail  to  be  accompanied  ;  and  not  only  disjoin- 
ed from  self-restraint,  but  united  with  the  indulgence  |  power  of  the  people  be  re-applied  to  the  existing  go- 
of those  passions  (self-will,  love  of  power,  (So.)  which  '  vernment,  by  the  other.    If  the  most  disgusting  forms 


it  is  the  principal  aim  and  hardest  task  of  Religion  to 
correct  and  restrain — this,  I  say,  is  altogether  differ- 
ent from  the  Village  Politics  of  yore,  and  may  be 
pronounced  alarming  and  of  dangerous  tendency  by 
the  boldest  Advocates  of  Reform  not  less  consistently, 
than  the  most  timid  eschewers  of  popular  disturbance. 


of  despotism  were  spoken  of  by  the  one  in  the  same 
respectful  language  as  the  executive  power  of  our 


*  I  do  not  mean  the  Sovereigns,  but  the  old  Nobility  of  both 
Germany  and  France.    The  extravagantly  false  and  flattering 
picture,  which  Burke  gave  of  the  French  Nobility  and  Hier- 
archy, has  always  appeared  to  me  the  greatest  defect  of  his, 
Still,  however,  the  system  had  its  golden  side  for  ,  in  so  many  respects,  invaluuble  Work. 

438 


THE  FRIEND. 


429 


own  country,  what  wonder  if  the  irritated  partizans 
of  the  other  were  able  to  impose  on  the  populace  the 
converse  of  the  proposition,  and  to  confound  the  exe- 
cutive branch  of  the  English  sovereignty  with  the 
despotisms  of  less  happy  lands?  The  first  duty  of  a 
wise  advocate  is  to  convince  his  opponents,  that  he 
understands  their  arguments  and  sympathizes  with 
their  just  feelings.  But  instead  of  this,  these  pretend- 
ed Constitutionalists  recurred  to  the  language  of  in- 
sult, and  to  measures  (if  persecution.  In  order  to  op- 
pose Jacobinism,  they  imitated  it  in  its  worst  features ; 
in  personal  slander,  in  illegal  violence,  and  even  in 
the  thirst  for  blood.  They  justified  the  corruptions 
of  the  state  in  the  same  spirit  of  sophistry,  by  the 
same  vague  arguments  of  general  Reason,  and  the 
same  disregard  of  ancient  ordinances  and  established 
opinions,  with  which  the  state  itself  had  been  attack- 
ed by  the  Jacobins.  The  wages  of  state-dependence 
were  represented  as  sacred  as  the  properly  won  by 
industry  or  derived  from  a  long  line  of  ancestors. 

It  was,  indeed,  evident  to  thinking  men,  that  both 
parties  were  playing  the  same  game  with  different 
counters.  If  the  Jacobins  ran  wild  with  the  Rights  j 
of  Man,  and  the  abstract  sovereignly  of  the  people, 
their  antagonists  flew  off  as  extravagantly  from  the 
sober  good  sense  of  our  forefathers,  and  idolized  as 
mere  an  abstraction  in  the  Rights  of  Sovereigns. 
Nor  was  this  confined  to  Sovereigns.  They  defend- 
ed the  exemptions  and  privileges  of  all  privileged 
orders  on  the  presumption  of  their  inalienable  right 
to  them,  however  inexpedient  they  might  have  been 
found,  as  universally  and  abstractly  as  if  these  privi- 
leges had  been  decreed  by  the  Supreme  Wisdom, 
instead  of  being  the  offspring  of  chance  or  violence, 
or  the  inventions  of  human  prudence.  Thus,  while 
they  deemed  themselves  defending,  they  were  in 
reality  blackening  and  degrading  the  uninjurious  and 
useful  privileges  of  our  English  nobility,  which 
(thank  Heaven!)  rest  on  nobler  and  securer  grounds. 
Thus  too,  the  necessity  of  compensations  for  de- 
throned princes  was  affirmed  as  familiarly,  as  if 
kingdoms  had  been  private  estates :  and  no  more 
disapprobation  was  expressed  at  the  transfer  of  live 
or  ten  millions  of  men  from  one  proprietor  to  another, 
than  of  as  many  score  head  of  cattle.  This  most  de- 
grading and  superannuated  superstition,  or  rather 
this  ghost  of  a  defunct  absurdity  raised  up  by  the 
necromancy  of  a  violent  re-action  (such  as  the  ex- 
treme of  one  system  is  sure  to  occasion  in  the  ad- 
herents of  its  opposite)  was  more  than  once  allowed 
to  regulate  our  measures  in  the  conduct  of  a  war  on 
which  the  independence  of  the  British  empire  and 
the  progressive  civilization  of  all  mankind  depended. 
I  could  mention  possessions  of  paramount  and  indis- 
pensable importance  to  first-rate  national  interests, 
the  nominal  sovereign  of  which  had  delivered  up  all 
his  sea-ports  and  strong-holds  to  the  French,  and 
maintained  a  French  army  in  his  dominions,  and  had 
therefore,  by  the  law  of  nations,  made  his  territories 
French  dependencies — which  possessions  were  not  to 
be  touched,  though  the  natural  inhabitants  were 
eager  to  place  themselves  under  our  permanent  pro- 
tection— and  why  ? — They  were  the  property  of  the 


king  of !    All  the  grandeur  and  majesty  of  the 

law  of  nations,  which  taught  our  ancestors  to  distin- 
guish between  a  European  sovereign  and  the  miser- 
able despots  of  oriental  barbarism,  and  to  consider 
the  former  as  the  representative  of  the  nation  which 
he  governed,  and  as  inextricably  connected  with  its 
fortunes  as  Scjvereign,  were  merged  in  the  basest 
personality.  Instead  of  the  interest  of  mighty  nations, 
it  seemed  as  if"  a  mere  law-suit  were  carrying  on  be- 
tween John  Doe  and  Richard  Roe  !  The  happiness 
of  millions  was  light  in  the  balance,  weighed  against 
a  theatric  compassion  for  one  individual  and  his  fam- 
ily, who,  (I  speak  from  facts  that  I  myself  know) 
if  they  feared  the  French  more,  hated  us  worse. 
Though  the  restoration  of  good  sense  commenced 
during  the  interval  of  the  peace  of  Amiens,  yet  it 
was  not  till  the  Spanish  insurrection  that  Englishmen 
of  all  parties  recurred,  in  Into,  to  the  old  English 
principles,  and  spoke  of  their  Hampdens,  Sidneys, 
and  Miltons,  with  the  old  enthusiasm.  During  the 
last  war,  an  acquaintance  of  mine  (least  of  all  a  po- 
litical zealot)  had  christened  a  vessel  which  he  had 
just  built — The  Lieerty;  and  was  seriously  admon- 
ished by  his  aristocratic  friends  to  change  it  lor  some 
other  name.  What  1  replied  the  owner  very  inno- 
cently— should  I  call  it  The  Fre,edom  ?  That  fit 
was  replied)  would  be  far  better,  as  people  might 
then  think  only  of  Freedom  of  Trade  ;  Whereas 
Liberty  has  a  Jacobinical  sound  with  it  ?  Alas  !  (and 
this  is  an  observation  of  Sir  J.  Denham  and  of  Burke) 
is  there  no  medium  between  an  ague-fit  and  a  fren- 
zy-fever. 

I  have  said  that  to  withstand  the  arguments  of  the 
lawless,  the  Anti-jacobins  proposed  to  suspend  tbe 
Law,  and  by  the  interposition  of  a  particular  statute 
to  eclipse  the  blessed  light  of  the  universal  Sun,  that 
spies  and  informers  might  tyrannize  and  escape  in 
the  ominous  darkness.  Oh  !  if  these  mistaken  men, 
intoxicated  with  alarm  and  bewildered  by  that  panic 
of  property,  which  they  themselves  were  the  chief 
agents  in  exciting,  had  ever  lived  in  a  country  where 
there  was  indeed  a  general  disposition  to  change  and 
rebellion  !  Had  they  ever  travelled  through  Sicily, 
or  through  France  at  the  first  coming  on  of  the 
Revolution,  or  even,  alas!  through  too  many  of  the 
provinces  of  a  sister-island,  they  could  not  but  have 
shrunk  from  their  own  declarations  concerning  the 
state  of  feeling  and  opinion  at  that  time  predominant 
throughout  Great  Britain.  There  was  a  time  (I  leaven 
grant  that  that  time  may  have  passed  by)  when  by 
g  a  narrow  strait  they  might  have  learnt  the 
true  symptoms  of  approaching  danger,  and  have  se- 
cured themselves  from  mistaking  the  meetings  and 
idle  rant  of  such  sedition  as  shrunk  appalled  from  the 
!  sight  of  a  constable,  for  the  dire  murmuring  and 
strange  consternation  which  precede  the  storm  or 
1  earthquake  of  national  discord.  Not  only  in  Coffee- 
houses and  public  Theatres,  but  even  at  the  tables 
of  the  wealthy,  they  would  have  heard  the  advocates 
of  existing  Government  defend  their  cause  in  the 
language  and  with  the  tone  of  men,  who  are  con- 
scious that  they  are  in  a  minority.  But  in  England, 
,  when  the  alarm  was  at  the  highest,  there  was  not  a 

439 


430 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


city,  no,  not  a  town  in  which  a  man  suspected  of 
holding  democratic  principles  could  move  abroad 
without  receiving  some  unpleasant  proof  of  the 
hatred  in  which  his  supposed  opinions  were  held  by 
the  great  majority  of  the  people :  and  the  only  in- 
stances of  popular  excess  and  indignation  were  on 
the  side  of  the  Government  and  the  Established 
Church.  But  why  need  I  appeal  to  these  invidious 
fads?  Turn  over  the  pages  of  History,  and  seek  for 
a  single  instance  of  a  revolution  having  been  effect- 
ed without  the  concurrence  of  either  the  Nobles,  or 
the  Ecclesiastics,  or  the  moneyed  classes,  in  any 
country  in  which  the  influences  of  property  had  ever 
been  predominant,  and  where  the  interests  of  the 
proprietors  were  interlinked  !  Examine  the  revolu- 
tion of  the  Belgic  provinces  under  Philip  the  Second  ; 
the  civil  wars  of  France  in  the  preceding  generation, 
the  history  of  the  American  revolution,  or  the  yet 
more  recent  events  in  Sweden  and  Spain  ;  and  it 
will  be  scarcely  possible  not  to  perceive,  that  in  Eng- 
land, from  1791  to  the  peace  of  Amiens,  there  were 
neither  tendencies  to  confederacy  nor  actual  confed- 
eracies, against  which  the  existing  Laws  had  not 
provided  both  sufficient  safeguards  and  an  ample 
punishment.  But  alas!  the  panic  of  property  had 
been  struck  in  the  first  instance  for  party  purposes  : 
and  when  it  became  general,  its  propagators  caught 
it  themselves,  and  ended  in  believing  their  own  lie  : 
even  as  our  bulls  in  Burrowdale  sometimes  run  mad 
with  the  echo  of  their  own  bellowing.  The  conse- 
quences were  most  injurious.  Our  attention  was  con- 
centrated to  a  monster  which  could  not  survive  the 
convulsions  in  which  it  had  been  brought  forth,  even 
the  enlightened  Burke  himself  too  often  talking  and 
reasoning  as  if  a  perpetual  and  organized  anarchy  had 
been  a  possible  thing!  Thus  while  we  were  warring 
against  French  doctrines,  we  took  little  heed  whether 
the  means  by  which  we  had  attempted  to  overthrow 
them,  were  not  likely  to  aid  and  augment  the  far 
more  formidable  evil  of  French  ambition.  Like 
children  we  ran  away  from  the  yelping  of  a  cur,  and 
took  shelter  at  the  heels  of  a  vicious  war-horse. 

The  conduct  of  the  aristocratic  party  was  equally 
unwise  in  private  life  and  to  individuals,  especially 
to  the  young  and  inexperienced,  who  were  surely  to 
be  forgiven  for  having  had  their  imagination  dazzled, 
and  their  enthusiasm  kindled,  by  a  novelty  so  spe- 
cious, that  even  an  old  and  tried  Statesman  had  pro- 
nounced it  "a  stupendous  monument  of  human  wis- 
dom and  human  happiness."  This  was  indeed  a 
gross  delusion,  but  assuredly  for  young  men  at  least, 
a  very  venial  one.  To  hope  too  boldly  of  Human 
Nature  is  a  fault  which  all  good  men  have  an  interest 
in  forgiving.  Nor  was  it  less  removable  than  venial, 
if  the  party  had  taken  the  only  way  by  which  the 
error  could  be,  or  even  ought  to  have  been,  removed. 
Having  first  sympathized  with  the  warm  benevolence 
and  the  enthusiasm  for  Liberty,  which  had  conse- 
crated it,  they  should  have  then  shown  the  young 
Enthusiasts  that  Liberty  was  not  the  only  blessing  of 
Society;  that  though  desirable,  even  for  its  own  sake, 
it  yet  derived  its  main  value  as  the  means  of  calling 
forth  and  securing  other  advantages  and  excellencies, 


the  activities  of  Industry,  the  security  of  Life  and 
Property,  the  peaceful  energies  of  Genius  and  mani- 
fold Talent,  the  development  of  moral  virtues,  and 
the  independence  and  dignily  of  the  nation  in  its  re- 
lations to  foreign  powers  :  and  that  neither  these  nor 
Liberty  itself  could  subsist  in  a  country  so  various  in 
its  soils,  so  long  inhabited  and  so  fully  peopled  as 
Great  Britain,  without  difference  of  ranks  and  with- 
out laws  which  recognized  and  protected  the  privi- 
leges of  each.  But  instead  of  thus  winning  them  back 
from  the  snare,  they  too  often  drove  them  into  it  by 
angry  contumelies,  which  being  in  contradiction  with 
each  other  could  only  excite  contempt  for  those  that 
uttered  them.  To  prove  the  folly  of  the  opinions, 
they  were  represented  as  the  crude  fancies  of  un- 
fledged wit  and  school-boy  statesmen  ;  but  when  ab- 
horrence was  to  be  expressed,  the  self-same  unfledged 
school-boys  were  invested  with  all  the  attributes  of 
brooding  conspiracy  and  hoary-headed  treason.  Nay, 
a  sentence  of  absolute  reprobation  was  passed  on 
them ;  and  the  speculative  error  of  Jacobinism  was 
equalized  to  the  mysterious  sin  in  Scripture,  which  in 
some  inexplicable  manner  excludes  not  only  mercy 
but  even  repentance.  It  became  the  watch-word  of 
the  party,  "  once  a  Jacobin,  always  a  Jacobin." 
And  wherefore?*  (We  will  suppose  this  question 
asked  by  an  individual,  who  in  his  youth  or  earliest 
manhood  had  been  enamoured  of  a  system,  which  for 
him  had  combined  the  austere  beauty  of  science,  at 
once  with  all  the  light  and  colours  of  imagination, 
and  with  all  the  warmth  of  wide  religious  charity, 
and  who,  overlooking  its  ideal  essence,  had  dreamt 
of  actually  building  a  government  on  personal  and 
natural  rights  alone.)  And  wherefore  ?  "  Is  Jacob- 
inism an  absurdity,  and  have  we  no  understanding  to 
detect  it  with  ?  Is  it  productive  of  all  misery  and  all 
horrors,  and  have  we  no  natural  humanity  to  make  us 
turn  away  with  indignation  and  loathing  from  it? 
Uproar  and  confusion,  insecurity  of  person  and  of 
property,  the  tyranny  of  mobs  or  the  domination  of  a 
soldiery ;  private  houses  changed  to  brothels,  the  cere- 
mony of  marriage  but  an  initiation  to  harlotry,  and 
marriage  itself  degraded  to  mere  concubinage— these, 
the  wiser  advocates  of  Aristocracy  have  said,  and 
truly  said,  are  the  effects  of  Jacobinism  ?  In  private 
life,  an  insufferable  licentiousness,  and  abroad  an 
intolerable  despotism  ?  "  Once  a  Jacobin,  always 
a  Jacobin" — O  wherefore?  Is  it  because  the 
Creed  which  we  have  stated  is  dazzling  at  first 
sight  to  the  young,  the  innocent,  the  disinterested, 
and  those  who,  judging  of  men  in  general  from 
their  own  uncorrupted  hearts,  judge  erroneously,  and 


*  The  passage  which  follows  was  first  published  in  the 
Morning  Post,  in  the  year  1800,  and  contained,  if  1  mistake 
not,  the  first  philosophical  appropriation  of  a  precise  import 
to  the  word  Jacobin,  as  distil  ct  from  Republican,  Democrat, 
and  Demagogue.  The  whole  Essay  has  n  peculiar  interest  to 
myself  at  the  present  moment,  (1  May,  1SI?)  from  the  recent 
notorious  publication  of  Mr.  Southey's  juvenile  Drama,  the 
Wat  Tyler,  and  the  consequent  assault  on  his  character  by  an 
M.  P.  in  his  senatorial  capacity,  to  whom  the  Publishers  are 
doubtless  knit  by  the  two-fold  tie  of  sympathy  and  gratitude. 
The  names  of  the  Publishers  are  Sherwood,  Nealy  and  Jones  i 
their  benefactor's  name  is  William  Smith. 

440 


THE  FRIEND. 


431 


expect  unwisely  ?  Is  it,  because  it  deceives  the  mind 
in  its  purest  and  most  flexible  period  ?  Is  it,  because 
it  is  an  error,  that  every  day's  experience  aids  to  de- 
tect ?  An  error  against  which  all  history  is  full  of 
warning  examples  >  Or  is  it  because  the  experiment 
has  been  tried  before  our  eyes  and  the  error  made 
palpable? 

From  what  source  arc  we  to  derive  this  strange 
phenomenon,  that  the  young  and  the  enthusiastic, 
who,  as  our  daily  experience  informs  us,  are  deceived 
in  their  religious  antipathies,  and  grow  wiser;  in  their 
friendships,  and  grow  wiser;  in  their  modes  of  plea- 
sure, and  grow  wiser;  should,  if  once  deceived  in  a 
question  of  abstract  politics,  cling  to  the  error  for  ever 
and  ever?  And  this  too,  although  in  addition  to  the 
natural  growth  of  judgment  and  information  with  in- 
crease of  years,  they  live  in  the  age  in  which  the  te- 
nets have  been  acted  upon;  and  though  the  conse- 
quences have  been  such,  that  every  good  man's  heart 
sickens,  and  his  head  turns  giddy  at  the  retrospect. 


ESSAY   II. 


Truth  1  pursued,  as  Fancy  sketch'd  the  way, 

And  wiser  men  than  I  went  worse  astray.        MSS. 


I  was  never  myself,  at  any  period  of  my  life,  a  con- 
vert to  the  system.  From  my  earliest  manhood,  it 
was  an  axiom  in  Politics  with  me,  that  in  every  coun- 
try where  property  prevailed,  property  must  be  the 
grand  basis  of  the  government;  and  that  that  govern- 
ment was  the  best,  in  which  the  power  or  political 
influence  of  the  individual  was  in  proportion  to  his 
property,  provided  that  the  free  circulation  of  proper- 
ly was  not  impeded  by  any  positive  laws  or  customs, 
nor  the  tendency  of  wealth  to  accumulate  in  abiding 
masses  unduly  encouraged.  I  perceived,  that  if  the 
people  at  large  were  neither  ignorant  nor  immoral, 
there  could  be  no  motive  for  a  sudden  and  violent 
change  of  government ;  and  if  they  were,  there 
could  be  no  hope  but  of  a  change  for  the  worse. 
"The  Temple  of  Despotism,  like  that  of  the  Mexican 
God,  would  be  rebuilt  with  human  skulls,  and  more 
firmly,  though  in  a  different  architecture."*  Thanks 
to  the  excellent  education  which  I  had  received,  my 
reason  was  too  clear  not  to  draw  this  "  circle  of  pow- 
er"' round  me,  and  my  spirit  too  honest  to  attempt  to 
break  through  it.  My  feelings,  however,  and  imagi- 
nation did  not  remain  unkindled  in  this  general  con- 
flagration; and  I  confess  I  should  be  more  inclined  to 
be  ashamed  than  proud  of  myself  if  they  hail !  I  was 
a  sharer  in  the  general  vortex,  though  my  little  world 
described  the  path  of  its  revolution  in  an  orbit  of  its 
own.  What  I  dared  not  expect  from  constitutions  of 
government  and  whole  nations,  I  hoped  from  Reli- 
gion and  a  small  company  of  chosen  individuals,  and 
formed  a  plan,  as  harmless  as  it  was  extravagant,  of 
trying  the  experiment  of  human  perfectibility  on  the 
banks  of  the  Susquehannah  ;  where  our  little  society, 

*  T  i  the  best  of  my  recollection,  these  were  Mr.  Somhey's 
words  in  the  year  1794. 

29  Nn2 


in  its  second  generation,  was  to  have  combined  the 
innocence  of  the  patriarchal  age  with  the  knowledge 
and  genuine  refinements  of  European  culture  :  and 
where  I  dreamt  that,  in  the  sober  evening  of  my  life, 
I  should  behold  the  Cottages  of  Independence  in  the 
undivided  Dale  of  Industry, 

"  And  oft,  soothed  sadly  by  some  dirgeful  wind 
JIuso  on  the  sole  ills  I  had  left  behind  '." 

Strange  fancies!  and  as  vain  as  strange!  yet  to  the 
!  intense  interest  and  impassioned  zeal,  which  called 
I  forth  and  strained  every  faculty  of  my  intellect  for 
j  the  organization  and  defence  of  this  scheme,  I  owe 
I  much  of  whatever  I  at  present  possess,  my  clearest 
,  insight  into  the  nature  of  individual  man,  and  my 
j  most  comprehensive  views  of  his  social  relations,  of 
the  true  uses  of  trade  and  commerce,  and  how  far 
I  the  wealth  and  relative  power  of  nations  promote  or 
impede  their   welfare  and  inherent   strength.      Nor 
were  they  less  serviceable  in  securing  myself,  and 
perhaps  some  others,  from  the  pitfalls  of  sedition:  and 
when  we  gradually  alighted  on  the  firm  ground  of 
common  sense,  from  the  gradually-exhausted  balloon 
of  youthful  enthusiasm,  though  the  air-built  castles, 
which  we  had  been  pursuing,  had  vanished  with  all 
their  pageantry  of  shifting  forms  and  glowing  colors, 
we  were  yet  free  from   the   stains   and   impurities 
which  might  have  remained  upon  us,  had  we  been 
travelling  with  the  crowd  of  less  imaginative  mal- 
contents, through  the  dark  lanes  and  foul  bye-roads 
of  ordinary  fanaticism. 

But  oh !  there  were  thousands  as  young  and  as  in- 
nocent as  myself  who,  not  like  me,  sheltered  in  the 
tranquil  nook  or  inland  cove  of  a  particular  fancy, 
were  driven  along  with  the  general  current !  Many 
there  were,  young  men  of  loftiest  minds,  yea  the 
prime  stuff  out  of  which  manly  wisdom  and  practi- 
cable greatness  is  to  be  formed,  who  had  appropriated 
their  hopes  and  the  ardor  of  their  souls  to  mankind  at 
large,  to  the  wide  expanse  of  national  interests, 
which  then  seemed  fermenting  in  the  French  Repub- 
lic as  the  main  outlet  and  chief  crater  of  the  revolu- 
tionary torrents ;  and  who  confidently  believed,  that 
these  torrents,  like  the  lavas  of  Vesuvius,  were  to 
subside  into  a  soil  of  inexhaustible  fertility  on  the  cir- 
cumjacent lands,  the  old  divisions  and  mouldering 
edifices  of  which  they  had  covered  or  swept  away — 
Enthusiasts  of  kindliest  temperament,  who,  to  use 
the  words  of  the  Poet,  (having  already  borrowed  the 
meaning  and  the  metaphor)  had  approached 


Of  human  nature  from  the  golden  side, 

And  would  hnve  fought  even  to  the  death  to  attest 

The  quality  of  the  metal  which  they  saw." 

My  honored  friend  has  permitted  me  to  give  a  value 
and  relief  to  the  present  Essay,  by  a  quotation  from 
one  of  his  unpublished  Poems,  the  length  of  which  I 
regret  only  from  its  forbidding  me  to  trespass  on  his 
kindness  by  making  it  yet  longer.  I  trust  there 
are  many  of  my  Readers  of  the  same  age  with  my- 
self who  will  throw  themselves  back  into  the  state 
of  thought  and  feeling  in  which  they  were  w:hen 
France  was  reported  to  have  solemnized  her  first  sa- 
crifice of  error  and  prejudice  on  the  bloodless  altar 
441 


432 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


of  Freedom,  by  an  oath  of  peace  and  good-will  to  all 

mankind. 

Oh  !  pleasant  exercise  of  hope  and  joy  ! 

For  mighty  were  the  auxiliaries,  which  then  stood 

Upon  our  side,  we  who  were  strong  in  love 

Bliss  was  it  in  that  dawn  to  be  alive, 

But  to  be  young  was  very  heaven  !  oh  '.  times 

In  which  the  meagre,  stale,  forbidding  ways 

Of  custom,  law,  and  staluie,  took  at  once 

The  attraction  of  a  country  in  Romance  ! 

When  Reason  seem'd  the  most  to  assert  her  rights. 

When  most  intent  on  making  of  herself 

A  prime  Enchanter  to  assist  the  work. 

Which  then  was  going  forward  in  her  name ! 

Not  favor'd  spots  alone,  but  the  whole  earth. 

The  beauty  wore  of  promise — that  which  beta 

(To  take  an  image  which  was  felt  no  doubt 

Among  the  bowers  of  Paradise  itself) 

The  budding  rose  above  the  rose  full  blown. 

What,  temper  at  the  prospect  did  not  wake 

To  happiness  unthought  of?    The  inert 

Were  roused,  and  lively  natures  rapt  away  ! 

They  who  had  fed  their  child  hoed  upon  dreams, 

The  play-fellows  of  fancy,  who  had  made 

All  powers  of  swiftness,  subtlety,  and  strength 

Their  ministers,  used  to  stir  in  lordly  wise 

Among  the  grandest  objects  of  the  sense, 

And  deal  with  whatsoever  they  found  there 

As  if  they  had  within  some  lurking  right 

To  yield  it; — they  too,  who  of  gentle  mood 

Had  watch'd  all  gentle  motions,  and  to  these 

Had  fitted  their  own  thoughts,  schemers  more  mild 

And  in  the  region  of  their  peaceful  selves; — 

Now  was  it  that  both  found,  the  Meek  and  Lofty 

Did  both  find  helpers  to  their  heart's  desire. 

And  stuffat  hand,  plastic  as  they  could  wish  ! — 

Were  call'd  upon  to  exercise  their  skill 

Not  in  Utopia,  subterraneous  fields. 

Or  some  secreted  island,  heaven  knows  where! 

But  in  the  very  world,  which  is  the  world 

Of  all  of  us,  the  place  where  in  the  end 

We  find  our  happiness,  or  not  at  all  ! 

WORDSWORTH. 

The  Peace  of  Amiens  deserved  the  name  of  peace, 
for  it  gave  us  unanimity  at  home,  and  reconciled  Eng- 
lishmen with  each  other.  Yet  it  would  be  as  wild  a 
fancy  as  any  of  which  we  have  treated,  to  expect  that 
the  violence  of  party  spirit  is  never  more  to  return. 
Sooner  or  later  the  same  causes,  or  their  equivalents, 
will  call  forth  the  same  opposition  of  opinion,  and 
bring  the  same  passions  into  play.  Ample  would  be 
my  recompense,  could  I  foresee  that  this  present  Es- 
say would  be  the  means  of  preventing  discord  and 
unhappiness  in  a  single  family  ;  if  its  words  of  warn- 
ing, aided  by  its  tones  of  sympathy,  should  arm  a  sin- 
gle man  of  genius  against  the  fascinations  of  his  own 
ideal  world,  a  single  philanthropist  against  the  enthu- 
siasm of  his  own  heart !  Not  less  would  be  my  sat- 
isfaction, dared  I  flatter  myself  that  my  lucubrations 
would  not  be  altogether  without  effect  on  those  who 
deem  themselves  Men  of  Judgment,  faithful  to  the 
light  of  Practice,  and  not  to  be  led  astray  by  the  wan- 
dering fires  of  Theory !  If  I  should  aid  in  making 
these  aware,  that  in  recoiling  with  too  incautious  an 
abhorrence  from  the  bugbears  of  innovation,  they  may 
sink  all  at  once  into  the  slough  of  slavishness  and 
corruption.  Let  such  persons  recollect  that  the 
charms  of  hope  and  novelty  furnish  some  palliation 
for  the  idolatry  to  which  they  seduce  the  mind;  but 
that  the  apotheosis  of  familiar  abuses  and  of  the  er- 
rors of  selfishness  is  the  vilest  of  superstitions.  Let 
them  recollect  too,  that  nothing  can  be  more  incon- 


gruous than  to  combine  the  pusillanimity,  which  de- 
spairs of  human  improvement,  with  the  arrogance, 
supercilious  contempt,  and  boisterous  anger,  which 
have  no  pretensions  to  pardon  except  as  the  overflow- 
ings of  ardent  anticipation  and  enthusiastic  faith! 
And  finally,  and  above  all,  let  it  be  remembered  by 
both  parties,  and  indeed  by  eontroversialisis,  on  all 
subjects,  that  every  speculative  error  which  boasts  a 
multitude  of  advocates,  has  ils  golden  as  well  as  its 
dark  side;  that  there  is  always  some  Truth  connect- 
ed with  it,  the  exclusive  attention  to  which  has  mis- 
led the  Understanding,  some  moral  beauty  which  has 
given  it  charms  for  the  heart.  Let  it  be  remembered, 
that  no  Assailant  of  an  Error  can  reasonably  hope  to 
be  listened  to  by  its  Advocates,  who  has  not  proved 
to  them  that  he  has  seen  the  disputed  subject  in  the 
same  point  of  view,  and  is  capable  of  contemplating 
it  with  the  same  feelings  as  themselves:  (for  why 
should  we  abandon  a  cause  at  the  persuasions  of  one 
who  is  ignorant  of  the  reasons  which  has  attached  us 
to  it?)  Let  it  be  remembered,  that  lo  write,  however 
ably,  merely  to  convince  those  who  are  already  con- 
vinced, displays  but  the  courage  of  a  boaster;  and  in 
any  subject  to  rail  against  the  evil  before  we  have 
inquired  for  the  good,  and  to  exasperate  the  passions 
of  those  who  think  with  us,  by  caricaturing  ihe  opin- 
ions and  blackening  the  motives  of  our  antagonists,  is 
to  make  the  Understanding  the  pander  of  the  pas- 
sions ;  and  even  though  we  should  have  defended 
the  right  cause,  to  gain  for  ourselves  ultimately,  from 
the  good  and  the  wise  no  other  praise  than  the  su- 
preme Judge  awarded  to  the  friends  of  Job  for  their 
partial  and  uncharitable  defence  of  his  justice:  "My 
wrath  is  kindled  against  you,  for  ye  have  not  spoken 
of  me  rightfully." 


ESSAY   III. 


ON  THE  VULGAR  ERRORS  RESPECTING 
TAXES  AND  TAXATION* 

'Oirsp  ya  phi  ra;  iy^eXag  Srjpoi  fitvoi  iri-ovSas' 
'Orav  fxiv  i)  \ijivji  KarayJj,   Xa/xPa  vovaiv  dvilv 
Edv  <5'  civu)  Tt  kUl  k&tu>  tov  fioppopov  KvkSan; 
A'ipovcn'  Kai  cv  Xaixfidvtis,  r\v  ti)v  rrdAu'  rapdrrris. 

Translation. — It  is  with  you  as  with  those  that  are  hunting 
for  eels.  While  the  pond  is  clear  and  settled,  they  Uike 
nothing;  but  if  they  stir  up  the  mud  high  and  low,  then,  they 
bring  up  the  fish  : — and  you  succeed  only  as  far  as  you  can 
set  the  State  in  tumult  and  confusion. 

In  a  passage  in  the  last  Essay,  I  referred  to  the 
second  part  of  the  "Rights  of  Man,"  in  which 
Paine  assures  his  Readers  that  their  Poverty  is 
the  consequence  of  Taxation:  that  taxes  are  ren- 
dered necessary  only  by  wars  and  state  corruption  ; 
that  war  and  corruption  are  entirely  owing  to  mon- 
archy and   aristocracy;   that  by  a  revolution  and 


*  For  the  moral  effects  of  our  present  System  of  Finance, 
and  its  consequences  on  the  we/fare  of  the  Nation,  as  distin- 
guished from  its  wealth,  the  Reader  is  referred  to  the  Author'8 
Second  Lay  Sermon,  and  to  the  Section  of  Morals  in  a  sub- 
sequent part  of  this  Work. 

442 


THE  FRIEND. 


433 


a  brotherly  alliance  with  the  French  Republic, 
our  land  and  sea  forces,  our  revenue  officers,  and 
three-fourths  of  our  pensioners,  placemen,  &c.  &c. 
would  be  rendered  superfluous;  and  thai  a  small  part 
of  the  expenses  thus  saved,  would  suffice  for  the  main- 
tenance of  the  pour,  the  infirm,  and  the  aged,  through- 
out the  kingdom.  Would  to  Heaven!  that  this  infa- 
mous mode  of  misleading  and  flattering  the  lower 
classes  were  confined  to  the  writings  of  Thomas 
Paine.  But  how  often  do  we  hear,  even  from  the 
mouths  of  our  parliamentary  advocates  for  popularity, 
the  taxes  stated  as  so  much  money  actually  loal  to  the 
people;  and  a  nation  in  debt  represented  as  the  same 
both  in  kind  and  consequences,  as  an  individual 
tradesman  on  the  brink  of  bankruptcy?  It  is  scarcely 
possible,  that  these  men  should  be  themselves  de- 
ceived ;  that  they  should  be  so  ignorant  of  history  as 
not  to  know  that  the  freest  nations,  being  at  the  same 
time  commercial,  have  been  at  all  times  the  most 
heavily  taxed  :  or  so  void  of  common  sense  as  not  to 
see  that  there  is  no  analogy  in  the  case  of  a  tradesman 
and  his  creditors,  to  a  nation  indebted  to  itself. 
Surely,  a  much  fairer  instance  would  be  that  of  a 
husband  and  wife  playing  cards  at  the  same  table 
against  each  other,  where  what  the  one  loses  the 
other  gains.  Taxes  may  be  indeed,  and  often  are  in- 
jurious to  a  country :  at  no  time,  however,  from  their 
amount  merely,  but  from  the  time  or  injudicious  mode 
in  which  they  are  raised.  A  great  Statesman,  lately 
deceased,  in  one  of  his  antiministerial  harangues 
against  some  proposed  impost,  said :  the  nation  has 
been  already  bled  in  every  vein,  and  is  faint  with 
loss  of  blood.  This  blood,  however,  was  circulating 
in  the  mean  time  through  the  whole  body  of  the  state, 
and  what  was  received  into  one  chamber  of  the  heart 
was  instantly  sent  out  again  at  the  other  portal.  Had 
he  wanted  a  metaphor  to  convey  the  possible  injuries 
of  Taxation,  he  might  have  found  one  less  opposite 
to  the  fact,  in  the  known  disease  of  aneurism,  or  re- 
laxation of  the  coats  of  particular  vessels,  by  a  dis- 
proportionate accumulation  of  blood  in  them,  which 
sometimes  occurs  when  the  circulation  has  been  sud- 
denly and  violently  changed,  and  causes  helpless- 
ness, or  even  mortal  stagnation,  though  the  total  quan- 
tity of  blood  remains  the  same  in  the  system  at  large. 
But  a  fuller  and  fairer  symbol  of  Taxation,  both  in 
its  possible  good  and  evil  effects,  is  to  be  found  in  the 
evaporation  of  waters  from  the  surface  of  the  planet. 
The  sun  may  draw  up  the  moisture  from  the  river, 
the  morass,  and  the  ocean,  to  be  given  back  in  genial 
showers  to  the  garden,  the  pasture,  and  the  corn- 
field; but  it  may  likewise  force  away  the  moisture 
from  the  fields  of  tillage,  to  drop  it  on  the  stagnant 
pool,  the  saturated  swamp,  or  the  unprofitable  sand- 
waste.  The  gardens  in  the  south  of  Europe  supply, 
perhaps,  a  not  less  apt  illustration  of  a  system  of  Fi- 
nance judiciously  conducted,  where  the  tanks  or  re- 
servoirs would  represent  the  capital  of  a  nation,  and 
the  hundred  rills  hourly  varying  their  channels  and 
directions  under  the  gardener's  spade,  give  a  pleasing 
image  of  the  dispersion  of  that  capital  through  the 
whole  population,  by  the  joint  effect  of  Taxation  and 
Trade.    For  Taxation  itself  is  a  part  of  Commerce, 


and  the  Government  may  be  fairly  considered  as  a 
great  manufacturing  house  carrying  on  in  different 
places,  by  means  of  its  partners  and  overseers,  the 
trades  of  the  ship-builder,  the  clolher,  the  iron-found- 
er, &c.  &c. 

There  are  so  many  real  evils,  so  many  just  causes 
of  complaint  in  the  Constitution  and  Administration 
of  Governments,  our  own  not  excepted,  that  it  be- 
comes the  imperious  Duty  of  every  Well-wisher  of 
his  country,  to  prevent,  as  much  as  in  him  lies,  the 
feelings  and  efforts  of  his  compatriots  from  losing 
themselves  on  a  u  rong  scent.  Whether  a  System  of 
Taxation  is  injurious  or  beneficial  on  the  whole,  is  to 
be  known,  not  by  the  amount  of  the  sum  taken  from 
each  individual,  but  by  that  which  remains  behind. 
A  war  will  doubtless  cause  a  stagnation  of  certain 
branches  of  Trade,  and  severe  temporary  distress  in 
the  places  where  those  branches  are  carried  on  ;  but 
are  not  the  same  effects  produced  in  time  of  Peace 
by  prohibitory  edicts  and  commercial  regulations  of 
foreign  powers,  or  by  new  rivals  with  superior  ad- 
vantages in  other  countries,  or  in  different  parts  of 
the  same  ?  Bristol  has,  doubtless,  been  injured  by 
the  rapid  prosperity  of  Liverpool  and  its  superior 
spirit  of  Enterprize ;  and  the  vast  Machines  of  Lan- 
cashire have  overwhelmed  and  rendered  hopeless 
the  domestic  industry  of  the  females  in  the  Cottages 
and  small  farm-houses  of  Westmoreland  and  Cum- 
berland. But  if  Peace  has  its  stagnations  as  well  as 
War,  does  not  War  create  or  re-enliven  numerous 
branches  of  Industry  as  well  as  Peace?  Is  it  not  a 
fact,  that  not  only  our  own  military  and  naval  forces, 
but  even  a  part  of  those  of  our  enemy  are  armed  and 
clothed  by  British  manufacturers?  It  cannot  be 
doubted,  that  the  whole  of  our  immense  military 
force  is  better  and  more  expensively  clothed,  and 
both  these  and  our  sailors  better  fed  than  the  same 
persons  would  be  in  their  individual  capacities :  and 
this  forms  one  of  the  real  expenses  of  War.  Not,  I 
say,  that  so  much  more  money  is  raised,  but  that  so 
much  more  of  the  means  of  comfortable  existence 
are  consumed,  than  would  otherwise  have  been. 
But  does  not  this,  like  all  other  luxury,  act  as  a  stim- 
ulus on  the  producing  classes,  and  this  in  the  most 
useful  manner,  and  on  the  most  important  branches 
of  production,  on  the  tiller,  on  the  glazier,  the 
clothier,  and  the  maker  of  arms?  Had  it  been  other- 
wise, is  it  possible  that  the  receipts  from  the  Property 
Tax  should  have  increased  instead  of  decreased, 
notwithstanding  all  the  rage  of  our  enemy  ? 

Surely,  never  from  the  beginning  of  the  world 
was  Mich  a  tribute  of  admiration  paid  by  one  power 
to  another,  as  Bonaparte  within  the  last  years  has 
paid  to  the  British  Empire  I  With  all  the  natural 
and  artificial  powers  of  almost  the  whole  of  con- 
tinental Europe,  with  all  the  fences  and  obstacles  of 
public  and  private  morality  broken  down  before  him, 
with  a  mighty  empire  of  fifty  millions  of  men,  near- 
ly two-thirds  of  whom  speak  the  same  language,  and 
are  as  it  were  fused  together  by  the  intensest  nation- 
ality ;  with  this  mighty  and  swarming  empire,  organ- 
ized in  all  its  parts  for  war,  and  forming  one  huge 
camp,  and  himself  combining  in  his  own  person  the 

443 


434 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


two-fold  power  of  Monarch  and  Commander  in 
Chief,  with  all  these  advantages,  with  all  these  stu- 
pendous instruments  and  inexhaustible  resources  of 
offence,  this  mighty  Being  finds  himself  imprisoned 
by  the  enemy  whom  he  most  hates  and  would  fain 
despise,  insulted  by  every  wave  that  breaks  upon  his 
shores,  and  condemned  to  behold  his  vast  flotillas  as 
worthless  and  idle  as  the  sea-weed  that  rots  around 
their  keels !  After  years  of  haughty  menace  and 
expensive  preparations  for  the  invasion  of  an  island, 
the  trees  and  buildings  of  which  are  visible  from 
the  roofs  of  his  naval  store-houses,  he  is  at  length 
compelled  to  make  open  confession,  that  he  possesses 
one  mean  only  of  ruining  Great  Britain.  And  what 
is  it  ?  The  ruin  of  his  own  enslaved  subjects  !  To 
undermine  the  resources  of  one  enemy,  he  reduces 
the  Continent  of  Europe  to  the  wretched  state  in 
which  it  \j-as  before  the  wide  diffusion  of  Trade  and 
Commerce,  deprives  its  inhabitants  of  comforts  and 
advantages  to  which  they  and  their  fathers  had  been 
for  more  than  a  century,  habituated,  and  thus  de- 
stroys, as  far  as  his  power  extends,  a  principal  source 
of  civilization,  the  origin  of  a  middle  class  through- 
out Christendom,  and  with  it  the  true  balance  of 
society,  the  parent  of  international  law,  the  foster- 
nurse  of  general  humanity,  and  (to  sum  up  all  in  one) 
the  main  principle  of  attraction  and  repulsion,  by 
which  the  nations  were  rapidly  though  insensibly 
drawing  together  into  one  system,  and  by  which 
alone  they  could  combine  the  manifold  blessings  of 
distinct  character  and  national  independence,  with 
the  needful  stimulation  and  general  influences  of 
intercommunity,  and  be  virtually  united  without  be- 
ing crushed  together  by  conquest,  in  order  to  waste 
away  under  the  tabes  and  slow  putrefaction  of  a 
universal  monarchy.  This  boasted  Pacificator  of  the 
World,  this  earthly  Providence*  as  his  Catholic  Bish- 
ops blasphemously  call  him,  professes  to  entertain  no 
hope  of  purchasing  the  destruction  of  Great  Britain 
at  a  less  price  than  that  of  the  barbarism  of  all 
Europe  !  By  the  ordinary  war  of  government  against 
government,  fleets  against  fleets,  and  armies  against 
armies,  he  could  effect  nothing.  His  fleets  might  as 
well  have  been  built  at  his  own  expense  in  our 
Dock-yards,  as  tribute-offerings  to  the  masters  of  the 
Ocean :  and  his  Army  of  England  lay  encamped  on 
his  Coasts  like  Wolves  baying  the  Moon ! 

Delightful  to  humane  and  contemplative  minds 
was  the  idea  of  countless  individual  efforts  working 
together  by  common  instinct  and  to  a  common  object, 
under  the  protection  of  an  unwritten  code  of  religion, 
philosophy,  and  common  interest  which  made  peace 
and  brotherhood  co-exist  with  the  most  active  hostil- 
ity.    Not  in  the  untamed  Plains  of  Tartary,  but  in 

*  It  has  been  well  remarked,  that  there  ia  something  far 
more  shocking  in  the  tyrant's  pretensions  to  the  gracious 
attributes  of  the  Supreme  Ruler,  than  in  his  most  remorseless 
cruelties.  There  is  a  sort  of"  wild  grandeur,  not  ungratifying 
to  the  imagination,  in  the  answer  of  Timur  Khan  to  one  who 
remonstrated  with  him  on  the  inhumanity  of  his  devastations  : 
cur  me  hominem  putas,  et  non  potius  iram  Dei  in  terris  agen- 
tem  ob  perniciem  humani  generis?  Why  do  you  deem  me 
a  man,  and  not  rather  the  incarnate  wrath  of  God  acting  on 
the  earth  for  the  ruin  of  mankind  7 


the  very  bosom  of  civilization,  and  himself  indebted 
to  its  fostering  care  for  his  own  education  and  for  all 
the  means  of  his  elevation  and  power,  did  this  genu- 
ine offspring  of  the  old  serpent  warm  himself  into  the 
fiend-like  resolve  of  waging  war  against  mankind  and 
the  quiet  growth  of  the  world's  improvement,  in  an 
emphatic  sense  the  enemy  of  the  human  race!  By 
these  means  only  he  deems  Great  Britain  assailable, 
(a  strong  presumption,  that  our  prosperity  is  built  on 
the  common  interests  of  mankind  !) — this  he  acknow- 
ledges to  be  his  only  hope — and  in  this  hope  he  has 
been  utterly  baffled ! 

To  what  then  do  we  owe  our  strength  and  our 
immunity  ?  The  sovereignty  of  law  :  the  incorrupt- 
ness  of  its  administration;  the  number  and  political 
importance  of  our  religious  sects,  which  in  an  incal- 
culable degree  have  added  to  the  dignity  of  the  es- 
tablishment; the  purity,  or  at  least  the  decorum  of 
private  morals,  and  the  independence,  activity,  and 
weight,  of  public  opinion  ?  These  and  similar  ad- 
vantages are  doubtless  the  materials  of  the  fortress, 
but  what  has  been  the  cement  ?  What  has  bound 
them  together?  What  has  rendered  Great  Britain, 
from  the  Orkneys  to  the  Rocks  of  Scilly,  indeed  and 
with  more  than  metaphorical  propriety  a  body  poli- 
tic, our  Roads,  Rivers,  and  Canals  being  so  truly  the 
veins,  arteries,  and  nerves,  of  the  state;  that  every 
pulse  in  the  metropolis  produces  a  correspondent  pul- 
sation in  the  remotest  village  on  its  extreme  shores ! 
What  made  the  stoppage  of  the  national  Bank  the 
conversation  of  a  day  without  causing  one  irregular 
throb,  or  the  stagnation  of  the  commercial  current  in 
the  minutest  vessel  ?  I  answer  without  hesitation, 
that  the  cause  and  mother  principle  of  this  unexam- 
pled confidence,  of  this  system  of  credit,  which  is  as 
much  stronger  than  mere  positive  possessions,  as  the 
soul  of  man  is  than  his  body,  or  as  the  force  of  a 
mighty  mass  in  free  motion,  than  the  pressure  of  its 
separate  component  parts  would  be  in  a  state  of  rest 
— the  main  cause  of  this,  I  say,  has  been  our  nation- 
al debt.  What  its  injurious  effects  on  the  Litera- 
ture, the  Morals,  and  religious  Principles,  have  been, 
I  shall  hereafter  develope  with  the  same  boldness. 
i  But  as  to  our  political  strength  and  circumstantial 
prosperity,  it  is  the  national  debt  which  has  wedded 
in  indissoluble  union  all  the  interests  of  the  state,  the 
\  landed  with  the  commercial,  and  the  man  of  inde- 
pendent fortune  with  the  stirring  tradesman  and  re- 
!  posing  annuitant.  It  is  the  National  Debt,  which  by 
the  rapid  nominal  rise  in  the  value  of  things,  has 
made  it  impossible  for  any  considerable  number  of 
men  to  retain  their  own  former  comforts  without 
joining  in  the  common  industry,  and  adding  to  the 
stock  of  national  produce  ;  which  thus  first  necessi- 
tates a  general  activity,  and  then  by  the  immediate 
and  ample  credit,  which  is  never  wanting  to  him, 
who  has  any  object  on  which  his  activity  can  employ 
itself,  gives  each  man  the  means  not  only  of  preserv- 
ing but  of  increasing  and  multiplying  all  his  former 
enjoyments,  and  all  the  symbols  of  the  rank  in  which 
he  was  born.  It  is  this  which  has  planted  the  naked 
hills  and  enclosed  the  bleak  wastes,  in  the  lowlands 
of  Scotland,  not  less  than  in  the  wealthier  districts 
444 


THE  FRIEND. 


435 


of  South   Britain:  it  is  this,  which  leaving  all  the 
i     other  causes  of  patriotism  and  national  fervor  undi- 
minished and   uninjured,  lias  added  to  our  public 
i      duties  the  same  leeling  of  necessity,  the  same  sense 
of  immediate  self-interest,  which  in  other  countries 
actuates  the  members  of  a  single  family  in  their  con- 
duct tow ar.l  eat  li  other. 
j  Somewhat  more  than  a  year  ago,  I  happened  to  be 

|  on  a  visit  with  a  friend,  in  a  small  market-town  in 
the  South-West  of  England,  when  one  of  the  compa- 
ny turned  the  conversation  to  the  weight  of  Taxes 
and  the  consequent  hardness  of  the  times.  I  answer- 
ed, that  if  the  Taxes  were  a  real  weight,  anil  that  in 
proportion  to  their  amount,  we  must  have  been  ruin- 
ed long  ago:  for  Mr.  Hume,  who  had  proceeded,  as 
on  a  self-evident  axiom,  on  the  hypothesis,  that  a  debt 
of  a  nation  was  the  same  as  a  debt  of  an  individual, 
had  declared  our  ruin  arithmetically  demonstrable,  if 
the  national  debt  increased  beyond  a  certain  sum. 
Since  his  time  it  has  more  than  quintupled  that  sum, 
and  yet — True,  answered  my  Friend,  but  the  princi- 
ple might  be  right  though  he  might  have  been  mis- 
taken in  the  time.  But  still,  I  rejoined,  if  the  princi- 
ple were  right,  the  nearer  we  came  to  that  given 
point,  and  the  greater  and  the  more  active  the  perni- 
cious cause  became,  the  more  manifest  would  its  ef- 
fects be.  We  might  not  be  absolutely  ruined,  but 
our  embarrassments  would  increase  in  some  propor- 
tion to  their  cause.  Whereas  instead  of  being  poorer 
and  poorer,  we  are  richer  and  richer.  Will  any  man 
in  his  senses  contend,  that  the  actual  labor  and  pro- 
duce of  the  country  has  not  only  been  decupled  with- 
in half  a  century,  but  increased  so  prodigiously  be- 
yond that  decuple  as  to  make  six  hundred  millions  a 
less  weight  to  us  than  fifty  millions  were  in  the  days 
of  our  grandfathers  ?  But  if  it  really  be  so,  to  what 
can  we  attribute  this  stupendous  progression  of  na- 
tional improvement,  but  to  that  system  of  credit  and 
paper  currency,  of  which  the  National  Debt  is  both 
the  reservoir  and  the  water-works  ?  A  constant  cause 
should  have  constant  effects ;  but  if  you  deem  that 
this  is  some  anomaly,  some  strange  exception  to  the 
general  rule,  explain  its  mode  of  operation,  make  it 
comprehensible,  how  a  cause  acting  on  a  whole  na- 
tion can  produce  a  regular  and  rapid  increase  of  pros- 
perity to  a  certain  point,  and  then  all  at  once  pass 
from  an  Angel  of  Light  into  a  Demon  of  Destruction  ? 
That  an  individual  house  may  live  more  and  more 
luxuriously  upon  borrowed  funds,  and  that  when  the 
suspicions  of  the  creditors  are  awakened,  and  their 
patience  exhausted,  the  luxurious  spendthrift  may  all 
at  once  exchange  his  Palace  for  a  Prison — this  I  can 
understand  perfectly:  for  I  understand,  whence  the 
luxuries  could  be  produced  for  the  consumption  of 
the  individual  house,  and  who  the  creditors  might  he, 
and  that  it  might  be  both  their  inclination  and  their 
interests  to  demand  the  debt,  and  to  punish  the  insol- 
vent Debtor.  But  who  are  a  Nation's  Creditors? 
The  answer  is,  every  Man  to  every  Man.  Whose 
possible  interest  could  it  be  either  to  demand  the 
Principal,  or  to  refuse  his  share  toward  the  means  of" 
paying  the  Interest?  Not  the  Merchant's:  for  he 
would  but  provoke  a  crash  of  Bankruptcy,  in  which 


his  own  House  would  as  necessarily  be  included,  as 
a  single  card  in  a  house  ot  cards!  Not  the  landhold- 
er's :  Ibr  in  the  general  destruction  of  all  credit,  how 
could  he  obtain  payment  for  the  Produce  of  his  Es- 
tates ?  Not  to  mention  the  improbability  that  he 
would  remain  the  undisturbed  Possessor  in  so  dire- 
ful a  concussion — not  to  mention,  that  on  him  must 
fall  the  whole  weight  of  the  public  necessities — not 
to  mention  that  from  the  merchant's  credit  depends 
the  ever-increasing  value  of  his  land  and  the  readiest 
means  of  improving  it.  Neither  could  it  be  the  labo- 
rer's interest :  for  he  must  be  either  thrown  out  of 
employ,  and  lie  like  the  fish  in  the  bed  of  a  River 
from  which  the  water  has  been  diverted,  or  have  the 
value  of  his  labor  reduced  to  nothing  by  the  irrup- 
tion of  eager  competitors.  But  least  of  all  could  it 
be  the  wish  of  the  lovers  of  liberty,  which  must  needs 
perish  or  be  suspended,  either  by  the  horrors  of  anar- 
chy, or  by  the  absolute  Power,  with  which  the  Go- 
vernment must  be  invested,  in  order  to  prevent  them- 
In  short,  with  the  exception  of  men  desperate  from 
guilt  or  debt,  or  mad  with  the  hlackest  ambition, 
there  is  no  class  or  description  of  men  who  can  have 
the  least  Interest  in  producing  or  permitting  a  Bank- 
ruptcy. If  then,  neither  experience  has  acquainted 
us  with  any  national  impoverishment  or  embarrass- 
ment from  the  increase  of  National  Debt,  nor  theory 
renders  such  effects  comprehensible,  (for  the  predic- 
tions of  Hume  went  on  the  false  assumption,  that  a 
part  only  of  the  Nation  was  interested  in  the  preser- 
vation of  the  Public  Credit)  on  what  authority  are  we 
to  ground  our  apprehensions  ?  Does  History  record  a 
single  Nation,  in  which  relatively  to  Taxation  there 
were  no  privileged  or  exempted  classes,  in  which 
there  were  no  compulsory  prices  of  labor,  and  in 
which  the  interest  of  all  the  different  classes  and  all 
the  different  districts,  were  mutually  dependent  and 
vitally  co-organized,  as  in  Great  Britain — has  History, 
I  say,  recorded  a  single  instance  of  such  a  Nation 
ruined  or  dissolved  by  the  weight  of  Taxation?  In 
France  there  was  no  public  credit,  no  communion  of 
Interests:  its  unprincipled  Government  and  the  pro- 
ductive and  taxable  Classes  were  as  two  Individuals 
with  separate  Interests.  Its  Bankruptcy  and  the  con- 
sequences of  it  are  sufficiently  comprehensible.  Yet 
the  Cahiers,  or  the  instructions  and  complaints  sent 
to  the  National  Assembly,  from  the  Towns  and  Pro- 
vinces of  France,  (an  immense  mass  of  documents  in- 
deed, but  without  examination  and  patient  perusal  of 
which,  no  man  is  entitled  to  write  a  History  of  the 
French  Revolution)  these  proved,  beyond  contradic- 
tion, that  the  amount  of  the  Taxes  was  one  only,  and 
that  a  subordinate  cause  of  the  revolutionary  move- 
ment. Indeed,  if  the  amount  of  the  Taxes  could  be 
disjoined  from  the  mode  of  raising  them,  it  might  be 
fairly  denied  to  have  been  a  cause  at  all.  Holland 
was  taxed  as  heavily  and  as  equally  as  ourselves ; 
but  was  it  by  Taxation  that  Holland  was  reduced  to 
its  present  miseries  ? 

The  mode  in  which  Taxes  are  supposed  to  act  on 

the  marketableness  of  our  manufactures  in  foreign 

marts,  I  shall  examine  on  some  future  occasion,  when 

I  shall  endeavor  to  explain  in  a  more  satisfactory  way 

445 


436 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


than  has  been  hitherto  done,  to  my  apprehension  at 
least,  the  real  mode  in  which  Taxes  act,  and  how  and 
why  and  to  what  extent  they  affect  the  wealth,  and 
what  is  of  more  consequence,  the  well-being  of  a  na- 
tion. But  in  the  present  exigency,  when  the  safety 
of  the  nation  depends,  on  the  one  hand,  on  the  sense 
which  the  people  at  large  have  of  the  comparative 
excellencies  of  the  Laws  and  Government,  and  on 
the  firmness  and  wisdom  of  the  legislators  and  en- 
lightened classes  in  detecting,  exposing,  and  removing 
its  many  particular  abuses  and  corruptions  on  the 
other,  right  views  on  this  subject  of  Taxation  are  of 
such  especial  importance;  and  I  have  besides  in  my 
inmost  nature  such  a  loathing  of  factious  falsehoods 
and  mob-sycophancy,  i.  e,  the  flattering  of  the  multi- 
tude by  informing  against  their  betters ;  that  I  cannot 
but  revert  to  that  point  of  the  subject  from  which  I 
began,  namely,  that  the  weight  of  Taxes  is  to  be 

CALCULATED  NOT  BY  WHAT  IS  PAID,  BUT  BV  WHAT  IS 

LEFT.  What  matters  it  to  a  man,  that  he  pays  six 
times  more  Taxes  than  his  father  did,  if,  notwith- 
standing, he  with  the  same  portion  of  exertion  enjoys 
twice  the  comforts  which  his  father  did  ?  Now  this 
I  solemnly  affirm  to  be  the  case  in  general,  through- 
out England,  according  to  all  the  facts  which  I  have 
collected  during  an  examination  of  years,  wherever 
I  have  travelled,  and  wherever  1  have  been  resident. 
(I  do  not  speak  of  Ireland,  or  the  lowlands  of  Scot- 
land :  and  if  I  may  trust  to  what  I  myself  saw  and 
heard  there,  I  must  even  except  the  Highlands.)  In 
the  conversation  which  I  have  spoken  of  as  taking 
place  in  the  south-west  of  England,  by  the  assistance 
of  one  or  other  of  the  company,  we  went  through 
every  family  in  the  town  and  neighborhood,  and  my 
assertion  was  found  completely  accurate,  though  the 
place  had  no  one  advantage  over  others,  and  many 
disadvantages,  that  heavy  one  in  particular,  the  non- 
residence  and  frequent  change  of  its  Rectors,  the 
living  being  always  given  to  one  of  the  Canons  of 
Windsor,  and  resigned  on  the  acceptance  of  belter 
preferment.  It  was  even  asserted,  and  not  only  as- 
serted but  proved,  by  my  friend  (who  has  from  his 
earliest  youth  devoted  a  strong,  original  understand- 
ing, and  a  heart  warm  and  benevolent  even  to  enthu- 
siasm, to  the  service  of  the  poor  and  the  laboring 
class,)  that  every  sober  Laborer,  in  that  part  of  Eng- 
land at  least,  who  should  not  marry  till  thirty,  might, 
without  any  hardship  or  extreme  self-denial,  com- 
mence house-keeping  at  the  age  of  thirty,  with  from 
a  hundred  to  a  hundred  and  twenty  pounds  belong- 
ing to  him.  I  have  no  doubt,  that  on  seeing  this 
Essay,  my  friend  will  communicate  to  me  the  proof 
in  detail.  But  the  price  of  labor  in  the  south-west 
of  England  is  full  one-third  less  than  in  the  greater 
number,  if  not  all,  of  the  Northern  Counties.  What 
then  is  wanting?  Not  the  repeal  of  Taxes;  but  the 
increased  activity  both  of  the  gentry  and  clergy  of  the 
land,  in  securing  the  instruction  of  the  lower  classes. 
A  system  of  education  is  wanting,  such  a  system  as 
that  discovered,  and  to  the  blessings  of  thousands 
realized,  by  Dr.  Bell,  which  I  never  am,  or  can  be 
weary  of  praising,  while  my  heart  retains  any  spark 
of  regard  for  Human  Nature,  or  of  reverence  for 


Human  Virtue — A  system,  by  which  in  the  very  act 
of  receiving  knowledge,  the  best  virtues  and  most 
useful  qualities  of  the  moral  character  are  awakened, 
developed,  and  formed  into  habits.  Were  there  a 
Bishop  of  Durham  (no  odds  whether  a  temporal  or  a 
spiritual  Lord)  in  every  county  or  half  county,  and  a 
Clergyman  enlightened  with  the  views  and  animated 
with  the  spirit  of  Dr.  Bell,  in  every  parish,  we  might 
bid  defiance  to  the  present  weight  of  Taxes,  and 
boldly  challenge  the  whole  world  to  show  a  Pea- 
santry as  well  fed  and  clothed  as  the  English,  or  with 
equal  chances  of  improving  their  situation,  and  of  se- 
curing an  old  age  of  repose  and  comfort  to  a  life  of 
cheerful  industry. 

I  will  add  another  anecdote,  as  it  demonstrates,  in- 
controvertibly,  the  error  of"  the  vulgar  opinion,  that 
Taxes  make  things  really  dear,  taking  in  the  whole  of 
a  man's  expenditure.  A  friend  of  mine,  who  had 
passed  some  years  in  America,  was  questioned  by  an 
American  Tradesman,  in  one  of  their  cities  of  the  se- 
cond class,  concerning  the  names  and  number  of  our 
Taxes  and  rates.  The  answer  seemed  perfectly  to 
astound  him  :  and  he  exclaimed,  "  How  is  it  possible 
that  men  can  live  in  such  a  country  ?  In  this  land  of 
liberty  we  never  see  the  face  of  a  Tax-gatherer,  nor 
hear  of  a  duty  except  in  our  seaports."  My  friend, 
who  was  perfect  master  of  the  question,  made  sem- 
blance of  turning  off  the  conversation  to  another  sub- 
ject: and  then,  without  any  apparent  reference  to 
the  former  topic,  asked  the  American,  for  what  sum 
he  thought  a  man  could  live  in  such  and  such  a  style, 
with  so  many  servants,  in  a  house  of  such  dimensions 
and  such  a  situation  (still  keeping  in  his  mind  the 
situation  of  a  thriving  and  respectable  shopkeeper 
and  householder  in  different  parts  of  England,)  first 
supposing  him  to  reside  in  Philadelphia  or  New 
York,  and  then  in  some  town  of  secondary  impor- 
tance. Having  received  a  detailed  answer  to  these 
questions,  he  proceeded  to  convince  the  American, 
that  notwithstanding  all  our  Taxes,  a  man  might  live 
in  the  same  style,  but  with  incomparably  greater 
comforts,  on  the  same  income  in  London  as  in  New 
York,  and  on  a  considerably  less  income  in  Exeter  or 
Bristol,  than  in  any  American  provincial  town  of  the 
same  relative  importance.  It  would  be  insulting  my 
Readers  to  discuss  on  how  much  less  a  person  may 
vegetate  or  brutalize  in  the  back  settlements  of  the 
republic,  than  he  could  live  as  a  man,  as  a  rational 
and  social  being,  in  an  English  village ;  and  it  would 
be  wasting  time  to  inform  him,  that  where  men  are 
comparatively  few,  and  unoccupied  land  is  in  inex- 
haustible abundance,  the  Laborer  and  common  Me- 
chanic must  needs  receive  (not  only  nominally  but 
really)  higher  wages  than  in  a  populous  and  fully-oc- 
cupied country.  But  that  the  American  Laborer  is 
therefore  happier,  or  even  in  possession  of  more  com- 
forts and  conveniences  of  life  than  a  sober  or  indus 
trious  English  Laborer  or  Mechanic,  remains  to  be 
proved.  In  conducting  the  comparison  we  must  not 
however  exclude  the  operation  of  moral  causes,  when 
these  causes  are  not  accidental,  but  arise  out  of  the 
nature  of  the  country  and  the  constitution  of  the  Go- 
vernment and  Society.  This  being  the  case,  take 
446 


THE  FRIEND. 


437 


away  from  the  American's  wages  all  the  Taxes 
which  Ins  insolence,  sloth,  and  attachment  to  spirit- 
ous  lulling  impose  on  him,  and  judge  of  the  remain- 
der In-  liis  house,  his  household  furniture  and  utensils 
— and  if  I  have  not  been  grievously  deceived  by 
those  whose  veracity  and  good  sense  I  have  found 
unquestionable  in  all  other  respects,  the  collage  of  an 
honest  English  husbandman,  in  the  service  of  an  en- 
lightened and  liberal  Farmer,  who  is  paid  for  his  la- 
bor at  the  price  usual  in  Yorkshire  or  Northumber- 
land, would  in  the  mind  of  a  man  in  the  same  rank 
of  life,  who  had  seen  a  true  account  of  America,  ex- 
cite do  ideas  favorable  to  emigration.  This  however, 
I  confess,  is  a  balance  of  morals  rather  than  of  cir- 
camstances  ;  it  proves,  however,  that  where  foresight 
and  good  morals  exist,  the  Taxes  do  not  stand  in  the 
way  of  an  industrious  man's  comforts. 

Dr.  Price  almost  succeeded  in  persuading  the  En- 
glish nation  (for  it  is  a  curious  fact,  that  the  limey  of 
our  calamitous  situation  is  a  sort  of  necessary  sauce 
without  which  our  real  prosperity  would  become  in- 
sipid to  us)  Dr.  Price,  I  say,  alarmed  the  country  with 
pretended  proofs  that  the  island  was  in  a  rapid  state 
of  depopulation,  that  England  at  the  Revolution  had 
been.  Heaven  knows  how  much!  more  populous; 
and  that  in  Queen  Elizabeth's  time,  or  about  the  Re- 
formation, (!!!)  the  number  of  inhabitants  in  England 
might  have  been  greater  than  even  at  the  Revolu- 
tion. My  old  mathematical  master,  a  man  of  an  un- 
commonly clear  head,  answered  this  blundering  book 
of  the  worthy  Doctor's,  and  left  not  a  stone  unturned 
of  the  pompous  cenotaph  in  which  the  effigy  of  the 
still-living  and  bustling  English  prosperity  lay  inter- 
red. And  yet  so  much  more  suitable  was  the  Doc- 
tor's book  to  the  purposes  of  faction,  and  to  the  Xo- 
rember  mood  of  (what  is  called)  the  Public,  that 
Mr.  Wales's  pamphlet,  though  a  master-piece  of  per- 
spicacity as  well  as  perspicuity,  was  scarcely  heard 
of.  This  tendency  to  political  nightmares  in  our 
countrymen  reminds  me  of  a  superstition,  or  rather 
nervous  disease,  not  uncommon  in  the  highlands  of 
Scotland,  in  which  men,  though  broad  awake,  im- 
agine thev  see  themselves  lying  dead  at  a  small  dis- 
tance from  them.  The  act  of  Parliament  for  ascer- 
taining the  population  of  the  empire  has  laid  forever 
this  uneasy  ghost :  and  now,  forsooth !  we  are  on  the 
brink  of  ruin  from  the  excess  of  population,  and  he 
who  would  prevent  the  poor  from  rotting  away  in 
disease,  misery,  and  wickedness,  is  an  enemy  to  his 
country !  A  lately  deceased  miser,  of  immense 
wealth,  is  reported  to  have  been  so  delighted  with 
this  splendid  discovery,  as  to  have  offered  a  hand- 
some annuity  to  the  Author,  in  part  of  payment,  for 
this  new  and  welcome  piece  of  heart-armor.  This, 
however,  we  may  deduce  from  the  fact  of  our  in- 
creased population,  that  if  clothing  and  food  had  ac- 
tually become  dearer  in  proportion  to  the  means  of 
procuring  them,  it  would  be  as  absurd  to  ascribe  this 
effect  to  increased  Taxation,  as  to  attribute  the  scan- 
tiness of  fare,  at  a  public  ordinary,  to  the  landlord's 
bill,  when  twice  the  usual  number  of  guests  had  sat 
down  to  the  same  number  of  dishes.  But  the  fact  is 
notoriously  otherwise,  and  every  man  has  the  means 


of  discovering  it  in  his  own  house  and  in  that  of  his 
neighbor,  provided  that  he  makes  the  proper  allow- 
ances for  the  disturbing  forces  of  individual  vice  and 
imprudence.  If  this  be  the  case,  I  put  it  to  the  con- 
sciences of  our  literary  demagogues,  whether  a  lie, 
for  the  purposes  of  creating  public  disunion  and  de- 
jection, is  not  as  much  a  lie,  as  one  for  the  purpose 
of  exciting  discord  among  individuals.  I  entreat  my 
readers  to  recollect,  that  the  present  question  does 
not  concern  the  effects  of  taxation  on  the  public  inde- 
pendence and  on  the  supposed  balance  of  the  free 
constitutional  powers,  (from  which  said  balance,  as 
well  as  from  the  balance  of  trade,  I  own,  I  have 
never  been  able  to  elicit  one  ray  of  common  sense.) 
That  the  nature  of  our  constitution  has  been  greatly 
modified  by  the  funding  system,  I  do  not  deny  :  whe- 
ther for  good  or  for  evil,  on  the  whole,  will  form  part 
of  my  Essay  on  the  British  Constitution  as  it  actually 
exists. 

There  arc  many  and  great  public  evils,  all  of 
which  are  to  be  lamented,  some  of  which  may  be, 
and  ought  to  be  removed,  and  none  of  which  can 
consistently  with  wisdom  or  honesty  be  kept  con- 
cealed from  the  public.  As  far  as  these  originate  in 
false  Principles,  or  in  the  contempt  or  neglect  of 
right  ones  (and  as  such  belonging  to  the  plan  of  The 
Friend,)  I  shall  not  hesitate  to  make  known  my  opi- 
nions concerning  them,  with  the  same  fearless  sim- 
plicity with  which  I  have  endeavored  to  expose  the 
errors  of  discontent  and  the  artifices  of  faction.  But 
for  the  very  reason  that  there  are  great  evils,  the 
more  does  it  behove  us  not  to  open  out  on  a  false 
scent. 

I  will  conclude  this  Essay  with  the  examination  of 
an  article  in  a  provincial  paper  of  a  recent  date, 
which  is  now  lying  before  me  ;  the  accidental  peru- 
sal of  which,  occasioned  the  whole  of  the  preceding 
remarks.  In  order  to  guard  against  a  possible  mis- 
take, I  must  premise,  that  I  have  not  the  most  distant 
intention  of  defending  the  plan  or  conduct  of  our  late 
expeditions,  and  should  be  grossly  calumniated  if  I 
were  represented  as  an  advocate  for  carelessness  or 
prodigality  in  the  management  of  the  public  purse. 
The  money  may  or  may  not  have  been  culpably 
wasted.  I  confine  myself  entirely  to  the  general 
falsehood  of  the  principle  in  the  article  here  cited; 
for  I  am  convinced,  that  any  hopes  of  reform  origina- 
ting in  such  notions,  must  end  in  disappointment  and 
public  mockery. 

"ONLY  A  FEW  MILLIONS! 

We  have  unfortunately  of  late  been  so  much  accustomed 
to  read  of  millions  being  spent  in  one  expedition,  and  millions 
being  spent  in  another,  that  a  comparative  insignificance  is 
attached  tci  an  immense  sum  of  money,  by  calling  it  only  a 
few  mil/inns.  Perhaps  some  of  our  readers  may  have  their 
judgment  a  little  improved  by  making  a  few  calculations, 
like  those  below,  on  the  millions  which  it  has  been  estimated 
will  be  lost  to  the  nation  by  the  late  expedition  to  Holland: 
and  then  perhaps,  they  will  be  led  to  reflect  on  the  many  mil- 
lions which  are  annually  expended  in  expeditions,  which  have 
almost  invariably  ended  in  absolute  loss. 

In  the  first  place,  with  less  money  than  it  cost  the  nation  to 
take  Walchercn,  &c.  with  the  view  of  taking  or  destroying 
the  French  fleet  at  Antwerp,  consisting  of  nine  sail  of  the 
line,  we  could  have  completely  built  and  equipped,  ready  for 
eea,  a  fleet  of  upwards  of  one  hundred  sail  of  the  line. 
447 


438 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Or,  secondly,  a  new  town  could  be  built  in  every  county  of 
England,  and  each  town  consist  of  upwards  of  1,000  substan- 
tial houses,  for  a  less  sum. 

Or.  thirdly,  it  would  have  been  enough  to  give  100/.  to 
2,000  poor  families  in  every  county  in  England  and  Wales. 

Or,  fourthly,  it  would  bo  more  than  sulHcient  to  give  a 
handsome  marriage  portion  to  200,000  young  women,  who 
probably,  if  they  had  even  less  than  50/.  would  not  long  re- 
main unsolicited  to  enter  the  happy  state. 

Or,  fifthly,  a  much  less  sum  would  enable  the  legislature  to 
establish  a  life  boat  in  every  port  in  the  United  Kingdom,  and 
provide  for  10  or  12  men  to  be  kept  in  constant  attendance 
on  each  ;  and  100.000/.  could  be  funded,  the  interest  of  which 
to  be  applied  in  premiums,  to  those  who  should  prove  to  be 
panicularly  active  in  saving  lives  from  wrecks,  &.C.  and  to 
provide  for  the  widows  and  children  of  those  men  who  may 
accidentally  lose  their  lives  in  the  cause  of  humanity. 

This  interesting  appropriation  of  10  millions  sterling,  may 
lead  our  readers  to  think  of  the  great  good  that  can  be  done 
by  only  a  few  millions.''' 

The  exposure  of  this  calculation  will  require  but  a 
few  sentences.  These  ten  millions  were  expended, 
J  presume,  in  arms,  artillery,  ammunition,  clothing, 
provision,  &c.  &c.  for  about  one  hundred  and  twenty 
thousand  British  subjects  \  and  I  presume  that  all 
these  consumables  were  produced  by,  and  purchased 
from,  other  British  subjecls.  Now  during  the  build- 
ing of  these  new  towns  for  a  thousand  inhabitants 
each  in  every  county,  or  the  distribution  of  the  hun- 
dred pound  bank  notes  to  the  two  thousand  poor  fa- 
milies, were  the  industrious  ship-builders,  clothiers, 
charcoal-burners,  gunpowder-makers,  gunsmiths,  cut- 
lers, cannon-founders,  tailors,  and  shoemakers,  to  be 
left  unemployed  and  starving?  or  our  brave  soldiers 
and  sailors  to  have  remained  without  food  and  rai- 
ment I  And  where  is  the  proof,  that  these  ten  mil- 
lions, which  (observe)  all  remain  in  the  kingdom,  do 
not  circulate  as  beneficially  in  the  one  way  as  they 
would  in  the  other?  Which  is  better?  To  give 
money  to  the  idle,  the  houses  to  those  who  do  not  ask 
for  them,  and  towns  to  counties  which  have  already 
perhaps  too  many  ?  Or  to  afford  opportunity  to  the 
industrious  to  earn  their  bread,  and  to  the  enterprising 
to  better  their  circumstances,  and  perhaps  found  new 
families  of  independent  proprietors  ?  The  only  mode, 
not  absolutely  absurd,  of  considering  the  subject, 
would  be,  not  by  the  calculation  of  the  money  ex- 
pended, but  of  the  labor,  of  which  the  money  is  a 
symbol.  But  then  the  question  would  be  removed 
altogether  from  the  expedition  :  for  assuredly,  neither 
the  armies  were  raised,  nor  the  fleets  built  or  manned 
for  the  sake  of  conquering  the  Isle  of  Walcheren,  nor 
would  a  single  regiment  have  been  disbanded,  or  a 
single  sloop  paid  off,  though  the  Isle  of  Walcheren 
had  never  existed.  The  whole  dispute,  therefore, 
resolves  itself  to  this  one  question  :  whether  our  sol- 
diers and  sailors  would  not  be  better  employed  in 
making  canals  for  instance,  or  cultivating  waste  lands, 
than  in  fighting  or  in  learning  to  fight ;  and  the 
tradesman,  &c.  in  making  grey  coals  instead  of  red 
or  blue  —  and  ploughshares,  &c,  instead  of  arms. 
When  I  reflect  on  the  state  of  China  and  the  moral 
character  of  the  Chinese,  I  dare  not  positively  affirm 
that  it  would  be  better.  When  the  fifteen  millions, 
which  form  our  present  population,  shall  have  at- 
tained to  the  same  purity  of  morals  and  of  primitive 
Christianity,  and  shall  be  capable  of  being  governed 


by  the  same  admirable  discipline,  as  the  Society  of 
the  Friends,  I  doubt  not  that  we  should  all  be  Qua- 
kers in  this  as  in  the  other  points  of  their  moral  doc- 
trine. But  were  this  transfer  of  employment  desira- 
ble, is  it  practicable  at  present,  is  it  in  our  power? 
These  men  know,  that  it  is  not.  What  then  does  a1' 
their  reasoning  amount  to  ?    Nonsense  ! 


ESSAY    IV, 


I  have  not  intentionally  either  hidden  or  disguised  the  Truth, 
like  an  advocate  ashamed  of  his  client,  or  a  bribed  ac- 
comptant  who  falsifies  the  quotient  to  make  the  bankrupt's 
ledger  square  with  the  creditor's  inventory.  My  conscience 
forbids  the  use  of  falsehood  and  the  arts  of  concealment ; 
and  were  it  otherwise,  yet  I  am  persuaded,  that  a  system 
which  has  produced  and  protected  so  great  prosperity,  can- 
not stand  in  need  of  them.  If  therefore  Honesty  and  the 
Knowledge  of  the  whole  Truth  be  the  things  you  aim  at, 
you  will  find  my  principles  suited  to  your  ends:  and  as  1 
like  not  the  democratic  forms,  so  am  I  not  fond  of  any  others 
above  the  rest.  That  a  succession  of  wise  and  godly  men 
may  be  secured  to  the  nation  in  the  highest  power  is  that 
to  which  I  have  directed  your  attention  in  this  Essay,  which 
if  you  will  read,  perhaps  you  may  see  the  error  of  those 
principles  which  have  led  you  into  errors  of  practice.  1 
wrote  it  purposely  for  the  use  of  the  multitude  of  well-mean- 
ing people,  that  are  tempted  in  these  times  to  usurp  author- 
ity and  meddle  with  government  before  they  have  any  call 
from  duty  or  tolerable  understanding  of  its  principles.  I  ne- 
ver intended  it  for  learned  men  versed  in  politics ;  but  for 
such  as  will  be  practitioners  before  they  have  been  students." 
BAXTER'S  Holy  Commonwealth,  or  Political  Apho- 
risms. 


The  metaphysical  (or  as  I  have  proposed  to  call 
them,  metapolilical)  reasonings  hitherto  discussed,  be- 
long to  Government  in  the  abstract.  But  there  is  a 
second  class  of  Reasoners,  who  argue  for  a  change 
in  our  Government  from  former  usage,  and  from  sta- 
tutes still  in  force,  or  which  have  been  repealed,  (so 
these  writers  affirm)  either  through  a  corrupt  influ- 
ence, or  to  ward  off"  temporary  hazard  or  inconve- 
nience. This  class,  which  is  rendered  illustrious  by 
the  names  of  many  intelligent  and  virtuous  patriots, 
are  advocates  for  reform,  in  the  literal  sense  of  the 
word.  They  wish  to  bring  back  the  Government  of 
Great  Britain  to  a  certain  form,  which  they  affirm  it 
to  have  once  possessed  ;  and  would  melt  the  bullion 
anew  in  order  to  recast  it  in  the  original  mould. 

The  answer  to  all  arguments  of  this  nature  is  obvi- 
ous, and  to  my  understanding  appears  decisive. 
These  Reformers  assume  the  character  of  Legislators 
or  of  Advisers  of  the  Legislature,  not  that  of  Law 
Judges  or  appellants  to  Courts  of  Law.  Sundry  sta- 
tutes concerning  the  righls  of  electors  (we  will  sup- 
pose) still  exist ;  so  likewise  do  sundry  statutes  on 
other  subjects  (on  witchcraft  for  instance)  which 
change  of  circumstances  has  rendered  obsolete,  or 
increased  information  shown  to  be  absurd.  It  is  evi- 
dent, therefore,  that  the  expediency  of  the  regulations 
prescribed  by  them,  and  their  suitableness  to  the  ex- 
isting circumstances  of  the  kingdom,  must  first  be 
proved :  and  on  this  proof  must  be  rested  all  rational 
claims  for  the  enforcement  of  the  statutes  that  have 
448 


THE  FRIEND. 


439 


not,  no  less  than  for  the  re-acting  of  those  that  have 
been,  repealed.    If  the  authority  of  the  men,  who 
first  enacted  the  Laws  in  question,  is  to  weigh  with 
us,  it  must  be  on  the  presumption  that  they  were  wise 
men.     Bui  the  wisdom  of  Legislation  consists  in  the 
adaptation  of  Laws  to  circumstances.    If  then  it  can 
be  proved,  that  the  circumstances,  under  which  those 
laws  were  enacted,  no  longer  exist ;  and  that  oilier 
circumstances  altogether  different,  and  in  some  in- 
stances opposite,  have  taken  their  place;  we  have 
the  best  grounds  for  supposing,  that  if  the  men  were 
now  alive,  they  would  not  pass  the  same  statutes.  Jn 
Other  words,  the  spirit  of  the  statute  interpreted  by 
the  intention  of  the  Legislator  would  annul  the  letter 
of  it.     It  is  not  indeed  impossible,  thai  by  a  rare  feli- 
city of  accident  the  same  law  may  apply  to  two  sols 
of  circumstances.     But  surely  the  prt  sumption  is,  that 
regulations  well  adapted  for  the  manners,  the  social 
distinctions,  and  the  slate  of  properly,  of  opinion,  and 
of  external  relations  of  England  in  the  reign  of  Al- 
fred, or  even  in  that  of  Edward  the  First,  will  not  be 
well  suited  to  Great  Britain  at  the  close  of  the  reign 
of  George   the  Third.     For  instance:   at  the  time 
when  the  greater  part  of  the  cottagers  and  inferior 
farmers  were  in  a  state  of  villenage,  when  Sussex 
alone  contained  seven  thousand,  and  the  Isle  of  Wight 
twelve  hundred  families  of  bondsmen,  it  was  the  law 
of  the  land  that  every  freeman  should  vote  in  the  As- 
sembly of  the  Xation  personally  or  by  his  representa- 
tive.    An  act  of  Parliament  in  the  year  1G60  confirm- 
ed what  a  concurrence  of  causes  had  previously  ef- 
fected : — every  Englishman  is  now  bom  free,  the  laws 
of  the  land  are  the  birth-right  of  every  native,  and 
with  the  exception  of  a  few  honorary  privileges  all 
classes  obey  the  same  Laws.     Now,  argues  one  of 
our  political  writers,  it  being  made  the  constitution 
of  the  land  by  our  Saxon  ancestors,  that  every  free- 
man should  have  a  vote,  and  all  Englishmen  being 
now  born  free,  therefore,  by  the  constitution  of  ihe 
land,  every  Englishman  has  now  a  right  to  vole.  How 
shall  we  reply  to  this  without  breach  of  that  respect, 
to  which  the  Reasoner  at  least,  if  not  the  Reasoning, 
is  entitled  ?  If  it  be  the  definition  of  a  pun,  that  it  is 
the  confusion  of  two  different  meanings,  under  the 
same  or  similar  sound,  we  might  almost  characterize 
this  argument  as  being  grounded  on  a  grave  pun. 
Our  ancestors  established  the  right  of  voting  in  a  par- 
ticular class  of  men,  forming  at  that  time  the  middle 
rank  of  society,  and  known  to  be  all  of  them,  or  al- 
most all,  legal  proprietors — and  these  were  then  call- 
ed the  Freemen  of  England  :  therefore  they  establish- 
ed it  in  the  lowest  classes  of  society,  in  those  w  ho  pos- 
sess no  properly,  because  these  too  are  now  called  by 
the  same  name !!     Under  a  similar  pretext,  grounded 
on  the  same  precious  logic,  a  Mameluke  Bey  exlort- 
ed   a  large  contribution  from  the  Egyptian  Jews: 
"These   books  (the   Pentateuch)  are   authentic?" — 
Yes  !    "  Well,  the  debt  then  is  acknowledged : — and 
now  the  receipt,  or  the  money,  or  your  heads!     Tie 
Jews  borrowed  a  large  treasure  from  the  Egyptians; 
but  you  are  Ihe  Jews,  and  on  you,  therefore,  I  call  for 
the  repayment."     Besides,  if  a  law  is  to  be  inlerpret- 
ed  by  the  known  intention  of  its  makers,  the  Parlia- 
Oo 


ment  in  1660,  which  declared  all  the  natives  of  Eng- 
land freemen,  but  neither  altered  nor  meant  thereby 
lo  allcr  the  limitations  id'  the  right  of  election,  did  to 
all  intents  and  purposes  except  that  right  from  the 
common  privileges  of  Englishmen,  as  Englishmen. 

A  moment's  reflection  may  convince  us,  that  every 
single  Statute  is  made  under  the  knowledge  of  all 
the  other  Laws,  with  which  it  is  meant  toco-exist, 
and  by  winch  its  action  is  to  be  modified  and  de- 
termined. In  the  legislative  as  in  the  religious  code, 
the  text  must  not  be  taken  without  the  context. 
Nfow,  1  think,  we  may  safely  leave  ii  to  the  Reform- 
ers themselves  lo  make  choice  between  the  civil  and 
political  privileges  of  Englishmen  at  present,  con- 
sidered as  one  sum  total,  and  those  of  our  Ancestors 
in  any  former  period  of  our  History,  considered  as 
another,  on  the  old  principle,  take  one  and  leave  the 
other;  hut  whichever  you  take,  take  it  all  or  none. 
Laws  seldom  become  obsolete  as  long  as  they  are 
both  useful  and  practicable;  but  should  there  be  an 
exception,  there  is  no  other  way  of  reviving  iis  val- 
idity, but  by  convincing  the  existing  Legislature  of 
its  undiminished  practicability  and  expedience  ;  which 
in  all  essential  points  is  the  same  as  the  recommend- 
ing of  a  new  Law.  And  this  leads  me  to  the  third 
class  of  the  advocates  of  Reform,  those,  namely,  who 
leaving  ancient  statutes  to  Lawyers  and  Historians, 
and  universal  principles  with  the  demonstrable  de- 
ductions from  them  to  the  Schools  of  Logic,  Mathe- 
matics, Theology,  and  Ethics,  rest  all  their  measures, 
which  they  wish  to  see  adopted,  wholly  on  their  ex- 
pediency. Consequently,  they  must  hold  themselves 
prepared  to  give  such  proof,  as  the  nature  of  com- 
parative expediency  admits,  and  to  bring  forward 
such  evidence,  as  experience  and  the  logic  of  proba- 
bility can  supply,  that  the  plans  which  they  recom- 
mend for  adoption,  are  :  first,  practicable  ;  secondly, 
suited  to  the  existing  circumstances ;  and  lastly,  ne- 
cessary, or  at  least  requisite,  and  such  as  will  enable 
the  Government  to  accomplish  more  perfectly  the 
ends  for  which  it  was  instituted.  These  are  the 
three  indispensable  conditions  of  all  prudent  change, 
the  credentials,  with  which  Wisdom  never  fails  to 
furnish  her  public  envoys.  Whoever  brings  forward 
a  measure  that  combines  this  threefold  excellence, 
whether  in  the  Cabinet,  the  Senate,  or  by  means  of 
the  Press,  merits  emphatically  the  title  of  a  patriotic 
Statesman.  Neither  are  they  without  a  fair  claim  to 
respectful  attention  as  State-Counsellors,  who  fully 
aware  of  these  conditions,  and  with  a  due  sense  of 
the  difficulty  of  fulfilling  them,  employ  their  time 
and  talents  in  making  the  attempt.  An  imperfect 
plan  is  not  necessarily  a  useless  plan :  and  in  a  com- 
plex enigma  the  greatest  ingenuity  is  not  always 
shown  by  him  who  first  gives  the  complete  solution. 
The  dwarf  sees  farther  than  the  giant,  when  he  has 
the  giant's  shoulders  to  mount  on. 

Thus,  as  perspicuously  as  I  could,  I  have  exposed 
the  erroneous  principles  of  political  Philosophy,  and 
pointed  out  the  one  only  ground  on  which  the  con- 
stitution  of  Governments  can  be  either  condemned 
or  justified  by  wise  men. 

If  I  interpret  aright  the  signs  of  the  times,  that 
449 


440 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


branch  of  politics  which  relates  to  the  necessity  and 
practicability  of  infusing  new  life  into  our  Legisla- 
ture, as  the  best  means  of  securing  talent  and  wis- 
dom in  the  Cabinet,  will  shortly  occupy  the  public 
attention  with  a  paramount  interest*  I  would  glad- 
ly therefore  suggest  the  proper  state  of  feeling  and 
the  right  preparatory  notions  with  which  this  disqui- 
sition should  be  entered  upon  :  and  I  do  not  know 
how  I  can  effect  this  more  naturally,  than  by  relating 
the  facts  and  circumstances  which  influenced  my 
own  mind.  I  can  scarcely  be  accused  of  egotism,  as 
in  the  communications  and  conversations  which  I 
am  about  to  mention  as  having  occurred  to  me  during 
my  residence  abroad,  I  am  no  otherwise  the  hero  of 
the  tale,  than  as  being  the  passive  receiver  or  audi- 
tor. But  above  all,  let  it  not  be  forgotten,  that  in  the 
following  paragraphs  I  speak  as  a  Christian  Moralist, 
not  as  a  Statesman. 

To  examine  any  thing  wisely,  two  conditions  are 
requisite :  first,  a  distinct  notion  of  the  desirable 
ends,  in  the  complete  accomplishment  of  which 
would  consist  the  perfection  of  such  a  thing,  or  its 
ideal  excellence;  and,  secondly,  a  calm  and  kindly 
mode  of  feeling,  without  which  we  shall  hardly  fail 
either  to  overlook,  or  not  to  make  due  allowances  for, 
the  circumstances  which  prevent  these  ends  from 
being  all  perfectly  realized  in  the  particular  thing 
which  we  are  to  examine.  For  instance,  we  must 
have  a  general  notion  what  a  Man  can  be  and  ought 
to  be,  before  we  can  fitly  proceed  to  determine  on 
the  merits  or  demerits  of  any  one  individual.  For 
the  examination  of  crur  own  Government,  I  prepared 
my  mind,  therefore,  by  a  short  Catechism,  which  I 
shall  communicate  in  the  next  Essay,  and  on  which 
the  letter  and  anecdotes  that  follow,  will,  I  flatter 
myself,  be  found  an  amusing,  if  not  an  instructive 
commentary. 


ESSAY   V. 


Hoc  potissimum  pacto  felicem  ac  magnum  regem  se  furp  ju- 
dicans:  non  si  quam  plurimis  sed  si  quam  optimis  imperet. 
Proinde  parum  esse  putat  justis  praisidiis  regnum  suum  mu- 
niisse,  nisi  idem  viris  eruditiune  juxta  ac  vita;  integritate 
prcecellentibus  ditet  atque  honestel.  Nimirum  intelligit  h»c 
demum  esse  vera  regni  decora,  has  veras  opes  :  banc  veram 
est  Dullisunquam  seculiscessuram  gloriam. — ERAS.  Rot.  R. 
S.  Poncherio,  Episc.  Parisian.  Epistola. 

Translation. — Judging  that  he  will  have  employed  Ihe  most 
effectual  means  of  being  a  happy  and  powerful  king,  not  by 
governing  the  most  numerous  but  the  most  moral  people. 
He  deemed  of  small  sufficiency  to  have  protected  the  coun- 
try by  fleets  and  garrison,  unless  he  should  at  the  same 
time  enrich  and  ornament  it  with  men  of  eminent  learning 
and  sanctity. 


I\  what  do  all  States  agree?    A  number  of  men — 
exert— power — in  union.      Wherein  do  they  differ? 


*  I  am  in  doubt  whether  the  five  hundred  petitions  present- 
ed at  the  Bame  time  to  the  House  of  Commons  by  the  Member 
for  Westminster,  are  to  be  considered  as  a  fulfilment  of  this 
prophecy.  I  have  heard  the  echoes  of  a  single  blunderbuss, 
on  one  of  our  Cumberland  lakes,  imitate  the  volley  from  a 
whole  regiment. 


1st.  In  the  quality  and  quantity  of  the  powers.  One 
possesses  Chemists,  Mechanists,  Mechanics  of  all  kinds, 
Men  of  Science  ;  and  the  arts  of  war  and  peace  ;  and 
its  Citizens  naturally  strong  and  of  habitual  courage. 
Another  State  may  possess  none  or  a  few  only  of  these, 
or  the  same  more  imperfectly.  Or  of  two  States  pos- 
sessing the  same  in  equal  perfection  the  one  is  more 
numerous  than  the  other,  as  France  and  Switzcrlaad. 
2d.  In  the  more  or  less  perfect  union  of  these  powers. 
Compare  Mr.  Leckie's  valuable  and  authentic  docu- 
ments respecting  the  stale  of  Sicily  with  the  preceding 
Essay  on  Taxation.  3dly.  In  the  greater  or  less  ac- 
tivity of  exertion.  Think  of  the  ecclesiastical  State  and 
its  silent  metropolis,  and  then  of  the  county  of  Lancas- 
ter and  the  towns  of  Manchester  and  Liverpool.  What 
is  the  condition  of  powers  exerted  in  union  by  a  num- 
ber of  men?  A  Government.  What  are  the  ends  of 
Government?  They  are  of  two  kinds,  negative  and 
positive.  The  negative  ends  of  Government  are  the 
protection  of  life,  of  personal  freedom,  of  property,  of 
reputation,  and  of  religion,  from  foreign  and  from 
domestic  attacks.  The  positive  ends  are,  1st.  to  make 
the  means  of  subsistence  more  easy  to  each  individ- 
ual: 2d.  that  in  addition  to  the  necessaries  of  life  he 
should  derive  from  the  union  and  division  of  labor 
a  share  of  the  comforts  and  conveniences  w  hich  hu- 
manize and  ennoble  his  nature;  and  at  the  same  time 
the  power  of  perfecting  himself  in  his  own  branch 
of  industry  by  having  those  things  which  he  needs 
provided  for  him  by  other  among  his  fellow-citizens; 
including  the  tools  and  raw  or  manufactured  materi- 
i  als  necessary  for  his  own  employment.  I  knew  a 
profound  mathematician  in  Sicily,  who  had  devoted  a 
full  third  of  Ins  life  to  Ihe  perfecting  the  discovery  of 
the  Longitude,  and  who  had  convinced  not  only  himself 
but  the  principal  mathematicians  of  Messina  and  Pa- 
lermo that  he  had  succeeded;  but  neither  throughout 
Sicily  or  Naples  coubi  he  find  a  single  Artist  capable 
of  constructing  the  instrument  which  he  had  invented^ 
3dly.  The  hope  of  bettering  his  own  condition  and 
that  of  his  children.  The  civilized  man  gives  up  those 
stimulants  of  hope  and  fear  which  constitute  the  chief 
charm  of  the  savage  life:  and  yet  his  maker  has  dis- 
tinguished him  from  the  brute  that  perishes,  by  making 
Hope  an  instinct  of  his  nature  and  an  indispensable 
condition  of  his  moral  and  intellectual  progression. 
But  a  natural  instinct  constitutes  a  natural  right,  as 
far  as  its  gratification  is  compatible  with  the  equal 
rights  of  others.  Hence  our  ancestors  classed  those 
who  were  bound  to  the  soil  {addicti  glebce)  and  incapa- 

t  The  good  man.  who  is  poor,  old,  and  blind,  universally 
esteemed  for  the  innocence  and  austerity  of  his  life  not  less 
than  for  his  learning,  and  yet  universally  neglected,  except  by 
persons  almost  as  poor  as  himself,  strongly  reminded  me  of  a 
German  epigram  on  Kepler,  which  may  be  thus  translated: 

No  mortal  spirit  yet  had  clomb  so  high 
As  Kepler— yet  his  country  saw  him  die 
For  very  want  1  the  minds  alone  he  fed. 
And  so  the  bodies  left  him  without  bread. 

The  good  old  man  presented  me  with  the  book  in  which  he 
has  described  and  demonstrated  his  invention:  and  1  should 
with  great  pleasure  transmit  it  to  any  mathematician  who 
would  feel  an  interest  in  examining  it  and  communicating  hia 
opinions  on  its  merits. 

450 


THE  FRIEND. 


441 


ble  by  law  of  altering  tfieir  condition  from  that  of  their 
parents,  as  bondsmen  or  villeins,  however  advantage- 
ously they  might  otherwise  be  situated.  Reflect  on  the 
direful  effects  of  castes  in  Hindostan,  and  then  transfer 
yourself  in  fancy  to  an  English  cottage, 

"  Where  o'er  the  cradled  Infant  bending 
Hope  has  fix'd  her  wishful  gaze," 

and  the  fond  mother  dreams  of  her  child's  future  fur- 
furies — who  knows  but  he  may  come  home  a  rich  mer- 
chant, like  such  a  one  ?  or  be  a  bishop  or  a  judge  ?  The 
prizes  are  indeed  few  and  rare ;  but  still  they  are  pos- 
sible: and  the  hope  is  universal,  and  perhaps  occasions 
more  happiness  than  even  its  fulfilment.  Lastly,  the 
development  of  those  faculties  which  are  essential  to 
his  human  nature  by  the  knowledge  of  his  moral  and 
religious  duties,  and  the  increase  of  his  intellectual 
powers  in  as  great  a  degree,  as  is  compatible  with  the 
other  ends  of  his  social  union,  and  does  not  involve  a 
contradiction.  The  poorest  Briton  possesses  much  and 
important  knowledge,  which  he  would  not  have  had,  if 
Newton,  Luther,  Calvm,  arid  their  compeers  had  not 
existed  ;  but  it  is  evident  that  the  means  of  science  and 
learning  could  not  exist,  if  all  men  had  a  right  to  be 
made  profound  Mathematicians  or  men  of  extensive 
erudition.  Still  instruction  is  one  of  the  ends  of  Gov- 
ernment :  for  it  is  that  only  which  makes  the  abandon- 
ment of  the  savage  state  an  absolute  duty  :  and  that 
Constitution  is  the  best,  under  which  the  average  sum 
of  useful  knowledge  is  the  greatest,  and  the  causes  that 
awaken  and  encourage  talent  and  genius,  the  most  pow- 
erful and  various. 

These  were  my  preparatory  notions.  The  influ- 
ences under  which  I  proceeded  to  re-examine  our 
own  Constitution,  were  the  following,  which  I  give, 
not  exactly  as  they  occurred,  but  in  the  order  in 
which  they  will  be  illustrative  of  the  different  arti- 
cles of  the  preceding  paragraph.  That  we  are  better 
and  happier  than  others  is  indeed  no  reason  for  our 
not  becoming  still  better ;  especially  as  with  states,  as 
well  as  individuals,  not  to  be  progressive  is  to  be  re- 
trograde. Yet  the  comparison  will  usefully  temper 
the  desire  of  improvement  with  love  and  a  sense  of 
gratitude  for  what  we  already  are. 

I.  A  Letter  received,  at  Malta  from  an  American 
officer  of  high  rank,  who  has  since  received  the  thanks 
and  rewards  of  the  congress  for  his  services  in  the 
Mediterranean. 

Grand  Cairo,  Dec.  13, 1804. 

Sir, — The  same  reason,  which  induced  me  to  re- 
quest letters  of  introduction  to  his  Britannic  Majes- 
ty's Agents  here,  suggested  the  propriety  of  showing 
an  English  jack  at  the  main-top-gallant  mast  head,  on 
entering  the  port  of  Alexandria  on  the  26th  ult.  The 
signal  w-as  recognized  ;  and  Mr.  B was  immedi- 
ately on  board. 

We  found  in  port,  a  Turkish  Vice  Admiral,  with  a 
ship  of  the  line,  and  six  frigates :  a  part  of  which 
squadron  is  stationed  there  to  preserve  the  tranquil- 
lity of  the  country;  with  just  as  much  influence  as 
the  same  number  of  Pelicans  would  have  on  the 
same  station. 


On  entering  and  passing  the  streets  of  Alexandria, 
I  could  not  but  notice  the  very  marked  satisfaction, 
which  every  expression  and  every  countenance  of  all 
denominations  of  people,  Turks  and  Frenchmen  only 
excepted,  manifested  tinder  the  impression  that  we 
were  the  avant-courier  of  an  English  army.  They 
had  conceived  this  from  observing  the  English  jack 
at  our  main,  taking  our  flag  perhaps  for  that  of  a 
saint,  and  because  as  is  common  enough  every  where, 
they  were  ready  to  believe  what  they  wished.  It 
would  have  been  cruel  to  have  undeceived  them: 
consequently  without  positively  assuming  it,  we 
passed  in  the  character  of  Englishmen  amiuiL'  the 
middle  and  lower  orders  of  society,  and  as  their  allies 
among  those  of  better  information.  Wherever  we 
entered  or  wherever  halted,  we  were  surrounded  by 
the  wretched  inhabitants;  and  stunned  with  their 
benedictions  and  prayers  for  blessings  on  us.  "  Will 
the  English  come?  Are  they  coming?  God  grant 
the  English  may  come !  we  have  no  commerce — we 
have  no  money — we  have  no  bread  !  When  will  the 
English  arrive!"  My  answer  was  uniformly.  Pa- 
tience !  The  same  tone  w  as  heard  at  Rosetta  as 
among  the  Alexandrians,  indicative  of  the  same  dis- 
positions; only  it  was  not  so  loud,  because  the  inhab- 
itants are  less  miserable,  although  without  any  traits 
of  happiness.  On  the  fourth  we  left  that  village  for 
Cairo,  and  for  our  security  as  well  as  to  facilitate  our 
procurement  of  accommodations  during  our  voyage, 
as  well  as  our  stay  there,  the  resident  directed  his 

secretary,  Capt.  V ,  to  accompany  us,  and  to  give 

us  lodgings  in  his  house.  WTe  ascended  the  A'ile  lei- 
surely, and  calling  at  several  villages,  it  was  plainly 
perceivable  that  the  rational  partiality,  the  strong  and 
open  expression  of  which  proclaimed  so  loudly  the 
feelings  of  the  Egyptians  of  the  sea  coast,  was  gene- 
ral throughout  the  country:  and  the  prayers  for  the 
return  of  the  English  as  earnest  as  universal. 

On  the  morning  of  the  sixth  we  went  on  shore  at 
the  village  of  Sabour.  The  villagers  expressed  an 
enthusiastic  gladness  at  seeing  red  and  blue  uniforms 
and  round  hats  (the  French,  I  believe,  wear  three- 
cornered  opes.)  Two  days  before,  five  hundred  Al- 
banian deserters  from  the  Viceroy's  army  had  pillaged 
and  left  this  village;  at  which  they  had  lived  at  free 
quarters  about  four  weeks. — The  famishing  inhabi- 
tants were  now  distressed  with  apprehensions  from 
another  quarter.  A  company  of  wild  Arabs  were 
encamped  in  sight.  They  dreaded  their  ravages  and 
apprised  us  of  danger  from  them.  We  were  eighteen 
in  the  party,  well  armed  ;  and  a  pretty  brisk  fire 
which  we  raised  around  the  numerous  flocks  of  pi- 
geons and  other  small  fowl  in  the  environs,  must 
have  deterred  them  from  mischief,  if,  as  it  is  most 
probable,  they  had  meditated  any  against  us.  Scarce- 
ly, however,  were  we  on  board  and  under  weigh, 
when  we  saw  these  mounted  marauders  of  the  de- 
sert fall  furiously  upon  the  herds  of  camels,  buffa- 
loes, and  cattle  of  the  village,  and  drive  many  of 
them  off  wholly  unannoyed  on  the  part  of  the  unre- 
sisting inhabitants,  unless  their  shrieks  could  be 
deemed  an  annoyance.  They  afterwards  attacked 
and  robbed  several  unarmed  boats,  which  were  a 
451 


442 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


few  hours  astern  of  us.  The  most  insensible  must 
surely  have  been  moved  by  the  situation  of  the  pea- 
sants of  that  village.  The  while  we  were  listening 
to  their  complaints,  they  kissed  our  hands,  and  with 
prostrations  to  the  ground,  rendered  more  affecting 
by  the  inflamed  state  of  the  eyes  almost  universal 
amongst  them,  and  which  the  new  traveller  might 
venially  imagine  to  have  been  the  immediate  effect 
of  weeping  and  anguish,  they  all  implored  English 
succor.  Their  shrieks  at  the  assault  of  the  wild 
Arabs  seemed  to  implore  the  same  still  more  forcibly, 
while  it  testified  what  multiplied  reasons  they  had  to 
implore  it.  I  confess,  I  felt  an  almost  insurmountable 
impulse  to  bring  our  little  party  to  their  relief,  and 
might  perhaps  have  done  a  rash  act,  had  it  not  been 

for  the  calm  and  just  observation  of  Captain  V 's, 

that  "  these  were  common  occurrences,  and  that  any 
relief  which  we  could  afford,  would  not  merely  be 
only  temporary,  but  would  exasperate  the  plunderers 
to  still  more  atrocious  outrages  after  our  departure." 

On  the  morning  of  the  seventh  we  landed  near  a 
village.  At  our  approach  the  villagers  fled  :  signals 
of  friendship  brought  some  of  them  to  us.  When 
they  were  told  that  we  were  Englishmen,  they  flock- 
ed around  us  with  demonstrations  of  joy,  offered  their 
services,  and  raised  loud  ejaculations  for  our  estab- 
lishment in  the  country.  Here  we  could  not  procure 
a  pint  of  milk  for  our  coffee.  The  inhabitants  had 
been  plundered  and  chased  from  their  habitations  by 
the  Albanians  and  Desert  Arabs,  and  it  was  but  the 
preceding  day,  they  had  returned  to  their  naked  cot- 
tages. 

Grand  Cairo  differs  from  the  places  already  passed, 
only  as  the  presence  of  the  tyrant  stamps  silence  on 
the  lips  of  misery  with  the  seal  of  terror.  Wretch- 
edness here  assumes  the  form  of  melancholy ;  but 
the  few  whispers  that  are  hazarded,  convey  the  same 
feelings  and  the  same  wishes.  And  wherein  does 
this  misery  and  consequent  spirit  of  revolution  con- 
sist ?  Not  in  any  form  of  government  but  in  a  form- 
less despotism,  an  anarchy  indeed  !  for  it  amounts 
literally  to  an  annihilation  of  every  thing  that  can 
merit  the  name  of  government  or  justify  ^he  use  of 
the  word  even  in  the  laxest  sense.  Egypt  is  under 
the  most  frightful  despotism,  yet  has  no  master!  The 
Turkish  soldiery,  restrained  by  no  discipline,  seize 
every  thing  by  violence,  not  only  all  that  their  neces- 
sities dictate,  but  whatever  their  caprices  suggest. 
The  Mamelukes,  who  dispute  with  these  the  right  of 
domination,  procure  themselves  subsistence  by  means 
as  lawless  though  less  insupportably  oppressive.  And 
the  wild  Arabs  availing  themselves  of  the  occasion, 
plunder  the  defenceless  wherever  they  find  plunder. 
To  finish  the  whole,  the  talons  of  the  Viceroy  fix  on 
every  thing  which  can  be  changed  into  currency,  in 
order  to  find  the  means  of  supporting  an  ungoverned, 
disorganized  banditti  of  foreign  troops,  who  receive 
the  harvest  of  his  oppression,  desert  and  betray  him. 
Of  all  this  rapine,  robbery,  and  extortion,  the  wretch- 
ed cultivators  of  the  soil  are  the  perpetual  victims. — 
A  spirit  of  revolution  is  the  natural  consequence. 

The  reason  the  inhabitants  of  this  country  give  for 
preferring  the  English  to  the  French,  whether  true 


or  false,  is  as  natural  as  it  is  simple,  and  as  influential 
as  natural.  "  The  English,"  say  they,  "  pay  for 
every  thing  —  the  French  pay  nothing,  and  take 
every  thing."  They  do  not  like  this  kind  of  deli- 
verers.      

Well,  thought  I,  after  the  perusal  of  this  Letter, 
the  Slave  Trade  (which  had  not  then  been  abolished) 
is  a  dreadful  crime,  an  English  iniquity .'  and  to  sanc- 
tion its  continuance  under  full  conviction  and  parlia- 
mentary confession  of  its  injustice  and  inhumanity, 
is,  if  possible,  still  blacker  guilt.  Would  that  our 
discontents  were  for  a  while  confined  to  our  moral 
wants  !  whatever  may  be  the  defects  of  our  Consti- 
tution, we  have  at  least  an  effective  Government, 
and  that  loo  composed  of"  men  who  were  born  with 
us  and  are  to  die  among  us.  We  are  at  least  pre- 
served from  the  incursions  of  foreign  enemies;  the 
intercommunion  of  interests  precludes  a  civil  war, 
and  the  volunteer  spirit  of  the  nation  equally  with 
its  laws,  give  to  the  darkest  lanes  of  our  crowded 
metropolis  that  quiet  and  security  which  the  remotest 
villager  at  the  cataracts  of  the  Nile  prays  for  in  vain, 
in  his  mud  hovel ! 

Not  yd  enslaved  nor  wholly  vile, 

O  Albion,  O  my  mother  isle  ! 

Thy  valleys  fair,  as  Eden's  bowers, 

Glitter  green  with  sunny  showers; 

Thy  grassy  uplands'  gentle  swells 

Echo  to  the  bleat  of  flocks  ; 

(Those  glassy  hills,  those  glitt'ring  dells 

Proudly  ramparted  with  rocks) 

Jind  ocean  'mid  his  uproar  wild 

Speaks  safety  to  his  island-child. 

Hence  for  many  a  fearless  age 

Has  social  quiet  lov'd  ihy  shore  ; 

Nor  ever  sworded  warrior's  rage 

Or  sack'd  thy  towers  or  stain'd  thy  fields  with  gore. 

COLERIDGE'S  Poems. 


II.  Anecdote  of  Buonaparte. 
Buonaparte,  during  his  short  stay  at  Malta,  called 
out  the  Maltese  regiments  raised  by  the  Knights, 
amounting  to  fifteen  hundred  of  the  stoutest  young 
men  of  the  islands.  As  they  were  drawn  up  on  the 
parade,  he  informed  them,  in  a  bombastic  harangue, 
that  he  had  restored  them  to  liberty  ;  but  in  proof 
that  his  attachment  to  them  was  not  bounded  by  this 
benefaction,  he  would  now  give  them  an  opportunity 
of  adding  glory  to  freedom — and  concluding  by  ask- 
ing who  of  them  would  march  forward  to  be  his  fel- 
low-soldier on  the  banks  of  the  Nile,  and  contribute 
a  flower  of  Maltese  heroism  to  the  immortal  wreaths 
of  fame,  with  which  he  meant  to  crown  the  pyra- 
mids of  Egypt!  Not  a  man  stirred  :  all  gave  a  silent 
refusal.  They  were  instantly  surrounded  by  a  regi- 
ment of  French  soldiers,  marched  to  the  Marino, 
forced  on  board  the  transports,  and  threatened  with 
death  if  any  one  of  them  attempted  his  escape  or 
should  be  discovered  in  any  part  of  the  islands  of 
Malta  or  Goza.  At  Alexandria  they  were  always 
put  in  front,  both  to  save  the  French  soldiery,  and  to 
prevent  their  running  away  :  and  of  the  whole  num- 
ber, fifty  only  survived  to  revisit  their  native  country. 
From  one  of  these  survivors  I  first  learned  this  fact, 
452 


THE  FRIEND. 


443 


which  was  afterwards  confirmed  to  me  by  several 
of  his  remaining  comrades,  as  well  as  by  the  most 
respectable  inhabitants  of  Valette. 

This  anecdote  recalled  to  my  mind  an  accidental 
conversation  with  an  old  countryman  in  a  central 
district  of  Germany.  I  purposely  omit  names  be- 
cause the  day  of  retribution  has  come  and  gone  by. 
I  was  looking  at  a  strong  fortress  in  the  distance, 
which  formed  a  highly  interesting  object  in  a  rich 
and  varied  landscape,  and  asked  the  old  man,  who 
had  stopped  to  gaze  at  me,  its  name,  &C.  adding — 
how  beautiful  it  looks!  It  maybe  well  enough  to 
look  at,  answered  he,  but  God  keep  all  Christians 
from  being   taken  thither!     He  then   proceeded  to 

■  gratify  the  curiosity  which  he  had  thus  excited,  by 

informing  me  that  the  Baron had  been  taken 

out  of  his  bed  at  midnight  and  carried  to  that  fortress 
—  that  he  was  not  heard  of  for  nearly  two  years, 
when  a  soldier  who  had  fled  over  the  boundaries 
6ent  information  to  his  family  of  the  place  and  mode 
of  his  imprisonment.  As  I  have  no  design  to  work 
on  the  feelings  of  my  readers,  I  pass  over  the  shock- 
ing detail:  had  not  the  language  and  countenance 
of  my  informant  precluded  such  a  suspicion,  I  might 
have  supposed  that  he  had  been  repeating  some  tale 
of  horror  from  a  Romance  of  the  dark  ages.  What 
was  his  crime !  I  asked — The  report  is,  said  the  old 
man,  that  in  his  capacity  as  minister  he  had  remon- 
strated with  the concerning  the  extravagance 

of  his  mistress,  an  outlandish  countess  ;  and  that  she 
in  revenge  persuaded  the  sovereign,  that  it  was  the 
Baron  who  had  communicated  to  a  professor  at  Got- 
tingen  the  particulars  of  the  infamous  sale  of  some 
thousand  of  his  subjects  as  soldiers.  On  the  same 
day  I  discovered  in  the  landlord  of  a  small  public 
house  one  of  the  men  who  had  been  thus  sold.  He 
seemed  highly  delighted  in  entertaining  an  English 
gentleman,  and  in  once  more  talking  English  after  a 
lapse  of  so  many  years.  He  was  far  from  regretting 
this  incident  in  his  life,  but  his  account  of  the  manner 
in  which  they  were  forced  away,  accorded  in  so 
many  particulars  with  Schiller's  impassioned  descrip- 
tion of  the  same,  or  a  similar  scene,  in  his  Tragedy 
of  Cabal  and  Love,  as  to  leave  a  perfect  conviction 
on  my  mind,  that  the  dramatic  pathos  of  that  descrip- 
tion was  not  greater  than  its  historic  fidelity. 

As  I  was  thus  reflecting,  I  glanced  my  eye  on  the 
leading  paragraph  of  a  London  newspaper,  containing 
|  much  angry  declamation,  and  some  bitter  truths,  re- 
•  specting  our  military  arrangements.    It  were  in  vain, 
[  thought  I,  to  deny  that  the  influence  of  parliamentary 
|   interest,  which  prevents  the  immense  patronage  of 
I  the  crown  from  becoming  a  despotic  power,  is  not  the 
most  likely  to  secure  the  ablest  commanders  or  the 
}   fittest  persons  for  the  management  of  our  foreign  em- 
pire.   However,  thank  Heaven !  if  we  fight,  we  fight 
for  our  own  king  and  country  :  and  grievances  which 
I  may  be  publicly  complained  of,  there  is  some  chance 
I  of  seeing  remedied. 

IB.  A  celebrated  Professor  in  a  German  Univer- 

■  sity,  showed  me  a  very  pleasing  print,  entitled,  "  Tol- 

Oo2 


eration." — A  Catholic  Priest,  a  Lutheran  Divine,  a 
Calvinist  Minister,  a  Quaker,  a  Jew,  and  a  Philoso- 
pher, were  represented  sitting  around  the  same  Table, 
over  which  a  winged  figure  hovered  in  the  attitude 
of  protection.  For  this  harmless  print,  said  my  friend, 
the  artist  was  imprisoned,  and  having  attempted  to 
escape,  was  sentenced  to  draw  the  lx>ats  on  the  banks 
of  the  Danube,  with  robbers  and  murderers :  and 
there  died  in  less  than  two  months,  from  exhaustion 
and  exposure.  In  your  happy  country,  sir,  this  print 
would  be  considered  as  a  pleasing  scene  from  real 
life:  for  in  every  great  town  throughout  your  empire 
you  may  meet  with  the  original.  Yes,  I  replied,  as 
far  as  the  negative  ends  of  Government  are  concerned 
we  have  no  reason  to  complain.  Our  Government 
protects  us  from  foreign  enemies,  and  our  Laws  se- 
cure our  lives,  our  personal  freedom,  our  properly, 
reputation,  and  religious  rights,  from  domestic  attacks. 
Our  taxes,  indeed  are  enormous — Oh!  talk  not  of 
taxes,  said  my  friend,  till  you  have  resided  in  a  coun- 
try where  the  boor  disposes  of  his  produce  to  stran- 
gers for  a  foreign  mart,  not  to  bring  back  to  his  fami- 
ly the  comforts  and  conveniences  of  foreign  manufac- 
tures, but  to  procure  that  com  which  his  lord  is  to 
squander  away  in  a  distant  land.  Neither  can  I  with 
patience  hear  it  said,  that  your  laws  act  only  to  the 
negative  ends  of  government.  They  have  a  manifold 
positive  influence,  and  their  incorrupt  administration 
gives  a  color  to  all  your  modes  of  thinking,  and  is  one 
of  the  chief  causes  of  your  superior  morality  in  pri- 
vate as  well  as  public  life.* 

My  limits  compel  me  to  strike  out  the  different  in- 
cidents which  1  had  written  as  a  commentary  on  the 
three  former  of  the  positive  ends  of  Government.  To 
the  moral  feelings  of  my  Readers  they  might  have 
been  serviceable ;  but  for  their  understanding  they 
are  superfluous.  It  is  surely  impossible  to  peruse 
them,  and  not  admit  that  all  three  are  realized  under 
our  Government  to  a  degree  unexampled  in  any  other 
old  and  long  peopled  country.  The  defects  of  our 
Constitution  (in  which  word  I  include  the  Laws  and 
Customs  of  the  Land  as  well  as  its  scheme  of  Legis- 
lative, and  Executive  Power)  must  exist,  therefore,  in 
the  fourth,  namely,  the  production  of  the  highest  aver- 
age of  general  information,  of  general  moral  and  reli- 
gious principles,  and  the  excitements  and  opportuni- 
ties which  it  affords  to  paramount  genius  and  heroic 

*  "  The  adminis'ration  of  justice  throughout  the  Continent 
is  partial,  venal,  und  infamous.  I  have,  in  conversation  with 
many  sensible  men,  met  with  something  of  content  with  their 
governments  in  all  other  respects  than  this:  hut  upon  the 
question  of  expecting  justice  to  he  really  and  fairly  adminis- 
teted,  every  one  confessed  there  was  no  such  thing  to  be  look- 
ed for.  The  conduct  of  the  judges  is  profligate  and  atrocious. 
Upon  almost  every  cause  that  comes  before  them  interest  iR 
openly  made  wilh  the  judges;  and  woe  betide  the  man,  whe  . 
with  a  cause  to  support  had  no  means  of  conciliating  favor, 
either  by  the  beauiy  of  a  handsome  wife,  or  by  other  me- 
thods."— This  quotation  is  confined  in  the  original  to  Frani" 
under  the  monarchy;  I  have  extended  the  application,  and 
adopted  the  words  as  comprising  the  result  of  my  own  expe- 
rience: and  I  take  this  opportunity  of  declaring,  that  the  most 
important  parts  of  Mr.  Lcckie's  statement  concerning  Sicily  I 
myself  know  to  be  accurate,  and  am  authorized  by  what  1 
myself  saw  there,  to  rely  on  the  whole  as  a  fair  and  unexag 
geraled  representation. 

453 


444 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


power  in  a  sufficient  number  of  its  citizens.  These 
are  points  in  which  it  would  be  immorality  to  rest 
content  with  the  presumption,  however  well  founded, 
that  we  are  better  than  others,  if  we  are  not  what 
we  ought  to  be  ourselves,  and  not  using  the  means 
of  improvement.  The  first  question  then  is,  what  is 
the  fact?  The  second,  supposing  a  defect  or  defi- 
ciency in  one  or  all  of  these  points,  and  that  to  a  de- 
gree which  may  affect  our  power  and  prosperity,  if 
not  our  absolute  safely,  are  the  plans  of  Legislative 
Reform  that  have  hitherto  been  proposed  fit  or  likely 
to  remove  such  defect,  and  supply  such  deficiency? 
The  third  and  last  question  is — Should  there  appear 
reason  to  deny  or  doubt  this,  are  there  then  any  other 
means,  and  what  are  they  ? — Of  these  points  in  the 
concluding  Essay  of  this  Section. 

A  French  gentleman  in  the  reign  of  Lewis  the  14th, 
was  comparing  the  French  and  English  writers  with 
all  the  boastfulness  of  national  prepossession.  Sir! 
(replied  an  Englishman  better  versed  in  the  princi- 
ples of  Freedom  than  the  canons  of  criticism)  there 
are  but  two  subjects  worthy  the  human  intellect : 
Politics  and  Religion,  our  state  here  and  our  state 
hereafter ;  and  on  neither  of  these  dare  you  write. 
Long  may  the  envied  privilege  be  preserved  to  my 
countrymen  of  writing  and  talking  concerning  both  ! 
Nevertheless,  it  behoves  us  all  to  consider,  that  to 
write  or  talk  concerning  any  subject,  without  having 
previously  taken  the  pains  to  understand  it,  is  a 
breach  of  duty  which  we  owe  to  ourselves,  though  it 
may  be  no  offence  against  the  laws  of  the  land.  The 
privilege  of  talking  and  even  publishing  nonsense  is 
necessary  in  a  free  state ;  but  the  more  sparingly  we 
make  use  of  it,  the  better. 


ESSAY   VI. 


Then  we  may  thank  ourselves, 
Who  spell  bound  by  the  magic  name  of  Peace 
Dream  golden  dreams.    Go,  warlike  Britain,  go. 
For  the  gray  olive-branch  change  thy  green  laurels: 
Hang  up  thy  rusty  helmet,  that  the  bee 
May  have  a  hive,  or  spider  find  a  loom  ! 
Instead  of  doubling  drum  and  thrilling  fife 
Be  lull'd  in  lady's  lap  with  amorous  flutes. 
But  for  Napoleon,  know,  he  'II  scorn  this  calm : 
The  ruddy  planet  at  his  birth  bore  sway. 
Sanguine,  a  dust  his  humor,  and  wild  fire 
His  ruling  element.    Rage,  revenge,  and  cunning 
Make  up  the  temper  of  this  captain's  valor. 

Jidavtcd  from  an  old  Play. 


Little  prospective  wisdom  can  that  man  obtain, 
who  hurrying  onward  with  the  current,  or  rather  tor- 
rent, of  events,  feels  no  interest  in  their  importance, 
except  as  far  as  his  curiosity  is  excited  by  their  novel- 
ty; and  to  whom  all  reflection  and  retrospect  are 
wearisome.  If  ever  there  were  a  time  when  the 
formation  of  just  public  principles  becomes  a  duty  of 
private  morality  ;  when  the  principles  of  morality  in 
general  ought  to  be  made  to  bear  on  our  public  suf- 
frages, and  to  affect  every  great  national  determina- 
tion ;  when,  in  short,  his   country  should   have  a 


place  by  every  Englishman's  fire-side  ;  and  when  the 
feelings  and  truths  which  give  dignity  to  the  fire-side 
and  tranquillity  to  the  death-bed,  ought  to  be  present 
and  influencive  in  the  cabinet  and  in  the  senate — 
that  time  is  now  with  us.  As  an  introduction  to,  and 
at  the  same  time  as  a  commentary  on,  the  subject  of 
international  law,  I  have  taken  a  review  of  the  cir- 
cumstances that  led  to  the  Treaty  of  Amiens,  and 
the  re-commencement  of  the  war,  more  especially 
with  regard  to  the  occupation  of  Malta. 

In  a  rich  commercial  state,  a  war  seldom  fails  to 
become  unpopular  by  length  of  continuance.  The 
first,  or  revolution  war,  which  towards  its  close,  had 
become  just  and  necessary,  perhaps  beyond  any  for- 
mer example,  had  yet  causes  of  unpopularity  peculiar 
to  itself.  Exhaustion  is  the  natural  consequence  of 
excessive  stimulation,  in  the  feelings  of  nations  equal- 
ly as  in  those  of  individuals.  Wearied  out  by  over- 
whelming novelties;  stunned  as  it  were,  by  a  series 
of  strange  explosions  ;  sick  too  of  hope  long  delayed  ; 
and  uncertain  as  to  the  real  object  and  motive  of  the 
war,  from  the  rapid  change  and  general  failure  of 
its  ostensible  objects  and  motives;  the  public  mind 
for  many  months  preceding  the  signing  of  the  pre- 
liminaries, had  lost  all  its  tone  and  elasticity.  The 
consciousness  of  mutual  errors  and  mutual  disap- 
pointments, disposed  the  great  majority  of  all  parties 
to  a  spirit  of  diffidence  and  toleration,  which,  amiable 
as  it  may  be  in  individuals,  yet  in  a  nation,  and  above 
all  in  an  opulent  and  luxurious  nation,  is  always  too 
nearly  akin  to  apathy  and  selfish  indulgence.  An 
unmanly  impatience  for  peace  became  only  not  uni- 
versal. After  as  long  a  resistance  as  the  nature  of 
our  Constitution  and  national  character  permitted  or 
even  endured,  the  government  applied  at  length  the 
only  remedy  adequate  to  the  greatness  of  the  evil,  a 
remedy  which  the  magnitude  of  the  evil  justified,  and 
which  nothing  but  an  evil  of  that  magnitude  could 
justify.  At  a  high  price  they  purchased  for  us  the 
name  of  peace,  at  a  time  when  the  views  of  France 
became  daily  more  and  more  incompatible  with  our 
vital  interests.  Considering  the  peace  as  a  mere 
truce  of  experiment,  wise  and  temperate  men  regard- 
ed with  complacency  the  Treaty  of  Amiens,  for  the 
very  reasons  that  would  have  ensured  the  condem- 
nation of  any  other  treaty  under  any  other  circum- 
stances. Its  palpable  deficiencies  were  its  antidote: 
or  rather  they  formed  its  very  essence,  and  declared 
at  first  sight,  what  alone  it  was,  or  was  meant  to  be. 
Any  attempt  at  that  time  and  in  this  Treaty  to  have 
secured  Italy,  Holland,  and  the  German  Empire, 
would  have  been  in  the  literal  sense  of  the  word, 
preposterous.  The  Nation  would  have  withdrawn 
all  faith  in  the  pacific  intentions  of  the  ministers,  if 
the  negotiation  had  been  broken  off  on  a  plea  of  this 
kind  :  for  it  had  been  taken  for  granted  the  extreme 
desirableness,  nay,  the  necessity  of  a  peace,  and, 
this  once  admitted,  there  would,  no  doubt,  have  been 
an  absurdity  in  continuing  the  war  for  ohjects  which 
the  war  furnished  no  means  of  realizing.  If  the 
First  Consul  had  entered  into  stipulations  with  us 
respecting  the  Continent,  they  would  have  been  ob- 
served only  as  long  as  his  interests  from  other  causes 

454 


THE  FRIEND. 


445 


night  have  dictated ;  they  would  have  been  signed 
with  as  much  sincerity  and  observed  with  as  much 
good  faith  as  the  article  actually  inserted  in  the 
Treaty  of  Amiens,  respecting  the  integrity  of  the 
Turkish  empire.  This  article  indeed  was  wisely 
insisted  upon  by  us,  because  it  affected  both  our  na- 
tional honor,  and  the  interests  of  our  Indian  empire 
immediately ;  and  still  more,  perhaps,  because  this 
of  all  others  was  the  most  likely  to  furnish  an  early 
proof  of  the  First  Consul's  real  dispositions.  But 
deeply  interested  in  the  fate  of  the  Continent,  as  we 
are  thought  to  be,  it  would  nevertheless  have  been 
most  idle  to  have  abandoned  a  peace,  supposing  it  at 
all  desirable,  on  the  ground  that  the  French  govern- 
ment had  refused  that  which  would  have  been  of 
no  value  had  it  been  granted. 

Indeed  there  results  one  serious  disadvantage  from 
insisting  on  the  rights  and  interests  of  Austria,  the 
Empire,  Switzerland,  &c.  in  a  treaty  between  Eng- 
land and  France  :  and,  as  it  should  seem,  no  advan- 
tage to  counterbalance  it.  For  so,  an}'  attack  on 
those  rights  instantly  pledges  our  character  and 
national  dignity  to  commence  a  war,  however  inex- 
pedient it  might  happen  to  be,  and  however  hopeless : 
while  if  a  war  were  expedient,  any  attack  on  these 
countries  by  France  furnishes  a  justifiable  cause  of 
war  in  its  essential  nature,  and  independently  of  all 
positive  treaty.  Seen  in  this  light,  the  defects  of  the 
treaty  of  Amiens  become  its  real  merits.  If  the 
government  of  France  made  peace  in  the  spirit  of 
peace,  then  a  friendly  intercourse  and  the  human- 
izing influences  of  commerce  and  reciprocal  hospital- 
ity would  gradually  bring  about  in  both  countries 
the  dispositions  necessary  (or  the  calm  discussion  and 
sincere  conclusion  of  a  genuine,  efficient,  and  com- 
prehensive treaty.  If  the  contrary  proved  the  fact, 
the  Treaty  of  Amiens  contained  in  itself  the  prin- 
ciples of  its  own  dissolution.  It  was  what  it  ought 
to  be.  If  the  First  Consul  had  both  meant  and  dealt 
fairly  by  us,  the  treaty  would  have  led  to  a  true  set- 
tlement :  but  he  acting  as  all  prudent  men  expected 
that  he  would  act,  it  supplied  just  reasons  for  the 
commencement  of  war — and  at  its  decease  left  us, 
as  a  legacy,  blessings  that  assuredly  far  outweighed 
our  losses  by  the  peace.  It  left  us  popular  enthusi- 
asm, national  unanimity,  and  simplicity  of  object : 
and  removed  one  inconvenience  which  cleaved  to 
the  last  war,  by  attaching  to  the  right  objects,  and 
enlisting  under  their  proper  banners,  the  scorn  and 
hatred  of  slavery,  the  passion  for  freedom,  all  the 
high  thoughts  and  high  feelings  that  connect  us  with 
the  honored  names  of  past  ages ;  and  inspire  senti- 
ments and  language,  to  which  our  Hampdens,  Sid- 
neys, and  Russels,  might  listen  without  jealousy. 

The  late  Peace  then  was  negotiated  by  the  Govern- 
ment, ratified  by  the  Legislature,  and  received  by  the 
nation,  as  an  experiment:  as  the  only  means  of  exhi- 
biting such  proof  as  would  be  satisfactory  to  the 
people  in  their  then  temper;  whether  Buonaparte 
devoting  his  ambition  and  activity  to  the  re-establish- 
ment of  trade,  colonial  tranquillity,  and  social  morals, 
in  France,  would  abstain  from  insulting,  alarming 
and  endangering  the   British  empire.      And  these 


thanks  at  least  were  due  to  the  First  Consul,  that  he 
didnot  longdelay  the  proof  With  more  than  papal  in- 
solence he  issued  edicts  of  anathema  against  us,  and 
excommunicated  us  from  all  interference  in  the  affairs 
of  the  Continent.  He  insulted  us  still  more  indecently 
by  perlinacious  demands  respecting  our  constitutional 
Laws  and  Rights  of  Hospitality;  by  the  official  pub- 
lication of  Sebastiani's  Report ;  and  by  a  direct  per- 
sonal outrage  offered  in  the  presence  of  all  the  foreign 
minislers  to  the  king,  in  the  person  of  his  ambassador. 
He  both  insulted  and  alarmed  us  by  a  display  of  the 
most  perfidious  ambition  in  the  subversion  of  the  in- 
dependence of  Switzerland,  in  the  avowal  of  designs 
against  Egypt,  Syria,  and  the  Greek  Islands,  and  in 
the  mission  of  military  spies  to  Great  Britain  itself. 
And  by  forcibly  maintaining  a  French  army  in  Hol- 
land, he  at  once  insulted,  alarmed,  and  endangered 
us.  What  can  render  a  war  just  (pre-supposing  its 
expedience)  if  insult,  repeated  alarm,  and  danger  do 
not !  And  how  can  it  be  expedient  for  a  rich,  united, 
and  powerful  Island-empire  to  remain  in  nominal 
peace  and  unresenting  passiveness  with  an  insolent 
neighbor,  who  has  proved  that  to  wage  against  it  an 
unmitigated  war  of  insult,  alarm,  and  endangerment 
is  both  his  temper  and  his  system  ? 

Many  attempts  were  made  by  Mr.  Fox  to  explain 
away  the  force  of  the  greater  number  of  the  facts 
here  enumerated  :  but  the  great  fact,  for  which  alone 
they  have  either  force  or  meaning,  the  great  ultimate 
fact,  that  Great  Britain  had  been  insulted,  alarmed, 
and  endangered  by  France,  Mr.  Fox  himself  ex- 
pressly admitted.  But  the  opposers  of  the  present 
war  concentre  the  strength  of  their  cause  in  the  fol- 
lowing brief  argument.  Supposing,  say  they,  the 
grievances  set  forth  in  our  manifesto  to  be  as  nolori- 
ous  as  they  are  asserted  to  be,  yet  more  notorious 
they  cannot  be  than  that  other  fact  which  utterly 
annuls  them  as  reasons  for  a  war — the  fact,  that  min- 
isters themselves  regard  them  only  as  the  pompous 
garnish  of  the  dish.  It  stands  on  record,  that  Buona- 
parte might  have  purchased  our  silence  for  ever,  re- 
specting these  insults  and  injuries,  by  a  mere  acqui- 
escence on  his  part  in  our  retention  of  Malta.  The 
whole  treaty  of  Amiens  is  little  more  than  a  per- 
plexed bond  of  compromise  respecting  Malta.  On 
Malta  we  rested  the  peace :  for  Malta  we  renewed 
the  war.  So  say  the  opposers  of  the  present  war. 
As  its  advocates  we  do  not  deny  the  fact  as  stated  bv 
them ;  but  we  hope  to  achieve  all,  and  more  than  all 
ihe  purposes  of  such  denial,  by  an  explanation  of  the 
fact.  The  difficulty  then  resolves  itself  into  twoques- 
tions :  first,  in  what  sense  of  the  words  can  we  be 
said  to  have  gone  to  war  for  Malta  alone?  Secondly, 
wherein  does  the  importance  of  Malta  consist?  The 
answer  to  the  second  will  be  found  in  the  Life  of  the 
Liberator  and  Political  Father  of  the  Maltese:  while 
the  attempt  to  settle  the  first  question,  so  at  the  same 
time  to  elucidate  the  Law  of  Nations  and  its  iden- 
tity with  the  Law  of  Conscience,  will  occupy  the 
remainder  of  the  present  Essay. 
I.  In  what  sense  can  we  be  affirmed  to  have  renewed 
the  war  for  Malta  alone  ? 

If  we  had  known  or  could  reasonably  have  be- 
455 


446 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Jieved,  that  the  views  of  France  were  and  would 
continue  to  be  friendly  or  negative  toward  Great  Bri- 
tain, neither  the  subversion  of  the  independence  of 
Switzerland,  nor  the  maintenance  of  a  French  army 
in  Holland,  would  have  furnished  any  prudent 
ground  for  war.  For  the  only  way  by  which  we 
could  have  injured  France,  namely,  the  destruction 
of  her  commerce  and  navy,  would  increase  her 
means  of  continental  conquests,  by  concentrating  all 
the  resources  and  energies  of  the  French  empire  in 
her  military  powers :  while  the  losses  and  miseries 
which  the  French  people  would  suffer  in  conse- 
quence, and  their  magnitude,  compared  with  any  ad- 
vantages that  might  accrue  to  them  from  the  exten- 
sion of  the  name  France,  were  facts  which,  we  knew 
by  experience,  would  weigh  as  nothing  with  the  ex- 
isting Government.  Its  attacks  on  the  independence 
of  its  continental  neighbors  become  motives  to  us  for 
the  re-commencement  of  hostility,  only  as  far  as  they 
give  proofs  of  a  hostile  intention  toward  ourselves, 
and  facilitate  the  realizing  of  such  intention.  If  any 
events  had  taken  place,  increasing  the  means  of  in- 
juring this  country,  even  though  these  events  fur- 
nished no  moral  ground  of  complaint  against  France, 
(such  for  instance,  might  be  the  great  extension  of 
her  population  and  revenue,  from  freedom  and  a  wise 
government)  much  more,  if  they  were  the  fruits  of 
iniquitous  ambition,  and  therefore  in  themselves  in- 
volved the  probability  of  an  hostile  intention  to  us — 
then,  I  say,  every  after  occurrence  becomes  import- 
ant, and  both  a  just  and  expedient  ground  of  war,  in 
proportion,  not  to  the  importance  of  the  thing  in  itself, 
but  to  the  quantity  of  evident  proof  afforded  by  it  of 
an  hostile  design  in  the  Government,  by  whose  power 
our  interests  are  endangered.  If  by  demanding  the 
immediate  evacuation  of  Malta,  when  he  had  him- 
self done  away  the  security  of  its  actual  indepen- 
dence (on  his  promise  of  preserving  which  our  pacific 
promises  rested  as  on  their  sole  foundation)  and  this 
too,  after  he  had  openly  avowed  such  designs  on 
Egypt,  as  not  only  in  the  opinion  of  our  ministers,  but 
in  his  own  opinion,  made  it  of  the  greatest  importance 
to  this  country,  that  Malta  should  not  be  under 
French  influence;  if  by  this  conduct  the  First  Consul 
exhibited  a  decisive  proof  of  his  intention  to  violate 
our  rights  and  to  undermine  our  national  interests ; 
then  all  his  preceding  actions  on  the  Continent  be- 
came proofs  likewise  of  the  same  intention;  and  any 
one*  of  these  aggressions  involves  the  meaning  of  the 


*  An  hundred  cases  might  be  imagined  which  would  place 
this  assertion  in  its  true  light.  Suppose,  for  instance,  a  coun- 
try according  to  the  laws  of  which  a  parent  might  not  disin- 
herit a  son  without  having  first  convicted  him  of  some  one  of 
sundry  crimes  enumerated  in  a  specific  statute.  Caius,  by  a 
series  of  vicious  actions  had  so  nearly  convinced  his  father  of 
his  utter  worthlessness,  that  the  father  resolves  on  the  next 
provocation  to  use  the  very  first  opportunity  of  legally  disin- 
heriting his  son.  The  provocation  occurs,  and  in  itself  fur- 
nishes this  opportunity,  and  Caius  is  disinherited,  though  for 
an  action  much  less  glaring  and  intolerable  than  most  of  his 
preceding  delinquencies  had  been.  The  advocates  of  Caius 
complain  that  he  should  be  thus  punished  for  a  comparative 
trifle,  so  many  worse  misdemeanors  having  been  passed  over. 
The  father  replies:  "This,  his  last  action,  is  not  the  cause  of 
the  disinheritance;  but  the  means  of  disinheriting  him.  I 
punished  him  by  it  rather  than  for  it.    In  truth  it  was  not  for 


whole.  Which  of  them  is  to  determine  as  to  war 
must  be  decided  by  other  and  prudential  considera- 
tions. Had  the  First  Consul  acquiesced  in  our  deten- 
tion of  Malta,  he  would  thereby  have  furnished  such 
proof  of  pacific  intentions,  as  would  have  led  to  fur- 
ther hopes,  as  would  have  lessened  our  alarm  from 
his  former  acts  of  ambition,  and  relatively  to  us  have 
altered  in  some  degree  their  nature. 

It  should  never  be  forgotten,  that  a  Parliament  or 
national  Council  is  essentially  different  from  a  Court 
of  Justice,  alike  in  its  objects  and  its  duties.  In  the 
latter,  the  Juror  lays  aside  his  private  knowledge  and 
his  private  connections,  and  judges  exclusively  ac- 
cording to  evidence  adduced  in  the  Court:  in  the 
former,  the  Senator  acts  upon  his  own  internal  con- 
victions, and  oftentimes  upon  private  information, 
which  it  would  be  imprudent  or  criminal  to  disclose. 
Though  his  ostensible  Reason  ought  to  be  a  true  and 
just  one,  it  is  by  no  means  necessary  that  it  should 
be  his  sole  or  even  his  chief  reason.  In  a  Court  of 
Justice,  the  Juror  attends  to  the  character  and  gene- 
ral intentions  of  the  accused  party,  exclusively,  as 
adding  to  the  probability  of  his  having  or  not  having 
committed  the  one  particular  action  then  in  question. 
The  Senator,  on  the  contrary,  when  he  is  to  deter- 
mine on  the  conduct  of  a  foreign  Power,  attends  to 
particular  actions,  chiefly  in  proof  of  character  and 
existing  intentions.  Now  there  were  many  and  very 
powerful  Reasons  why,  though  appealing  to  the 
former  actions  of  Buonaparte,  as  confirmations  of  his 
hostile  spirit  and  alarming  ambition,  we  should  never- 
theless make  Malta  the  direct  object  and  final  deter- 
minant of  the  war.  Had  we  gone  to  war  avowedly 
for  the  independence  of  Holland  and  Switzerland, 
we  should  have  furnished  Buonaparte  with  a  color- 
able pretext  for  annexing  both  countries  immediately 
to  the  French  empire.t  which,  if  he  should  do  (as  if 
his  power  continues  he  most  assuredly  will  sooner  or 
later)  by  a  mere  act  of  violence,  and  undisguised  ty- 
ranny, there  will  follow  a  moral  weakening  of  his 
power  in  the  minds  of  men,  which  may  prove  of  in- 
calculable advantage  to  the  independence  and  well- 
being  of  Europe ;  but  which,  unfortunately,  for  this 
very  reason,  that  it  is  not  to  be  calculated,  is  too  often 
disregarded  by  ordinary  Statesmen.  At  all  events,  it 
would  have  been  made  the  plea  for  banishing,  plun- 
dering, and  perhaps  murdering  numbers  of  virtuous 
and  patriotic  individuals,  as  being  the  partizans  of 
"  the  Enemy  of  the  Co?itine?it."  Add  to  this,  that  we 
should  have  appeared  to  have  rushed  into  a  war  for 
objects  which  by  war  we  could  not  hope  to  realize ; 
we  should  have  exacerbated  the  misfortunes  of  the 


any  of  his  actions  that  I  have  thus  punished  him,  but  for  his 
vices ;  that  is,  not  so  much  for  the  injuries  which  I  have  suf- 
fered, as  for  the  dispositions  which  these  actions  evinced;  for 
the  insolent  and  alarming  intentions  of  which  they  are  proofs. 
Now  of  this  habitual  temper,  of  these  dangerous  purposes, 
his  last  action  is  as  true  and  complete  a  manifestation  as  any 
or  all  of  his  preceding  offences ;  and  it  therefore  may  and 
must  he  taken  as  their  common  representative." 

t  This  disquisition  was  written  in  the  year  1804,  in  Malta, 
at  the  request  of  Sir  Alexander  Ball,  [with  the  exception  of 
the  latter  paragraphs,  which  I  have  therefore  included  in 
crotchets.] 

456 


THE  FRIEND. 


447 


countries  of  which  we  had  elected  ourselves  the 
champions;  and  the  war  would  have  appeared  a 
mere  war  of  revenge  and  reprisal,  a  circumstance 
always  to  be  avoided  where  it  is  possible.  The  ablest 
and  best  men  in  the  Batavian  Republic,  those  who 
felt  the  insults  oi  Prance  most  acutely,  and  were  suf- 
fering from  her  oppressions  the  most  severely,  entreat- 
ed our  Government,  through  their  minister,  that  it 
would  not  make  the  state  of  Holland  the  great  osten- 
sible reason  of  the  war.  The  Swiss  patriots,  too,  be- 
lieved that  we  could  do  nothing  to  assist  them  at  that 
time,  and  attributed  to  our  forbearance  the  compara- 
tively timid  use  which  France  has  hitherto  made  of 
her  absolute  power  over  that  country.  Resides,  Aus- 
tria, whom  the  changes  on  the  Continent  much  more 
nearly  concerned  than  England,  having  refused  all 
co-operation  with  us,  there  is  reason  to  fear  that  an 
opinion  (destructive  of  the  one  great  blessing  purcha- 
sed by  the  peace,  our  national  unanimity)  would  have 
taken  root  in  the  popular  mind,  that  these  charges 
were  mere  pretexts.  Neither  should  we  forget,  that 
the  last  war  had  left  a  dislike  in  our  countrymen  to 
continental  interference,  and  a  not  implausible  per- 
suasion, that  where  a  nation  has  not  sufficient  sensi- 
bility to  its  wrongs  to  commence  a  war  against  the 
aggressor,  unbribed  and  ungoaded  by  Great  Britain, 
a  war  begun  by  the  Government  of  such  a  nation,  at 
the  instance  of  our  Government,  has  little  chance  of 
other  than  a  disastrous  result,  considering  the  charac- 
ter and  revolutionary  resources  of  the  enemy.  What- 
ever may  be  the  strength  or  weakness  of  this  argu- 
ment, it  is  however  certain,  that  there  was  a  strong 
predilection  in  the  British  people  for  a  cause  indis- 
putably and  peculiarly  British.  And  this  feeling  is 
not  altogether  ungrounded.  In  practical  politics  and 
the  great  expenditures  of  national  power,  we  must 
not  pretend  to  be  too  far-sighted  :  otherwise  even  a 
transient  peace  wrould  be  impossible  among  the  Eu- 
ropean nations.  To  future  and  distant  evils  we  may 
always  oppose  the  various  unforeseen  events  that  are 
ripening  in  the  womb  of  the  future.  Lastly,  it  is 
chiefly  to  immediate  and  unequivocal  attacks  on  our 
own  interests  and  honor,  that  we  attach  the  notion  of 
Right  with  a  full  and  efficient  feeling.  Now,  though 
we  may  be  first  stimulated  to  action  by  probabilities 
and  prospects  of  advantage,  and  though  there  is  a 
perverse  restlessness  in  human  nature,  which  renders 
almost  all  wars  popular  at  their  commencement,  yet 
a  nation  always  needs  a  sense  of  positive  Right  to 
steady  its  spirit.  There  is  always  needed  some  one 
reason,  short,  simple,  and  independent  of  complicated 
calculation,  in  order  to  give  a  sort  of  muscular 
strength  to  the  public  mind,  when  the  power  that  re- 
sults from  enthusiasm,  animal  spirits,  and  the  charm 
of  novelty,  has  evaporated. 

There  is  no  feeling  more  honorable  to  our  nature, 
few  that  strike  deeper  root  when  our  nature  is  hap- 
pily circumstanced,  than  the  jealousy  concerning  a 
positive  right,  independent  of  an  immediate  interest. 
To  surrender  in  our  national  character,  the  merest 
trifle,  that  is  strictly  our  right,  the  merest  rock  on 
which  the  waves  will  scarcely  permit  the  seafowl  to 
lay  its  eggs,  at  the  demand  of  an  insolent  and  power- 
30 


fill  rival,  on  a  shopkeeper's  calculation  of  loss  and, 
gain,  is  in  its  final,  and  assuredly  not  very  distant 
consequences,  a  loss  of  every  thing — of  national  spi- 
rit, of  national  independence,  and  with  these,  of  the 
very  wealth  for  which  the  low  calculation  was  made. 
This  feeling  in  individuals,  indeed,  and  in  private 
lite,  is  to  be  sacrificed  to  religion.  Say  rather,  that 
by  religion,  it  is  transmuted  into  a  higher  virtue, 
growing  on  an  higher  and  engrafted  branch,  yet  nou- 
rished from  the  same  root:  that  it  remains  in  its  es- 
sence the  same  spirit,  but 

Made  pure  by  Thought,  and  naturalized  in  Heaven ; 
and  he  who  cannot  perceive  the  moral  differences  of 
national  and  individual  duties,  comprehends  neither 
the  one  or  the  other,  and  is  not  a  whit  the  better 
Christian  for  being  a  bad  patriot.  Considered  nation- 
ally, it  is  as  if  the  captain  of  a  man-of-war  should 
strike  and  surrender  his  colors  under  the  pretence, 
that  it  would  be  folly  to  risk  the  lives  of  so  many 
good  Christian  sailors  for  the  sake  of  a  few  yards  of 
coarse  canvas. '  Of  such  reasoners  we  take  an  in- 
dignant leave  in  the  words  of  an  obscure  poet. 

Fear  never  wanted  arguments:  you  do 
Keasnn  yourselves  into  a  careful  bondage, 
Circumspect  only  to  your  Misery. 
I  could  urge  Freedom,  Charters,  Country,  Laws, 
Gods,  nnd  Religion,  and  such  precious  names — 
Nay,  what  you  value  higher,   Wealth!  But  that 
You  sue  for  bondage,  yielding  to  demands 
As  impious  as  they're  insolent,  and  have 
Only  this  sluggish  name — to  perish  full ! 

CARTWR1GHT. 

And  here  we  find  it  necessary  to  animadvert  on  a 
principle  asserted  by  Lord  Minto,  (in  his  speech,  June 
6th,  1803,  and  afterwards  published  at  full  length)  that 
France  had  an  undoubted  right  to  insist  on  our  aban- 
donment of  Malta,  a  right  not  given,  but  likewise  not 
abrogated,  by  the  Treaty  of  Amiens.  Surely  in  this 
effort  of  candor,  his  Lordship  must  have  forgotten  the 
circumstances  on  which  he  exerted  it.  The  case  is 
simply  thus:  the  British  government  was  convinced, 
and  the  French  government  admitted  the  justice  of 
the  conviction,  that  it  was  of  the  utmost  importance 
to  our  interests,  that  Malta  should  remain  uninflu- 
enced by  France.  The  French  government  binds 
itself  down  by  a  solemn  treaty,  that  it  will  use  its 
best  endeavors  in  conjunction  with  us,  to  secure  this 
independence.  This  promise  was  no  act  of  liberality, 
no  generous  free-gift  on  the  part  of  France,  No  !  we 
purchased  it  at  a  high  price.  We  disbanded  our 
forces,  we  dismissed  our  sailors,  and  we  gave  up  the 
best  part  of  the  fruits  of  our  naval  victories.  Can  it 
therefore  with  a  shadow  of  plausibility  be  affirmed, 
that  the  right  to  insist  on  our  evacuation  of  the  island 
was  unaltered  by  the  treaty  of  Amiens,  when  this 
demand  is  strictly  tantamount  to  our  surrender  of  all 
the  advantages  which  we  had  bought  of  France  at 
so  high  a  price?  Tantamount  to  a  direct  breach  on 
her  part,  not  merely  of  a  solemn  treaty,  but  of  an  ab- 
solute bargain?  It  was  not  only  the  perfidy  of  un- 
principled ambition — the  demand  was  the  fraudulent 
trick  of  a  sharper.  For  what  did  France?  She  sold 
us  the  independence  of  Malta :  then  exerted  her 
power,  and  annihilated  the  very  possibility  of  that 
457 


448 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


independence,  and  lastly,  demanded  of  us  that  we 
should  leave  it  bound  hand  and  foot  for  her  to  seize 
without  trouble,  whenever  her  ambitious  projects  led 
her  to  regard  such  seizure  as  expedient.  We  bound 
ourselves  to  surrender  it  to  the  Knights  of  Malta — 
not  surely  to  Joseph,  Robert,  or  Nicolas,  but  to  a 
known  order,  clothed  with  certain  powers,  and  capa- 
ble of  exerting  them  in  consequence  of  certain  reve- 
nues. We  found  no  such  order.  The  men  indeed 
and  (he  name  we  found  :  and  even  so,  if  we  had  pur- 
chased Sardinia  of  its  sovereign  for  so  many  millions 
of  money,  which  through  our  national  credit,  and 
from  the  equivalence  of  our  national  paper  to  gold 
and  silver,  he  had  agreed  to  receive  in  bank  notes, 
and  if  he  had  received  them — doubtless,  he  would 
have  the  bank  notes,  even  though  immediately  after 
our  payment  of  them  wTe  had  for  this  very  purpose 
forced  the  Bank  Company  to  break.  But  would  he 
have  received  the  debt  due  to  him  ?  It  is  nothing 
more  or  less  than  a  practical  pun,  as  wicked,  though 
not  quite  so  ludicrous,  as  the  (in  all  senses)  execrable 
pun  of  Earl  Godwin,  who  requesting  basium  (i.  e.  a 
kiss)  from  the  archbishop,  thereupon  seized  on  the 
archbishop's  manor  of  Baseham. 

A  Trea^r  is  a  writ  of  mutual  promise  between  two 
independent  States,  and  the  Law  of  Promise  is  the 
same  to  nations  as  to  individuals.  It  is  to  be  sacredly 
performed  by  each  party  in  that  sense  in  which  it 
knew  and  permitted  the  other  party  to  understand  it, 
at  the  time  of  the  contract.  Anything  short  of  this 
is  criminal  deceit  in  individuals,  and  in  governments 
impious  perfidy.  After  the  conduct  of  France  in  the 
affair  of  the  guarantees,  and  of  the  revenues  of  the 
order,  we  had  the  same  right  to  preserve  the  island 
independent  of  France  by  a  British  garrison,  as  a 
lawful  creditor  has  to  the  household  goods  of  a  fugi- 
tive and  dishonest  debtor. 

One  other  assertion  of  his  Lordship's,  in  the  same 
speech,  bears  so  immediately  on  the  plan  of  The 
Friend,  as  far  as  it  proposed  to  investigate  the  prin- 
ciple of  international,  no  less  than  of  private  morality, 
that  I  feel  myself  in  some  degree  under  an  obligation 
to  notice  it.  A  Treaty  (says  his  Lordship)  ought  to 
be  strictly  observed  by  a  nation  in  its  literal  sense, 
even  though  the  utter  ruin  of  that  nation  should  be 
the  certain  and  fore-known  consequence  of  that  ob- 
servance. Previous  to  any  remarks  of  my  own  on 
this  high  flight  of  diplomatic  virtue,  we  will  hear 
what  Harrington  has  said  on  this  subject.  "  A  man 
may  devote  himself  to  death  or  destruction  to  save  a 
nation ;  but  no  nation  will  devote  itself  to  death  or 
destruction  to  save  mankind.  Machiavel  is  decried 
for  saying,  '  that  no  consideration  is  to  be  had  of  what 
is  just  or  unjust,  of  what  is  merciful  or  cruel,  of  what 
is  honorable  or  ignominious,  in  case  it  be  to  save  a 
state  or  to  preserve  liberty :'  which  as  to  the  manner 
of  expression  may  perhaps  be  crudely  spoken.  But 
to  imagine  that  a  nation  will  devote  itself  to  death  or 
destruction  any  more  after  faith  given,  or  an  engage- 
ment thereto  tending,  than  if  there  had  been  no  en- 
gagement made  or  faith  given,  were  not  piety  but 
folly." Crudely  spoken   indeed!    and    not  less  I 


crudely  thought :  nor  is  the  matter  much  mended  by 
the  commentator.  Yet  every  man,  who  is  at  all  ac- 
quainted with  the  world  and  its  past  history,  knows 
that  the  fact  itself  is  truly  stated  :  and  what  is  more 
important  in  the  present  argument,  he  cannot  find  in 
his  heart  a  full,  deep,  and  downright  verdict,  that  it 
should  be  otherwise.  The  consequences  of  this  per- 
plexity in  the  moral  feelings,  are  not  seldom  exten- 
sively injurious.  For  men  hearing  the  duties  which 
would  be  binding  on  two  individuals  living  under  the 
same  laws,  insisted  on  as  equally  obligatory  on  two 
independent  states,  in  extreme  cases,  where  they  see 
clearly  the  impracticability  of  realizing  such  a  notion  ; 
and  having  at  the  same  time  a  dim  half-consciousness, 
that  two  States  can  never  be  placed  exactly  on  the 
same  ground  as  two  individuals;  relieve  themselves 
from  their  perplexity  by  cutting  what  they  cannot 
untie,  and  assert  that  national  policy  cannot  in  all 
cases  be  subordinated  to  the  laws  of  morality :  in 
other  words,  that  a  government  may  act  with  injus- 
tice, and  yet  remain  blameless.  This  assertion  was 
hazarded  (I  record  it  with  unfeigned  regret)  by  a 
Minister  of  State,  on  the  affair  of  Copenhagen.  Tre- 
mendous assertion  !  that  would  render  every  com- 
plaint, which  we  make,  of  the  abominations  of  the 
French  tyrant,  hypocrisy,  or  mere  incendiary  decla- 
mation for  the  simple-headed  multitude  !  But,  thank 
heaven!  it  is  as  unnecessary  and  unfounded,  as  it  is 
tremendous.  For  what  is  a  treaty  ?  a  voluntary  con- 
tract between  two  nations.  So  we  will  state  it  in  the 
first  instance.  Now  it  is  an  impossible  case,  that  any 
nation  can  be  supposed  by  any  other  to  have  intended 
its  own  absolute  destruction  in  a  treaty,  which  its  in- 
terests alone  could  have  prompted  it  to  make.  The 
very  thought  is  self-contradictory.  Not  only  Athens 
(we  will  say)  could  not  have  intended  this  to  have 
been  understood  in  any  specific  promise  made  to 
Sparta;  but  Sparta  could  never  have  imagined  that 
Athens  had  so  intended  it.  And  Athens  itself  must 
have  known,  that  had  she  even  affirmed  the  contrary, 
Sparta  could  not  have  believed — nay,  would  have 
been  under  a  moral  obligation  not  to  have  believed 
her.  Were  it  possible  to  suppose  such  a  case — for 
instance,  such  a  treaty  made  by  a  single  besieged 
town,  under  an  independent  government  as  that  of 
Numantium — it  becomes  no  longer  a  state,  but  the 
act  of  a  certain  number  of  individuals  voluntarily 
sacrificing  themselves,  each  to  preserve  his  separate 
honor.  For  the  state  was  already  destroyed  by  the 
circumstances  which  alone  could  make  such  an  en- 
gagement conceivable. — But  we  have  said,  nations. — 
Applied  to  England  and  France,  relatively  to  treaties, 
this  is  but  a  form  of  speaking.  The  treaty  is  really 
made  by  some  half  dozen,  or  perhaps  half  a  hundred 
individuals,  possessing  the  government  of  these  coun- 
tries. Now  it  is  a  universally  admitted  part  of  the 
Law  of  Nations,  that  an  engagement  entered  into  by 
a  minister  with  a  foreign  power,  when  it  was  known 
to  this  power  that  the  minister  in  so  doing  had  ex- 
ceeded and  contravened  his  instructions,  is  altogether 
nugatory.  And  is  it  to  be  supposed  for  a  moment, 
that  a  whole  nation,  consisting  of  perhaps  twenty 
458 


THE  FRIEND. 


449 


millions  of  human  souls,  cou|d  ever  have  invested  a 
few  individuals— whom  altogether  for  the  promotion 
of  its  welfare,  it  had  intrusted  with  its  government— 
with  the  right  of  signing  away  its  existence  ? 


ESSAY  VII. 


Arnicas  reprehensiones  gratissime  accipiamus,  oportet:  etiam 
si  rcprehendi  non  meruit  opinio  nostra,  vel  hanc  propter  | 
causam,  quod  recto  defendi  potest.    Si  vero  infirmitas  vol  I 
humana  vel  propria,  etiam  cum  veraciter  arguitur,  non  po- 
test non  aliquantulum  contristari,  melius  tumor  dolet  cum  | 
curatur,  quam  dum  ei  parcitur  et  non  sanatur.    Hoc  enim 
est  quod  acute  vidit,  qui  dixit :  utiliores  esse  haud  raro  inimi- 
cos  objurgantes.  quam  arnicas  objurgare  metuentes.    llli 
enim  dum  rixantur,  dicunt  aliquando  vera  qua;  corrigamus  : 
isti  autem  minorem,  quam  oportet,  exhibent  justitise  libor- 
tatero,  dum  amieitia-  timent  exasperare  duleedinem. —  AU- 
GUS  i'lNUS  HIERONYMO:  Epist.xciYi.  Hieron  Opera. 
Tom.  li.  p.  "J:i3. 

Translation — Censures  offered  in  friendliness,  we  ought  to 
receive  with  gratitude:  yea,  though  our  opinions  did  not 
merit  censure,  we  should  still  be  thankful  for  the  attack  on 
them,  were  it  only  that  it  gives  us  an  opportunity  of  success- 
fully defending  the  same.  (For  never  doth  an  important- 
truth  spread  its  roots  so  wide  or  clasp  the  soil  so  stubborn- 
ly, as  tchen  it  has  braved  the -winds  of  controversy.  There 
is  a  stirring  and  a  far-heard  inusic  sent  forth  from  the 
tree  of  sound  knowledge,  when  its  branches  are  fighting 
with  the  storm,  which  passing  onward  shrills  out  at  once 
Truth's  triumph  and  its  own  defeat.)  But  if  the  infirmity 
of  human  nature,  or  of  our  own  constitutional  temperament, 
cannot,  even  when  we  have  been  fairly  convicted  of  error, 
but  suffer  some  small  mortification,  yet  better  suffer  pain 
from  iis  extirpation,  than  from  the  consequences  of  its  con- 
tinuance, and  of  the  false  tenderness,  that  had  withheld  the 
remedy.  This  is  what  the  acute  observer  had  in  his  mind, 
who  said,  that  upbraiding  enemies  were  not  seldom  more 
profitable  than  friends  afraid  to  find  fault.  For  the  former 
amidst  their  quarrelsome  invectives  may  chance  on  some 
home  truths,  which  we  may  amend  in  consequence;  while 
the  latter,  from  an  over-delicate  apprehension  of  ruffling  the 
Bmoolh  surface  of  friendship,  shrink  from  its  duties,  and 
from  the  manly  freedom  which  Truth  and  Justice  demand. 


Only  a  few  privileged  individuals  are  authorized 
to  pass  into  the  theatre  without  stopping  at  the  door- 
keeper's box ;  but  every  man  of  decent  appearance 
may  put  down  the  play-price  there,  and  thencefor- 
ward has  as  good  a  right  as  the  managers  themselves 
not  only  to  see  and  hear,  as  far  as  his  place  in  the 
house,  and  his  own  ears  and  eyes  permit  him,  but 
likewise  to  express  audibly  his  approbation  or  disap- 
probation of  what  may  be  going  forward  on  the  stage. 
If  his  feelings  happen  to  be  in  unison  with  those  of 
the  audience  in  general,  he  may  without  breach  of 
decorum  persevere  in  his  notices  of  applause  or  dis- 
like, till  the  wish  of  the  house  is  complied  with.  If 
he  finds  himself  unsupported,  he  rests  contented  with 
having  once  exerted  his  common  right,  and  on  that 
occasion  at  least  gives  no  further  interruption  to  the 
amusement  of  those  who  feel  differently  from  him. 
So  it  is,  or  so  it  should  be,  in  Literature.  A  few  ex- 
traordinary minds  may  be  allowed  to  pass  a  mere 
opinion:  though  in  point  of  fact  those,  who  alone  are 
entitled  to  this  privilege,  are  ever  the  last  to  avail 
themselves  of  it.  Add  too,  that  even  the  mere  opin- 
ions of  such  men  may  in  general  be  regarded  either 


as  promissory  notes,  or  as  receipts  referring  to  a  for- 
mer payment.  But  every  man's  opinion  has  a  right 
to  pass  into  the  common  auditory,  if  his  reason  for  the 
opinion  is  paid  down  at  the  same  time:  for  arguments 
are  the  sole  current  coin  of  intellect.  The  degree  of 
influence  to  which  the  opinion  is  entitled,  should  be 
proportioned  to  the  weight  and  value  of  the  reasons 
for  it;  and  whether  these  are  shillings  or  pounds 
sterling,  the  man,  who  has  given  them,  remains 
blameless,  provided  he  contents  himself  with  the 
place  to  which  they  have  entitled  him,  and  does  not 
attempt  by  the  strength  of  lungs  to  counterbalance  its 
disadvantages,  or  expect  to  exert  as  immediate  an  in- 
fluence in  the  back  seats  of  the  upper  gallery,  as  if 
he  had  paid  in  gold  and  been  seated  in  the  stage  box. 

But  unfortunately  (and  here  commence  the  points 
of  difference  between  the  theatric  and  the  Literary 
Public)  in  the  great  theatre  of  Literature  there  are 
no  authorized  door-keepers :  for  our  anonymous  crit- 
ics are  self-elected.  I  shall  not  fear  the  cnarge  of 
calumny  if  I  add,  that  they  have  lost  all  credit  with 
wise  men,  by  unfair  dealing :  such  as  their  refusal  to 
receive  an  honest  man's  money,  (that  is,  his  argu- 
ment) because  they  anticipate  and  dislike  his  opinion, 
while  others  of  suspicious  character  and  the  most  un- 
seemly appearance,  are  suffered  to  pass  without  pay- 
ment, or  bv  virtue  of  orders  which  they  have  them- 
selves  distributed  to  known  partizans.  Sometimes 
the  honest  man's  intellectual  coin  is  refused  under 
pretence  that  it  is  light  or  counterfeit,  without  any 
proof  given  either  by  the  money  scales,  or  by  sound- 
ing the  coin  in  dispute  together  with  one  of  known 
goodness.  We  may  carry  the  metaphor  still  farther. 
It  is  by  no  means  a  rare  case,  that  the  money  is  re- 
turned because  it  had  a  different  sound  from  that  of 
a  counterfeit,  the  brassy  blotches  on  which  seemed 
to  blush  for  the  impudence  of  the  silver  wash  in  which 
they  were  inisled,  and  rendered  the  mock  coin  a  live- 
ly emblem  of  a  lie  self-detected.  Still  oftener  does 
the  rejection  take  place  by  a  mere  act  of  insolence, 
and  a  blank  assertion  that  the  candidate's  money  is 
light  or  bad,  is  justified  by  a  second  assertion,  that  he 
is  a  fool  or  knave  for  offering  it. 

The  second  point  of  difference  explains  the  pre- 
ceding, and  accounts  both  for  the  want  of  established 
door-keepers  in  the  auditory  of  Literature,  and  for  the 
practices  of  those,  who  under  the  name  of  Reviewers 
volunteer  this  office.  There  is  no  royal  mintage  for 
arguments,  no  ready  means  by  which  all  men  alike, 
who  possess  common  sense,  may  determine  their 
value  and  intrinsic  worth  at  the  first  sight  or  sound. 
Certain  forms  of  natural  Logic  indeed  there  are,  the 
inobservance  of  which  is  decisive  against  an  argu- 
ment; but  the  strictest  adherence  to  Ihem  is  no  proof 
of  its  actual  (though  an  indispensable  condition  of  its 
possible)  validity;  in  the  arguer's  own  conscience 
there  is,  no  doubt,  a  certain  value,  and  an  infallible 
criterion  of  it,  which  applies  to  all  arguments  equal- 
ly: and  this  is  the  sincere  conviction  of  the  mind  it- 
self. But  for  ihose  to  whom  it  is  offered,  these  are 
only  conjectural  marks ;  yet  such  as  will  seldom  mis- 
lead any  man  of  plain  sense,  who  is  both  honest  and 
observant.  These  characteristics  the  Friend  at- 
459 


450 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


tempted  to  comprise  in  the  concluding  paragraph  of 
the  Fourth  Essay  of  the  Volume,  and  has  described 
them  more  at  large  in  the  Essays  that  follow,  "  On 
the  communicating  of  Truth."  If  the  honest  warmth, 
which  results  from  the  strength  of  the  particular  con- 
viction, be  tempered  by  the  modesty  which  belongs 
to  the  sense  of  general  fallibility;  if  the  emotions, 
which  accompany  all  vivid  perceptions,  are  pre- 
served distinct  from  the  expression  of  personal  pas- 
sions, and  from  appeals  to  them  in  the  heart  of  others; 
if  the  Reasoner  asks  no  respect  for  the  opinion,  as  his 
opinion,  but  only  in  proportion  as  it  is  acknowledged 
by  that  Reason,  which  is  common  to  all  men;  and, 
lastly,  if  he  supports  an  opinion  on  no  subject  which 
he  has  not  previously  examined,  and  furnishes  proof 
both  that  he  possesses  the  means  of  inquiry  by  his 
education  or  the  nature  of  his  pursuits,  and  that  he 
has  endeavored  to  avail  himself  of  those  means;  then, 
and  with  these  conditions,  every  human  Being  is  au- 
thorized to  make  public  the  grounds  of  any  opinion 
which  he  holds,  and  of  course  the  opinion  itself,  as 
the  object  of  them.  Consequently,  it  is  the  duty  of 
all  men,  not  always  indeed  to  attend  to  him,  but,  if 
they  do,  to  attend  to  him  with  respect,  and  with  a 
sincere  as  well  as  apparent  toleration.  I  should  of- 
fend against  my  own  Laws,  if  I  disclosed  at  present 
the  nature  of  my  convictions  concerning  the  degree, 
in  which  this  virtue  of  toleration  is  possessed  and  prac- 
tised by  the  majority  of  my  contemporaries  and  coun- 
trymen. But  if  the  contrary  temper  is  felt  and  shown 
in  instances  where  all  the  conditions  have  been  ob- 
served, which  have  been  stated  at  full  in  the  preli- 
minary numbers  that  form  the  Introduction  of  this 
Work,  and  the  chief  of  which  I  have  just  now  recap- 
itulated ;  I  have  no  hesitation  in  declaring  that  what- 
ever the  opinion  may  be,  and  however  opposite  to 
the  hearer's  or  reader's  previous  persuasions,  one  or 
other  or  all  of  the  following  defects  must  be  taken 
for  granted.  Either  the  intolerant  person  is  not  mas- 
ter of  the  grounds  on  which  his  own  faith  is  built : 
which  therefore  neither  is  or  can  be  his  own  faith, 
though  it  may  very  easily  be  his  imagined  interest, 
and  his  habit  of  thought.  In  this  case  he  is  sfhgry, 
not  at  the  opposition  to  Truth,  but  at  the  interruption 
of  his  own  indolence  and  intellectual  slumber,  or 
possibly  at  the  apprehension,  that  his  temporal  advan- 
tages are  threatened,  or  at  least  the  ease  of  mind,  in 
which  he  had  been  accustomed  to  enjoy  them.  Or, 
secondly,  he  has  no  love  of  Truth  for  its  own  sake ; 
no  reverence  for  the  divine  command  to  seek  ear- 
nestly afier  it,  which  command,  if  it  had  not  been  so 
often  and  solemnly  given  by  Re  vela!  ion,  is  yet  in- 
volved and  expressed  in  the  gift  of  Reason  and  in  the 
dependence  of  all  our  virtues  on  its  development. 
He  has  no  moral  and  religious  awe  for  freedom  of 
thought,  though  accompanied  both  by  sincerity  and 
humility;  nor  for  the  right  of  free  communication 
which  is  ordained  by  God,  together  with  that  freedom, 
if  it  be  true  that  God  has  ordained  us  to  live  in  soci- 
ety, and  has  made  the  progressive  improvement  of 
all  and  each  of  us  depend  on  the  reciprocal  aids, 
which  directly  or  indirectly  each  supplies  to  all,  and 
all  to  each.    But  if  his  alarm  and  his  consequent  in- 


tolerance, are  occasioned  by  his  eternal  rather  than 
temporal  interests,  and  if  as  is  most  commonly  the 
case,  he  does  not  deceive  himself  on  this  point, 
gloomy  indeed,  and  erroneous  beyond  idolatry,  must 
have  been  his  notions  of  the  Supreme  Being !  For 
surely  the  poor  Heathen  who  represents  to  himself 
the  divine  attributes  of  wisdom,  justice,  and  mercy, 
under  multiplied  and  forbidden  symbols  in  the  pow- 
ers of  Nature  or  the  souls  of  extraordinary  men,  prac- 
tises a  superstition  which  (though  at  once  the  cause 
and  effect  of  blindness  and  sensuality)  is  less  incom- 
patible with  inward  piety  and  true  religious  feeling, 
than  the  creed  of  that  man,  who  in  the  spirit  of  his 
practice,  though  not  in  direct  words,  loses  sight  of  all 
these  attributes,  and  substitutes  "servile  and  thrall- 
like fear  instead  of  the  adoptive  and  cheerful  bold- 
ness, which  our  new  alliance  with  God  requires  of 
us  as  Christians."*  Such  fear-ridden  and  thence 
angry  believers,  or  rather  acquiescents,  would  do  well 
to  re-peruse  the  book  of  Job,  and  observe  the  sen- 
tence passed  by  the  all-just  on  the  friends  of  the  suf- 
ferer, who  had  hoped,  like  venal  advocates,  to  pur- 
chase the  favor  of  deity  by  uttering  truths  of  which 
in  their  own  hearts  they  had '  neither  conviction  nor 
comprehension.    The  truth  from  the  lips  did  not 

ATONE  FOR  THE  LIE    IN    THE  HEART,  while    the    rash- 

ness  of  agony  in  the  searching  and  bewildered  com- 
plainant, was  forgiven  in  consideration  of  his  since- 
rity and  integrity  in  not  disguising  the  true  dictates 
of  his  Reason  and  Conscience,  but  avowing  his  inca- 
pability of  solving  a  problem  by  his  Reason,  which 
before  the  Christian  dispensation  the  Almighty  was 
pleased  to  solve  only  by  declaring  it  to  be  beyond  the 
limits  of  human  Reason.  Having  insensibly  passed 
into  a  higher  and  more  serious  style  than  I  had  first 
intended,  I  will  venture  to  appeal  to  these  self-obscu- 
rants, whose  faith  dwells  in  the  Land  of  the  Shadow 
of  Darkness,  these  Papists  without  Pope,  and  Protes- 
tants who  protest  only  against  all  protesting ;  and  will 
appeal  to  them  in  words  which  yet  more  immediately 
concern  them  as  Christians,  in  the  hope  that  they  will 
lend  a  fearless  ear  to  the  learned  apostle,  when  he 
both  assures  and  labors  to  persuade  them  that  they 
were  called  in  Christ  to  all  perfectness  in  spiritual 
Knowledge  and  full  assurance  of  understanding  in  the 
mystery  of  God.  There  can  be  no  end  without 
means :  and  God  furnishes  no  means  that  exempt  us 
from  the  task  and  duty  of  joining  our  own  best  en- 
deavors. The  original  stock,  or  wild  olive-tree  of  our 
natural  powers,  was  not  given  us  to  be  burnt  or 
blighted,  but  to  be  grafted  on.  We  are  not  only  not 
forbidden  to  examine  and  propose  our  doubts,  so  it  be 
done  with  humility  and  proceed  from  a  real  desire 

*  Milton's  Reformation  in  England.  "  For  in  very 
deed,  the  superstitious  man  by  his  good  will  is  an  Atheist: 
but  being  scared  from  thence  by  the  pangs  of  conscience,  shuf- 
fles up  to  himself  such  a  God  and  such  a  Worship  as  is  most 
accordant  to  his  fear :  which  fear  of  his  as  also  his  hope,  beins 
fixed  only  upon  the  flesh,  renders  likewise  the  whole  faculty 
of  his  apprehension  carnal,  and  all  tin  inward  acts  of  wor- 
ship issuing  from  the  native  strength  of  the  Soul,  run  out 
lavishly  to  the  upper  skin,  and  there  harden  into  a  crust  of 
formality.  Hence  men  came  to  scar,  the  Scriptures  by  the 
letter,  and  in  the  covenant  of  our  redemption  magnified  the 
external  signs  more  than  the  quickening  power  of  the  Spirit.' 

460 


THE  FRIEND. 


451 


to  know  Ihc  Truth ;  but  we  are  repeatedly  command- 
ed so  to  do:  and  with  a  most  unchristian  spirit  must 
that  man  have  read  the  preceding  passages,  if  he  can 
interpret  any  one  sentence  as  having  for  its  object  to 
excuse  a  too  numerous  class,  who,  to  use  the  words 
of  St.  Augustine,  quarunl  non  utfdem  ted  ut  i 
tatem  tntwntant:  i.  e.  such  as  examine  not  to  find 
reasons  lor  faith,  but  pretexts  for  infidelity. 


ESSAY   VIII, 


Such  is  the  iniquity  of  men,  that  they  suck  in  opinions  as  wild 
asses  do  the  wind,  without  distinguishing  the  wholesome 
from  the  corrupted  air,  and  then  live  upon  it  at  a  venture: 
and  when  all  their  confidence  is  built  upon  zeal  and  mistake, 
yet  therefore  because  they  are  zealous  and  mistaken  they 

are  impatient  of  contradiction. TAYLOR'S    Episl. 

Dedic.  to  the  Liberty  of  Prophesying. 


"If,"  (observes  the  eloquent  Bishop  in  the  13th 
section  of  the  work,  from  which  my  motto  is  select- 
ed) "an  opinion  plainly  and  directly  brings  in  a  crime, 
as  if  a  man  preaches  treason  or  sedition,  his  opinion 
is  not  his  excuse.  A  man  is  nevertheless  a  traitor 
because  he  believes  it  lawful  to  commit  treason  ;  and 
a  man  is  a  murtherer  if  he  kills  his  brother  unjustly, 
although  he  should  think  that  he  was  doing  God  good 
service  thereby.  Matters  of  fact  are  equally  judi- 
cable, whether  the  principle  of  them  be  from  within  or 
from  ivithout.'' 

To  dogmatize  a  crime,  that  is,  to  teach  it  as  a  doc- 
trine, is  itself  a  crime,  great  or  small  as  the  crime 
dogmatized  is  more  or  less  palpably  so.  You  say 
(said  Sir  John  Cheke  addressing  himself  to  the  Pa- 
pists of  his  day)  that  you  rebel  for  your  religion. 
First  tell  me,  what  religion  is  that  which  teaches  you 
to  rebel.  As  my  object  in  the  present  section  is  to 
treat  of  Tolerance  and  Intolerance  in  the  public 
bearings  of  opinions  and  their  propagation,  I  shall 
embrace  this  opportunity  of  selecting  the  two  pas- 
sages, which  I  have  been  long  inclined  to  consider 
as  the  most  eloquent  in  our  English  Literature, 
though  each  in  a  very  different  style  of  eloquence, 
as  indeed  the  authors  were  as  dissimilar  in  their  bias, 
if  not  in  their  faith,  as  two  bishops  of  the  same 
church  can  well  be  supposed  to  have  been.  I  think 
too,  I  may  venture  to  add,  that  both  the  extracts  will 
be  new  to  a  very  great  majority  of  my  readers.  For 
the  length  I  will  make  no  apology.  It  was  a  part  of 
my  plan  to  allot  two  numbers  of  The  Friend,  the  one 
to  a  selection  from  our  prose  writers,  and  the  other 
from  our  poets  ;  but  in  both  cases  from  works  that 
do  not  occur  in  our  ordinary  reading. 

The  following  passages  are  both  on  the  same  sub- 
ject:  the  first  from  Taylor's  Dissuasive  from  Popery: 
— the  second  from  a  Letter  of  Bishop  Bedell's  to  an 
unhappy  friend  who  had  deserted  the  church  of  Eng- 
land for  that  of  Rome. 

1.  The  Rise  and  Progress  of  a  controversy,  from 
the  speculative  Opinion  of  an  Individual  to  the  Revo- 
lution or  Intestine  War  of  a  Nation. 

This  is  one  of  the  most  inseparable  characters  of 
Pp 


a  heretic;  he  sets  his  whole  communion  and  all  his 
charity  upon  his  article;  for  to  be  zealous  in  the 
schism,  that  is  the  characteristic  of  a  good  man,  that 
is  his  nolo  of  ( 'hristianity  ;  in  all  the  rest  he  excuses 
you  or  tolerates  you,  provided  you  be  a  true  believer; 
then  you  are  one  of  the  faithful,  a  good  man  and  a 
precious,  you  are  of  the  congregation  of  the  saints, 
and  one  of  the  godly.  All  Solifidiana  do  thus;  and 
all  that  do  thus  are  Sulilidians,  the  church  of  Rome 
herself  not  excepted;  for  though  in  words  she  pro- 
claims the  possibility  of  keeping  all  the  command- 
roents  ;  yet  she  dispenses  easier  with  him  that  breaks 
them  all,  than  v\ith  him  that  speaks  one  word  against 
any  of  her  articles,  though  but  the  least;  even  the 
eating  of  fish  and  forbidding  flesh  in  Lent.  So  that 
it  is  faith  they  regard  more  than  charity,  a  right  be- 
lief more  than  a  holy  life;  and  for  this  you  shall  be 
with  them  upon  terms  easy  enough,  provided  you  go 
not  a  hair's  breadth  from  any  thing  of  her  belief. 
For  if  you  do,  they  have  provided  for  you  two  deaths 
and  two  fires,  both  inevitable  and  one  eternal.  And 
this  certainly  is  one  of  the  greatest  evils,  of  which 
the  church  of  Rome  is  guilty :  for  this  in  itself  is  the 
greatest  and  unworthiest  uncharitableness.  But  the 
procedure  is  of  great  use  to  their  ends.  For  the 
greatest  part  of  Christians  are  those  that  cannot  con- 
sider things  leisurely  and  wisely,  searching  their 
bottoms  and  discovering  their  causes,  or  foreseeing 
events  which  are  to  come  after;  but  are  carried 
away  by  fear  and  hope,  by  affection  and  preposses- 
sion: and  therefore  the  Roman  doctors  are  careful  to 
govern  them  as  thev  will  be  governed.  If  you  dis- 
pute, you  gain,  it  may  be,  one,  and  lose  five ;  but  if 
you  threaten  them  with  damnation,  you  keep  them 
in  fetters  ;  for  they  that  are, '  in  fear  of  death,  are  all 
their  lifetime  in  bondage  '*  (saith  the  Apostle : )  and 
there  is  in  the  world  nothing  so  potent  as  fear  of  the 
two  deaths,  which  are  the  two  arms  and  grapples  of 
iron  by  which  the.  church  of  Rome  takes  and  keeps 
her  timorous  or  conscientious  proselytes.  The  easy 
Protestant  calls  upon  you  from  scripture  to  do  your 
duty,  to  build  a  holy  life  upon  a  holy  faith,  the  faith 
of  the  Apostles  and  first  disciples  of  our  Lord  ;  he 
tells  you  if  yon  err;  and  teaches  ye  the  truth  ;  and 
if  ye  will  obey,  it  is  well ;  if  not,  he  tells  you  of  your 
sin,  and  that  all  sin  deserves  the  wrath  of  God  ;  but 
judges  no  man's  person,  much  less  any  states  of  men. 
He  knows  that  God's  judgments  are  righteous  and 
true  ;  but  he  knows  also,  that  his  mercy  absolves 
many  persons,  who,  in  his  just  judgment,  were  con- 
demned :  and  if  he  had  a  warrant  from  God  to  say, 
that  he  should  destroy  all  the  Papists,  as  Jonas  had 
concerning  the  Pvinevites;  yet  he  remembers  that 
every  repentance,  if  it  be  sincere,  will  do  more,  and 
prevail  greater,  and  last  longer  than  G°d's  anger 
will.  Besides  these  things,  there  is  a  strange  spring, 
and  secret  principle  in  every  man's  understanding, 
that  is  oftentimes  turned  about  by  such  impulses,  of 
which  no  man  can  give  an  account.  But  we  all  re- 
member a  most  wonderful  instance  of  it,  in  the 
disputation  between  the  two  Reynolds's,  John  and 


1  Hebrews,  ii.  15. 


4G1 


452 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


William ;  the  former  of  which  being  a  Papist,  and 
the  latter  a  Protestant,  met  and  disputed,  with  a  pur- 
pose to  confute,  and  to  convert  each  other.  And  so 
they  did:  for  those  arguments,  which  were  used, 
prevailed  fully  against  their  adversary,  and  yet  did 
not  prevail  with  themselves.  The  Papist  turned 
Protestant,  and  the  Protestant  became  a  Papist,  and 
so  remained  to  their  dying  day.  Of  which  some 
ingenious  person  gave  a  most  handsome  account  in 
the  following  excellent  Epigram, 

Bella,  inter  geminns,  plusquam  civil ia,  fratres 

Traxerat  ambizuus  Religionis  apex. 
Hie  reformats  fidei  propartibus  inslat : 

Iste  reformandam  denegat  es^e  fidem. 
Propositis  causa?  rationibus  ;  niter  utrinque 

Concurrere  p;ires,  et  cecidere  pares. 
Quod  fuit in  votis,  fratrem  capit  alter  uterq: 

Quod  fuit  in  fatis,  perilit  uterque  fidem. 
Captivi  gemini  sine  captivante  fuerutit, 

Et  victor  victi  iransluga  castra  petit. 
Quod  genus  hoc  pugna;  est,  ubi  vic.tus  gaudet  uterq  ; 

Et  tamen  alleruter  se  superasse  dolet  7 

But  further  yet,  he  considers  the  natural  and  regu- 
lar infirmities  of  mankind  ;  and  God  considers  them 
much  more ;  he  knows  that  in  man  there  is  nothing 
admirable  but  his  ignorance  and  weakness;  his  pre- 
judice, and  the  infallible  certainty  of  being  deceived 
in  many  things;  he  sees,  that  wicked  men  oftentimes 
know  much  more  than  many  very  good  men ;  and 
that  the  understanding  is  not  of  itself  considerable  in 
morality,  and  effects  nothing  in  rewards  and  punish- 
ments; it  is  the  will  only  that  rules  man,  and  can 
obey  God.  He  sees  and  deplores  it,  t!»at  men  study 
hard,  and  understand  little,  that  they  dispute  earnest- 
ly, and  understand  not  one  another  at  all ;  that  affec- 
tions creep  so  certainly,  and  mingle  with  their  argu- 
ing, that  the  argument  is  lost,  and  nothing  remains 
but  the  conflict  of  two  adversaries'  affections;  that  a 
man  is  so  willing,  so  easy,  so  ready,  to  believe  what 
makes  for  his  opinion,  so  hard  to  understand  an  argu- 
ment against  himself,  that  it  is  plain,  it  is  the  princi- 
ple within,  not  the  argument  without,  that  determines 
him.  He  observes  also  that  all  the  world  (a  few  in- 
dividuals excepted)  are  unalterably  determined  to 
the  religion  of  their  country,  of  their  family,  of  their 
society ;  that  there  is  never  any  considerable  change 
made,  but  what  is  made  by  war  and  empire,  by  fear 
and  hope.  He  remembers  that  it  is  a  rare  thing,  to 
see  a  Jesuit  of  the  Dominican  opinion  ;  or  a  Domini- 
can (until  of  late)  of  the  Jesuit ;  hut  every  order  gives 
laws  to  the  understanding  of  their  novices,  and  they 
never  change.  He  considers  there  is  such  ambiguity 
in  words,  by  which  all  Lawgivers  express  their  mean- 
ing; that  there  is  such  abstruseness  in  mysteries  of 
religion,  that  some  things  are  so  much  too  high  for 
H8,  that  we  cannot  understand  them  rightly;  and  yet 
they  are  so  sacred,  and  concerning,  that  men  will 
think  they  are  bound  to  look  into  them,  as  for  as  they 
can  ;  that  it  is  no  wonder  if  they  quickly  go  too  for, 
where  no  understanding,  if  it  were  fitted  for  it,  could 
go  for  enough  ;  but  in  these  things  it  will  be  hard  not 
to  be  deceived  ;  since  our  words  cannot  rightly  ex- 
press those  things.  That  there  is  such  variety  of  hu- 
man understandings,  that  men's  faces  differ  not  so 


much  as  their  souls ;  and  that  if  there  were  not  so 
much  difficulty  in  things,  yet  they  could  not  but  be 
variously  apprehended  by  several  men.  And  hereto 
he  considers,  that  in  twenty  opinions,  it  may  be  that 
not  one  of  them  is  true ;  nay,  whereas  Varro  reckon- 
ed, that  among  the  old  Philosophers  there  were  eight 
hundred  opinions  concerning  the  summum  bonum, 
that  yet  not  one  of  them  hit  the  right.  He  sees  also 
that  in  all  religions,  in  all  societies,  in  all  families,  and 
in  all  things,  opinions  differ;  and  since  opinions  are 
too  often  begot  by  passion,  by  passions  and  violence 
they  are  kept ;  and  every  man  is  too  apt  to  overvalue 
his  own  opinion ;  and  out  of  a  desire  that  every  man 
should  conform  his  judgment  to  his  that  teaches,  men 
are  apt  to  be  earnest  in  their  persuasion,  and  overact 
the  proposition;  and  from  being  true  as  he  supposes, 
he  will  think  it  profitable;  and  if  you  warm  him 
either  with  confidence  or  opposition,  he  quickly  tells 
you  it  is  necessary ;  and  as  he  loves  those  that  think 
as  he  does,  so  he  is  ready  to  hate  them  that  do  not ; 
and  then  secretly  from  wishing  evil  to  him,  he  is  apt 
to  believe  evil  will  come  to  him;  and  that  it  is  just 
it  should  ;  and  by  this  time  the  opinion  is  troublesome, 
and  puts  other  men  upon  their  guard  against  it;  and 
then  while  passion  reigns,  and  reason  is  modest  and 
patient,  and  talks  not  loud  like  a  storm,  victory  is 
more  regarded  than  truth,  and  men  call  God  into  the 
party,  and  his  judgments  are  used  for  arguments,  and 
the  threatenings  of  the  Scripture  are  snatched  up  in 
haste,  and  men  throw  arrows,  fire-brands,  and  death, 
and  by  this  time  all  the  world  is  in  an  uproar.  All 
this,  and  a  thousand  tilings  more  the  English  protest- 
ants  considering  deny  not  their  communion  to  any 
Christian  who  desires  it,  and  believes  the  Apostles' 
Creed,  and  is  of  the  religion  of  the  four  first  general 
councils  ;  they  hope  well  of  all  that  live  well ;  they 
receive  into  their  bosom  all  true  believers  of  what 
church  soever;  and  for  them  that  err,  they  instruct 
them,  and  then  leave  them  to  their  liberty,  to  stand 
or  fall  before  their  own  master. — 

2.  A  doctrine  not  the  less  safe  for  being  the  more 
charitable. 

"  Christ  our  Lord  hath  given  us,  amongst  others, 
two  infallible  notes  to  know  the  church."  "My 
sheep,"  saith  he,  "  hear  my  voice :"  and  again,  "  By 
this  shall  all  men  know  that  you  are  my  disciples,  if 
ye  love  one  another." — What,  shall  we  stand  upon 
conjectural  arguments  from  that  which  men  say? 
We  are  partial  to  ourselves,  malignant  to  our  oppo- 
sites.  Let  Christ  be  heard  who  be  his,  who  not.  And 
for  the  hearing  of  his  voice — O  that  it  might  be  the 
issue !  But  I  see  you  decline  it,  therefore  I  leave  it 
also  for  the  present.  That  other  is  that  which  now  I 
stand  upon  :  "  the  badge  of  Christ's  sheep."'  Not  a 
likelihood,  but  a  certain  token  wherein'  every  man 
may  know  them:  "by  this,"  saith  he,  "shall  all  men 
know  that  ye  are  my  disciples,  if  ye  have  charity  one 
towards  another." — Thanks  be  to  God,  this  mark  of 
our  Saviour  is  in  us  which  you  with  our  schismatics 
and  other  enemies  want.  As  Solomon  found  the  true 
mother  by  her  natural  affection,  that  chose  rather  to 
yield  to  her  adversary's  plea,  claiming  her  child,  than 
endure  that  it  should  be  cut  in  pieces ;  so  may  it  soon 
462 


THE  FRIEND. 


453 


be  found  at  this  day  whether  is  the  true  mother. 
Ours,  that  saith,  give  her  the  living  child  and  kill  him 
not;  or  yours,  that  if  she  may  not  have  it,  is  content 
it  be  killed  rather  than  want  of  her  will.  Alas! 
(saith  ours  even  of  those  that  leave  her)  these  be  my 
children!  I  have  borne  them  to  Christ  in  baptism:  I 
have  nourished  them  as  I  could  with  mine  own 
breasts,  his  testaments.  I  would  have  brought  them 
up  to  man's  estate,  as  their  free  birth  and  parentage 
deserves.  Whether  it  be  their  lightness  or  discontent, 
or  her  enticing  words  and  gay  shows,  they  leave  me : 
they  have  found  a  better  mother.  Let  them  live  vet, 
though  in  bondage.  I  shall  have  patience;  I  permit 
the  care  of  them  to  their  father,  I  beseech  him  to  keep 
them  that  they  do  no  evil.  If  they  make  their  peace 
with  him,  I  am  satisfied  :  they  have  not  hurt  me  at 
all.  Nay,  but  saith  vours,  I  sit  alone  as  Queen  and 
Mistress  of  Christ's  Family,  he  that  hath  not  me  for 
his  Mother,  cannot  have  God  for  his  Father.  Mine 
therefore  are  these,  either  born  or  adopted :  and  if 
they  will  not  be  mine  they  shall  be  none.  So  with- 
out expecting  Christ's  sentence  she  cuts  with  the 
temporal  sword,  hangs,  burns,  draws,  those  that  she 
perceives  inclined  to  leave  her,  or  have  left  her  al- 
ready. So  she  kills  with  the  spiritual  sword  those 
that  subject  not  to  her,  yea  thousands  of  souls  that 
not  only  have  no  means  so  to  do,  but  many  which  ne- 
ver so  much  as  have  heard,  whether  there  be  a  Pope 
of  Rome  or  no.  Let  our  Solomon  be  judge  between 
them,  yea,  judge  you,  Mr.  Waddesworth  !  more  seri- 
ously and  maturely,  not  by  guesses,  but  by  the  very 
mark  of  Christ,  which  wanting  yourselves  you  have 
unawares  discovered  in  us :  judge,  I  say,  without  pas- 
sion and  partiality,  according  to  Christ's  word :  which 
is  his  flock,  which  is  his  church. 


ESSAY   IX. 
ON  THE  LAW  OF  NATIONS. 


Ilpof  to\ioi^  ivSaiiiOvtav  xai  SiKaioavvnv  ~dvra  I&oLtov 
e/nrpaovCv  TiTaKtrai  (pvircf  roviroiv  St  to.  jxzv  ai'3pu>— ira 
h^Ta  Seta,  ra  &e$i~ia  L^rbv  'rjyzfibva  Now  Zv/nravTa 
ill  /3XfiT£iv,  &w%  (I15-  rpo?  dpirn^  r"t  fiopoiov,  a^a 
Tpb?  apirnv  ev  aptrai^  au  vno/itvovcrav,  015-  Jrpog- 
ibjiov  riva  vopoSero  vvra. 

TlXaruiv  Ttpi  No^ojv. 

Translation. — For  all  things  that  regard  the  well-being  and 
justice  of  a  State  are  pre-ordained  and  established  in  the 
nature  of'the  individual.  Of  these  it  behoves  that  the  mere- 
ly human  (the  temporal  and  Jluzional)  should  be  referred 
and  subordinated  to  the  Divine  in  man,  and  the  Divine  in 
like  manner  to  the  Supreme  Mind,  so  however  that  the  Slate 
is  not  to  regulate  its  actions  by  reference  to  any  particular 
form  and  fragment  of  virtue,  but  must  fix  its  eye  on  that 
virtue,  which  is  the  abiding  spirit  and  (as  it  were)  substra- 
tum in  all  the  virtues,  as  on  a  law  that  is  itself  legislative. 


It  were  absurd  to  suppose,  that  individuals  should 
be  under  a  law  of  Moral  obligation,  and  yet  that  a 
million  of  the  same  individuals  acting  collectively  or 


through  representatives,  should  be  exempt  from  all 
law  :  for  morality  is  no  accident  of  human  nature,  but 
its  essential  characteristic.  A  being  absolutely  with- 
out morality  is  either  a  beast  or  a  fiend,  according  as 
we  conceive  this  want  of  conscience  to  be  natural  or 
sell-produced ;  or  (to  come  nearer  lo  the  common  no- 
tion, though  with  the  sacrifice  of  austere  accuracy) 
according  as  the  being  is  conceived  without  the  law, 
or  in  unceasing  and  irretrievable  rebellion  to  it.  Yet 
were  it  possible  to  conceive  a  man  wholly  immoral, 
it  would  remain  impossible  to  conceive  him  without 
a  moral  obligation  to  be  otherwise ;  and  none  but  a 
madman  will  imagine  that  the  essential  qualities  of 
any  thing  can  be  altered  by  its  becoming  part  of  an 
aggregate;  that  a  grain  of  corn,  for  instance,  shall 
cease  to  contain  flour,  as  soon  as  it  is  part  of  a  pi  ck 
or  bushel.  It  is  therefore  grounded  in  the  nature  of 
the  thing,  and  not  by  a  mere  fiction  of  the  mind,  that 
wise  men,  who  have  written  on  the  law  of  nations, 
have  always  considered  the  several  states  of  the  civi- 
lized world,  as  so  many  individuals,  and  equally  with 
the  latter  under  a  moral  obligation  to  exercise  their 
free  agency  within  such  bounds,  as  render  it  compa- 
tible with  the  existence  of  free  agency  in  others.  We 
may  represent  to  ourselves  this  original  free  ayency, 
as  a  right  of  commonage,  the  formation  of  separate 
states  as  an  enclosure  of  this  common,  the  allotments 
awarded  severally  to  the  co-proprietors  as  constituting 
national  rights,  and  the  law  of  nations  as  the  common 
register  office  of  their  title  deeds.  But  in  all  morality, 
though  the  principle,  which  is  the  abiding  spirit  of 
the  law,  remains  perpetual  and  unaltered,  even  as 
that  supreme  reason  in  whom  and  from  whom  it  has 
its  being,  yet  the  teller  of  the  law,  that  is,  the  appli- 
cation of  it  to  particular  instances,  and  the  mode  of 
realizing  it  in  actual  practice,  must  be  modified  by 
the  existing  circumstances.  What  we  should  desire 
to  do,  the  conscience  alone  will  inform  us  ;  but  how 
and  when  we  are  to  make  the  attempt,  and  to  what 
extent  it  is  in  our  power  to  accomplish  it,  are  ques- 
tions for  the  judgment,  and  require  an  acquaintance 
with  facts  and  their  bearings  on  each  other.  Thence 
the  improvement  of  our  judgment  and  the  increase 
of  our  knowledge,  on  all  subjects  included  within 
our  sphere  of  action,  are  not  merely  advantages  re- 
commended bv  prudence,  but  absolute  duties  imposed 
on  us  by  conscience. 

As  the  circumstances  then,  under  which  men  act 
as  Statesmen,  are  different  from  those  under  which 
they  act  as  individuals,  a  proportionate  difference 
must  be  expected  in  the  practical  rules  by  which 
their  public  conduct  is  to  be  determined.  Let  me  not 
be  misunderstood:  I  speak  of  a  difference  in  the 
practical  rules,  not  in  the  moral  law  itself  which 
these  rules  point  out,  the  means  of  administering  in 
particular  cases,  and  under  given  circumstances. 
The  spirit  continues  one  and  the  same,  though  it  may 
vary  its  form  according  to  the  element  into  which  it 
is  transported.  This  difference  with  its  grounds  and 
consequences  it  is  the  province  of  the  philosophical 
juspublicist  to  discover  and  display  :  and  exactly  in 
this  point  (I  speak  with  unfeigned  diffidence)  it  ap- 
463 


454 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


pears  to  me  that  the  Writers  on  the  Law  of  Nations,* 
whose  works  I  have  had  the  opportunity  of  studying, 
have  been  least  successful.  In  what  does  the  Law 
of  Nations  differ  from  the  Laws  enacted  by  a  parti- 
cular State  ibr  its  own  subjects  ?  The  solution  is  evi- 
dent. The  Law  of  Nations,  considered  apart  from 
the  common  principle  of  all  morality,  is  not  fixed  or 
positive  in  itself  nor  supplied  with  any  regular  means 
of  being  enforced.  Like  those  duties  in  private  life 
which,  lor  the  same  reasons,  moralists  have  entitled 
imperfect  duties  (though  the  most  atrocious  guilt  may 
be  involved  in  the  omission  or  violation  of  them,)  the 
Law  of  Nations  appeals  only  to  the  conscience  and 
prudence  of  the  parties  concerned.  Wherein  then 
does  it  differ  from  the  moral  laws  which  the  Reason, 
considered  as  Conscience,  dictates  for  the  conduct  of 
individuals?  This  is  a  more  difficult  question;  but 
my  answer  would  be  determined  by,  and  grounded 
on  the  obvious  differences  of  the  circumstances  in 
the  two  cases.  Remember  then,  that  we  are  now 
reasoning,  not  as  sophists  or  system-mongers,  but  as 
men  anxious  to  discover  what  is  right  in  order  that 
we  may  practise  it,  give  our  suffrage  and  the  influ- 
ence of  our  opinion  in  recommending  its  practice. 
We  must  therefore  confine  the  question  to  those 
cases  in  which  honest  men  and  real  patriots  can  sup- 
pose any  controversy  to  exist  between  real  patriotism 
and  common  honesty.  The  objects  of  the  patriot  are, 
that  his  countrymen  should  as  far  as  circumstances 
permit,  enjoy  what  the  Creator  designed  for  the  en- 
joyment of  animals  endowed  with  reason,  and  of 
course  developed  those  faculties  which  were  given 
them  to  be  developed.  He  would  do  his  best  that 
every  one  of  his  countrymen  should  possess  whatever 
all  men  may  and  should  possess,  and  that  a  sufficient 
number  should  be  enabled  and  encouraged  to  acquire 
those  excellencies  which,  though  not  necessary  or  pos- 
sible/or all  men,  are  yet  to  all  men  useful  and  honor- 
able. He  knows,  that  patriotism  itself  is  a  necessary 
link  in  the  golden  chain  of  our  affections  and  virtues, 
and  turns  away  with  indignant  scorn  from  the  false 
Philosophy  or  mistaken  Religion,  which  would  per- 
suade him  that  Cosmopolitism  is  nobler  than  National- 
ity, and  the  human  race  a  sublimer  object  of  love  than 
a  people ;  that  Plato,  Luther,  Newton,  and  their  eu  uals, 
formed  themselves  neither  in  the  market  nor  the  sen- 
ate, but  in  the  world,  and  for  all  men  of  all  ages.  True! 
But  where,  and  among  whom  are  these  giant  excep- 
tions produced  ?  In  the  wide  empires  of  Asia,  where 
millions  of  human  beings  acknowledge  no  other  bond 
but  that  of  a  common  slavery,  and  are  distinguished 
on  the  map  but  by  a  name  which  themselves  perhaps 
never  heard,  or  hearing  abhor  ?    No !    In  a  circle 

*  Grotius,  Bykenshock,  Puffendorf,  Wolfe,  and  Vatel  ;  to 
whose  works  I  must  add,  as  comprising  whatever  is  most  valu- 
able in  the  preceding  Auihors,  with  many  important  improve- 
ments anil  additions,  Robinson's  Keporls  of  the  Causes  of  the 
Court  of  Admiralty  under  Sir  W.  Scott :  to  whom  internation- 
al law  is  under  no  less  obligation  than  the  law  of  commercial 
proceedings  was  to  the  late  Lord  Mansfield.  As  I  have  never 
seen  Sir  W.  Scott,  nor  either  by  myself  or  my  connections  en- 
joy the  honor  of  the  remotest  acquaintance  with  him,  I  trust 
that  even  by  those  who  may  think  my  opinion  erroneous,  I 
shall  at  least  not  be  suspected  of  international  flattery. 


defined  by  human  affections,  the  first  firm  sod  within 
which  becomes  sacred  beneath  the  quickened  step  of 
the  returning  citizen — here,  where  the  powers  and 
interests  of  men  spread  without  confusion  through  a 
common  sphere,  like  the  vibrations  propagated  in  the 
air  by  a  single  voice,  distinct  yet  coherent,  and  all 
uniting  to  express  one  thought  and  the  same  feeling! 
here,  where  even  the  common  soldier  dares  force  a 
passage  for  his  comrades  by  gathering  up  the  bayo- 
nets of  the  enemy  into  his  own  breast :  because  his 
country  "expected  every  man  to  do  hie  duty!"  and  this 
not  after  he  has  been  hardened  hy  habit,  but,  as  pro- 
bably, in  his  first  battle  ;  not  reckless  or  hopeless,  but 
braving  death  from  a  keener  sensibility  to  those 
blessings  which  make  life  dear,  to  those  qualities 
which  render  himself  worthy  to  enjoy  them  ?  Here, 
where  the  royal  crown  is  loved  and  worshipped  as  a 
glory  around  the  sainted  head  of  Freedom!  Where 
the  rustic  at  his  plough  whistles  with  equal  enthusi- 
asm, "  God  save  the  King,"  and  "  Britons:  never  shah 
be  slaves;"  or,  perhaps,  leaves  one  thistle  unweeded 
in  his  garden,  because  it  is  the  svmbol  of  his  dear  na- 
tive land  !t  Here,  from  within  this  circle  defined,  as 
light  by  shape,  or  rather  as  light  within  light,  by  its 
intensity,  here  alone,  and  only  within  these  magic  cir- 
cles, rise  up  the  awful  spirits,  whose  words  are  ora- 
cles for  mankind,  whose  love  embraces  all  countries, 
and  whose  voice  sounds  through  all  ages!  Here,  and 
here  only,  may  we  confidently  expect  those  mighty 
minds  to  be  reared  and  ripened,  whose  names  are 
naturalized  in  foreign  lands,  the  sure  fellow-travellers 
of  civilization!  and  yet  render  their  own  country 
dearer  and  more  proudly  dear  to  their  own  country- 
men. This  is  indeed  Cosmopolitism,  at  once  the 
nursling  and  the  nurse  of  patrioticjiffection  !  This, 
and  this  alone,  is  genuine  Philanthropy,  which  like 
the  olive  tree,  sacred  to  Concord  and  to  Wisdom,  fat- 
tens not  exhausts  the  soil,  from  which  it  sprang,  and 
in  which  it  remains  rooted.  It  is  feebleness  only 
which  cannot  be  generous  without  injustice,  or  just 
without  ceasing  to  be  generous.  Is  the  morning  star 
less  brilliant,  or  does  a  ray  less  fall  on  the  golden 
fruitage  of  the  earth,  because  the  moons  of  Saturn 
too  feed  their  lamps  from  the  same  Sun  ?  Even  Ger- 
many, though  curst  with  a  base  and  hateful  brood  of 
nobles  and  princelings,  cowardly  and  ravenous  jack- 
als to  the  very  flocks  intrusted  to  them  as  to  shep- 
herds, who  hunt  for  the  tiger  and  whine  and  wag 
their  tails  for  his  bloody  offal — even  Germany,  whose 
ever-changing  boundaries  superannuate  the  last  year's 


t  I  cannot  here  refuse  myself  the  pleasure  of  recording  a 
speech  of  the  Poet  Burns,  related  to  me  by  the  lady  to  whom 
it  was  addressed.  Having  been  asked  hy  her,  why  in  his  more 
serious  poems  he  had  not  changed  the  two  or  ihree  Scotch 
words  which  seemed  only  to  disturb  the  purity  of  the  style  ? 
the  Poet  with  great  sweetness,  and  in  his  usual  happiness  in 
reply,  answered,  why  in  truth  it  would  have  been  better,  but — 
The  rough  bur-thistle  spreading  wide 

Amang  the  bearded  bear, 
I  turn'd  the  weeder-clips  aside 
An'  spar'd  the  symbol  dear. 
An  author  may  be  allowed  to  quote  from  his  own  poems, 
when  ho  does  it  with  as  much  modesty  and  felicity  as  Burns 
did  in  this  instance. 

464 


THE  FRIEND. 


455 


map,  and  are  altered  as  easily  as  the  hurdles  of  a  tem- 
porary sheep-fold,  is  still  remembered  with  filial  love 
and  a  patriot's  pride,  when  the  thoughtful  German 
hears  the  names  of  Luther  and  Leibnitz.  "Ah! 
why,"  he  si^lis,  "  why  for  herself  in  vain  should  my 
country  have  produced  such  a  host  of  immortal 
minds!"  Yea,  oven  the  poor  enslaved,  degraded, 
ami  barbarized  (ireek,  can  still  point  to  the  harbour 
of  TenedoB,  and  say,  "  there  lay  our  fleet  when  we 
were  besieging  Troy."  Reflect  a  moment  on  the 
past  history  of  t/tis  wonderful  people!  What  were 
they  while  they  remained  free  and  independent? 
when  Greece  resembled  a  collection  of  mirrors  set  in 
a  single  frame,  each  having  its  own  focus  of  patriot- 
ism, yet  all  capable,  as  at  Marathon  and  Platea,  of 
converging  to  one  point  and  of  consuming  a  common 
foe?  What  were  they  then  ?  The  fountains  of  light 
and  civilization,  of  truth  and  of  beauty,  to  all  man- 
kind !  they  were  the  thinking  head,  the  beating  heart 
of  the  whole  world!  They  lost  their  independence, 
and  with  their  independence  their  patriotism;  and 
became  the  cosmopolites  of  antiquity.  It  has  been 
truly  observed  (by  the  author  of  the  work  for  which 
Palm  was  murdered)  that,  after  the  first  acts  of  seve- 
rity, the  Romans  treated  the  Greeks  not  only  more 
mildly  than  their  own  slaves  and  dependants,  they 
behaved  to  them  even  affectionately  and  with  muni- 
ficence. The  victor  nation  felt  reverentially  the  pre- 
sence of  the  visible  and  invisible  deities  that  give 
sanctity  to  every  grove,  every  fountain,  and  every 
forum.  "Think  (writes  Pliny  to  one  of  his  friends) 
that  you  are  sent  into  the  province  of  Achaia,  that 
true  and  genuine  Greece,  where  civilization,  letters, 
even  corn,  are  believed  to  have  been  discovered  ; 
that  you  are  sent  to  administer  the  affairs  of  free 
states,  that  is,  to  men  eminently  free,  who  have  re- 
tained their  natural  right  by  valor,  by  services,  by 
friendship,  lastly  by  treaty  and  by  religion.  Revere 
the  Gods,  their  founders,  the  sacred  influences  repre- 
sented in  those  Gods,  revere  their  ancient  glory  and  this 
very  old  age  which  tn  man  is  venerable,  in  cities  sacred. 
Cherish  in  thyself  a  reverence  of  antiquity,  a  reverence 
for  their  great  exploits,  a  reverence  even  for  their  fa  bles. 
Detract  nothing  from  the  proud  pretensions  of  any  state  ; 
keep  before  thine  eyes  that  this  is  the  land  which  sent 
us  our  institutions,  which  gave  us  our  laws,  not  after 
it  was  subjugated,  but  in  compliance  with  our  peti- 
tion."* And  what  came  out  of  these  men,  who  were 
eminently  free  without  patriotism,  because  without 
national  independence?  (which  eminent  freedom, 
however,  Pliny  himself,  in  the  very  next  sentence, 
styles  the  shadow  and  residuum  of  liberty.)  While 
they  were  intense  patriots,  they  were  the  benefactors 
of  all  mankind,  legislators  for  the  very  nation  that 
afterwards  subdued  and  enslaved  them.  When, 
therefore,  they  became  pure  cosmopolites,  and  no  par- 
tial affections  interrupted  their  philanthropy,  and 
whe:i  yet  they  retained  their  country,  their  language, 
and  their  arts,  what  noble  works,  what  mighty  dis- 
coveries may  we  not  expect  from  them  ?  If  the  ap- 
plause of  a  little  city  (a  first-rate  town  of  a  country 

*  Plin.  Epi9t.  Lib.  VIII. 
Pp2 


not  much  larger  than  Yorkshire)  and  the  encourage- 
ment of  a  Pericles,  produced  a  Phidias,  a  Sophocles, 
and  a  constellation  of  other  stars  scarcely  inferior  in 
glory,  what  will  not  the  applause  of  the  world  effect, 
and  the  boundless  munificence  of  the  world's  impe- 
rial master?  Alas!  no  Sophocles  appeared,  no  Phid- 
ias was  born!  individual  genius  fled  with  national  in- 
dependence, and  the  best  products  were  cold  and 
laborious  copies  of  what  their  fathers  had  thought 
and  invented  in  grandeur  and  majesty.  At  length 
nothing  remained  but  dastardly  and  cunning  slaves, 
who  avenged  their  own  ruin  and  degradation  by  as- 
sisting to  degrade  and  ruin  their  conquerors;  and  the 
golden  harp  of  their  divine  language  remained  only 
as  the  frame  on  which  priests  and  monks  spun  their 
dirty  cobwebs  of  sophistry  and  superstition! 

if  then  in  order  to  be  men  we  must  be  patriots, 
and  patriotism  cannot  exist  without  national  indepen- 
dence, we  need  no  new  or  particular  code  of  morals 
to  justify  us  in  placing  and  preserving  our  country  in 
that  relative  situation  which  is  more  favorable  to  its 
independence.  But  the  true  patriot  is  aware  that 
this  subject  is  not  to  be  accomplished  by  a  system  of 
general  conquest,  such  as  was  pursued  by  Philip  of 
Macedon  and  his  son,  nor  yet  by  the  political  anni- 
hilation of  the  one  state,  which  happens  to  be  its 
most  formidable  rival :  the  unwise  measure  recom- 
mended by  Cato,  and  carried  into  effect  by  the  Ro- 
mans, in  the  instance  of  Carthage.  Not  by  the  latter: 
for  rivalry  between  two  nations  conduces  to  the  in- 
dependence of  both,  calls  forth  or  fosters  all  the 
virtues  by  which  national  security  is  maintained. 
Still  less  by  the  former:  for  the  victor  nation  itself 
must  at  length,  by  the  very  extension  of  its  own  con- 
quests, sink  into  a  mere  province  ;  nay,  it  will  most 
probably  become  the  most  abject  portion  of  the  Em- 
pire, and  the  most  cruelly  oppressed,  both  because 
it  will  be  more  feared  and  suspected  by  the  common 
tyrant,  and  because  it  will  be  the  sink  and  centre  of 
his  luxury  and  corruption.  Even  in  cases  of  actual 
injury  and  just  alarm  the  Patriot  sets  bounds  to  the 
reprisal  of  national  vengeance,  and  contents  himself 
with  such  securities  as  are  compatible  with  the  wel- 
fare, though  not  with  the  ambitious  projects  of  the 
nation,  whose  aggressions  had  given  the  provocation: 
for  as  patriotism  inspires  no  super-human  faculties, 
neither  can  it  dictate  any  conduct  which  would  re- 
quire such.  Fie  is  too  conscious  of  his  own  ignorance 
of  the  future,  to  dare  extend  his  calculations  into  re- 
mote periods ;  nor,  because  he  is  a  statesman,  arro- 
gates to  himself  the  cares  of  Providence  and  the 
government  of  the  world.  How  does  he  know,  but 
that  the  very  independence  and  consequent  virtues 
of  the  nation,  which  in  the  anger  of  cowardice  he 
would  fain  reduce  to  absolute  insignificance,  and  rob 
even  of  its  ancient  name,  may  in  some  future  emer- 
gence be  the  destined  guardians  of  his  own  country  ; 
and  that  the  power  which  now  alarms,  may  hereaf- 
ter protect  and  preserve  it  ?  The  experience  ol 
History  authorises  not  only  the  possibility,  but  even 
the  probability  of  such  an  event.  An  American 
commander,  who  has  deserved  and  received  the 
highest  honors  which  his  grateful  country,  through 
465 


456 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


her  assembled  Representatives,  could  bestow  upon 
him,  once  said  to  me  with  a  sigh  :  In  an  evil  hour 
for  my  country  did  the  French  and  Spaniards  aban- 
don Louisiana  to  the  United  States.  We  were  not 
sufficiently  a  country  before  ;  and  should  we  ever 
be  mad  enough  to  drive  the  English  from  Canada 
and  her  other  North  American  Provinces,  we  shall 
soon  cease  to  be  a  country  at  all.  Without  local 
attachment,  without  national  honor,  we  shall  resem- 
ble a  swarm  of  insects  that  settle  on  the  fruits  of  the 
earth  to  corrupt  and  consume  them,  rather  than  men 
who  love  and  cleave  to  the  land  of  their  forefathers. 
After  a  shapeless  anarchy,  and  a  series  of  civil  wars, 
we  shall  at  last  be  formed  into  many  countries  ;  un- 
less the  vices  engendered  in  the  process  should  de- 
mand further  punishment,  and  we  should  previously 
fall  beneath  the  despotism  of  some  military  adven- 
turer, like  a  lion,  consumed  by  an  inward  disease, 
prostrate  and  helpless,  beneath  the  beak  and  talons 
of  a  vulture,  or  yet  meaner  bird  of  prey. 


ESSAY   X. 

0(  ti  i*ev  ttooj'  tov  tv  b\ov  t:\ovtov,  fiaWov  ii  Troog-  ti 
tyavraana  7roXfu^  liiraVijf,  o  -navTa^ri  Kai  ovSani)  cj-t, 
(piptt  /xdSrina  Kai  fTn-njS-fii/ua,  tovto  ^pijat/xov  Kai 
aoijiov  ti  <5o|a<r?7/<7£rai'  riov  (5f  aWuiv  Karay&a  b 
TTO^ITIKO^-  TaVT)]V  Tr)v  aiTiav  %pri  (pdvai  tov  jxfirt 
aAAo  KaXov,  vqTC  ru  7700;-  tov  vo^t/iov  fmyakoirpi-u)^ 
aoKtiv  ra<;  7rdXa;-,  ruiv  iio\iru)v  fid\'  tviort  &vk 
a(pvG>v  ovtu)v,  SvaTv^ovvriiv  yc  jiTJv.  IIcD;-  Xfy<5" ; 
Ilwj-  jnev  ovv  avrovs  bv  Xfyoi/i'  av  to  irapatrav  oWr- 
ti^tTs-,  o7y  y£  avdyKt)  Ma  (iiov  TtivZci  t!)v  <pw%riv 
ah  Tr)v  avrrjv  Sic^t\Sc7v.  Yl\ariiiv. 

Translation. — Whatever  study  or  doctrine  boars  upon  the 
wealth  of  the  whole,  say  ratrmr  on  a  certain  Phantom  of  a 
State  in  toto,  which  is  everywhere  and  nowhere,  this  shall 
be  deemed  most  useful  and  wise;  and  all  else  is  the  state- 
craflman's  scorn.  This  we  dare  pronounce  the  cause  why 
nations  torpid  on  their  dignity  in  general,  conduct  their 
wars  so  little  in  a  grand  and  magnanimous  spirit,  while  the 
Citizens  are  too  often  wretched,  though  endowed  with  high 
capabilities  by  Nature.  How  say  you  ?  Nay,  how  should 
I  not  call  them  wretched,  who  are  under  the  unrelenting 
necessity  of  wasting  away  their  life  in  the  mere  search  after 
the  means  of  supporting  it  ? PLATO,  de  legibus,  viii. 


In  the  preceding  Essay  we  treated  of  what  may  be 
wisely  desired  in  respect  to  our  foreign  relations. 
The  same  sanity  of  mind  will  the  true  Patriot  display, 
in  all  that  regards  the  internal  prosperity  of  his  coun- 
try. He  will  reverence  not  only  whatever  tends  to 
make  the  component  individuals  more  happy,  and 
more  worthy  of  happiness :  but  likewise  whatever 
tends  to  bind  them  more  closely  together  as  a  people  ; 
that  as  a  multitude  of  parts  and  functions  make  up 
one  human  body,  so  the  whole  multitude  of  his  coun- 
trymen may,  by  the  visible  and  invisible  influences  of 
religion,  language,  laws,  customs,  and  the  reciprocal 
dependence  and  reaction  of  trade  and  agriculture,  be 
organized   into  one  body  politic.     But  much  as  he 


desires  to  see  all  become  a  whole,  he  places  limits 
even  to  this  wish,  and  abhors  that  system  of  policy, 
which  would  blend  men  into  a  state  by  the  dissolu- 
tion of  all  those  virtues  which  make  them  happy  and 
estimable  as  individuals.  Sir  James  Sluart  (Polit. 
Eicon.  Vol.  I.  p.  88,)  after  stating  the  case  of  ihe  vine- 
dresser, who  is  proprietor  of  a  bit  of  laud,  on  which 
grain  (enough,  and  no  more)  is  raised  for  himself  and 
family — and  who  provides  for  their  other  wan!s  of 
clothing,  salt,  &C  by  his  extra  labor,  as  a  vine-dresser, 
observes — "  From  this  example  we  discover  the  dif- 
ference between  Agriculture  exercised  as  a  trade, 
and  as  a  direct  means  of  subsisting.  We  have  the 
two  species  in  the  vine-dresser:  he  labors  the  vine- 
yard as  a  trade,  and  his  spot  of  ground  for  subsistence. 
We  may  farther  conclude,  that  as  to  the  last  part  he 
is  only  useful  to  himself;  but  as  to  the  first,  he  is  use- 
ful to  the  society  and  becomes  a  member  of  it;  con- 
sequently were  it  not  for  his  trade  the  state  would 
lose  nothing,  although  the  vine-dresser  and  his  land 
were  both  swallowed  up  by  an  earthquake." 

Now  this  contains  the  sublime  philosophy  of  the 
sect  of  Economists.  They  worship  a  kind  of  non-en- 
tity, under  the  different  words,  the  State,  the  Whole, 
the  Society,  &c.  and  to  this  idol  they  make  bloodier 
sacrifices  than  ever  the  Mexicans  did  to  Tescaltpoca. 
All,  that  is,  each  and  every  sentient  Being  in  a  given 
tract,  are  made  diseased  and  vicious,  in  order  that 
each  may  become  useful  to  all,  or  the  Slate,  or  the 
Society, — that  is,  to  the  word,  all,  the  Word,  State,  or 
the  word,  Society.  The  absurdity  may  be  easily 
perceived  by  omitting  the  words  relating  to  this  idol 
— as  for  instance — in  a  former  paragraph  of  the  same 
(in  most  respects)  excellent  work:  "If  it  therefore 
happens  that  an  additional  number  produced  no  more 
than  feed  themselves,  then  1  perceive  no  advantage 
gained  from  their  production."  What!  no  advantage 
gained  by,  for  instance,  ten  thousand  happy,  intelli- 
gent, and  immortal  Beings  having  been  produced  ? — 
O  yes !  but  no  advantage  "  to  this  Society." — What  is 
this  Society?  this  "Whole?"  this  "State?"  Is  it 
anything  else  but  a  word  of  convenience  to  express 
at  once  the  aggregate  of  confederated  individuals  liv- 
ing in  a  certain  district?  Let  the  sum  total  of  each 
man's  happiness  be  supposed — 1000;  and  suppose  ten 
thousand  men  produced,  who  neither  made  swords 
or  poison,  or  found  corn  or  clothes  for  those  who  did 
— but  who  procured  by  their  labor  food  and  raiment 
for  themselves,  and  for  their  children — would  not  that 
Society  be  richer  by  10,000,000  parts  of  happiness  ? 
And  think  you  it  possible,  that  ten  thousand  happy 
human  Beings  can  exist  together  without  increasing 
each  other's  happiness,  or  that  it  will  not  overflow 
into  countless  channels,*  and  diffuse  itself  through  the 
rest  of  the  Society. 

*  Well,  and  in  the  spirit  of  genuine  philosophy,  does  the 
poet  describe  such  beings  as  men 

"  Who  being  innocent  do  for  that  cause 

Bestir  them  in  good  deeds." 

WORDSWORTH. 

Providence,  by  the  ceaseless  activity  which  it  has  implanted 
in  our  nature,  has  sufficiently  guarded  against  an  innocence 
without  virtue. 

466 


THE  FRIEND. 


457 


The  poor  vine-dresser  rises  from  sweet  sleep,  wor- 
ships his  Maker,  goes  with  his  wife  and  children 
into  his  little  plot — returns  to  his  hut  at  noon,  and  eats 
the  produce  of  the  similar  labor  of  a  former  day.  Is 
he  useful  ?  i\o!  not  yet.  Suppose  then,  that  during 
the  remaining  hours  of  the  day  he  endeavored  to 
provide  for  his  moral  and  intellectual  appetites,  by 
physical  experiments  and  philosophical  research,  by 
acquiring  knowledge  for  himself,  and  communicating 
it  to  his  wife  and  children.  Would  he  be  useful 
then?  "He  useful?  The  state  would  lose  nothing 
although  the  vine-dresser  and  his  land  were  both 
swallowed  up  by  an  earthquake  !"  Well  then,  in- 
stead of  devoting  the  latter  half  of  each  day  to  his 
closet,  his  laboratory,  or  to  neighborly  conversation, 
suppose  he  goes  to  the  vineyard,  and  from  the  ground 
which  would  maintain  in  health,  virtue,  and  wisdom, 
twenty  of  his  fellow-creatures,  helps  to  raise  a  quan- 
tity of  liquor  that  will  disease  the  bodies,  and  debauch 
the  souls  of  an  hundred — is  he  useful  now9. — O  yes! 
— a  very  useful  man,  and  a  most  excellent  citizen ! ! 
In  what  then  does  the  law  between  state  and 
state  differ  from  that  between  man  and  man  ?  For 
hitherto  we  seem  to  have  discovered  no  variation. 
The  law  of  nations  is  the  law  of  common  honesty, 
modified  by  the  circumstances  in  which  States  differ 
from  individuals.  According  to  the  Friend's  best 
understanding,  the  differences  may  be  reduced  to 
this  one  point :  that  the  influences  of  example  in  any 
extraordinary  case,  as  the  possible  occasion  of  an  ac- 
tion apparently  like,  though  in  reality  very  different, 
is  of  considerable  importance  in  the  moral  calcula- 
tions of  an  individual;  but  of  little,  if  any,  in  those 
of  a  nation.  The  reasons  are  evident.  In  the  first 
place,  in  cases  concerning  which  there  can  be  any 
dispute  between  an  honest  man  and  a  true  patriot, 
the  circumstances,  which  at  once  authorize  and  dis- 
criminate the  measure,  are  so  marked  and  peculiar 
and  notorious,  that  it  is  incapable  of  being  drawn 
into  a  precedent  by  any  other  state,  under  dissimilar 
circumstances ;  except  perhaps  as  a  mere  pretext  for 
an  action,  which  had  been  predetermined  without 
reference  to  this  authority,  and  which  would  have 
taken  place,  though  it  had  never  existed.  But  if  so 
strange  a  thing  should  happen,  as  a  second  coinci- 
dence of  the  same  circumstances,  or  of  circumstances 
sufficiently  similar  to  render  the  prior  measure  a  fair 
precedent;  then  if  the  one  action  was  justifiable,  so 
will  the  other  be;  and  without  any  reference  to  the 
former,  which  in  this  case  may  be  useful  as  a  light, 
but  cannot  be  requisite  as  an  authority.  Secondly,  in 
extraordinary  cases  it  is  ridiculous  to  suppose  that  the 
Conduct  of  states  will  be  determined  by  example. 
We  know  that  they  neither  will,  nor  in  the  nature  of 
things  can  be  determined  by  any  other  consideration 
but  that  of  the  imperious  circumstances  which  ren- 
der a  particular  measure  advisable.  But  lastly,  and 
more  important  than  all,  individuals  are  and  must  be 
under  positive  laws:  and  so  very  great  is  the  advan- 
tage which  results  from  the  regularity  of  legal  deci- 
sions, and  their  consequent  capability  of  being  fore- 
known and  relied  upon,  that  equity  itself  must  some- 
times be  sacrificed  to  it.    For  the  very  letter  of  a 


positive  law  is  part  of  its  spirit.  But  states  neither 
are,  nor  can  be,  under  positive  laws.  The  only  fixed 
part  of  the  law  of  nations  is  the  spirit :  the  letter  of 
the  law  consists  w:holly  in  the  circumstances  to  which 
the  spirit  of  the  law  is  applied.  It  is  mere  puerile 
declamation  to  rail  against  a  country,  as  having  imi- 
tated the  very  measures  for  which  it  hud  most  blamed 
its  ambitious  enemy,  if  that  enemy  had  previously 
changed  all  the  relative  circumstances  which  had 
existed  for  him,  and  therefore  rendered  his  conduct 
iniquitous;  but  which,  having  been  removed,  how- 
ever iniquitously,  cannot  without  absurdity  be  sup- 
posed any  longer  to  control  the  measures  of  an  inno- 
cent nation,  necessitated  to  struggle  for  its  own 
safety:  especially  when  the  measures  in  question 
were  adopted  for  the  very  purpose  of  restoring  those 
circumstances. 

There  are  times  when  it  would  be  wise  to  regard 
patriotism  as  a  light  that  is  in  danger  of  being  blown 
out,  rather  than  as  a  fire  which  needs  to  be  fanned 
by  the  winds  of  party  spirit.  There  are  times  when 
party  spirit,  without  any  unwonted  excess,  may  yet 
become  faction  ;  and  though  in  general  not  less  useful 
than  natural  in  a  free  government,  may  under  partic- 
ular emergencies  prove  fatal  to  freedom  itself  I  trust 
I  am  writing  to  those  who  think  with  me,  that  to  have 
blackened  a  ministry,  however  strong  or  rational  our 
dislike  may  be  of  the  persons  who  compose  it,  is  a 
poor  excuse  and  a  miserable  compensation  for  the 
crime  of  unnecessarily  blackening  the  character  of 
our  country.  Under  this  conviction,  I  request  my 
reader  to  cast  his  eye  back  on  my  last  argument,  and 
then  to  favor  me  with  his  patient  attention  while  I 
attempt  at  once  to  explain  its  purport  and  to  show  its 
cogency. 

Let  us  transport  ourselves  in  fancy  to  the  age  and 
country  of  the  Patriarchs,  or,  if  the  reader  prefers  it, 
to  some  small  colony  uninfluenced  by  the  mother 
country,  which  has  not  organized  itself  into  a  state, 
or  agreed  to  acknowledge  any  one  particular  gover- 
nor. We  will  suppose  this  colony  to  consist  of  from 
twenty  to  thirty  households  or  separate  establish- 
ments, differing  greatly  from  each  other  in  the  num- 
ber of  retainers  and  in  extent  of  possessions.  Each 
household,  however,  possesses  its  own  domain,  the 
least  equally  with  the  greatest,  in  full  right ;  and  its 
master  is  an  independent  sovereign  within  his  own 
boundaries.  This  mutual  understanding  and  tacit 
agreement  we  may  well  suppose  to  have  been  the 
gradual  result  of  many  feuds,  which  had  produced 
misery  to  all  and  real  advantages  to  none:  and  that 
the  same  sober  and  reflecting  persons,  dispersed 
through  the  different  establishments,  who  had  brought 
about  this  state  of  things,  had  likewise  coincided  in 
the  propriety  of  some  other  prudent  and  humane  reg- 
ulations, which  from  the  authority  of  these  wise  men 
on  points,  in  which  they  were  unanimous,  and  from 
the  evident  good  sense  of  the  rules  themselves,  were 
acknowledged  throughout  the  whole  colony,  though 
the  determination  of  the  cases,  to  which  these  rules 
were  applicable,  had  not  been  intrusted  to  any  recog- 
nized judge,  nor  their  enforcement  delegated  to  anv 
particular  magistrate.  Of  these  virtual  laws,  this,  we 
467 


458 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


may  safely  conclude,  would  be  the  chief:  that  as  no 
man  ought  to  interfere  in  the  affairs  of  another 
against  his  will,  so  if  any  master  of  a  household,  in- 
stead of  occupying  himself  with  the  improvement  of 
his  own  fields  and  flocks,  or  with  the  better  regula- 
tion of  his  own  establishment,  should  be  foolish  and 
wicked  enough  to  employ  his  children  and  servants 
in  breaking  down  the  fences  and  taking  possession 
of  the  lands  and  property  of  a  fellow-colonist,  or  in 
turning  the  head  of  the  family  out  of  his  house,  and 
forcing  those  that  remained  to  acknowledge  himself 
as  their  governor  instead,  and  to  obey  whomever  he 
might  please  to  appoint  as  his  deputy — that  it  then 
became  the  duty  and  interest  of  the  other  colonists 
to  join  against  the  aggressor,  and  to  do  all  in  their 
power  to  prevent  him  from  accomplishing  his  bad 
purposes,  or  to  compel  him  to  make  restitution  and 
compensation.  The  mightier  the  aggressor,  and  the 
weaker  the  injured  party,  the  more  cogent  would  the 
motive  become  for  restraining  the  one  and  protecting 
the  other.  For  it  was  plain  that  he  who  was  suffered 
to  overpower,  one  by  one,  the  weaker  proprietors, 
and  render  the  members  of  their  establishment  sub- 
servient to  his  will,  must  soon  become  an  overmatch 
for  those  who  were  formerly  his  equals:  and  the 
mightiest  would  differ  from  the  meanest  only  by 
being  the  last  victim. 

This  allegorical  fable  faithfully  pourtrays  the  law 
of  nations  and  the  balance  of  power  among  the  Eu- 
ropean stales.  Let  us  proceed  with  it  in  the  form  of 
History.  In  the  second  or  third  generation  the  pro- 
prietors too  generally  disregarded  the  good  old 
opinion,  that  what  injured  any  could  be  real  advan- 
tage to  none ;  and  treated  those,  who  still  professed 
it,  as  fit  only  to  instruct  children  in  their  catechism. 
By  the  avarice  of  some,  the  cowardice  of  others,  and 
by  the  corruption  and  want  of  foresight  in  the  great- 
er part,  the  former  state  of  things  had  been  complete- 
ly changed,  and  the  tacit  compact  set  at  nought  the 
general  acknowledgment  of  which  had  been  so  in- 
strumental in  producing  this  state  and  in  preserving 
it,  as  long  as  it  lasted.  The  stronger  had  preyed  on 
the  weaker,  whose  wrongs,  however,  did  not  remain 
long  unavenged.  For  the  same  selfishness  and  blind- 
ness to  the  future,  which  had  induced  the  wealthy  to 
trample  on  the  rights  of  the  poorer  proprietors,  pre- 
vented them  from  assisting  each  other  effectually, 
when  they  were  themselves  attacked,  one  after  the 
other,  by  the  most  powerful  of  all :  and  from  a  con- 
currence of  circumstances  attacked  so  successfully, 
that  of  the  whole  colony  few  remained,  that  were 
not,  directly  or  indirectly,  the  creatures  and  depend- 
ants of  one  overgrown  establishment.  Say  rather, 
of  its  new  master,  an  adventurer  whom  chance  and 
poverty  had  brought  thither,  and  who  in  better  times 
would  have  been  employed  in  the  swine-yard,  or  the 
slaughter-house,  from  his  moody  temper  and  his  aver- 
sion to  all  the  Art  that  tended  to  improve  either  the 
land  or  those  that  were  to  be  maintained  by  its  pro- 
duce. He  was  however  eminent  for  other  qualities, 
which  were  still  better  suited  to  promote  his  power 
among  those  degenerate  colonists :  for  he  feared  nei- 
ther God  nor  his  own  conscience.    The  most  solemn 


oaths  could  not  bind  him ;  the  most  deplorable  cala- 
mities could  not  awaken  his  pity ;  and  when  others 
were  asleep,  he  was  either  brooding  over  some 
scheme  of  robbery  or  murder,  or  with  a  part  of  his 
banditti  actually  employed  in  laying  waste  his  neigh- 
bor's fences,  or  in  undermining  the  walls  of  their 
houses.  His  natural  cunning,  undistracted  by  any 
honest  avocations,  and  meeting  with  no  obstacle  ei- 
ther in  his  head  or  heart,  and  above  all,  having  been 
quickened  and  strengthened  by  constant  practice  and 
favored  by  the  times  with  all  conceivable  opportuni- 
ties, ripened  at  last  into  a  surprising  genius  for  op- 
pression and  tyranny ;  and,  as  we  must  distinguish 
him  by  some  name,  we  will  call  him  Misetes.  The 
only  estate,  which  remained  able  to  bid  defiance  to 
this  common  enemy,  was  that  of  Pamphilus,  superior 
to  Misetes  in  wealth,  and  his  equal  in  strength ; 
though  not  in  the  power  of  doing  mischief,  and  still 
less  in  the  wish.  Their  characters  were  indeed  per- 
fectly contrasted:  for  it  may  be  truly  said,  that 
throughout  the  whole  colony  there  was  not  a  single 
establishment  which  did  not  owe  some  of  its  best 
buildings,  the  increased  produce  of  its  fields,  its  im- 
proved implements  of  industry,  and  the  general  more 
decent  appearance  of  its  members,  to  the  information 
given  and  the  encouragements  afforded  by  Pamphilus 
and  those  of  his  household.  Whoever  raised  more 
than  they  wanted  for  their  own  establishment,  were 
sure  to  find  a  ready  purchaser  in  Pamphilus,  and 
oftentimes  for  articles  which  they  had  themselves 
been  before  accustomed  to  regard  as  worthless,  or 
even  as  nuisances:  they  received  in  return  things 
necessary  or  agreeable,  and  always  in  one  respect  at 
least  useful,  that  they  roused  the  purchaser  to  indus- 
try and  its  accompanying  virtues.  In  this  intercom- 
munion all  were  benefited  ;  for  the  wealth  of  Pam- 
philus was  increased  by  the  increasing  industry  of 
his  fellow-colonists,  and  their  industry  needed  the 
support  and  encouraging  influences  of  Pamphilus's 
capital.  To  this  good  man  and  his  estimable  house- 
hold Misetes  bore  the  most  implacable  hatred,  and 
had  publicly  sworn  that  he  would  root  him  out ;  the 
only  sort  of  oath  which  he  was  not  likely  to  break  by 
any  want  of  will  or  effort  on  his  own  part.  But  for- 
tunately for  Pamphilus,  his  main  property  consisted 
of  one  compact  estate  divided  from  Misetes  and  the 
rest  of  the  colony  by  a  wide  and  dangerous  river, 
with  the  exception  of  one  small  plantation  which  be- 
longed to  an  independent  proprietor  whom  we  will 
name  Lathrodacnus:  a  man  of  no  influence  in  the 
colony,  but  much  respected  by  Pamphilus.  They 
were  indeed  relations  by  blood  originally  and  after- 
wards by  intermarriages;  and  it  was  to  the  power 
and  protection  of  Pamphilus  that  Lathrodacnus  owed 
his  independence  and  prosperity,  amid  the  general 
distress  and  slavery  of  the  other  proprietors.  Not  less 
fortunately  did  it  happen,  that  the  means  of  passing 
the  river  were  possessed  exclusively  by  Pamphilus 
and  his  above  mentioned  kinsman;  and  not  only  the 
boats  themselves,  but  all  the  means  of  constructing 
and  navigating  them.  As  the  very  existence  of  La- 
throdacnus, as  an  independent  colonist,  had  no  solid 
ground,  but  in  the  strength  and  prosperity  of  Pamphi- 
468 


THE  FRIEND. 


459 


Ins;  and  as  the  interests  of  the  one  in  no  respect  in- 
terfered with  those  of  the  other,  Pamphilus  for  a  con- 
siderable time  remained  without  any  anxiety,  and 
looked  on  the  river-craft  of  Lathrodacnus  with  as 
little  alarm,  as  on  th.ise  of  his  own  establishment.  It 
did  not  disquiet  him,  that  Lathrodacnua  had  remained 
neutral  in  the  quarrel.  Nay,  though  many  advan- 
tages, which  i;i  peaceful  times  would  have  belonged 
to  Pamphilus,  were  now  transferred  to  his  Neighbor, 
and  had  more  than  doubled  the  extent  and  profit  of 
his  concern,  Pamphilus,  instead  of  repining  at  this, 
was  glad  that  some  good  at  least  to  some  one  came 
out  of  the  general  evil.  Great  then  was  his  surprise, 
when  he  discovered,  that  without  any  conceivable 
reason  Lathrodacnus  had  employed  himself  in  build- 
ing and  collecting  a  very  unusual  number  of  such 
boats,  as  were  of  no  use  to  him  in  his  traffic,  but  de- 
signed exclusively  as  ferry-boats :  and  what  was  still 
stranger  and  more  alarming,  that  he  chose  to  keep 
these  in  a  bay  on  the  other  side  of  the  river,  opposite 
to  the  one  small  plantation,  alongside  of  Pamphilus's 
estate,  from  which  plantation  Lathrodacnus  derived 
the  materials  for  building  them.  Willing  to  believe 
this  conduct  a  transient  whim  of  his  neighbor's  oc- 
casioned partly  by  his  vanity,  and  partly  by  envy  (to 
which  latter  passion  the  want  of  liberal  education, 
and  the  not  sufficiently  comprehending  the  grounds 
of  his  own  prosperity,  had  rendered  him  subject) 
Pamphilus  contented  himself  for  a  while  with  urgent 
yet  friendly  remonstrances.  The  only  answer  which 
Lathrodacnus  vouchsafed  to  return,  was,  that  by  the 
law  of  the  colony,  which  Pamphilus  had  made  so 
many  professions  of  revering,  every  proprietor  was 
an  independent  sovereign  within  his  own  boundaries; 
that  the  boats  were  his  own,  and  the  opposite  shore, 
to  which  they  were  fastened,  part  of  a  field  which 
belonged  to  him  ;  and,  in  short,  that  Pamphilus  had 
no  right  to  interfere  with  the  management  of  his  pro- 
perty, which,  trifling  as  it  might  be,  compared  with 
that  of  Pamphilus,  was  no  less  sacred  by  the  law  of 
the  colony.  To  this  uncourteous  rebuff  Pamphilus 
replied  with  a  fervent  wish,  that  Lathrodacnus  could 
with  more  propriety  have  appealed  to  a  law,  as  still 
subsisting,  which,  he  well  knew,  had  been  effectually 
annulled  by  the  unexampled  tyranny  and  success  of 
Misetes,  together  with  the  circumstances  which  had 
given  occasion  to  the  law,  and  made  it  wise  and 
practicable.  He  further  urged,  that  this  law  was  not 
made  for  the  benefit  of  any  one  man,  but  for  the  com- 
mon safety  and  advantage  of  all :  that  it  was  absurd 
to  suppose  that  either  he  (Pamphilus)  or  that  Lathro- 
dacnus himself,  or  any  other  proprietor,  ever  did  or 
could  acknowledge  this  law  in  the  sense  that  it  was 
to  survive  the  very  circumstances,  of  which  it  was 
the  mere  reflex.  Much  less  could  they  have  even 
tacitly  assented  to  it,  if  they  had  ever  understood  it 
as  authorizing  one  neighbor  to  endanger  the  absolute 
ruin  of  another,  who  had  perhaps  fifty  times  the  pro- 
perty to  lose,  and  perhaps  ten  times  the  number  of 
souls  to  answer  for,  and  yet  forbidding  the  injured 
person  to  take  any  steps  in  his  own  defence ;  and 
lastly,  that  this  law  gave  no  right  without  imposing  a 
corresponding  duty.    Therefore  if  Lathrodacnus  in- 


sisted on  the  rights  given  him  by  the  law,  he  ought 
at  the  same  time  to  perform  the  duties  which  it  re- 
quired, and  join  heart  and  hand  with  Pamphilus  in 
his  endeavors  to  defend  his  independence,  to  restore 
the  former  state  of  the  colony,  and  with  this  to  re-en- 
force the  old  law  in  opposition  to  Misetes  who  had 
enslaved  the  one  and  set  at  nought  the  other.  So  ar- 
dently was  Pamphilus  attached  to  the  law,  that  ex- 
cepting his  own  salety  and  independence  there  was 
no  price  which  he  would  not  pay,  no  sacrifice  which 
he  would  nut  make  for  its  restoration.  His  reverence 
for  the  very  memory  of  the  law  was  such,  that  the 
mere  appearance  of  transgressing  it  would  be  a  heavy 
affliction  to  him.  In  hope  therefore  of  gaining  from 
the  avarice  of  Lathrodacnus  that  consent  which  he 
could  not  obtain  from  his  justice  or  neighborly  kind- 
ness, he  offered  to  give  him  in  full  right  a  plantation 
ten  times  the  value  of  all  his  boats,  and  yet,  when- 
ever the  colony  should  once  more  be  settled,  to  re- 
store the  boats :  if  he  would  only  permit  Pamphilus 
to  secure  them  during  the  present  state  of  things,  on 
his  side  of  the  river,  retaining  whatever  he  really 
wanted  for  the  passage  of  his  own  household.  To 
all  these  persuasions  and  entreaties  Lathrodacnus 
turned  a  deaf  ear;  and  Pamphilus  remained  agitated 
and  undetermined,  till  at  length  he  received  certain 
intelligence  that  Lathrodacnus  had  called  a  council 
of  the  chief  members  of  his  establishment,  in  conse- 
quence of  the  threats  of  Misetes,  that  he  would  treat 
him  as  the  friend  and  ally  of  Pamphilus,  if  he  did 
not  declare  himself  his  enemy.  Partly  for  the  sake 
of  a  large  meadow  belonging  to  him  on  the  other 
side  of  the  river  which  it  was  not  easy  to  secure  from 
the  tyrant,  but  still  more  from  envy  and  the  irritable 
temper  of  a  proud  inferior,  Lathrodacnus,  and  with 
him  the  majority  of  his  advisers  (though  to  the  great 
discontent  of  the  few  wise  heads  among  them)  settled 
it  finally  that  if  he  should  be  again  pressed  on  this 
point  by  Misetes,  he  would  join  him  and  commence 
hostilities  against  his  old  neighbor  and  kinsman.  It 
is  indeed  but  too  probable  that  he  had  long  brooded 
over  this  scheme ;  for  to  what  other  end  could  he 
have  strained  his  income,  and  over-worked  his  ser- 
vants in  building  and  fitting  up  such  a  number  of 
passage-boats  ?  As  soon  as  this  information  was  re- 
ceived by  Pamphilus,  and  this  from  a  quarter  which 
it  was  impossible  for  him  to  discredit,  he  obeyed  the 
dictates  of  self-preservation,  took  possession  of  the 
passage-boats  by  force,  and  brought  them  over  to  his 
own  grounds;  but  without  any  further  injury  to  La- 
throdacnus, and  still  urging  him  to  accept  a  compen- 
sation and  continue  in  that  amity  which  was  so  man- 
ifestly their  common  interest.  Instantly  a  great  out- 
cry was  raised  against  Pamphilus,  who  was  charged 
in  the  bitterest  terms  with  having  first  abused  Mise- 
tes, and  then  imitated  him  in  his  worst  acts  of  vio- 
lence. In  the  calmness  of  a  good  conscience  Pam- 
philus contented  himself  with  the  following  reply : 
•'  Even  so,  if  I  were  out  on  a  shooting  party  with  a 
Quaker  for  my  companion,  and  saw  coming  towards 
us  an  old  footpad  and  murderer,  who  had  made 
known  his  intention  of  killing  me  wherever  he  might 
meet  me ;  and  if  my  companion  the  Quaker  would 
469 


460 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


neither  give  up  his  gun,  nor  even  discharge  it  as  (we 
will  suppose)  I  had  just  before  unfortunately  dis- 
charged my  own;  if  he  would  neither  promise  to  as- 
sist me  nor  even  promise  to  make  the  least  resistance 
to  the  robber's  attempt  to  disarm  himself;  you  might 
call  me  a  robber  for  wresting  this  gun  from  my  com- 
panion, though  for  no  other  purpose  but  that  I  might 
at  least  do  for  by  myself,  what  he  ought  to  have  done, 
but  would  not  do  either  for  or  with  me !  Even  so, 
and  as  plausibly,  you  might  exclaim,  O  the  hypocrite 
Pamphilus!  Who  has  not  been  deafened  with  his 
complaints  against  robbers  and  footpads  ?  and  lo !  he 
himself  has  turned  footpad,  and  commenced  by  rob- 
bing his  peaceful  and  unsuspecting  companion  of  his 
double-barrelled  gun!"  It  is  the  business  of  The 
Friend  to  lay  down  principles,  not  to  make  the  appli- 
cations of  them  to  particular,  much  less  to  recent 
cases.  If  any  such  there  be  to  which  these  principles 
are  fairly  applicable,  the  reader  is  no  less  master  of 
the  facts  than  the  Writer  of  the  present  Essay.  If 
not,  the  principles  remain  ;  and  The  Friend  has  fin- 
ished the  task  which  the  plan  of  his  work  imposed 
on  him,  of  proving  the  identity  of  international  law 
and  the  law  of  morality  in  spirit,  and  the  reasons  of 
their  difference  in  practice,  in  those  extreme  cases  in 
which  alone  they  have  been  allowed  to  differ. 


POSTSCRIPT. 
The  preceding  Essay  has  more  than  its  natural  in- 
terest for  the  author  from  the  abuse,  which  it  brought 
down  on  him  as  the  defender  of  the  attack  on  Copen- 
hagen, and  the  seizure  of  the  Danish  fleet.  The 
odium  of  the  measure  rested  wholly  on  the  com- 
mencement of  hostilities  without  a  previous  procla- 
mation of  war.  Now  it  is  remarkable,  that  in  a  work 
published  many  years  before  this  event  Professor 
Beck  had  made  this  very  point  the  subject  of  a  par- 
ticular chapter  in  his  admirable  Comments  on  the 
Law  of  Nations:  and  every  one  of  the  circumstances 
stated  by  him  as  forming  an  exception  to  the  moral 
necessity  of  previous  proclamation  of  war,  concurred 
in  the  Copenhagen  expedition.  I  need  mention  two 
only.  First  by  the  act  or  acts,  which  provoked  the 
expedition,  the  party  attacked  had  knowingly  placed 
himself  in  a  state  of  war.  Let  A  stand  for  the  Dan- 
ish, B  for  the  British,  government.  A  had  done  that 
which  he  himself  was  fully  aware  would  produce 
immediate  hostilities  on  the  part  of  B,  the  moment  it 
came  to  the  knowledge  of  the  latter.  The  act  itself 
was  a  waging  of  war  against  B  on  the  part  of  A.  B 
therefore  was  the  party  attacked :  and  common  sense 
dictates,  that  to  resist  and  baffle  an  aggression  re- 
quires no  proclamation  to  justify  it.  I  perceived  a 
dagger  aimed  at  my  back,  in  consequence  of  a  warn- 
ing given  me,  just  time  enough  to  prevent  the  blow, 
knock  the  assassin  down,  and  disarm  him :  and  he 
reproaches  me  with  treachery,  because  forsooth  I  had 
not  sent  him  a  challenge  !  Secondly,  when  the  ob- 
ject which  justifies  and  necessitates  the  war  would 
be  frustrated  by  the  proclamation.  For  neither  State 
or  Individual  can  be  presumed  to  have  given  either 
a  formal  or  a  tacit  assent  to  any  such  modification  of 


a  positive  Right,  as  would  suspend  and  virtually  an- 
nul the  Right  itself:  the  Right  of  self-preservation  for 
instance.  This  second  exception  will  often  depend 
on  the  existence  of  the  first,  and  must  always  receive 
additional  sense  and  clearness  from  it.  That  both  of 
these  exceptions  appertained  to  the  case  in  question, 
is  now  notorious.  But  at  the  time  I  found  it  neces- 
sary to  publish  the  following  comment,  which  I  adapt 
lo  the  present  rifacciamento  of  The  Friend,  as  illus- 
trative of  the  fundamental  principle  of  public  justice; 
viz.  that  personal  and  national  morality,  ever  one  and 
the  same,  dictate  the  same  measures  under  the  same 
circumstances,  and  different  measures  only  as  far  as 
the  circumstances  are  different. 

As  my  limits  will  not  allow  me  to  do  more  in  the 
second,  or  ethical  section  of  The  Friend,  than  to 
propose  and  develope  my  own  system,  without  con- 
troverting the  systems  of  others,  I  shall  therefore  de- 
vote the  Essay,  which  follows  this  Postscript,  to  the 
consideration  of  the  problem :  How  far  is  the  moral 
nature  of  an  action  constituted  by  its  individual  cir- 
cumstances i. 

It  was  once  said  to  me,  when  the  Copenhagen  af- 
fair was  in  dispute,  "  You  do  not  see  the  enormity, 
because  it  is  an  affair  between  state  and  state  :  con- 
ceive a  similar  case  between  man  and  man,  and  you 
would  both  see  and  abhor  it."  Now,  I  was  neither 
defending  or  attacking  the  measure  itself.  My  argu- 
ments were  confined  to  the  grounds  which  had  been 
taken  both  in  the  arraigning  of  that  measure  and  in 
its  defence,  because  I  thought  both  equally  untenable. 
I  was  not  enough  master  of  facts  to  form  a  decisive 
opinion  on  the  enterprise,  even  for  my  own  mind ; 
but  I  had  no  hesitation  in  affirming,  that  the  princi- 
ples, on  which  it  was  defended  in  the  legislature,  ap- 
peared to  me  fitter  objects  of  indignant  reprobation 
than  the  act  itself  This  having  been  premised,  I 
replied  to  the  assertion  above  stated,  by  asserting  the 
direct  contrary:  namely,  that  were  a  similar  case 
conceived  between  man  and  man,  the  severest  ar- 
raigners  of  the  measure,  would,  on  their  grounds,  find 
nothing  to  blame  in  it.  How  was  I  to  prove  this  as- 
sertion ?  Clearly,  by  imagining  some  case  between 
individuals  living  in  the  same  relations  toward  each 
other,  in  which  the  several  states  of  Europe  exist  or 
existed.  My  allegory,  therefore,  so  far  from  being  a 
disguise,  was  a  necessary  part  of  the  main  argument, 
a  case  in  point,  to  prove  the  identity  of  the  law  of 
nations  with  the  law  of  conscience.  We  have  only 
to  conceive  individuals  in  the  same  relations  as  states, 
in  order  to  learn  that  the  rules  emanating  from  inter- 
national law,  differ  from  those  of  private  honesty, 
solely  through  the  difference  of  the  circumstances. 

But  why  did  not  The  Friend  avow  the  application 
of  the  principle  to  the  seizure  of  the  Danish  fleet ! 
Because  I  did  not  possess  sufficient  evidence  to  prove 
to  others,  or  even  to  decide  for  myself,  that  my  prin- 
ciple was  applicable  to  this  particular  act.  In  the 
case  of  Pamphilus  and  Lathrodacnus,  the  prudence 
and  necessity  of  the  measure  was  certain  ;  and,  this 
taken  for  granted,  I  showed  its  perfect  rightfulness. 
In  the  affair  of  Copenhagen,  I  had  no  doubt  of  our 
right  to  do  as  we  did,  sujjposing  the  necessity,  or  at 
470 


THE  FRIEND. 


461 


least  the  extreme  prudence  of  the  measure;  taking 
for  granted  that  there  existed  a  motive  adequate  to 
the  action,  and  that  the  action  was  an  adequate 
means  of  realizing  the  motive. 

But  this  I  was  not  authorized  to  take  for  granted 
in  the  real,  as  I  had  been  in  the  imaginary  case.  I 
saw  many  reasons  for  the  affirmative,  and  many  for 
the  negative.  For  the  former,  the  certainty  of  an 
hostile  design  on  the  part  of  the  Danes,  the  alarming 
etate  of  Ireland,  that  vulnerable  heel  of  the  British 
Achilles!  and  the  immense  difference  between  mili- 
tary and  naval  superiority.  Our  naval  power  collec- 
tively might  have  defied  that  of  the  whole  world  ; 
but  it  was  widely  scattered,  and  a  combined  opera- 
tion from  the  Baltic,  Holland,  Brest,  and  Lisbon, 
might  easily  bring  together  a  fleet  double  to  that 
which  we  could  have  brought  against  it  during  the 
short  time  that  might  be  necessary  to  convey  thirty 
or  forty  thousand  men  to  Ireland.  On  the  other  hand, 
it  seemed  equally  clear  that  Buonaparte  needed  sail- 
ors rather  than  ships;  and  that  we  took  the  ships  and 
left  him  the  Danish  sailors,  whose  presence  in  the 
fleet  at  Antwerp  turned  the  scale,  perhaps,  in  favor 
of  the  worse  than  disastrous  expedition  to  Walcheren. 

But  I  repeat,  that  The  Friend  had  no  concern 
with  the  measure  itself:  but  only  with  the  grounds 
or  principles  on  which  it  had  been  attacked  or  de- 
fended. Those  who  attacked  it  declared  that  a  right 
had  been  violated  by  us,  and  that  no  motive  could 
justify  such  violation,  however  imperious  that  motive 
might  be.  In  opposition  to  such  reasoners,  I  proved 
that  no  such  right  existed,  or  is  deducible  either  from 
international  law  or  the  law  of  private  morality. 
Those  again  who  defended  the  seizure  of  the  Danish 
fleet,  conceded  that  it  was  a  violation  of  right ;  but 
affirmed,  that  such  violation  was  justified  by  the  ur- 
gency of  the  motive.  It  was  asserted  (as  I  have  be- 
fore noticed  in  the  introduction  to  the  subject)  that 
national  policy  cannot  in  all  cases  be  subordinated  to 
the  laws  of  morality  :  in  other  words,  that  a  govern- 
ment mav  act  with  injustice,  and  yet  remain  blame- 
less. To  prove  this  assertion  as  groundless  and  un- 
necessary as  it  is  tremendous,  formed  the  chief  object 
of  the  whole  disquisition.  I  trust  then,  that  my  can- 
did judges  will  rest  satisfied  that  it  is  not  only  the 
profession  and  pretext  of  The  Friend,  but  his  con- 
stant plan  and  actual  intention,  to  establish  Princi- 
ples ;  that  he  refers  to  particular  facts  for  no  other 
purpose  than  that  of  giving  illustration  and  interest 
to  those  principles :  and  that  to  invent  principles 
with  a  view  to  particular  cases,  whether  with  the 
motive  of  attacking  or  arraigning  a  transitory  cabi- 
net, is  a  baseness  which  will  scarcely  be  attributed 
to  The  Friend  by  any  one  who  understands  the 
work,  even  though  the  suspicion  should  not  have 
been  precluded  by  a  knowledge  of  the  author. 


ESSAY   XI. 


Ja,  ich  bin  der  Atheist  un  Gottlose.  der  einer  imaeinaren 
Berechnungslehre,  einer  blosen  Einbildung  von  allgemeinen 
Folgen,  die  nie  folgen  konnen,  zuwider —  lugen  will,  wie 


Desdemona  aterbend  log  ;  lugen  und  betrugen  will,  wie  der 
fur  Orest  sich  darstellende  Pyladcs  ;  Tempelraub  unierneh. 
men,  wie  David  ;  ja,  Achren  ausraufen  am  Sabbath,  auch 
nur  darum,  weil  inich  hungert,  und  das  Oesetz  um  des 
menschen  willen  gemacht  ist,  nicht   der  Mensch  um  des 

Gczettes  willen. JACOM  an  FICIITF. 

Translatinn.-Yes,  I  am  that  Atheist,  that  godless  person, 
who  in  opposition  to  an  imaginary  Doctrine  of  Calculation, 
to  a  mere  ideal  Fabric  of  general  Consequences,  that  can 
never  be  realized,  would  lie,  as  the  dying  Desdemona  lied;* 
lie  and  deceive  as  Pi/lades  when  he  personated  Orestes ; 
would  commit  sacrilege  with  David;  yea  and  pluck  ears 
of  corn  on  the  Sabbath,  for  no  other  reason  than  that  I  was 
fainting  from  lack  of  food,  and  that  the  Law  was  made  for 
Man,  and  not  Man  for  the  Law. 

JACOBI'S  letter  to  FICHTE. 


If  there  be  no  better  doctrine,  I  would  add — Much 
and  often  have  I  suffered  from  having  ventured  to  avow 
my  doubts  concerning  the  truth  of  certain  opinions, 
which  had  been  sanctified  in  the  minds  of  manv  hear- 
ers, by  the  authority  of  some  reigning  great  name  ; 
even  though  in  addition  to  my  own  reasons,  I  had  all 
the  greatest  names  from  the  Reformation  to  the  Revo- 
lution on  my  side.  I  could  not,  therefore,  summon 
courage,  without  some  previous  pioneering,  to  declare 
publicly,  that  the  principles  of  morality  taught  in  the 
present  work  will  be  in  direct  opposition  to  the  sys- 
tem of  the  late  Dr.  Paley.  This  confession  I  should 
have  deferred  to  future  time,  if  my  opinions  on  the 
grounds  of  international  morality  had  not  been  con- 
tradictory to  a  fundamental  point  in  Paley 's  System 
of  moral  and  political  Philosophy.  I  mean  that  chap- 
ter which  treats  of  general  consecuences,  as  the 
chief  and  best  criterion  of  the  right  or  wrong  of  par- 
ticular actions.  Now  this  doctrine  I  conceive  to  be 
neither  tenable  in  reason  nor  safe  in  practice:  and 
the  following  are  the  grounds  of  my  opinion. 

First ;  this  criterion  is  purely  ideal,  and  so  far  pos- 
sesses no  advantages  over  the  former  systems  of  Mo- 
rality :  while  it  labors  under  defects,  with  which 
those  are  not  justly  chargeable.  It  is  ideal:  for  it  de- 
pends on,  and  must  vary  with,  the  notions  of  the  indi- 
vidual, who  in  order  to  determine  the  nature  of  an  ac- 
tion is  to  make  the  calculation  of  its  general  conse- 
quences. Here,  as  in  all  other  calculation,  the  result 
depends  on  that  faculty  of  the  soul  in  the  degrees  of 
which  men  most  vary  from  each  other,  and  which 
is  itself  most  affected  by  accidental  advantages  or  dis- 
advantages of  education,  natural  talent,  and  acquired 
knowledge — the  faculty,  I  mean,  of  foresight  and  sys- 
tematic comprehension.  But  surely  morality,  which 
is  of  equal  importance  to  all  men,  ought  to  be  ground- 
ed, if  possible,  in  that  part  of  our  nature  which  in  all 
men  may  and  ought  to  be  the  same :  in  the  conscience 
and  the  common  sense.  Secondly:  this  criterion  con- 
founds morality  with  law ;  and  when  the  author  adds, 
that  in  all  probability  the  divine  Justice  will  be  regu- 

*  JEmilia.—O  who  hath  done 
This  deed 7 

Desd.  Nobody.     1  myself.    Farewell. 

Commend  me  to  my  kind  Lord— O— farewell. 

Othello. — You  heard  her  say  yourself,  it  was  not  I. 

^Emilia. — She  said  so.    I  must  needs  report  the  truth. 

Othello. — She's  like  a  liar  gone  to  burning  hell  ! 
'Twas  [  Uiat  killed  her ! 

JEmilia. —  The  more  angel  she  ! 

471 


462 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


lated  in  the  final  judgment  by  a  similar  rule,  he  draws 
away  the  attention  from  the  wilt,  that  is,  from  the  inward 
motives  and  impulses  which  constitute  the  essence 
of  morality,  to  the  outward  act :  and  thus  changes  the 
virtue  commanded  by  the  gospel  into  the  mere  legal- 
ity, which  was  to  be  enlivened  by  it.  One  of  the 
most  persuasive,  if  not  one  of  the  strongest,  arguments 
ibr  a  future  state,  rests  on  the  belief,  that  although 
by  the  necessity  of  things  our  outward  and  temporal 
welfare  must  be  regulated  by  our  outward  actions, 
which  alone  can  be  the  objects  and  guides  of  human 
law,  there  must  yet  needs  come  a  juster  and  more 
appropriate  sentence  hereafter,  in  which  our  inten- 
tions will  be  considered,  and  our  happiness  and  mis- 
ery made  to  accord  with  the  grounds  of  our  actions. 
Our  fellow-creatures  can  only  judge  what  we  are  by 
what  we  do  ;  but  in  the  eye  of  our  Maker  what  we 
do  is  of  no  worth,  except  as  it  flows  from  what  we  are. 
Though  the  fig-tree  should  produce  no  visible  fruit, 
yet  if  the  living  sap  is  in  it,  and  if  it  has  struggled  to 
put  forth  buds  and  blossoms  which  have  been'pre- 
vented  from  maturing  by  inevitable  contingencies  of 
tempests  or  untimely  frosts,  the  virtuous  sap  will  be 
accounted  as  fruit :  and  the  curse  of  barrenness  will 
light  on  many  a  tree,  from  the  boughs  of  which  hun- 
dreds have  been  satisfied,  because  the  omniscient 
judge  knows  that  the  fruits  were  threaded  to  the 
boughs  artificially  by  the  outward  working  of  base 
fear  and  selfish  hopes,  and  were  neither  nourished  by 
the  love  of  God  or  of  man,  nor  grew  out  of  the  graces 
engrafted  on  the  stock  by  religion.  This  is  not,  in- 
deed, all  that  is  meant  in  the  apostle's  use  of  the  word, 
faith,  as  the  sole  principle  of  justification;  but  it  is 
included  in  his  meaning,  and  forms  an  essential  part 
of  it,  and  I  can  conceive  nothing  more  groundless, 
than  the  alarm,  that  this  doctrine  may  be  prejudicial 
to  outward  utility  and  active  well-doing.  To  sup- 
pose that  a  man  should  cease  to  be  -beneficent  by  be- 
coming benevolent,  seems  to  me  scarcely  less  absurd, 
than  to  fear  that  a  fire  may  prevent  heat,  or  that  a 
perennial  fountain  may  prove  the  occasion  of  drought. 
Just  and  generous  actions  may  proceed  from  bad  mo- 
tives, and  both  may,  and  often  do,  originate  in  parts 
and  as  it  were  fragments  of  our  nature.  A  lascivious 
man  may  sacrifice  half  his  estate  to  rescue  his  friend 
from  prison,  for  he  is  constitutionally  sympathetic,  and 
the  better  part  of  his  nature  happened  to  be  upper- 
most. The  same  man  shall  afterwards  exert  the  same 
disregard  of  money  in  an  attempt  to  seduce  that 
friend's  wife  or  daughter.  Cut  faith  is  a  total  act  of 
the  soul :  it  is  the  whole  state  of  the  mind,  or  it  is  not 
at  all!  and  in  this  consists  its  power,  as  well  as  its 
exclusive  worth. 

This  subject  is  of  such  immense  importance  to  the 
welfare  of  all  men,  and  the  understanding  of  it  to  the 
present  tranquillity  of  many  thousands  at  this  time 
and  in  this  country,  that  should  there  be  one  only  of 
nil  my  Readers,  who  should  receive  conviction  or  an 
additional  light  from  what  is  here  written,  I  dare  hope 
that  a  great  majority  of  the  rest  would  in  considera- 
tion of  that  solitary  effect  think  these  paragraphs 
neither  wholly  uninteresting  or  altogether  without 
value.    For  this  cause  I  will  endeavor  so  to  explain 


this  principle,  that  it  may  be  intelligible  to  the  sim- 
plest capacity.  The  apostle  tells  those  who  would 
substitute  obedience  for  faith  (addressing  the  man  as 
obedience  personified)  "  Know  that  thou  bearest  not 
the  Hoot,  but  the  ROOT  thee" — a  sentence  which, 
methinks,  should  have  rendered  all  disputes  concern- 
ing faith  and  good  works  impossible  among  those  who 
profess  to  take  the  Scriptures  for  their  guide.  It 
would  appear  incredible,  if  the  fact  were  not  notori- 
ous, that  two  sects  should  ground  and  justify  their 
opposition  to  each  other,  the  one  on  the  words  of  the 
apostle,  that  we  are  justified  by  faith,  i.  e.  the  inward 
and  absolute  ground  of  our  actions;  and  the  other  on 
the  declaration  of  Christ,  that  he  will  judge  us  ac- 
cording to  our  actions.  As  if  an  action  could  be 
either  good  or  bad  disjoined  from  its  principle!  as  if 
it  could  be,  in  the  Christian  and  only  proper  sense  of 
the  word,  an  action  at  all,  and  not  rather  a  mechanic 
series  of  lucky  or  unlucky  motions!  Yet  it  may  be 
well  worth  the  while  to  show  the  beauty  and  harmo- 
ny of  these  twin  truths,  or  rather  of  this  one  great 
truth  considered  in  its  two  principal  bearings.  God 
will  judge  each  man  before  all  men :  consequently 
he  will  judge  us  relatively  to  man.  But  man  knows 
not  the  heart  of  man ;  scarcely  does  any  one  know 
his  own.  There  must  therefore  be  outward  and  visi- 
ble signs,  by  which  men  may  be  able  to  judge  of  the 
inward  state:  and  thereby  justify  the  ways  of  God  to 
their  own  spirits,  in  the  reward  or  punishment  of 
themselves  and  their  fellow-men.  Now  good  works 
are  these  signs,  and  as  such  become  necessary.  In 
short  there  are  two  parties, God  and  the  human  race: 
and  both  are  to  be  satisfied !  first,  God,  who  seeth  the 
root  and  knovveth  the  heart:  therefore  there  must  be 
faith,  or  the  entire  and  absolute  principle.  Then  man, 
who  can  judge  only  by  the  fruits  :  therefore  that  faith 
must  bear  fruits  of  righteousness,  that  principle  must 
manifest  itself  by  actions.  But  that  which  God  sees, 
that  alone  justifies !  What  man  sees,  does  in  this  life 
show  that  the  justifying  principle  may  be  the  root  of 
the  thing  seen ;  but  in  the  final  judgment  the  accept- 
ance of  these  actions  will  show,  that  this  principle 
actually  was  the  root.  In  this  world  a  good  life  is  a 
presumption  of  a  good  man  :  his  virtuous  actions  are 
the  only  possible,  though  still  ambiguous,  manifesta- 
tions of  his  virtue :  but  the  absence  of  a  good  life  is 
not  only  a  presumption,  but  a  proof  of  the  contrary,  as 
long  as  it  continues.  ( lood  works  may  exist  without 
saving  principles,  and  therefore  cannot  contain  in 
themselves  the  principle  of  salvation;  but  saving 
principles  never  did,  never  can,  exist  without  good 
works.  On  a  subject  of  such  infinite  importance,  I 
have  feared  prolixity  less  than  obscurity.  Men  often 
talk  against  faith,  and  make  strange  monsters  in  their 
imagination  of  those  who  profess  to  abide  by  the  words 
of  the  Apostle  interpreted  literally:  and  yet  in  their 
ordinary  feelings  they  themselves  judge  and  act  by  a 
similar  principle.  For  what  is  love  without  kind 
offices,  wherever  they  are  possible  ?  (and  they  are 
always  possible,  if  not  by  actions  commonly  so' called, 
yet  by  kind  words,  by  kind  looks ;  and,  where  even 
these  are  out  of  our  power,  by  kind  thoughts  and  fer- 
vent prayers !)  yet  what  noble  mind  would  not  be 
472 


THE  FRIKXD. 


463 


offended,  if  he  were  supposed  to  value  the  service- 
able offices  equally  with  the  love  that  produced 
them;  or  if  he  were  thought  to  value  the  love  for  the 
sake  of  the  services,  and  not  the  services  lor  the  sake 
of  the  love  ? 

I  return  to  the  question  of  general  consequences, 
considered  as  the  criterion  of  moral  actions.  The 
admirer  of  Paley's  System  is  required  to  suspend  (or 
a  short  time  the  objection,  which,  1  doubt  not,  he  has 
already  made,  that  general  consequences  are  stated 
by  Paley  as  the  criterion  of  the  action,  not  of  the 
airent.  1  will  endeavor  to  satisfy  him  on  this  point, 
when  I  have  completed  niv  present  chain  of  argu- 
ment. It  has  been  shown,  that  this  criterion  is  no 
less  ideal  than  that  of  any  former  system:  that  is,  it 
is  no  less  incapable  of  receiving  any  external  experi- 
mental proof,  compulsory  on  the  understandings  of  all 
men,  such  as  the  criteria  exhibited  in  chemistry.  Yet, 
unlike  the  elder  Systems  of  Morality,  it  remains  in 
the  world  of  the  senses,  without  deriving  any  evi- 
dence therefrom.  The  agent's  mind  is  compelled  to 
go  out  of  itself  in  order  to  bring  back  conjectures,  the 
probability  of  which  will  vary  with  the  shrewdness 
of  the  individual.  But  this  criterion  is  not  only  ideal : 
it  is  likewise  imaginary.  If  we  believe  in  a  scheme 
of  Providence,  all  actions  alike  work  for  good. 
There  is  not  the  least  ground  for  supposing  that  the 
crimes  of  Nero  were  less  instrumental  in  bringing 
about  our  present  advantages,  than  the  virtues  of  the 
Antonines.  Lastly:  the  criterion  is  either  nugatory 
or  false.  It  is  demonstrated,  that  the  only  real  conse- 
quences cannot  be  meant.  The  individual  is  to 
imagine  what  the  general  consequences  icould  be,  all 
other  things  remaining  the  same,  if  all  men  were  to 
act  as  he  is  about  to  act.  I  scarcely  need  remind  the 
reader,  what  a  source  of  self-delusion  and  sophistry 
is  here  opened  to  a  mind  in  a  state  of  temptation. 
Will  it  not  say  to  itself,  I  know  that  all  men  will  vol 
act  so:  and  the  immediate  good  consequences  are 
imaginary  and  improbable?  When  the  foundations 
of  morality  have  once  been  laid  in  outward  conse- 
quences, it  will  be  in  vain  to  recall  to  the  mind,  what 
the  consequences  would  be,  were  all  men  to  reason 
in  the  same  way:  for  the  very  excuse  of  this  mind  to 
itself  is,  that  neither  its  action  nor  its  reasoning  is 
likely  to  have  any  consequences  at  all,  its  immediate 
object  excepted.  But  suppose  the  mind  in  its  sanes! 
state.  How  can  it  possibly  form  a  notion  of  the  na- 
ture of  an  action  considered  as  indefinitely  multi- 
plied, unless  it  has  previously  a  distinct  notion  of  the 
nature  of  the  single  action  itself,  which  is  the  multi- 
plicand ?  If  I  conceive  a  crown  multiplied  a  hundred 
fold,  the  single  crown  enables  me  to  understand  what 
a  hundred  crowns  are;  but  how  can  the  notion  hun- 
dred teach  me  what  a  crown  is?  For  the  crown  sub- 
stitute X.  Y.  or  abracadabra,  and  my  imagination  may 
multiply  it  to  infinity,  yet  remain  as  much  at  a  loss 
as  before.  But  if  there  be  any  means  of  ascertaining 
the  action  in  and  for  itself,  what  further  do  we  want  ? 
Would  we  give  light  to  the  sun,  or  look  at  our  fingers 
through  a  telescope  ?  The  nature  of  every  action  is 
determined  by  all  its  circumstances  :  alter  the  circum- 
stances and  a  similar  set  of  motions  may  be  repeated, 
31  Uq 


but  they  are  no  longer  the  same  or  similar  action. 
What  would  a  surgeon  say,  if  he  were  advised  not  to 
mi  off  a  limb,  because  if  all  men  were  to  do  the 
same,  the  consequences  would  be  dreadful?  Would 
not  his  answer  be — "Whoever  does  the  same  under 
the  same  circumstances,  and  with  the  same  motives, 
will  do  right;  but  if  the  circumstances  and  motives 
are  different,  what  have  I  to  do  with  it?"  I  confess 
myself  unable  to  divine  any  possible  use,  or  even 
meaning,  in  this  doctrine  of  general  consequences, 
lie,  that  in  all  our  actions  we  are  bound  to 
consider  the  effect  of  our  example,  and  to  guard  as 
much  as  possible  against  the  hazard  of  their  being 
misunderstood.  I  will  not  slaughter  a  lamb,  or  drown 
a  litter  of  kittens  in  the  presence  of  my  child  of  four 
•use  the  child  cannot  understand  my 
action,  but  will  understand  that  his  father  has  inflict- 
ed pain,  and  taken  away  life  from  beings  that  had 
never  offended  him.  All  this  is  true,  and  no  man  in 
his  senses  ever  thought  otherwise.  But  methinks  it 
is  strange  to  state  that  as  a  criterion  of  morality, 
which  is  no  more  than  an  accessary  aggravation  of  an 
action  bad  in  its  own  nature,  or  a  ground  of  caution 
as  to  the  mode  and  time  in  which  we  are  to  do  or 
suspend  what  is  in  itself  good  or  innocent. 

The  duty  of  setting  a  good  example  is  no  doubt  a 
most  important  duty  ;  but  the  example  is  good  or  bad, 
necessary  or  unnecessary,  according  as  the  action 
may  be,  which  has  a  chance  of  being  imitated.  I 
once  knew  a  small,  but  (in  outward  circumstances  at 
least)  respectable  congregation,  four-fifths  of  whom 
professed  that  they  went  to  church  entirely  for  the 
example's  sake;  in  other  words  to  cheat  each  other 
and  act  a  common  lie?  These  rational  Christians 
had  not  considered,  that  example  may  increase  the 
good  nr  evil  of  an  action,  but  can  never  constitute 
either.  If  it  was  a  foolish  thing  to  kneel  when  they 
were  not  inwardly  praying,  or  to  sit  and  listen  to  a 
discourse  of  which  they  believed  little  and  cared 
.  they  were  setting  a  foolish  example.  Per- 
sons in  their  respectable  circumstances  do  not  think  it 
try  to  clean  shoes,  that  by  their  example  they 
may  encourage  the  shoe-black  in  continuing  /n'soccu- 
pation  :  and  Christianity  does  not  think  so  meanly  of 
herself  as  to  fear  tint  the  poor  and  afflicted  will  be  a 
whit  the  less  pious,  though  they  should  see  reason  to 
believe  that  those,  who  possessed  the  good  things  of 
the  present  life,  were  determined  to  leave  all  the 
■  of  the  future  for  their  more  humble  inferi- 
ors. If  I  have  spoken  with  bitterness,  let  it  be  recol- 
lected that  my  subject  is  hypocrisy. 

It  is  likewise  fit,  that  in  all  our  actions  we  should 
have  considered  how  far  they  are  likely  to  be  misun- 
derstood, and  from  superficial  resemblances  to  be  con- 
founded with,  and  so  appear  to  authorize  actions  of  a 
very  different  character.  But  if  this  caution  be  in- 
tended for  a  moral  rule,  the  misunderstanding  must 
be  such  as  might  be  made  by  persons  who  are  nei- 
ther very  weak  nor  very  wicked.  The  apparent  re- 
semblances between  the  good  action  we  were  about 
to  do  and  the  bad  one  which  might  possiblv  be  done 
in  mistaken  imitation  of  it,  must  be  obvious  :  or  that 
which  makes  them  essentially  different,  must  be 
473 


464 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


subtle  or  recondite.  For  what  is  there  which  a 
wicked  man  blinded  by  his  passions  may  not,  and 
which  a  madman  will  not,  misunderstand  ?  It  is  ridi- 
culous to  frame  rules  of  morality  with  a  view  to  those 
who  are  (it  objects  only  for  the  physician  or  the  ma- 
gistrate. 

The  question  may  be  thus  illustrated.  At  Florence 
there  is  an  unfinished  bust  of  Brutus,  by  Michael 
Angelo,  under  which  a  Cardinal  wrote  the  following 
distich : 

Dum  Bruti  efligiem  sculptor  de  mnimnre  finxit, 
In  mentem  sceleris  venit ;  et  abstinuit. 
As  the  Sculptor  was  forming  the  effigy  of  Brutus,  in  mar- 
ble, he  recollected  his  act  of  guilt  and  refrained. 

An  English  Nobleman,  indignant  at  this  distich, 
wrote  immediately  under  it  the  following: 

Brutum  efiinxisset  sculptor,  sod  mente  recursat 
Multa  virt  virtus;  stetitet  obstupuit. 
The  Sculptor  would  have  framed  a  Brutus,  out  the.  vast 
and  manifold  virtue  of  the  man  flashed  upon  his 
thought :  he  stopped  and  remained  in  aston- 
ished admiration. 

Now  which  is  the  nobler  and  more  moral  senti- 
ment, the  Italian  Cardinal's,  or  the  English  Noble- 
man's ?  The  cardinal  would  appeal  to  the  doctrine 
of  general  consequences,  and  pronounce  the  death  of 
Caesar  a  murder,  and  Brutus  an  assassin.  For  (he 
would  say)  if  one  man  may  be  allowed  to  kill  ano- 
ther because  he  thinks  him  a  tyrant,  religious  or  po- 
litical phrenzy  may  stamp  the  name  of  tyrant  on  the 
best  of  kings;  regicide  will  be  justified  under  the 
pretence  of  tyrannicide,  and  Brutus  be  quoted  as  au- 
thority for  the  Clements  and  Ravilliacs.  From  kings 
it  may  pass  to  generals  and  statesmen,  and  from  these 
to  any  man  whom  an  enemy  or  enthusiast  may  pro- 
nounce unfit  to  live.  Thus  we  may  have  a  cobbler 
of  Messina  in  every  city,  and  bravos  in  our  common 
streets  as  common  as  in  those  of  Naples,  with  the  name 
Brutus,  on  their  stilettos. 

The  Englishman  would  commence  his  answer  by 
commenting  on  the  words  "  because  he  thinks  him  a 
tyrant."  No !  he  would  reply,  not  because  the  pa- 
triot thinks  him  a  tyrant;  but  because  he  knows  him 
to  be  so,  and  knows  likewise,  that  the  vilest,  of  his 
slaves  cannot  deny  the  fact  that  he  has  by  violence 
raised  himself  above  the  laws  of  his  country — be- 
cause he  knows  that  all  good  and  wise  men  equally 
with  himself  abhor  the  fact!  If  there  be  no  such 
state  as  that  of  being  broad  awake,  or  no  means  of 
distinguishing  it  when  it  exists;  if  because  men 
sometimes  dream  that  they  are  awake,  it  must  follow 
that  no  man,  when  awake,  can  be  sure  that  he  is  not 
dreaming;  if  because  an  hypochondriac  is  positive 
that  his  legs  are  cylinders  of  glass,  all  other  men  are 
to  learn  modesty,  and  cease  to  be  so  positive  that  their 
legs  are  legs;  what  possible  advantage  can  your  cri- 
terion of  general  consequences  possess  over  any 
other  rule  of  direction  ?  If  no  man  can  be  sure  that 
what  he  thinks  a  robber  with  a  pistol  at  his  breast  de- 
manding his  purse,  may  not  be  a  good  friend  enquir- 
ing after  his  health;  or  that  a  tyrant  (the  son  of  a 
cobbler  perhaps,  who  at  the  head  of  a  regiment  of 
perjured  traitors,  has  driven  the  representatives  of 


his  country  out  of  the  senate  at  the  point  of  the  bay- 
onet, subverted  the  constitution  which  had  trusted, 
enriched,  and  honored  him,  trampled  on  the  laws 
which  before  God  and  Man  he  had  sworn  to  obey, 
and  finally  raised  himself  above  all  law)  may  not,  in 
spite  of  his  own  and  his  neighbors'  knowledge  of  the 
contrary,  be  a  lawful  king,  who  has  received  his 
power,  however  despotic  it  may  be,  from  the  kings 
his  ancestors,  who  exercises  no  other  power  than 
what  had  been  submitted  to  for  centuries,  and  been 
acknowledged  as  the  law  of  the  country;  on  what 
ground  can  you  possibly  expect  less  fallibility,  or  a 
result  more  to  be  relied  upon  in  the  same  man's  cal- 
culation   of  your  GENERAL   CONSEQUENCES  ?      Would 

he,  at  least,  find  any  difficulty  in  converting  your  cri- 
terion into  an  authority  lor  his  act?  What  should 
prevent  a  man,  whose  perceptions  and  judgments  are 
so  strangely  distorted,  from  arguing,  that  nothing  is 
more  devoutly  to  be  wished  for,  as  a  general  conse- 
quence, than  that  every  man,  who  by  violence  places 
himself  above  the  laws  of  his  country,  should  in  all 
ages  and  nations  be  considered  by  mankind  as  placed 
by  his  own  act  out  of  the  protection  of  law,  and  be 
treated  by  them  as  any  other  noxious  wild  beast 
would  be  ?  Do  you  think  it  necessary  to  try  adders 
by  a  jury  ?  Do  you  hesitate  to  shoot  a  mad  dog,  be- 
cause it  is  not  in  your  power  to  have  him  first  tried 
and  condemned  at  the  Old  Bailey  ?  On  the  other 
hand,  what  consequence  can  be  conceived  more  de- 
testable, than  one  which  would  set  a  bounty  on  the 
most  enormous  crime  in  human  nature,  and  establish 
as  a  law  of  religion  and  morality  that  the  accomplish- 
ment of  the  most  atrocious  guilt  invests  the  perpetra- 
tor with  impunity,  and  renders  his  person  forever  sa- 
cred and  inviolable  ?  For  madmen  and  enthusiasts 
what  avail  your'  moral  criterions?  But  as  to  your 
Neapolitan  Bravos,  if  the  act  of  Brutus  who  "  In  pify 
I  to  the  general  wrong  of  Rome,  Slew  his  best  lover  for 
the  good  of  Rome,"  authorized  by  the  laws  of  his 
'  country,  in  manifest  opposition  to  all  selfish  interests 
in  the  face  of  the  Senate,  and  instantly  presenting 
himself  and  his  cause  first  to  that  Senate,  and  then  to 
|  the  assembled  commons,  by  them  to  stand  acquitted 
'  or  condemned — if  such  an  act  as  1 1  lis,  with  all  its 
j  vast  out-jutting  circumstances  of  distinction,  can  be 
j  confounded  by  any  mind,  not  frantic,  with  the  crime 
of  a  cowardly  skulking  assassin  who  hires  out  his 
i  dagger  for  a  few  crowns  to  gratify  a  hatred  not  his 
own,  or  even  with  the  deed  of  that  man  who  makes 
I  a  compromise  between  his  revenge  and  his  coward- 
!  ice,  and  stabs  in  the  dark  the  enemy  whom  he  dared 
not  meet  in  the  open  field,  or  summon  before  the 
laws  of  his  country — what,  actions  can  be  so  different, 
that  they  may  not  be  equally  confounded  1  The  am- 
bushed soldier  must  not.  fire  his  musket,  lest  his  ex- 
ample should  be  quoted  by  the  villain  who,  to  make 
sure  of  his  booty,  discharges  his  piece  at  the  unsus- 
picious passenger  from  behind  a  hedge.  The  physi- 
cian must  not  administer  a  solution  of  arsenic  to  the 
leprous,  lest  his  example  should  be  quoted  by  profes- 
sional poisoners.  If  no  distinction,  full  and  satisfac- 
tory to  the  conscience  andcommon  sense  of  mankind, 
be  afforded  by  the  detestation  and  horror  excited  in 

474 


THE  FRIEND. 


4G5 


all  men,  (even  in  the  meanest  and  most  vicious,  if 
they  are  not  wholly  monsters)  by  the  act  of  the  as- 
sassin, contrasted  with  the  fervent  admiration  felt  by 
the  good  and  wise  in  all  ages  when  they  mention 
the  name  of  Brutus ;  contrasted  with  the  fact  that 
the  honor  or  disrespect  with  which  that  name  was 
spoken  of,  became  an  historic  criterion  of  a  noble  or 
a  base  age ;  and  if  it  is  in  vain  that  our  own  hearts 
answer  to  the  question  of  the  Poet 

"  Is  there  anions  t lie  adamantine  spheres 

Wheeling  unshaken  through  ihe  buundless  void. 
Aught  thai  wiih  half  such  majesty  can  fill 
The  human  bosom,  as  when  Brutus  rose 
Refulgent  from  the  siroke  of  Caesar's  fate 
Amiil  the  crowd  of  Patriots  ;  and  his  aim 
Aloft  extending,  like  eternal  Jove, 
When  guilt  brings  down  the  thunder,  eall'd  aloud 
On  Tully's  nan.'',  and  shook  his  crimson  sword, 
And  bade  the  Father  of  his  Country,  Hail ! 
For  lo  the  Tyrant  proslrate  on  the  dust, 
And  Rome  again  is  free!" 

If,  I  say,  all  this  be  fallacious  and  insufficient,  can  we 
have  any  firmer  reliance  on  a  cold  ideal  calculation 
of  imaginary  general  consequences,  which,  if 
they  were  general,  could  not  be  consequences  at  all: 
for  they  would  be  effects  of  the  frenzy  or  frenzied 
wickedness,  which  alone  could  confound  actions  so 
utterly  dissimilar?  No!  (would  the  ennobled  de- 
scendant of  our  Russels  or  Sidneys  conclude)  No! 
Calumnious  bigot!  never  yet  did  a  human  being  be- 
come an  assassin  from  his  own  or  the  general  admi- 
ration of  the  hero  Brutus ;  but  I  dare  not  warrant, 
that  villains  might  not  be  encouraged  in  their  trade 
of  secret  murder,  by  finding  their  own  guilt  attribu- 
ted to  the  Roman  patriot,  and  might  not  conclude, 
that  if  Brutus  be  no  better  than  an  assassin,  an  assas- 
sin can  be  no  worse  than  Brutus. 

I  request  that  the  preceding  be  not  interpreted  as 
my  own  judgment  on  tyrannicide.  I  think  with  Ma- 
chiavel  and  with  Spinoza  for  many  and  weighty  reasons 
assigned  by  those  philosophers,  that  it  is  difficult  to 
conceive  a  case,  in  which  a  good  man  would  attempt 
tyrannicide,  because  it  is  difficult  to  conceive  one.  in 
which  a  wise  man  would  recommend  it.  In  a  small 
state,  included  within  the  walls  of  a  single  city,  and 
where  the  tyranny  is  maintained  by  foreign  guards, 
it  may  be  otherwise ;  but  in  a  nation  or  empire  it  is 
perhaps  inconceivable,  that  the  circumstances  which 
made  a  tyranny  possible,  should  not  likewise  render 
the  removal  of  the  tyrant  useless.  The  patriot's  sword 
may  cut  off  the  Hydra's  head  ;  but  he  possesses  no 
brand  to  stanch  the  active  corruption  of  the  body, 
which  is  sure  to  re-produce  a  successor. 

I  must  now  in  a  few  words  answer  the  objection 
to  the  former  part  of  my  argument  (for  to  that  part 
only  the  objection  applies,)  namely,  that  the  doctrine 
of  general  consequences  was  stated  as  the  criterion 
of  the  action,  not  of  the  agent.  I  might  answer,  that 
the  author  himself  had  in  some  measure  justified  me 
in  not  noticing  this  distinction  by  holding  forth  the 
probability,  that  the  Supreme  Judge  will  proceed  by 
the  same  rule.  The  agent  may  then  safely  be  inclu- 
ded in  the  action,  if  both  here  and  hereafter  the  ac- 
tion only  and  its  general  consequences  will  be  attend- 
ed to.    But  ray  main  ground  of  justification  is  that 


the  distinction  itself  is  merely  logical,  not  real  and 
vital.  The  character  of  the  agent  is  determined  by 
his  view  of  the  action:  and  lhat  system  of  morality 
is  alone  true  and  soiled  to  human  nature,  which 
unites  the  intention  and.  the  motive,  the  warmth  and 
the  light,  in  one  and  the  same  act  of  mind.  This 
alone  is  worthy  to  be  called  a  moral  principle.  Such  a 
principle  may  be  extracted,  though  not  without  diffi- 
culty and  danger,  from  the  ore  of  the  stoic  philoso- 
phy ;  but  it  is  to  bo  found  unalloyed  and  entire  in  the 
Christian  system,  and  is  there  called  Faith. 


ESSAY   XII. 


The  following  address  was  delivered  at  Bristol,  in  the  year 
1794-D5.  The  only  omissions  regard  the  names  of  persons : 
and  I  insert  them  here  in  support  of  the  assertion  made  by 
me  in  a  former  Leciure,  and  because  this  very  Lecture  has  been 
referred  to  in  an  infamous  Libel  in  proof  of  the  Author's 
former  Jacobinism.  Different  as  my  present  convictions  are 
on  the  subject  of  philosophical  Necessity,  I  have  for  this 
reason  left  the  last  page  unaltered. 


An  yap  tit;  ~E\tv§ipias  s^is/nar  roXXa  St  cv  km  tois 
r/iiAEAMJ-Stpot?  fjiiariTta,  avTt\ev§£pa. 

Translation.  —For  I  am  always  a  lover  of  Liberty  ;  but  in 
those  who  would  appropriate  the  Title,  I  find  too  many 
points  destructive  of  Liberty  and  hateful  to  her  genuine 
advocates. 

Companies  resembling  the  present  will,  from  a  va- 
riety of  circumstances,  consist  chiefly  of  the  zealous 
Advocates  for  Freedom.  It  will  therefore  be  our  en- 
deavor, not  so  much  to  excite  the  torpid,  as  to  regu- 
late the  feelings  of  the  ardent:  and  above  all,  to 
evince  the  necessity  of  bottoming  on  fixed  Principles, 
that  so  we  may  not  be  the  unstable  Patriots  of  Pas- 
sion or  Accident,  nor  hurried  away  by  names  of  which 
we  have  not  si  fled  the  meaning,  and  by  tenets  of 
which  we  have  not  examined  the  consequences.  The 
Times  are  trying  ;  and  in  order  to  he  prepared  against 
their  difficulties,  we  should  have  acquired  a  prompt 
facility  of  adverting  in  all  our  doubts  to  some  grand 
!  and  comprehensive  Truth.  In  a  deep  and  strong  soil 
j  must  that  tree  fix  its  roots,  the  height  of  which  is  to 
"  reach  to  Heaven,  and  the  sight  of  it  to  the  ends  of 
all  the  Earth." 

The  example  of  France  is  indeed  a  "Warning  to 
Britain."     A  nation  wading  to  their  rights  through 
blood,  and  marking  the  track  of  Freedom  by  Devas- 
tation !    Yet  let  us  not  embattle  our  Feelings  against 
our  Reason.     Let  us  not  indulge  our  malignant  pas- 
sions under  the  mask  of  Humanity.     Instead  of  rail- 
ing with  infuriate  declamation  against  these  excesses, 
i  we  shall  be  more  profitably  employed  in  develop- 
!  ing  the  sources  of  them.   French  Freedom  is  the  bea- 
;  con  which  if  it  guides  to  Equality  should  show  us 
likewise  the  dangers  that  throng  the  road. 
The  annals  of  the  French  Revolution  have  record- 
!  ed  in  letters  of  blood,  that  the  knowledge  of  the  few 
cannot  counteract  the  ignorance  of  the  many ;  that 
I  the  light  of  philosophy,  when  it  is  confined  to  a  small 

475 


4G6 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


minority,  points  out  the  possessors  as  the  victims,  ra- 
ther tiian  the  illuminators,  of  the  multitude.  The  pa- 
triots of  France  either  hastened  into  the  dangerous 
and  gigantic  error  of  making  certain  evil  the  means 
of  contingent  good,  or  were  sacrificed  by  the  mob, 
with  whose  prejudices  and  ferocity  their  unbending 
virtue  tbrbade  them  to  assimilate.  Like  Sampson, 
the  people  were  strong — like  Sampson,  the  people 
were  blind.  Those  two  massy  pillars  of  the  temple 
of  Oppression,  their  Monarchy  and  Aristocracy, 

Willi  horrible  Convulsion  to  and  fro 

They  tugg'd,  they  shook — till  down  tliey  came,  and  drew 

Tin'  whole  roof  nfter  them  with  burst  of  thunder 

Upon  the  heads  of  all  who  sat  beneath. 

Lords,  Ladies,  Captains,  Counsellors,  and  Priests, 

Their  choice  nobility! MILTON.  .Sum.  Agon. 

The  Girondists,  who  were  the  first  republicans  in 
power;  were  men  of  enlarged  views  and  great  liter- 
ary attainments;  but  they  seem  to  have  been  defi- 
cient in  that  vigor  and  daring  activity,  which  circum- 
stances made  necessary.  Men  of  genius  are  rarely 
either  prompt  in  action  or  consistent  in  general  con- 
duct. Their  early  habits  have  been  those  of  contem- 
plative indolence;  and  the  day-dreams,  with  which 
they  have  been  accustomed  to  amuse  their  solitude 
adapt  them  for  splendid  speculation,  not  temperate 
and  practicable  counsels.  Brissot,  the  leader  of  the 
Gironde  party,  is  entitled  to  the  character  of  a  virtu- 
ous man,  and  an  eloquent  speaker;  but  he  was  rather 
a  sublime  visionary,  than  a  quick-eyed  politician;  and 
his  excellences  equally  with  his  faults  rendered  him 
unfit  for  the  helm  in  the  stormy  hour  of  Revolution. 
Robespierre,  who  displaced  him,  possessed  a  glowing 
ardor  that  still  remembered  the  end,  and  a  cool  fero- 
city that  never  either  overlooked,  or  scrupled  the 
means.  What  that  end  was,  is  not  known :  that  it 
was  a  wicked  one,  has  by  no  means  been  proved.  I 
rather  think,  that  the  distant  prospect,  to  which  he 
was  travelling,  appeared  to  him  grand  and  beautiful ; 
but  that  he  fixed  his  eye  on  it  with  such  intense  ea- 
gerness as  to  neglect  the  foulness  of  the  road.  If 
however  his  intentions  were  pure,  his  subsequent 
enormities  yield  us  a  melancholy  proof,  that  it  is  not 
the  character  of  the  possessor  which  directs  the  pow- 
er, but  the  power  which  shapes  and  depraves  the 
character  of  the  possessor.  In  Robespierre,  its  influ- 
ence was  assisted  by  the  properties  of  his  disposition. 
— Enthusiasm,  even  in  the  gentlest  temper,  will  fre- 
quently generate  sensations  of  an  unkindly  order.  If 
we  clearly  perceive  any  one  thing  to  be  of  vast  and 
infinite  importance  to  ourselves  and  all  mankind,  our 
first  feelings  impel  us  to  turn  with  angry  contempt 
from  those  who  doubt  and  oppose  it.  The  ardor  of 
undisciplined  benevolence  seduces  us  into  malignity  : 
and  whenever  our  hearts  are  warm,  and  our  objects 
great  and  excellent,  intolerance  is  the  sin  that  does 
most  easily  beset  us.  But  this  enthusiasm  in  Robes- 
pierre was  blended  with  gloom,  and  suspiciousness, 
and  inordinate  vanity.  His  dark  imagination  was 
still  brooding  over  supposed  plots  against  freedom — 
to  prevent  tyranny  he  became  a  tyrant — and  having 
realized  the  evils  which  he  suspected,  a  wild  and 
dreadful  tyrant. — Those  loud-tongued  adulators,  the 
mob,  overpowered  the  lone  whispered  denunciations 


of  conscience — he  despotized  in  all  the  pomp  of  pa- 
triotism, and  masqueraded  on  the  bloody  stasre  of 
revolution,  a  Caligula  with  the  cap  of  liberty  on  his 
head. 

It  has  been  affirmed,  and  I  believe  with  truth,  that 
the  system  of  Terrorism  by  suspending  the  struggles 
of  contrariant  factions  communicated  an  energy  to 
the  operations  of  the  Republic,  which  had  been  hith- 
erto  unknown,  and  without  which  it  could  not  have 
been  preserved.  The  system  depended  for  its  exist- 
ence on  the  general  sense  of  its  necessity,  and  when 
it  had  answered  its  end,  it  was  soon  destroyed  by  the 
same  power  that  had  given  it  birth — popular  opinion. 
It  must  not  however  be  disguised,  that  at  all  times, 
but  more  especially  when  the  public  feelings  are 
wavy  and  tumultuous,  artful  demagogues  may  create 
this  opinion:  and  they,  who  are  inclined  to  tolerate 
evil  as  the  means  of  contingent  good,  should  reflect, 
that  if  the  excesses  of  terrorism  gave  to  the  Republic 
that  efficiency  and  repulsive  force  which  its  circum- 
stances made  necessary,  they  likewise  afforded  to  the 
hostile  courts  the  most  powerful  support,  and  excited 
that  indignation  and  horror,  which  every  where  pre- 
cipitated the  subject  into  the  designs  of  the  ruler. 
Nor  let  it  be  forgotten  that  these  excesse^ierpetuated 
the  war  in  La  Vendee  and  made  it  more  terrible,  both 
by  the  accession  of  numerous  partisans,  who  had  fled 
from  the  persecution  of  Robespierre,  and  by  inspiring 
the  Chouans  with  fresh  fury,  and  an  unsubmitting 
spirit  of  revenge  and  desperation. 

Revolutions  are  sudden  to  the  unthinking  only. 
Political  disturbances  happen  not  without  their  warn- 
ing harbingers.  Strange  rumblings  and  confused 
noises  still  precede  these  earthquakes  and  hurricanes 
of  the  moral  world.  The  process  of  revolution  in 
France  has  been  dreadful,  and  should  incite  us  to 
examine  with  an  anxious  eye  the  motives  and  man- 
ners of  those,  whose  conduct  and  opinions  seem  cal- 
culated to  forward  a  similar  event  in  our  own  coun- 
try. The  oppositionists  to  "things  as  they  are,"  are 
divided  into  many  and  different  classes.  To  deline- 
ate them  with  an  unflattering  accuracy  may  be  a 
delicate,  but  it  is  a  necessary  task,  in  order  that  we 
may  enlighten,  or  at  least  beware  of  the  misguided 
men  who  have  enlisted  tinder  the  banners  of  liberty, 
from  no  principles  or  with  bad  ones  ;  whether  they 

be  those,  who 

admire  they  know  not  what, 
And  know  not  whom,  but  as  one  leads  to  the  other  : 

or  whether  those, 

Whose  end  is  private  hate,  not  help  to  freedom. 
Adverse  and  turbulent  when  she  would  lead 
To  virtue. 

The  majority  of  democrats  appear  to  me  to  have 
attained  that  portion  of  knowledge  in  politics,  which 
infidels  possess  in  religion.  I  would  by  no  means  be 
supposed  to  imply,  that  the  objections  of  both  are 
equally  unfounded,  but  that  they  both  attribute  to  the 
system  which  they  reject,  all  the  evils  existing  under 
it;  and  that  both  contemplating  truth  and  justice 
"  in  the  nakedness  of  abstraction,"  condemn  constitu- 
tions and  dispensations  without  having  sufficiently 
examined  the  natures,  circumstances  and  capacities 
470 


THE  FRIEND. 


4G7 


of  their  recipients.  The  first  class  among  the  pro- 
fessed friends  of  liberty  is  composed  of  men,  who 
unaccustomed  to  the  labor  of  thorough  investigation, 
and  not  particularly  oppressed  by  the  burthens  of 
state,  are  vet  impelled  by  their  feelings  to  disapprove 
of  its  grosser  depravities,  and  prepared  to  give  an 
indolent  vote  in  favor  of  reform.  Their  sensibilities 
unbraced  by  the  cooperation  of  fixed  principles,  they 
offer  no  sacrifices  to  the  divinity  of  active  virtue. 
Their  political  opinions  depend  with  weather-cock 
uncertain'y  on  the  winds  of  rumor,  that  blow  from 
France.  On  the  report  of  French  victories  they  blaze 
into  republicanism,  at  a  tale  of  French  excesses  they 
darken  into  aristocrats.  These  dough-baked  patriots 
are  not  however  useless.  This  oscillation  of  political 
opinion  will  retard  the  day  of  revolution,  and  it  will 
operate  as  a  preventive  to  its  excesses.  Indecisive- 
ness  of  character,  though  the  effect  of  timidity,  is  al- 
most al  ited  with  benevolence. 

Wilder  features  characterize  the  second  class. 
Sufficiently  possessed  of  natural  sense  to  despise  the 
priest,  and  of  natural  feeling  to  hate  the  oppressor, 
they  listen  only  to  the  inflammatory  harangues  of 
some  mad-headed  enthusiast,  and  imbibe  from  them 
1;  rage,  not  liberty.  Unillumined  by 
philosophy,  and  stimulated  to  a  lust  of  revenge  by 
aggravaied  wrongs,  they  would  make  the  altar  of 
freedom  stream  with  blood,  while  the  grass  grew  in 
the  desolated  halls  of  justice. 

We  contemplate  those  principles  with  horror.  Yet 
they  possess  a  kind  of  wild  justice  well  calculated  to 
spread  them  among  the  grossly  ignorant.  To  unen- 
lightened minds,  there  are  terrible  charms  in  the  idea 
of  retribution,  however  savagely  it  be  inculcated. 
The  groans  of  the  oppressors  make  fearful  yet  plea- 
sant music  to  the  ear  of  him,  whose  mind  is  darkness, 
and  into  whose  soul  the  iron  has  entered. 

This  class,  at  present,  is  comparatively  small — Yet 
soon  to  form  an  overwhelming  majority,  unless  great 
and  immediate  efforts  are  used  to  lessen  the  intolera- 
ble grievances  of  our  poor  brethren,  and  infuse  into 
their  sorely  wounded  hearts  the  healing  qualities  of 
knowledge.  For  can  we  wonder  that  men  should 
want  humanity,  who  want  all  the  circumstances  of 
life  that  humanize  I  Can  we  wonder  that  with  the 
ignorance  of  brutes  they  should  unite  their  ferocity  ? 
Peace  and  comfort  be  with  these  !  But  let  us  shud- 
der to  hear  from  men  of  dissimilar  opportunities  sen- 
timents of  similar  revengefulness.  The  purifying 
alchemy  of  education  may  transmute  the  fierceness 
of  an  ignorant  man  into  virtuous  energv — but  what 
remedy  shall  we  apply  to  him,  whom  plenty  has  not 
softened,  whom  knowledge  has  not  taught  benevo- 
lence ?  This  is  one  among  the  manv  fatal  effects 
which  result  from  the  want  of  fixed  principles. 

There  is  a  third  class  among  the  friends  of  freedom, 
who  possess  not  the  wavering  character  of  the  first 
description,  nor  the  ferocity  last  delineated.  They 
pursue  the  interests  of  freedom  steadily,  but  with 
Barrow  and  self-centering  views:  they  anticipate 
with  exultation  the  abolition  of  privileged  orders,  and 
of  acts  that  persecute  by  exclusion  from  the  right  of 
Qq2 


citizenship.  They  are  prepared  to  join  in  digging  up 
the  rubbish  of  mouldering  establishments,  and  strip- 
ping offlhe  tawdry  pageantry  of  governments.  What- 
ever is  above  them  they  are  most  willing  to  drag 
down  :  but  every  proposed  alteration  that  would  ele- 
vate the  ranks  of  our  poorer  brethren,  they 
with  suspicions  jealousy,  as  the  dreams  of  the  vision- 
ary; as  11  there  were  any  thing  in  the  supers 
Ijord  to  Gentleman,  so  mortifying  in  the  barrier,?" 
filial  to  happiness  in  the  consequences,  as  the  mure 
real  distinction  of  master  and  servant,  of  rich 
and  of  poor.  Wherein  am  I  made  worse  by  my  i  n- 
neighbor?  Ix>  the  childish  titles  of  ArisbM ■- 
racy  detract  from  my  domestic  comforts,  or  prevent 
my  intellectual  acquisitions?  But  those  institutions 
of  society  which  should  condemn  me  to  the  in  i 
of  twelve  hours  daily  toil,  would  make  my  soul  a 
slave,  and  sink  the  rational  being  into  the  mere  ani- 
mal. It  is  a  mockery  of  our  fellow-creatures'  wrongs 
to  call  them  equal  in  rights,  when  by  the  bitti  I 
pulsion  of  their  wants  we  make  them  inferior  to  us 
in  all  that  can  soften  the  heart,  or  dignify  the  under- 
standing. Let  us  not  say  that  this  is  the  work  of 
time — that  it  is  impracticable  at  present,  unless  we 
each  in  our  individual  capacities  do  strenuously  and 
perseveringly  endeavor  to  diffuse  among  our  domes- 
tics those  comforts  and  that  illumination  which  far 
beyond  all  political  ordinances  are  the  true  equalizers 
of  men. 

We  turn  w  ith  pleasure  to  the  contemplation  of  that 
small  but  glorious  band,  whom  we  may  truly  distin- 
guish by  the  name  of  thinking  and  disinterested  pa- 
triots. These  are  the  men  who  have  encouraged  the 
sympathetic  passions  till  they  have  become  irresisti- 
ble habits,  and  made  their  duty  a  necessary  part  of 
their  self-interest,  by  the  long-continued  cultivation 
of  that  moral  taste  which  derives  our  most  exquisite 
pleasures  from  the  contemplation  of  possible  perfec- 
tion, and  proportionate  pain  from  the  perception  of 
existing  depravation.  Accustomed  to  regard  all  the 
affairs  of  man  as  a  process,  they  never  hurry  and  they 
never  pause.  Theirs  is  not  that  twilight  of  political 
knowledge  which  gives  us  just  light  enough  to  place 
one  foot  before  the  other;  as  they  advance  the  scene 
still  opens  upon  them,  and  they  press  right  onward  with 
a  vast  and  various  landscape  of  existence  around  them. 
Calmness  and  enersry  mark  all  their  actions.  Con- 
vinced that  vice  originates  not  in  the  man,  but  in  the 
surrounding  circumstances ;  not  in  the  heart,  but  in 
the  understanding  ;  he  is  hopeless  concerning  no  one 
— to  correct  a  vice  or  generate  a  virtuous  conduct  he 
[wllutes  not  his  hands  with  the  scourge  of  coercion; 
but  by  endeavoring  to  alter  the  circumstances  would 
remove,  or  by  strengthening  the  intellect,  disarms  the 
temptation.  The  unhappy  children  of  vice  and  folly, 
whose  tempers  are  adverse  to  their  own  happiness  as 
well  as  to  the  happiness  of  others,  will  at  times 
awaken  a  natural  pang;  but  he  looks  forward  with 
gladdened  heart  to  that  glorious  period  when  justice 
shall  have  established  the  universal  fraternity  of  love. 
!'.il-ennobling  views  bestow  the  virtues  which 
they  anticipate.  He  whose  mind  is  habitually  im- 
477 


468 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


prest  with  them  soars  above  the  present  state  of  hu- 
manity, and  may  be  justly  said  to  dwell  in  the 
presence  of  the  Most  High. 


would  the  forms 

Of  servile  custom  cramp  the  patriot's  power? 
Would  sordid  policies, the  barbarous  growth 
Of  ignorance  and  rapine,  bow  him  down 
To  tame  pursuits,  to  indolence  and  fear  1 
Lo  !  he  appeals  to  nature,  to  the  winds 
And  rolling  waves,  the  sun's  unwearied  course. 
The  elements  and  seasons — all  declare 
For  what  the  Eternal  Maker  has  ordained 
The  powers  of  man  :  we  feel  within  ourselves 
His  energy  divine  :   he  tells  the  heart 
He  meant,  he  mado  us  to  behold  and  love 
What  he  beholds  and  loves,  the  general  orb 
Of  life  and  being — to  be  great  like  him, 
Beneficent  and  active. AKENSIDE. 

That  the  general  illumination  should  precede  rev- 
olution, is  a  truth  as  obvious,  as  that  the  vessel  should 
be  cleansed  before  we  (ill  it  with  a  pure  liquor.  But 
the  mode  of  diffusing  it  is  not  discoverable  with  equal 
facility.  We  certainly  should  never  attempt  to  make 
proselytes  by  appeals  to  the  selfish  feelings — and  con- 
sequently, should  plead  for  the  oppressed,  not  to 
them.  The  author  of  an  essay  on  political  justice 
considers  private  societies  as  the  sphere  of  real  utility 
— that  (each  one  illuminating  those  immediately  be- 
neath him,)  truth,  by  a  gradual  descent,  may  at  last 
reach  the  lowest  order.  But  this  is  rather  plausible 
than  just  or  practicable.  Society  as  at  present  con- 
stituted does  not  resemble  a  chain  that  ascends  in  a 
continuity  of  links.  Alas!  between  the  parlour  and 
the  kitchen,  the  tap  and  the  coffee-room — there  is  a 
gulf  that  may  not  be  passed.  He  would  appear  to 
me  to  have  adopted  the  best  as  well  as  the  most  be- 
nevolent mode  of  diffusing  truth,  who  uniting  the 
zeal  of  the  Methodist  with  the  views  of  the  Philoso- 
pher, should  be  personally  among  the  poor,  and  teach 
them  their  duties  in  order  that  he  may  render  them 
susceptible  of  their  rights. 

Yet  by  w  hat  means  can  the  lower  classes  be  made 
to  learn  their  duties,  and  urged  to  practise  them? 
The  human  race  may  perhaps  possess  the  capability 
of  all  excellence;  and  truth,  I  doubt  not,  is  omnipotent 
to  a  mind  already  disciplined  for  its  reception;  but 
assuredly  the  over-worked  laborer,  skulking  into  an 
ale-house,  is  not  likely  to  exemplify  the  one,  or  prove 
the  other.  In  that  barbarous  tumult  of  inimical  in- 
terests, which  the  present  state  of  society  exhibits, 
religion  appears  to  offer  the  only  means  universally 
efficient.  The  perfectness  of  future  men  is  indeed  a 
benevolent  tenet,  and  may  operate  on  a  few  vision- 
aries whose  studious  habits  supply  them  with  employ- 
ment, and  seclude  them  from  temptation.  But  a  dis- 
tant prospect  which  we  are  never  to  reach,  will  sel- 
dom quicken  our  footsteps,  however  lovely  it  may 
appear;  and  a  blessing,  which  not  ourselves  but  pos- 
terity are  destined  to  enjoy,  will  scarcely  influence 
the  actions  of  any — still  less  of  the  ignorant,  the  pre- 
judiced, and  the  selfish. 

"  Go  preach  the  Gospel  to  the  poor."  By  its  sim- 
plicity it  will  meet  their  comprehension,  by  its  benev- 
olence soften  their  affections,  by  its  precepts  it  will 
direct  their  conduct,  by  the  vastness  of  its  motives 


insure  their  obedience.  The  situation  of  the  poor  i9 
perilous  :  they  are  indeed  both 

' '  from  within  and  from  without 
Unarmed  to  all  temptations." 

Prudential  reasonings  will  in  general  be  powerless 
with  them.  For  the  incitements  of  this  world  are 
weak  in  proportion  as  we  are  wretched — 

The  world  is  not  my  friend,  nor  the  world's  law. 

The  world  has  got  no  law  to  make  me  rich. 
They  too  who  live  from  hand  to  month,  will  most 
frequently  become  improvident.  Possessing  no  stock 
of  happiness  they  eagerly  seize  the  gratifications  of 
the  moment,  and  snatch  the  froth  from  the  wave  as 
it  passes  by  them.  Nor  is  the  desolate  state  of  their 
families  a  restraining  motive,  unsoftened  as  they  are 
by  education,  and  benumbed  into  selfishness  by  the 
torpedo  touch  of  extreme  want.  Domestic  affections 
depend  on  association.  We  love  an  object  if,  as  often 
as  we  see  or  recollect  if,  an  agreeable  sensation  arises 
in  our  minds.  But  alas !  how  should  he  glow  with 
the  charities  of  father  and  husband,  who  gaining 
scarcely  more  than  his  own  necessities  demand,  must 
have  been  accustomed  to  regard  his  wife  and  chil- 
dren, not  as  the  soothers  of  finished  labor,  but  as  ri- 
vals for  the  insufficient  meal!  In  a  man  so  circum- 
stanced the  tyranny  of  the  Present  can  be  overpow- 
ered only  by  the  ten-fold  mightiness  of  the  Future. 
Religion  will  cheer  his  gloom  with  her  promises,  and 
by  habituating  his  mind  to  anticipate  an  infinitely 
great  Revolution  hereafter,  may  prepare  it  even  for 
the  sudden  reception  of  a  less  degree  of  amelioration 
in  this  world. 

But  if  we  hope  to  instruct  others,  we  should  fami- 
liarize our  own  minds  to  some  fixed  and  determinate 
principles  of  action.  The  world  is  a  vast  labyrinth, 
in  which  almost  every  one  is  running  a  different  way. 
A  few  indeed  stand  motionless,  and  not  seeking  to 
lead  themselves  or  others  out  of  the  maze,  laugh  at 
the  failures  of  their  brethren.  Yet  with  little  reason  : 
for  more  grossly  than  the  most  bewildered  wanderer 
does  he  err,  who  never  aims  to  go  right.  It  is  more 
honorable  to  the  head,  as  well  as  to  the  heart,  to  be 
misled  by  our  eagerness  in  the  pursuit  of  Truth,  than 
to  be  safe  from  blundering  by  contempt  of  it.  The 
happiness  of  mankind  is  the  end  of  virtue,  and  truth 
is  the  knowledge  of  the  means;  which  he  will  never 
seriously  attempt  to  discover,  who  has  not  habitually 
interested  himself  in  the  welfare  of  others.  The 
searcher  after  truth  must  love  and  be  beloved  ;  for 
general  benevolence  is  a  necessary  motive  to  con- 
stancy of  pursuit ;  and  this  general  benevolence  is 
begotten  and  rendered  permanent  by  social  and  do- 
mestic affections.  Let  us  beware  of  that  proud  phi- 
losophy, which  affects  to  inculcate  philanthropy  while 
it  denounces  every  home-born  feeling  by  which  it  is 
produced  and  nurtured.  The  paternal  and  filial  du- 
ties discipline  the  heart  and  prepare  it  for  the  love  of 
all  mankind.  The  intensity  of  private  attachments 
encourages,  not  prevents,  universal  Benevolence. 
The  nearer  we  approach  to  the  sun,  the  more  in- 
tense his  heat:  yet  what  corner  of  the  system  does 
he  not  cheer  and  vivify  ? 
The  man  who  would  find  Truth,  must  likewise 
478 


THE  FRIEND. 


469 


seek  it  with  an  humble  and  simple  heart,  otherwise 
he  will  be  precipitant  and  overlook  it ;  or  he  will  be 
prejudiced,  and  refuse  to  see  it.  To  emancipate  it  ft  If 
from  the  tyranny  of  association,  is  the  most  arduous 
effort  of  the  mind,  particularly  in  religious  and  politi- 
cal disquisitions.  The  asserters  of  the  system  have 
associated  with  it  the  preservation  of  order  and  pub- 
lic virtue;  the  oppugner  of  imposture  and  wars  and 
rapine.  Hence,  when  they  dispute,  each  trembles  at 
the  consequences  of  the  other's  opinions  instead  of  at- 
tending to  his  train  of  arguments.  Of  this  however 
we  may  be  certain,  whether  we  be  Christians  or  In- 
fidels, Aristocrats  or  Republicans,  that  our  minds  are 
in  a  state  unsusceptible  of  Knowledge,  when  we  feel 
an  eagerness  to  detect  the  falsehood  of  an  adversa- 
ry's reasonings,  not  a  sincere  wish  to  discover  if 
there  be  Truth  in  them ; — when  we  examine  an  ar- 
gument in  order  that  we  may  answer  it,  instead  of 
answering  because  we  have  examined  it. 

Our  opponents  are  chiefly  successful  in  confuting 
the  Theory  of  Freedom  by  the  practices  of  its  advo- 
cates: from  our  lives  they  draw  the  most  forcible  ar- 
guments against  our  doctrines.  Nor  have  they  adopt- 
ed an  unfair  mode  of  reasoning.  In  a  science  the 
evidence  suffers  neither  diminution  or  increase  from 
the  actions  of  its  professors;  but  the  comparative 
wisdom  of  political  systems  depends  necessarily  on 
the  manner  and  capacities  of  the  recipients.  Why 
should  all  things  be  thrown  into  confusion  to  acquire 
that  liberty  which  a  faction  of  sensualists  and  gam- 
blers will  neither  be  able  or  willing  to  preserve  ? 

A  system  of  fundamental  Reform  will  scarcely  be 
effected  by  massacres  mechanized  into  Revolution. 
We  cannot  therefore  inculcate  on  the  minds  of  each 
other  too  often  or  with  too  great  earnestness  the  ne- 
cessity of  cultivating  benevolent  affections.  We 
should  be  cautious  how  we  indulge  the  feelings  even 
of  virtuous  indignation.    Indignation  is  the  handsome 


brother  of  Anger  and  Hatred.  The  temple  of  Des- 
potism, like  that  of  Tescalipoca,  the  Mexican  deity, 
is  built  of  human  skulls,  and  cemented  with  human 
blood  ; — let  us  beware  that  we  be  not  transported  into 
revenge  while  we  are  levelling  the  loathsome  pile  ; 
lest  when  we  erect  the  edifice  of  Freedom  we  but 
vary  the  style  of  architecture,  not  change  the  mate- 
rials. Let  us  not  wantonly  offend  even  the  preju- 
dices of  our  weaker  brethren,  nor  by  ill-timed  and 
vehement  declarations  of  opinion  excite  in  them  ma- 
lignant feelings  towards  us.  The  energies  of  mind 
are  wasted  in  these  intemperate  effusions.  Those 
materials  of  projectile  force,  which  now  carelessly 
scattered  explode  with  an  offensive  and  useless  noise, 
directed  by  wisdom  and  union  might  heave  rocks' 
from  their  base, — or  perhaps  (dismissing  the  meta- 
phor) might  produce  the  desired  effect  without  the 
convulsion. 

For  this  "subdued  sobriety"  of  temper,  a  practical 
faith  in  the  doctrine  of  philosophical  necessity  seems 
the  only  preparative.  That  vice  is  the  effect  of  error 
and  the  offspring  of  surrounding  circumstances,  the 
object  therefore  of  condolence  not  of  anger,  is  a  pro- 
position easily  understood,  and  as  easily  demonstrated. 
But  to  make  it  spread  from  the  understanding  to  the 
affections,  to  call  it  into  action,  not  only  in  the  great 
exertions  of  patriotism,  but  in  the  daily  and  hourly 
occurrences  of  social  life,  requires  the  most  watchful 
attentions  of  the  most  energetic  rnind.  It  is  not 
enough  that  we  have  once  swallowed  these  truths — 
we  must  feed  on  them,  as  insects  on  a  leaf,  till  the 
whole  heart  be  colored  by  their  qualities,  and  show 
its  food  in  every,  the  minutest  fibre. 
Finally ;  in  the  words  of  the  Apostle, 
Watch  ye!  Stand  fast  in  the  principles  of  which 
ye  have  been  convinced :  Quit  yourselves  like  men  '. 
Be  strong !  Yet  let  all  things  be  done  in  the  spirit 
of  love. 

479 


&\\t  Setowtr  Hautrtns  place: 


ESSAYS  INTERPOSED  FOR  AMUSEMENT,  RETROSPECT,  AND  PREPARATION. 


MISCELLANY    THE     SECOND. 


Etiam  a  musts  si  quando  animum  paulisper  abducaraus,  apud  Musas  nihilominus  feriamur :  at  reclines  quidem,  at  otiosas, 
at  de  his  et  illis  inter  se  libere  colloqucntes. 


ESSAY   I. 


It  were  a  wantonness  and  would  demand 
Severe  reproof  if  we  were  men  whose  hearts 
Could  hold  vain  dalliance  with  the  misery 
Even  of  the  dead  ;  contented  thence  to  draw 
A  momentary  pleasure,  never  mark'd 
By  reason,  barren  of  all  future  good. 
But  we  have  known  that  there  is  often  found 
In  mournful  thoughts,  and  always  might  be  found 
A  power  to  virtue  friendly. 

WORDSWORTH.  MSS. 


I  know  not  how  I  can  better  commence  my  second 
Landing  Place,  as  joining  on  to  the  section  of  Poli- 
tics, than  by  the  following  proof  of  the  severe  mise- 
ries which  misgovernment  may  occasion  in  a  country 
nominally  free.  In  the  homely  ballad  of  the  Three 
Graves  (published  in  my  Sibylline  Leaves)  I  have 
attempted  to  exemplify  the  effect,  which  one  painful 
idea  vividly  impressed  on  the  mind  under  unusual 
circumstances,  might  have  in  producing  an  alienation 
of  the  understanding ;  and  in  the  parts  hitherto  pub- 
lished, I  have  endeavored  to  trace  the  progress  to 
madness,  step  by  step.  But  though  the  main  inci- 
dents are  facts,  the  detail  of  the  circumstances  is  of 
my  own  invention :  that  is,  not  what  I  knew,  but 
what  I  conceived  likely  to  have  been  the  case,  or  at 
least  equivalent  to  it.  In  the  tale  that  follows,  I  pre- 
sent an  instance  of  the  same  causes  acting  upon  the 
mind  to  the  production  of  conduct  as  wild  as  that  of 
madness,  but  without  any  positive  or  permanent  loss 
of  the  Reason  or  the  Understanding :  and  this  in  a 
real  occurrence,  real  in  all  its  parts  and  particulars. 
But  in  truth  this  tale  overflows  with  a  human  interest, 
and  needs  no  philosophical  deduction  to  make  it  im- 
pressive. The  account  was  published  in  the  city  in 
which  the  event  took  place,  and  in  the  same  year  I 
read  it,  when  I  was  in  Germany,  and  the  impression 
made  on  my  memory  was  so  deep,  that  though  I  re- 
late it  in  my  own  language,  and  with  my  own  feel- 
ings, and  in  reliance  on  the  fidelity  of  my  recollection, 
I  dare  vouch  for  the  accuracy  of  the  narration  in  all 
important  particulars. 

The  imperial  free  towns  of  Germany  are,  with  only 
two  or  three  exceptions,  enviably  distinguished  by 


the  virtuous  and  primitive  manners  of  the  citizens, 
and  by  the  parental  character  of  their  several  govern 
ments.  As  exceptions,  however,  we  must  mention 
Aix  la  Chapelle,  poisoned  by  French  manners,  and 
the  concourse  of  gamesters  and  sharpers ;  and  Nu- 
remberg, whose  industrious  and  honest  inhabitants 
deserve  a  better  fate  than  to  have  their  lives  and 
properties  under  the  guardianship  of  a  wolfish  and 
merciless  oligarchy,  proud  from  ignorance,  and  re- 
maining ignorant  through  pride.  It  is  from  the  small 
States  of  Germany,  that  our  writers  on  political  econ- 
omy might  draw  their  most  forcible  instances  of  ac- 
tually oppressive,  and  even  mortal  taxation,  and  gain 
the  clearest  insight  into  the  causes  and  circumstances 
of  the  injury.  One  other  remark,  and  I  proceed  to 
the  story.  I  well  remember,  that  the  event  I  am 
about  to  narrate,  called  forth,  in  several  of  the  Ger- 
man periodical  publications,  the  most  passionate  (and 
in  more  than  one  instance,  blasphemous)  declama- 
tions, concerning  the  incomprehensibility  of  the  moral 
government  of  the  world,  and  the  seeming  injustice 
and  cruelty  of  the  dispensations  of  Providence.  But, 
assuredly,  every  one  of  my  readers,  however  deeply 
he  may  sympathize  with  the  poor  sufferers,  will  at 
once  answer  all  such  declamations  by  the  simple  re- 
flection, that  no  one  of  these  awful  events  could  pos- 
sibly have  taken  place  under  a  wise  police  and  hu- 
mane government,  and  that  men  have  no  right  to 
complain  of  Providence  for  evils  which  they  them- 
selves are  competent  to  remedy  by  mere  common 
sense,  joined  with  mere  common  humanity. 

Maria  Eleonora  Schoning  was  the  daughter  of 
a  Nuremberg  wire-drawer.  She  received  her  un- 
happy existence  at  the  price  of  her  mother's  life,  and 
at  the  age  of  seventeen  she  followed,  as  the  sole 
mourner,  the  bier  of  her  remaining  parent.  From 
her  thirteenth  year  she  had  passed  her  life  at  her  fa- 
ther's sick-bed,  the  gout  having  deprived  him  of  the 
use  of  his  limbs:  and  beheld  the  arch  of  heaven  only 
when  she  went  to  fetch  food  or  medicines.  The  dis- 
charge of  her  filial  duties  occupied  the  whole  of  her 
time  and  all  her  thoughts.  She  was  his  only  nurse, 
and  for  the  last  two  years  they  lived  without  a  ser- 
vant. She  prepared  his  scanty  meal,  she  bathed  his 
480 


THE  FRIEND. 


471 


aching  limbs,  and   though  weak  and  delicate  from 

constant  confinement  and  the  poison  of  melancholy 

had  acquired  an  unusual  power  in  her 

arms,  from  the  habil  of  lifting  her  old  and  suffering 

father  out  of  and  into  his  bed  of  pain.  Thus  passed 
away  her  early  youth  in  sorrow:  she  grew  Up  in 
tears,  a  stranger  to  the  amusements  of"  youth,  and  its 
more  delightful  schemes  and  imaginations.  She  u  as 
not,  however,  unhappy:  she  attributed,  ind 
merit  to  herself  for  her  virtues,  but  for  that  reason 
were  they  the  more  her  reward.  The  peaa 
passelh  all  understanding,  disclosed  itself  in  all  her 
looks  and  movements.  It  lay  on  her  countenance, 
like  a  steady  unshadowed  moonlight;  and  her  voice, 
which  was  naturally  at  once  sweet  and  subtle,  came 
from  her,  like  the  tine  flute-tones  of  a  masterly  per- 
former which  still  floating  at  some  uncertain  distance, 
seem  to  he  created  by  the  player,  rather  than  to  pro- 
ceed from  the  instrument.  If  you  had  listened  to  it 
in  one  of  those  brief  sabbaths  of  the  soul,  when  the 
activity  and  discursiveness  of  the  thoughts  are  sus- 
pended, and  the  mind  quietly  eddies  round,  instead 
of  flowing  onward — (as  at  late  evening  in  the  spring 
I  have  seen  a  bat  wheel  in  silent  circles  round  and 
round  a  fruit-tree  in  full  blossom,  in  the  midst  of 
which,  as  within  a  close  tent  of  the  purest  white,  an 
unseen  nightingale  was  piping  its  sweetest  notes) — in 
such  a  mood  you  might  have  half-fancied,  half-felt, 
that  her  voice  had  a  separate  being  of  its  own — that 
it  was  a  living  something,  whose  mode  of  existence 
was  for  the  ear  only :  so  deep  was  her  resignation, 
so  entirely  had  it  become  the  unconscious  habit  of 
her  nature,  and  in  all  she  did  or  said,  so  perfectly 
were  both  her  movements  and  her  utterance  without 
effort  and  without  the  appearance  of  effort!  Her 
dying  father's  last  words,  addressed  to  the  clergyman 
who  attended  him,  were  his  grateful  testimony,  that 
during  his  long  and  sore  trial  his  good  Maria  had  be- 
haved to  him  like  an  angel :  that  the  most  disagreea- 
ble offices  and  the  least  suited  to  her  age  and  sex, 
had  never  drawn  an  unwilling  look  from  her,  and 
that  whenever  his  eye  had  met  her's,  ho  had  been 
sure  to  see  in  it  either  the  tear  of  pity  or  the  sudden 
smile  expressive  of  her  affection  and  wish  to  cheer 
him.  God  (said  he)  will  reward  the  good  girl  for  all 
her  long  dutifulness  to  me  !  lie  departed  during  the 
inward  prayer,  which  followed  these  his  last  words. 
His  wish  will  be  fulfilled  in  eternity;  but  tor  this 
world  the  prayer  of  the  dying  man  was  not  heard. 

Maria  sate  and  wept  by  the  grave,  which  now  con- 
tained her  father,  her  friend,  the  only  bond  by  which 
she  was  linked  to  life.  But  while  yet  the  last  sound 
of  his  death-bell  was  murmuring  away  in  the  air,  she 
was  obliged  to  return  with  two  Revenue  Officers, 
who  demanded  entrance  into  the  house,  in  order  to 
take  possession  of  the  papers  of  the  deceased,  and 
from  them  to  discover  whether  he  had  always  given 
in  his  income,  and  paid  the  yearly  income  tax  accord- 
ing to  his  oath,  and  in  proportion  to  his   property.* 

♦This  tax  called  the  Losung  or  Ransom,  in  Nuremburg, 
was  at  first  a  voluntary  contribution :  every  one  gave  ac- 
cording to  bis  liking  or  circumstances  ;  but  in  the  beginning 
of  the  15th  century  the  heavy  contribution  levied  for  the  eer- 


After  the  few  documents  had  been  looked  through 
and  collated  with  the  registers,  the  officers  found,  or 
pretended  to  find,  sufficient  proofs,  that  the  deceased 
had  not  paid  his  tax  proportionally,  which  imposed 
on  them  the  duty  to  pul  all  the  effects  under  lock  and 
seal.  They  therefore  desired  the  maiden  to  retire  to 
an  empty  room,  till  the  Ransom  Office  had  decided 
on  the  affair.  Bred  up  in  Buffering,  and  habituated 
to  immediate  compliance,  the  affrighted  and  weeping 
maiden  obeyed.  She  hastened  to  the  empty  garret, 
while  the  Revenue  Officers  placed  the  lock  and  seal 
upon  the  other  doors,  and  finally  took  away  the  pa- 
pers to  the  Ransom  Office. 

Not  before  evening  did  the  poor  faint  Maria,  ex- 
hausted with  weeping,  rouse  herself  with  the  inten- 
tion of  going  to  her  bed  :  but  she  found  the  door  of 
her  chamber  sealed  up  and  must  pass  the  night  on 
the  floor  of  the  garret.  The  officers  had  had  the  hu- 
manity to  place  at  the  door  the  small  portion  of  food 
that  happened  to  be  in  the  bouse.  Thus  passed  sev- 
eral days,  till  the  officers  returned  with  an  order  that 
Maria  Eleonora  Schoxixg  should  leave  the  house 
without  delay,  the  commission  Court  having  confis- 
cated the  whole  property  to  the  City  Treasury.  The 
father  before  he  was  bed-ridden  had  never  possessed 
any  considerable  property;  but  yet,  by  his  industry, 
had  been  able  not  only  to  keep  himself  i'ree  from 
debt,  but  to  lay  tip  a  small  sum  for  the  evil  day. 
Three  years  of  evil  days,  three  whole  years  of  sick- 
ness, had  consumed  the  greatest  part  of  this;  yet  still 
enough  remained  not  only  to  defend  his  daughter 
from  immediate  want,  but  likewise  to  maintain  her 
till  she  could  get  into  some  service  or  employment, 
and  have  recovered  her  spirits  sufficiently  to  bear  up 
against  the  hardships  of  life.  With  this  thought  the 
dying  father  comforted  himself,  and  this  hope  too 
proved  vain ! 

A  timid  girl,  whose  past  life  had  been  made  up  of 
sorrow  and  privation,  she  went  indeed  to  solicit  the 
commissioners  in  her  own  behalf;  but  these  were,  as 
is  mostly  the  case  on  the  Continent,  advocates — the 
most  hateful  class,  perhaps,  of  human  society,  harden- 
ed by  the  frequent  sight  of  misery,  and  seldom  supe- 
rior in  moral  character  to  English  pettifoggers  or  Old 
Bailev  attorneys.  She  went  to  them,  indeed,  but  not 
a  word  could  she  say  for  herself.  Her  tears  and  in- 
articulate sounds — for  these  her  judges  had  no  ears 
or  eyes.  Mute  and  confounded,  like  an  unfledged 
dove  fallen  out  from  its  mother's  nest,  Maria  betook 
herself  to  her  home,  and  found  the  house-door  too 
now  shut  upon  her.    Her  whole  wealth  consisted  in 

vice  of  the  empire,  forced  the  magistrates  to  determine  the 
proportions  and  make  the  payment  compulsory.  At  the  time 
in  which  ibis  event  took  place,  1787,  every  citizen  must  year- 
ly take  what  was  called  his  Ransom  Oath  (liOsungseid)  that 
the  sum  paid  by  him  had  been  in  the  strict  determinate  pro- 
portion to  his  property.  On  the  death  of  any  citizen,  the 
Ransom  Ofhce,  or  commissioners  for  this  income  or  property 
tax,  possess  the  right  to  examine  his  books  and  papers,  and 
to  compare  his  yearly  payment  as  found  in  their  registers  with 
the  property  he  appears  to  have  possessed  during  that  time. 
If  any  disproportion  appeared,  if  the  yearly  declarations  of 
the  deceased  should  have  been  inaccurate  in  the  least  degree, 
his  whole  effects  are  confiscated,  and  though  he  should  have 
left  wife  and  child  the  state  treasury  becomes  his  heir. 
481 


472 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


the  clothes  she  wore.  She  had  no  relations  to  whom 
she  could  apply,  for  those  of  her  mother  had  disclaim- 
ed all  acquaintance  with  her,  and  her  father  was  a 
Nether  Saxon  by  birth.  She  had  no  acquaintance, 
for  all  the  friends  of  old  Schoning  had  forsaken  him 
in  the  first  year  of  his  sickness.  She  had  no  play-fel- 
low, for  who  was  likely  to  have  been  the  companion 
of  a  nurse  in  the  room  of  a  sick  man  ?  Surely,  since 
the  creation  never  was  a  human  being  more  solitary 
and  forsaken,  than  this  innocent  poor  creature,  that 
now  roamed  about  friendless  in  a  populous  city,  to 
the  whole  of  whose  inhabitants  her  filial  tenderness, 
her  patient  domestic  goodness,  and  all  her  soft  yet 
difficult  virtues,  might  well  have  been  the  model. 

"  But  homeless  near  a  thousand  homes  she  stood. 
And  near  a  thousand  tables  pined  and  wanted  food!" 

The  night  came,  and  Maria  knew  not  where  to  find 
a  shelter.  She  tottered  to  the  church-yard  of  the  St. 
James'  Church  in  Nuremburg,  where  the  body  of  her 
father  rested.  Upon  the  yet  grassless  grave  she 
threw  herself  down ;  and  could  anguish  have  pre- 
vailed over  youth,  that  night  she  had  been  in  heaven. 
The  day  came,  and  like  a  guilty  thing,  this  guiltless, 
this  good  being,  stole  away  from  the  crowd  that  be- 
gan to  pass  through  the  church-yard,  and  hastening 
through  the  streets  to  the  city  gale,  she  hid  herself 
behind  a  garden  hedge  just  beyond  it,  and  there  wept 
away  the  second  day  of  her  desolation.  The  evening 
closed  in :  the  pang  of  hunger  made  itself  felt  amid 
the  dull  aching  of  self-wearied  anguish,  and  drove 
the  sufferer  back  again  into  the  city.  Yet  what  could 
she  gain  there  ?  She  had  not  the  courage  to  beg,  and 
the  very  thought  of  stealing  never  occurred  to  her 
innocent  mind.  Scarce  conscious  whither  she  was 
going,  or  why  she  went,  she  found  herself  once  more 
by  her  father's  grave,  as  the  last  relict  of  evening 
faded  away  in  the  horizon.  I  have  sate  for  some  min- 
utes with  my  pen  resting :  I  can  scarce  summon  the 
courage  to  tell,  what  I  scarce  know,  whether  I  ought 
to  tell.  Were  I  composing  a  tale  of  fiction,  the  reader 
might  justly  suspect  the  purity  of  my  own  heart,  and 
most  certainly  would  have  abundant  right  to  resent 
such  an  incident,  as  an  outrage  wantonly  offered  to 
his  imagination.  As  I  think  of  the  circumstance,  it 
seems  more  like  a  distempered  dream  :  but  alas !  what 
is  guilt  so  detestable  other  than  a  dream  of  madness, 
that  worst  madness,  the  madness  of  the  heart  ?  I  can- 
not but  believe,  that  the  dark  and  restless  passions 
must  first  have  drawn  the  mind  in  upon  themselves, 
and  as  with  the  confusion  of  imperfect  sleep,  have  in 
some  strange  manner  taken  away  the  sense  of  reality, 
in  order  to  render  it  possible  for  a  human  being  to 
perpetrate  what  it  is  too  certain  that  human  beings 
have  perpetrated.  The  church-yards  in  most  of  the 
German  cities,  and  too  often,  I  fear,  in  those  of  our 
own  country,  are  not  more  injurious  to  health  than  to 
morality.  Their  former  venerable  character  is  no 
more.  The  religion  of  the  place  has  followed  its  su- 
perstitions, and  their  darkness  and  loneliness  tempt 
worse  spirits  to  roam  in  them  than  those  whose  night- 
ly wanderings  appalled  the  believing  hearts  of  our 
brave  forefathers !  It  was  close  by  the  new-made 
grave  of  her  father,  that  the  meek  and  spotless  daugh- 


ter became  the  victim  to  brutal  violence,  which 
weeping  and  watching  and  cold  and  hunger  had  ren- 
dered her  utterly  unable  to  resist.  The  monster  left 
her  in  a  trance  of  stupefaction,  and  into  her  right 
hand,  which  she  had  clenched  convulsively,  he  had 
forced  a  half-dollar. 

It  was  one  of  the  darkest  nights  of  autumn :  in  the 
deep  and  dead  silence  the  only  sounds  audible  were 
the  slow,  blunt  ticking  of  the  church  clock,  and  now 
and  then  the  sinking  down  of  bones  in  the  nigh  char- 
nel  house.  Maria,  when  she  had  in  some  degree  re- 
covered her  senses,  sate  upon  the  grave  near  which 
—not  her  innocence  had  been  sacrificed,  but  that 
which,  from  the  frequent  admonitions,  and  almost  the 
dying  words  of  her  father,  she  had  been  accustomed 
to  consider  as  such.  Guiltless,  she  felt  the  pangs  of 
guilt,  and  still  continued  to  grasp  the  coin,  which  the 
monster  had  left  in  her  hand,  with  an  anguish  as  sore 
as  if  it  had  been  indeed  the  wages  of  voluntary  pros- 
titution. Giddy  and  faint  from  want  of  food,  her 
brain  became  feverish  from  sleeplessness,  and  this 
unexampled  concurrence  of  calamities,  this  compli- 
cation and  entanglement  of  misery  in  misery !  she 
imagined  that  she  heard  her  father's  voice  bidding  her 
leave  his  sight.  His  last  blessings  had  been  condi- 
tional, for  in  his  last  hours  he  had  told  her,  that  the 
loss  of  her  innocence  would  not  let  him  rest  quiet  in 
his  grave.  His  last  blessings  now  sounded  in  her 
ears  like  curses,  and  she  fled  from  the  church-yard  as 
if  a  demon  had  been  chasing  her;  and  hurrying 
along  the  streets,  through  which  it  is  probable  her  ac- 
cursed violator  had  walked  with  quiet  and  orderly 
step  *  to  his  place  of  rest  and  security,  she  was  seized 
by  the  watchman  of  the  night — a  welcome  prey,  as 
they  receive  in  Nuremburg  half  a  gulden  from  the 
police  chest,  for  every  woman  that  they  find  in  the 
streets  after  ten  o'clock  at  night.  It  was  midnight, 
and  she  was  taken  to  the  next  watch-house. 

The  sitting  magistrate,  before  whom  she  was  car- 


*  It  must  surely  have  been  after  hearing  or  of  witnessing 
some  similar  event  or  scene  of  wretchedness,  hat  the  most 
eloquent  of  our  Writers  (I  had  almost  said  of  our  Poets) 
Jeremy  Taylor,  wrote  the  following  paragraph,  which  at 
least  in  Longinus's  sense  of  the  word,  we  may  place  among 
the  most  sublime  passages  in  English  Literature.  "  He  that 
is  no  fool,  but  can  consider  wisely,  if  he  be  in  love  with  this 
world  we  need  not  despair  but  that  a  witty  man  might  recon- 
cile him  with  tortures,  and  make  him  think  charitably  of  the 
rack,  and  be  brought  to  admire  the  harmony  that  is  made  by 
a  herd  of  evening  wolves  when  they  miss  their  draught  of 
blood  in  their  midnight  revels.  The  groans  of  a  man  in  a  fit 
of  the  stone  are  worse  than  all  these  ;  and  the  distractions  of 
a  troubled  conscience  are  worse  than  those  groans:  and  yet 
a  careless  merry  sinner  is  worse  than  all  that.  But  if  we 
could  fiom  one  of  the  battlements  of  Heaven  espy,  how  many 
men  and  women  at  this  time  lie  fainting  and  dying  for  want 
of  bread ,  how  many  young  men  are  hewn  down  by  the 
sword  of  war ;  how  many  orphans  are  now  weeping  over  the 
graves  of  their  father,  by  whose  life  they  were  enabled  to  eat; 
if  we  could  but  hear  how  many  mariners  and  passengers  are 
at  this  present  time  in  a  storm,  and  shriek  out  because  their 
keel  dashes  against  a  rock,  or  bulges  under  them  ;  how  many 
people  there  are  that  weep  with  want,  and  are  mad  with  op- 
pression, or  are  desperate  by  a  too  quick  sense  of  a  constant 
infelicity  ;  in  all  reason  we  should  be  glad  to  be  out  of  the 
noise  and  participation  of  so  many  evils.  This  is  a  place  of 
sorrow  and  tears,  of  great  evils  and  constant  calamities:  let 
us  remove  hence,  at  least  in  affections  and  preparations  of 

mind. Holy  Dying,  Chap.  1.  Sect.  5. 

482 


THE  FRIEND. 


473 


lied  the  next  morning,  prefaced  his  question  with  the 
most  opprobrious  title  that  ever  belonged  to  the  most 
hardened  street-walkers,  and  which  man  born  of 
woman  should  not  address  even  to  these,  were  it  but 
for  his  own  sake.  The  frightful  name  awakened  the 
poor  orphan  from  her  dream  of  guilt,  it  brought  back 
the  consciousness  of  her  innocence,  but  with  it  the 
sense  likewise  of  her  wrongs  and  of  her  helplessness. 
The  cold  hand  of  death  seemed  to  grasp  her,  she 
fainted  dead  away  at  his  feet,  and  was  not  without 
difficulty  recovered.  The  magistrate  was  so  far  soft- 
ened, and  only  so  far,  as  to  dismiss  her  for  the  pre- 
sent ;  but  with  a  menace  of  sending  her  to  the  House 
of  Correction  if  she  were  brought  before  him  a  se- 
cond time.  The  idea  of  her  own  innocence  now  be- 
came uppermost  in  her  mind  ;  but  mingling  with  the 
thought  of  her  utter  forlornness,  and  the  image  of  her 
angry  lather,  and  doubtless  still  in  a  state  of  bewil- 
derment, she  formed  the  resolution  of  drowning  her- 
self in  the  river  Pegnitz — in  order  (for  this  was  the 
shape  which  her  fancy  had  taken)  to  throw  herself 
at  her  father's  feet,  and  to  justify  her  innocence  to 
him  in  the  World  of  Spirits.  She  hoped  that  her  fa- 
ther would  speak  for  her  to  the  Saviour,  and  that  she 
should  be  forgiven.  But  as  she  was  passing  through 
the  suburb,  she  was  met  by  a  soldier's  wife,  who 
during  the  life-time  of  her  father  had  been  occasion- 
ally employed  in  the  house  as  a  char-woman.  This 
poor  woman  was  startled  at  the  disordered  apparel, 
and  more  disordered  looks  of  her  young  mistress,  and 
questioned  her  with  such  an  anxious  and  heartfelt 
tenderness,  as  at  once  brought  back  the  poor  orphan 
to  her  natural  feelings  and  the  obligations  of  religion. 
As  a  frightened  child  throws  itself  into  the  arms  of 
its  mother,  and  hiding  its  head  on  her  breast,  half 
tells  amid  sobs  what  has  happened  to  it,  so  did  she 
throw  herself  on  the  neck  of  the  woman  who  had 
uttered  the  first  words  of  kindness  to  her  since  her 
father's  death,  and  with  loud  weeping  she  related 
what  she  bad  endured  and  what  she  was  about  to 
have  done,  told  her  all  her  affliction  and  misery,  the 
wormwood  and  the  gall!  Her  kind-hearted  friend 
mingled  tears  with  tears,  pressed  the  poor  forsaken- 
one  to  her  heart ;  comforted  her  with  sentences  out 
of  the  hymn-book ;  and  with  the  most  affectionate 
entreaties  conjured  her  to  give  up  her  horrid  purpose, 
for  that  life  was  short,  and  heaven  was  for  ever. 

Maria  had  been  bred  up  in  the  fear  of  God :  she 
now  trembled  at  the  thought  of  her  former  purpose, 
and  followed  her  friend  Harlin,  for  that  was  the  name 
of  her  guardian  angel,  to  her  home  hard  by.  The 
moment  she  entered  the  door  she  sank  down  and  lay 
at  her  full  length,  as  if  only  to  be  motionless  in  a 
place  of  shelter  had  been  the  fulness  of  delight.  As 
when  a  withered  leaf,  that  has  been  long  whirled 
about  by  the  gusts  of  autumn,  is  blown  into  a  cave 
or  hollow  tree,  it  stops  suddenly,  and  all  at  once  looks 
the  very  image  of  quiet — such  might  this  poor  orphan 
appear  to  the  eye  of  a  meditative  imagination. 

A  place  of  shelter  she  had  attained,  and  a  friend 
willing  to  comfort  her,  all  that  she  could:  but  the 
noble-hearted  Harlin  was  herself  a  daughter  of  cala- 
mity, one  who  from  year  to  year  must  lie  down  in 


weariness  and  rise  up  to  labor;  for  whom  this  world 
provides  no  other  comfort  but  sleep  which  enables 
them  to  forget  it;  no  other  physician  but  death, 
which  takes  them  out  of  it !  She  was  married  to  one 
of  the  city  guards,  who,  like  Maria's  father,  had  been 
long  sick  and  bed-ridden.  Him,  herself,  and  two  lit- 
tle children,  she  had  to  maintain  by  washing  and 
charing;*  and  sometime  after  Maria  had  been  domes- 
ticated with  them,  Harlin  told  her  that  she  herself 
had  been  once  driven  to  a  desperate  thought  by  the 
cry  of  her  hungry  children,  during  a  want  of  employ- 
ment, and  that  she  had  been  on  the  point  of  killing 
one  of  the  little  ones,  and  then  surrendering  herself 
into  the  hands  of  justice.  In  this  manner,  she  had 
conceived,  all  would  be  well  provided  for;  the  sur- 
viving child  would  be  admitted,  as  a  matter  of  course, 
into  the  Orphan  House,  and  her  husband  into  the 
Hospital ;  while  she  herself  would  have  atoned  for 
her  act  by  a  public  execution,  and  together  with  the 
child  that  she  had  destroyed,  would  have  passed  into 
a  state  of  bliss.  All  this  she  related  to  Maria,  and 
those  tragic  ideas  left  but  too  deep  and  lasting  im- 
pression on  her  mind.  Weeks  after,  she  herself  re- 
newed the  conversation,  by  expressing  to  her  bene- 
factress her  inability  to  conceive  how  it  was  possible 
for  one  human  being  to  take  away  the  life  of  another, 
especially  that  of  an  innocent  little  child.  For  that 
reason,  replied  Harlin,  because  it  was  so  innocent 
and  so  good,  I  wished  to  put  it  out  of  this  wicked 
world.  Thinkest  thou  then  that  I  would  have  my 
head  cut  off  for  the  sake  of  a  wicked  child  ?  There- 
fore it  was  little  Nan,  that  I  meant  to  have  taken 
with  me,  who,  as  you  see,  is  always  so  sweet  and  pa- 
tient ;  little  Frank  has  already  his  humors  and  naughty 
tricks,  and  suits  better  for  this  world.  This  was  the 
answer.  Maria  brooded  awhile  over  it  in  silence, 
then  passionately  snatched  the  children  up  in  her 
arms,  as  if  she  would  protect  them  against  their  own 
mother. 

For  one  whole  year  the  orphan  lived  with  the  sol- 
dier's wife,  and  by  their  joint  labors  barely  kept  off* 
absolute  want.  As  a  little  boy  (almost  a  child  in  size, 
though  in  his  thirteenth  year)  once  told  me  of  him- 
self, as  he  was  guiding  me  up  the  Brocken,  in  the 
Hartz  Forest,  they  had  but  "little  of  that,  of  which  a 
great  deal  tells  but  for  little."  But  now  came  the  se- 
cond winter,  and  with  it  came  bad  times,  a  season  of 
trouble  for  this  poor  and  meritorious  household.  The 
wife  now  fell  sick:  too  constant  and  too  hard  labor, 
too  scanty  and  too  irmutritious  food,  had  gradually 
wasted  away  her  strength.  Maria  redoubled  her 
efforts  in  order  to  provide  bread  and  fuel  for  their 
washing  which  they  took  in ;  but  the  task  was  above 
her  powers.  Besides,  she  was  so  timid  and  so  agi- 
tated at  the  sight  of  strangers,  that  sometimes,  with 
the  best  good-will,  she  was  left  without  employment 
One  by  one,  every  article  of  the  least  value  which 
they  possessed  was  sold  off  except  the  bed  on  which 
the  husband  lay.  He  died  just  before  the  approach 
of  spring;  but  about  the  same  time  the  wife  gave 

*  I  am  ienorant,  whether  there  be  any  classical  authority 
for  this  word ;  but  I  know  nr>  other  word  that  expresses  oc- 
casional day  labor  in  the  houses  of  others. 

483 


474 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


signs  of  convalescence.  The  physician,  though  al- 
most as  poor  as  his  patients,  had  been  kind  to  them  : 
silver  and  gold  had  he  none,  but  he  occasionally 
brought  a  little  wine,  and  often  assured  them  that 
nothing  was  wanting  to  her  perfect  recovery,  but 
better  nourishment  and  a  little  wine  every  day.  This, 
however,  could  not  be  regularly  procured,  and  Ilar- 
lin's  spirits  sank,  and  as  her  bodily  pain  left  her  she 
became  more  melancholy,  silent,  and  self-involved. 
And  now  it  was  that  Maria's  mind  was  incessantly 
racked  by  the  frightful  apprehension,  that  her  friend 
might  be  again  meditating  the  accomplishment  of  her 
former  purpose.  She  had  grown  as  passionately  fond 
of  the  two  children  as  if  she  had  borne  them  under 
her  own  heart ;  but  the  jeopardy  in  which  she  con- 
ceived her  friend's  salvation  to  stand — litis  was  her 
predominant  thought.  For  all  the  hopes  and  fears, 
which  under  a  happier  lot  would  have  Been  asso- 
ciated with  the  objects  of  the  senses,  were  trans- 
ferred, by  Maria,  to  her  notions  and  images  of  a 
future  state. 

In  the  beginning  of  March,  one  bitter  cold  evening, 
Maria  started  up  and  suddenly  left  the  house.  The 
last  morsel  of  food  had  been  divided  betwixt  the  two 
children  for  their  breakfast ;  and  for  the  last  hour  or 
more  the  little  boy  had  been  crying  for  hunger, 
while  his  gentler  sister  had  been  hiding  her  face  in 
Maria's  lap,  and  pressing  her  little  body  against  her 
knees,  in  order  by  that  mechanic  pressure  to  dull  the 
aching  from  emptiness.  The  tender-hearted  and  vis- 
ionary maiden  had  watched  the  mother's  eye,  and 
had  interpreted  several  of  her  sad  and  steady  looks 
according  to  her  preconceived  apprehensions.  She 
had  conceived  all  at  once  the  strange  and  enthusias- 
tic thought,  that  she  would  in  some  way  or  other  offer 
her  own  soul  for  the  salvation  of  the  soul  of  her 
friend.  The  money,  which  had  been  left  in  her  hand, 
flashed  upon  the  eye  of  her  mind,  as  a  single  uncon- 
nected image:  and  faint  with  hunger  and  shivering 
with  cold,  she  sallied  forth  —  in  search  of  guilt! 
Awful  are  the  dispensations  of  the  Supreme,  and  in 
his  severest  judgments  the  hand  of  mercy  is  visible. 
It  was  a  night  so  wild  with  wind  and  rain,  or  rather 
rain  and  snow  mixed  together,  that  a  famished  wolf 
would  have  stayed  in  his  cave,  and  listened  to  a  howl 
more  fearful  than  his  own.  Forlorn  Maria!  thou 
wert  kneeling  in  pious  simplicity  at  the  grave  of  thy 
father,  and  thou  becamest  the  prey  of  a  monster! 
Innocent  thou  wert  and  without  guilt  didst  thou  re- 
main. Now  thou  goest  forth  of  thy  own  accord — but 
God  will  have  pity  on  thee!  Poor  bewildered  inno- 
cent! in  thy  spotless  imagination  dwelt  no  distinct 
conception  of  the  evil  which  thou  wentest  forth  to 
brave  !  To  save  the  soul  of  thy  friend  was  the  dream 
of  thy  feverish  brain,  and  thou  wert  again  appre- 
hended as  an  outcast  of  shameless  sensuality,  at  the 
moment  when  thy  too  spiritualized  fancy  was  busied 
with  the  glorified  forms  of  thy  friend  and  of  her  little 
ones  interceding  for  thee  at  the  throne  of  the  Re- 
deemer! 

At  this  moment  her  perturbed  fancy  suddenly  sug- 
gested to  her  a  new  mean  for  the  accomplishment  of 
her  purpose :  and  she  replied  to  the  night-watch,  who 


with  a  brutal  laugh  bade  her  expect  on  the  morrow 
the  unmanly  punishment,  which  to  the  disgrace  of 
human  nature  the  laws  of  Protestant  states  (alas! 
even  those  of  our  own  country,)  inflict  on  female  va- 
grants, that  she  came  to  deliver  herself  up  as  an 
infanticide.  She  was  instantly  taken  before  the  mag- 
istrate, through  as  wild  and  pitiless  a  storm  as  ever 
pelted  on  a  houseless  head !  through  as  black  and 
"tyrannous a  night,"  as  ever  aided  the  workings  of  a 
heated  brain  !  Here  she  confessed  that  she  had  been 
delivered  of  an  infant  by  the  soldier's  wife,  Ilarlin, 
that  she  deprived  it  of  life  in  the  presence  of  Harlin, 
and  according  to  a  plan  preconcerted  with  her,  and 
that  Harlin  had  buried  it  somewhere  in  the  wood,  but 
where  she  knew  not.  During  this  strange  tale  she 
appeared  to  listen  with  a  mixture  of  fear  and  satisfac- 
tion, to  the  howling  of  the  wind ;  and  never  sure 
could  a  confession  of  real  guilt  have  been  accom- 
panied by  a  more  dreadfully  appropriate  music.  At 
the  moment  of  her  apprehension  she  had  formed  the 
scheme  of  helping  her  friend  out  of  the  world  in  a 
state  of  innocence.  When  the  soldier's  widow  was 
confronted  with  the  orphan,  and  the  latter  had  re- 
peated her  confession  to  her  face,  Harlin  answered  in 
these  words,  "  For  God's  sake,  Maria !  how  have  I 
deserved  this  of  thee?"  Then  turning  to  the  magis- 
trate, said,  "  I  know  nothing  of  this."  This  was  the 
sole  answer  which  she  gave,  and  not  another  word 
could  they  extort  from  her.  The  instruments  of  tor- 
ture were  brought,  and  Harlin  was  warned,  that  if 
she  did  not  confess  of  her  own  accord,  the  truth 
would  be  immediately  forced  from  her.  This  menace 
convulsed  Maria  Schoning  with  affright:  her  inten- 
tion had  been  to  emancipate  herself  and  her  friend 
from  a  life  of  unmixed  suffering,  without  the  crime 
of  suicide  in  either,  and  with  no  guilt  at  all  on  the 
part  of  her  friend.  The  thought  of  her  friend's  being 
put  to  the  torture  had  not  occurred  to  her.  Wildly 
and  eagerly  she  pressed  her  lriend's  hands,  already 
bound  in  preparation  for  the  torture — she  pressed 
them  in  agony  between  her  own,  and  said  to  her, 
"Anna!  confess  it!  Anna,  dear  Anna!  it  will  then 
be  well  with  all  of  us!  and  Frank  and  little  Nan 
will  be  put  into  the  Orphan  House !  Maria's  scheme 
now  passed,  like  a  flash  of  lightning  through  the  wi- 
dow's mind,  she  acceded  to  it  at  once,  kissed  Maria 
repeatedly,  and  then  serenely  turning  her  face  to  the 
judge,  acknowledged  that  she  had  added  to  the  guilt 
by  so  obstinate  a  denial,  that  all  her  friend  had  said, 
had  been  true,  save  only  that  she  had  thrown  the 
dead  infant  into  the  river,  and  not  buried  it  in  the 
wood. 

They  were  both  committed  to  prison,  and  as  they 
both  persevered  in  their  common  confession,  the  pro- 
cess was  soon  made  out  and  the  condemnation  fol- 
lowed the  trial :  and  the  sentence,  by  which  they 
were  both  to  be  beheaded  with  the  sword,  was  order- 
ed to  be  put  in  force  on  the  next  day  but  one.  On  the 
morning  of  the  execution,  the  delinquents  were 
brought  together,  in  order  that  they  might  be  recon- 
ciled with  each  other,  and  join  in  common  prayer  for 
forgiveness  of  their  common  guilt. 

But  now  Maria's  thoughts  took  another  turn.  The 
484 


THE  FRIEND. 


475 


idea  that  her  benefactress,  that  so  very  good  a  wo- 
man, should  be  violently  put  out  of  life,  and  this  with 
an  infamy  on  her  name  which  would  cling  for  ever 
to  the  little  orphans,  overpowered  her.  Her  own  ex- 
cessive desire  to  die  scarcely  prevented  her  from  dis- 
covering the  whole  plan;  and  when  Ilarlin  was  left 
alone  with  her,  and  she  saw  her  friend's  calm  and 
affectionate  look,  her  fortitude  was  dissolved:  she 
burst  into  a  loud  and  passionate  weeping,  and  throw- 
ing herself  into  her  friend's  arms,  with  convulsive 
sobs  she  entreated  her  forgiveness.  Ilarlin  pressed 
the  poor  agonized  girl  to  her  arms;  like  a  tender  mo- 
ther, she  kissed  and  fondled  her  wet  cheeks,  and  in 
the  most  solemn  and  emphatic  tones  assured  her,  that 
there  was  nothing  to  forgive.  On  the  contrary,  she 
was  her  greatest  benefactress  and  the  instrument  of 
God's  goodness  to  remove  her  at  once  from  a  misera- 
ble world  and  from  the  temptation  of  committing  a 
heavy  crime.  In  vain !  Her  repeated  promises  that 
she  would  answer  before  God  for  them  both,  could 
not  pacify  the  tortured  conscience  of  Maria,  till  at 
length  the  presence  of  a  clergyman  and  the  prepara- 
tions for  receiving  the  sacrament  occasioned  the  wi- 
dow to  address  her  thus — "See,  Maria!  this  is  the 
Body  and  Bloed  of  Christ,  which  takes  away  all  sin  ! 
Let  us  partake  together  of  this  holy  repast  with  full 
trust  in  God  and  joyful  hope  of  our  approaching  hap- 
piness." These  words  of  comfort,  uttered  with  cheer- 
ing tones,  and  accompanied  with  a  look  of  inexpressi- 
ble tenderness  and  serenity,  brought  back  peace  for 
a  while  to  her  troubled  spirit.  They  communicated 
together,  and  on  parting,  the  magnanimous  woman 
once  more  embraced  her  young  friend  :  then  stretch- 
ing her  hand  toward  Heaven,  said,  "  Be  tranquil,  Ma- 
ria! by  to-morrow  morning  we  are  there,  and  all  our 
sorrows  stay  here  behind  us." 

I  hasten  to  the  scene  of  execution:  for  I  anticipate 
my  reader's  feelings  in  the  exhaustion  of  my  own 
heart.  Serene  and  with  unaltered  countenance  the 
lofty-minded  Ilarlin  heard  the  strokes  of  the  death- 
bell,  stood  before  the  scaffold  while  the  staff  was  bro- 
ken over  her,  and  at  length  ascended  the  steps,  all 
with  a  steadiness  and  tranquillity  of  manner  which 
was  not  more  distant  from  fear  than  from  defiance 
and  bravado.  Altogether  different  was  the  state  of 
pour  Maria:  with  shattered  nerves  and  an  agonizing 
conscience  that  incessantly  accused  her  as  the  mur- 
deress of  her  friend,  she  did  not  walk  but  staggered 
towards  the  scaffold,  and  stumbled  up  the  steps. 
While  Ilarlin,  who  went  first,  at  every  step  turned 
her  head  round  and  still  whispered  to  her,  raising  her 
eyes  to  heaven, — "but  a  few  minutes,  Maria!  and 
we  are  there !"  On  the  scaffold  she  again  bade  her 
farewell,  again  repeating,  "Dear  Maria!  but  one 
minute  now,  and  we  are  together  with  God."  But 
when  she  knelt  down  and  her  neck  was  bared  for 
the  stroke,  the  unhappy  girl  lost  all  self-command,  and 
with  a  loud  and  piercing  shriek  she  bade  them  hold 
and  not  murder  the  innocent.  "She  is  innocent!  I 
have  borne  false  witness!  I  alone  am  the  murderess!" 
She  rolled  herself  now  at  the  feet  of  the  executioner, 
and  now  at  those  of  the  clergyman,  and  conjured 
Rr 


them  to  stop  the  execution :  that  the  whole  story  had 
been  invented  by  herself;  that  she  had  never  brought 
forth,  much  less  destroyed  an  infant ;  that  for  her 
friend's  sake  she  had  made  this  discovery ;  that  lor 
herself  she  wished  to  die,  and  would  die  gladly,  if 
they  would  take  away  her  friend,  and  promise  to  free 
her  soul  from  the  dreadful  agony  of  having  murdered 
her  friend  by  false  witness.  The  executioner  asked 
Ilarlin,  if  there  were  any  truth  in  what  Maria  Scho- 
ning  had  said.  The  Heroine  answered  with  mani- 
fest reluctance:  "most  assuredly  she  has  said  the 
truth:  I  confessed  myself  guilty,  because  I  wished  to 
die  and  thought  it  best  for  both  of  us :  and  now  that 
my  hope  is  on  the  moment  of  its  accomplishment,  I 
cannot  be  supposed  to  declare  myself  innocent  for 
the  sake  of  saving  my  life — but  any  wretchedness  is 
to  be  endured  rather  than  that  poor  creature  should 
be  hurried  out  of  the  world  in  a  state  of  despair." 

The  outcry  of  the  attending  populace  prevailed  to 
suspend  the  execution :  a  report  was  sent  to  the  as- 
sembled magistrates,  and  in  the  mean  time  one  of  the 
priests  reproached  the  widow  in  bitter  words  for  her 
former  false  confession.  "  What,"  she  replied  stern- 
ly, but  without  anger,  "  what  could  the  truth  have 
availed  ?  Before  I  perceived  my  friend's  purpose  I 
did  deny  it :  my  assurance  was  pronounced  an  impu- 
dent lie :  I  was  already  bound  for  the  torture,  and  so 
bound  that  the  sinews  of  my  hands  started,  and  one 
of  their  worships  in  the  large  white  peruke,  threaten- 
ed that  he  would  have  me  stretched  till  the  sun  shone 
through  me!  and  that  then  I  should  cry  out,  Yes, 
when  it  was  too  late."  The  priest  was  hard-hearted 
or  superstitious  enough  to  continue  his  reproofs,  to 
which  the  noble  woman  condescended  no  further  an- 
swer. The  other  clergyman,  however,  was  both 
more  rational  and  more  humane.  He  succeeded  in 
silencing  his  colleague,  and  the  former  half  of  the 
long  hour,  which  the  magistrates  took  in  making 
speeches  on  the  improbability  of  the  tale  instead  of 
re-examining  the  culprits  in  person,  he  employed  in 
gaining  from  the  widow  a  connected  account  of  all 
the  circumstances,  and  in  listening  occasionally  to 
Maria's  passionate  descriptions  of  all  her  friend's 
goodness  and  magnanimity.  For  she  had  gained  an 
influx  of  life  and  spirit  from  the  assurance  in  her 
mind,  both  that  she  had  now  rescued  Ilarlin  from 
death  and  was  about  to  expiate  the  guilt  of  her  pur- 
pose by  her  own  execution.  For  the  latter  half  of 
the  time  the  clergyman  remained  in  silence,  lost  in 
thought,  and  momently  expecting  the  return  of  the 
messenger.  All  which  during  the  deep  silence  of 
this  interval  could  be  heard,  was  one  exclamation  of 
Ilarlin  to  her  unhappy  friend — "  Oh,  Maria!  Maria ! 
couldst  thou  have  kept  up  thy  courage  hut  for  ano- 
ther minute,  we  should  have  been  now  in  heaven! 
The  messenger  came  back  with  an  order  from  the 

magistrates to  proceed  with  the  execution!   With 

re-animated  countenance  Harlin  placed  her  neck  on 
the  block,  and  her  head  was  severed  from  her  body 
amid  a  general  shriek  from  the  crowd.  The  execu- 
tioner limited  after  the  blow,  and  the  under-hangman 
was  ordered  to  take  his  place.  He  was  not  wanted. 
485 


476 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Maria  was  already  gone  :  her  body  was  found  as  cold 
as  if  she  had  been  dead  for  some  hours.  The  flower 
had  been  snapped  in  the  storm,  belbre  the  scythe  of 
violence  could  come  near  it. 


ESSAY   II, 


The  History  of  Times  representeth  the  magnitude  of  actiona 
and  the  public  faces  or  deportment  of  persons,  and  passeth 
over  in  silence  the  smaller  passages  and  motions  of  men 
and  matters.  But  such  being  the  workmanship  of  God, 
that  he  doth  hang  the  greatest  weight  upon  the  smallest 
wires,  maxima  e  minimis  suspendens  :  it  comes  therefore  to 
pass,  that  Histories  do  rather  set  forth  the  pomp  of  business 
than  the  true  and  inward  resorts  thereof.  But  Lives,  if 
they  be  well  wrilten,  propounding  to  themselves  a  person 
to  represent  in  whom  actions  both  greater  and  smaller,  pub- 
lic and  private,  have  a  commixture,  must  of  necessity  con- 
tain a  more  true,  native,  and  lively  representation. 

LORD  BACON. 


Mankind  in  general  are  so  little  in  the  habit  of 
looking  steadily  at  their  own  meaning,  or  of  weighing 
the  words  by  which  they  express  it,  that  the  writer, 
who  is  careful  to  do  both,  will  sometimes  mislead  his 
readers  through  the  very  excellence  which  qualifies 
him  to  be  their  instructor:  and  this  with  no  other 
fault  on  his  part,  than  the  modest  mistakeof  suppos- 
ing in  those,  to  whom  he  addresses  himself,  an  intel- 
lect as  watchful  as  his  own.  The  inattentive  Reader 
adopts  as  unconditionally  true,  or  perhaps  rails  at  his 
Author  for  having  staled  as  such,  what  upon  exami- 
nation would  be  found  to  have  been  duly  limited,  and 
would  so  have  been  understood,  if  opaque  spots  and 
false  refractions  were  as  rare  in  the  mental  as  in  the 
bodily  eye.  The  motto,  for  instance,  to  this  Paper 
has  more  than  once  served  as  an  excuse  and  authori- 
ty for  huge  volumes  of  biographical  minutiiE,  which 
renders  the  real  character  almost  invisible,  like  clouds 
of  dust  on  a  portrait,  or  the  counterfeit  frankincense 
which  smoke-blacks  the  favorite  idol  of  a  Catholic 
village.  Yet  Lord  Bacon,  by  the  words  which  I  have 
marked  in  italics,  evidently  confines  the  Biographer 
to  such  facts  as  are  either  susceptible  of  some  useful 
general  inference,  or  tend  to  illustrate  those  qualities 
which  distinguish  the  subject  of  them  from  ordinary 
men;  while  the  passage  in  general  was  meant  to 
guard  the  Historian  against  considering,  as  trifles,  all 
that  might  appear  so  to  those  who  recognize  no  great- 
ness in  the  mind,  and  can  conceive  no  dignity  in  any 
incident,  which  does  not  act  on  their  senses  by  its  ex- 
ternal accompaniments.  Things  apparently  insignifi- 
cant are  recommended  to  our  notice,  not  for  their 
own  sakes,  but  for  their  bearings  or  influences  on 
things  of  importance ;  in  oilier  words,  when  they  are 
insignificant  in  appearance  only. 

An  inquisitiveness  into  the  minutest  circumstances 
and  casual  sayings  of  eminent  contemporaries,  is  in- 
deed quite  natural ;  but  so  are  all  oar  follies,  and  the 
more  natural  they  are,  the  more  caution  should  we 
exert  in  guarding  against  them.  To  scribble  trifies 
even  on  the  perishable  glass  of  an  inn  window,  is  the 


mark  of  an  idler  ;  but  lo  engrave  them  on  the  mar- 
ble monument,  sacred  to  the  memory  of  the  departed 
Great,  is  something  worse  than  idleness.  The  spirit 
of  genuine  Biography  is  in  nothing  more  conspicuous, 
than  in  the  firmness  with  which  it  withstands  the 
cravings  of  worthless  curiosity,  as  distinguished  from 
the  thirst  after  useful  knowledge.  For,  in  the  first 
place,  such  anecdotes  as  derive  their  whole  and  sole 
interest  from  the  great  name  of  the  person  concern- 
ing whom  they  are  related,  and  neither  illustrate  his 
general  character  nor  his  particular  actions,  would 
scarcely  have  been  noticed  or  remembered  except  by 
men  of  weak  minds;  it  is  not  unlikely  therefore,  that 
they  were  misapprehended  at  the  time,  and  it  is  most 
probable  that  they  have  been  related  as  incorrectly 
as  they  were  noticed  injudiciously.  Nor  are  the  con- 
sequences of  such  garrulous  Biography  merely  nega- 
tive. For  as  insignificant  stories  can  derive  no  real 
respectability  from  the  eminence  of  the  person  who 
happens  to  be  the  subject  of  them,  but  rather  an  ad- 
ditional deformity  of  disproportion,  they  are  apt  to 
have  their  insipidity  seasoned  by  the  same  bad  pas- 
sions that  accompany  the  habit  of  gossiping  in  gene- 
ral ;  and  the  misapprehension  of  weak  men  meeting 
with  the  misinterpretations  of  malignant  men,  have 
not  seldom  formed  the  ground  of  the  most  grievous 
calumnies.  In  the  second  place,  these  trifles  are  sub- 
versive of  the  great  end  of  Biography,  which  is  to  fix 
the  attention,  and  to  interest  the  feelings,  of  men  on 
those  qualities  and  actions  which  have  made  a  parti- 
cular life  worthy  of  being  recorded.  It  is,  no  doubt, 
the  duty  of  an  honest  Biographer,  to  portray  the  pro- 
minent imperfections  as  well  as  excellencies  of  his 
Hero;  but  I  am  at  a  loss  to  conceive  how  this  can  be 
deemed  an  excuse  for  heaping  together  a  multitude 
of  particulars,  which  can  prove  nothing  of  any  man 
that  might  not  have  been  safely  taken  for  granted  of 
all  men.  In  the  present  age  (emphatically  the  age 
of  personality  !)  there  are  more  than  ordinary  motives 
for  withholding  all  encouragement  from  this  mania 
of  busying  ourselves  with  the  names  of  others,  which 
is  still  more  alarming  as  a  symptom,  than  it  is  trouble- 
some as  a  disease.  The  Reader  must  be  still  less  ac- 
quainted with  contemporary  literature  than  myself — 
a  case  not  likely  to  occur — if  he  needs  me  to  inform 
him,  that  there  are  men,  who  trading  in  the  silliest 
anecdotes,  in  unprovoked  abuse  and  senseless  eulo- 
gy, think  themselves  nevertheless  employed  both 
worthily  and  honorably,  if  only  all  this  be  done  "  in 
good  set  terms"  and  from  the  press,  and  of  public  cha- 
racters :  a  class  which  has  increased  so  rapidly  of 
late,  that  it  becomes  difficult  to  discover  what  cha- 
racters are  to  be  considered  as  private.  Alas!  if 
these  wretched  misusers  of  language,  and  the  means 
of  giving  wings  to  thought,  the  means  of  multiplying 
the  presence  of  an  individual  mind,  had  ever  known, 
how  great  a  thing  the  possession  of  any  one  simple 
truth  is,  and  how  mean  a  thing  a  mere  fact  is,  except 
as  seen  in  the  light  of  some  comprehensive  truth  ;  if 
they  had  but  once  experienced  the  unborrowed  com- 
placency, the  inward  independence,  the  home-bred 
strength,  with  which  every  clear  conception  of  the 
reason  is  accompanied  :  they  would  shrink  from  their 
486 


THE  FRIEND. 


477 


own  pages  as  at  the  remembrance  of  a  crime.  For  a 
crime  it  is,  (and  the  man  who  hesitates  in  pronounc- 
ing it  such,  must  be  ignorant  of  what  mankind  owe 
to  books,  what  he  himself  owes  to  them  in  spite  of 
his  ignorance)  thus  to  introduce  the  spirit  of  vulgar 
scandal  and  personal  inquietude  into  the  Closet  and 
the  Library,  environing  with  evil  passions  the  very 
Sanctuaries,  to  which  we  should  flee  for  refuge  from 
them!  For  to  what  do  these  Publications  appeal, 
whether  they  present  themselves  as  Biography  or  as 
anonymous  Criticism,  but  to  the  same  feelings  which 
the  scandal-bearers  and  time-killers  of  ordinary  life 
seek  to  gratify  in  themselves  and  their  listeners  ? 
And  both  the  authors  and  admirers  of  such  publica- 
tions, in  what  respect  are  they  less  truants  and  desert- 
ers from  their  own  hearts,  and  from  their  appointed 
task  of  understanding  and  amending  them,  than  the 
most  garrulous  female  Chronicler,  of  the  goings-on 
of  yesterday  in  the  families  of  her  neighbors  and 
townsfolk  ! 

The  Friend  has  reprinted  the  following  Biograph- 
ical sketch,  partly  indeed  in  the  hope  that  it  may  be 
the  means  of  introducing  to  the  Reader's  knowledge, 
in  case  he  should  not  have  formed  an  acquaintance 
with  them  already,  two  of  the  most  interesting  bio- 
graphical Works  in  our  language,  both  for  the  weight 
of  the  matter,  and  the  i/icuriosa  felicitas  of  the  style. 
1  refer  to  Roger  North's  Examen,  and  the  Life  of  his 
brother,  the  Lord  Chancellor  North.  The  pages  are 
all  alive  with  the  genuine  idioms  of  our  mother- 
tongue. 

A  fastidious  taste,  it  is  true,  will  find  offence  in  the 
occasional  vulgarisms,  or  what  we  now  call  slang, 
which  not  a  few  of  our  writers,  shortly  after  the  Re- 
storation of  Charles  the  Second,  seem  to  have  affect- 
ed as  a  mark  of  loyalty.  These  instances,  however, 
are  but  a  trifling  drawback.  They  are  not  sought  for, 
as  is  too  often  and  too  plainly  done  by  L'Estrange, 
Collyer,  Tom  Brown,  and  their  imitators.  North 
never  goes  out  of  his  way  either  to  seek  them  or  to 
avoid  them;  and  in  the  main  his  language  gives  us 
the  very  nerve,  pulse,  and  sinew  of  a  hearty,  healthy 
conversational  English. 

This  is  The  Friend's  first  reason  for  the  insertion 
of  this  Extract.  His  other  and  principal  motive  may 
be  found  in  the  kindly,  good-tempered  spirit  of  the 
passage.  But  instead  of  troubling  the  Reader  with 
the  painful  contrast  which  so  many  recollections  force 
on  my  own  feelings,  I  will  refer  the  character-makers 
of  the  present  day  to  the  Letters  of  Erasmus  and  Sir 
Thomas  More  to  Martin  Dorpius,  that  are  commonly 
annexed  to  the  Encomium  Moriae ;  and  then  for  a 
practical  comment  on  the  just  and  affecting  senti- 
ments of  these  two  great  men,  to  the  works  of  Roger 
North,  as  proofs  how  alone  an  English  scholar  and 
gentleman  will  permit  himself  to  delineate  his  con- 
temporaries even  under  the  strongest  prejudices  of 
party  spirit,  and  though  employed  on  the  coarsest  sub- 
jects. A  coarser  subject  than  L.  C.  J.  Saunders  can- 
not well  be  imagined  ;  nor  does  North  use  his  colors 
with  a  sparing  or  very  delicate  hand.  And  yet  the 
final  impression  is  that  of  kindness. 


EXTRACT   FROM    NORTH  S    EXAMEN. 

The  Lord  Chief  Justice  Saunders  succeeded  in  the 
room  of  Pemberton.  His  character,  and  his  begin- 
ning were  equally  strange.  He  was  at  first  no  better 
than  a  poor  boy,  if  not  a  parish-foundling,  without 
knowing  parents  or  relations.  He  had  found  a  way 
to  live  by  obsequiousness  in  Clement's  Inn,  as  I  re- 
member, and  courting  the  attorneys'  clerks  for  scraps. 
The  extraordinary  observance  and  diligence  of  the 
boy,  made  the  society  willing  to  do  him  good.  He 
appeared  very  ambitious  to  learn  to  write,  and  one  of 
the  attorneys  got  a  board  knocked  up  at  a  window  on 
the  top  of  a  stair-case;  and  that  was  his  desk,  where 
he  sat  and  wrote  after  copies  of  court,  and  other  hands 
the  clerks  gave  him.  He  made  himself  so  export  a 
writer  that  he  took  in -business,  and  earned  some 
pence  by  hackney-writing.  And  thus  by  degrees  he 
pushed  his  faculties  and  fell  to  forms,  and  by  books 
that  were  lent  him,  became  an  exquisite  entertaining 
clerk ;  and  by  the  same  course  of  improvement  of  him- 
self, an  able  counsel,  first  in  special  pleading,  then  at 
large :  after  he  was  called  to  the  Bar,  had  practice  in 
the  King's  Bench  Court  equal  with  any  there.  As 
to  his  person  he  was  very  corpulent  and  beastly,  a 
mere  lump  of  morbid  flesh.  He  used  to  say,  by  his 
troggs,  (such  an  humorous  way  of  talking  he  affect- 
ed) none  could  say  he  wanted  issue  of  his  body,  for 
he  had  nine  in  his  back.  He  was  a  fetid  mass,  that 
offended  his  neighbors  at  the  bar  in  the  sharpest  de- 
gree. Those  whose  ill-fortune  it  was  to  stand  near 
him,  were  confessors,  and  in  the  summer  time,  almost 
martyrs.  This  hateful  decay  of  his  carcase  came 
upon  him  by  continual  sottishness ;  for  to  say  nothing 
of  brandy,  he  was  seldom  without  a  pot  of  ale  at  his 
nose,  or  near  him.  That  exercise  was  all  that  he 
used ;  the  rest  of  his  life  was  sitting  at  his  desk  or  pip- 
ing at  home ;  and  that  home  was  a  tailor's  house,  in 
Butcher  Row,  called  his  lodging,  and  the  man's  wife 
was  his  nurse  or  worse  ;  but  by  virtue  of  his  money, 
of  which  he  had  made  little  account,  though  he  got 
a  great  deal,  he  soon  became  master  of  the  family; 
and  being  no  changeling  he  never  removed,  but  was 
true  to  his  friends,  and  they  to  him  to  the  last  hour  of 
his  life.  So  much  for  his  person  and  education.  As 
!  for  his  parts,  none  had  them  more  lively  than  he ;  wit 
and  repartee  in  an  affected  rusticity  were  natural  to 
him.  He  was  ever  ready  and  never  at  a  loss ;  and 
none  came  so  near  as  he  to  be  a  match  for  sergeant 
Mainerd.  His  great  dexterity  was  in  the  art  of  spe- 
cial pleading,  and  he  would  lay  snares  that  often 
caught  his  superiors  who  were  not  aware  of  his  traps. 
And  he  was  so  fond  of  success  for  his  clients,  that  ra- 
ther than  fail,  he  would  set  the  court  with  a  trick ; 
for  which  he  met,  sometimes,  with  a  reprimand  which 
I  he  would  ward  off,  so  that  no  one  was  much  offended 
j  with  him.  But  Hales  could  not  bear  his  irregularity 
of  life;  and  for  that,  and  suspicion  of  his  tricks,  used 
I  to  bear  hard  upon  him  in  the  court.  But  no  ill-usage 
from  the  bench  was  too  hard  for  his  hold  of  business, 
I  being  such  as  scarce  any  could  do  but  himself.  With 
|  all  this  he  had  a  goodness  of  nature  and  disposition  in 

487 


478 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


so  great  a  degree,  that  he  may  be  deservedly  styled 
a  Philanthrope.  He  was  a  very  Silenus  to  the  boys, 
as  in  this  place  I  may  term  the  students  of  the  law, 
to  make  them  merry  whenever  they  had  a  mind  to  it. 
He  had  nothing  of  rigid  or  austere  in  him.  If  any 
near  him  at  the  bar  grumbled  at  his  stench,  he  ever 
converted  the  complaint  into  content  and  laughing 
with  the  abundance  of  his  wit.  As  to  his  ordinary 
dealing,  he  was  as  honest  as  the  driven  snow  was 
white;  and  why  not,  having  no  regard  lor  money,  or 
desire  to  be  rich?  And  for  good-nature  and  conde- 
scension there  was  not  his  fellow.  I  have  seen  him 
for  hours  and  half-hours  together,  before  the  court  sat, 
stand  at  the  bar,  with  an  audience  of  Students  over 
against  him,  putting  of  cases,  and  debating  so  as  suit- 
ed their  capacities,  and  encouraged  their  industry. 
And  so  in  the  Temple,  he  seldom  moved  without  a 
parcel  of  youths  hanging  about  him,  and  he  merry 
and  jesting  with  them. 

It  will  be  readily  conceived  that  this  man  was 
never  cut  out  to  be  a  Presbyter,  or  any  thing  that  is 
severe  and  crabbed.  In  no  time  did  he  lean  to  fac- 
tion, but  did  his  business  without  offence  to  any.  lie 
put  off  officious  talk  of  government  or  politics  with 
jests,  and  so  made  his  wit  a  catholicon  or  shield  to 
cover  all  his  weak  places  or  infirmities.  When  the 
court  fell  into  a  steady  course  of  using  the  law  against 
all  kinds  of  offenders,  this  man  was  taken  into  the 
king's  business ;  and  had  the  part  of  drawing,  and 
perusal  of  almost  all  indictments  and  informations 
that  were  then  to  be  prosecuted,  with  the  pleadings 
thereon,  if  any  were  special ;  and  he  had  the  settling 
of  the  large  pleadings  in  the  quo  Warranto  against 
London.  His  Lordship  had  no  sort  of  conversation 
with  him  but  in  the  way  of  business  and  at  the  bar ; 
but  once,  after  he  was  in  the  king's  business,  he 
dined  with  his  Lordship,  and  no  more.  And  there 
he  showed  another  qualification  he  had  acquired,  and 
that  was  to  play  jigs  upon  an  harpsichord  ;  having 
taught  himself  with  the  opportunity  of  an  old  virginal 
of  his  landlady's;  but  in  such  a  manner,  not  for  de- 
fect, but  figure,  as  to  see  him  were  a  jest.  The  king 
observing  him  to  be  of  a  free  disposition,  loyal, 
friendly,  and  without  greediness  or  guile,  thought  of 
him  to  be  Chief  Justice  to  the  King's  Bench  at  that 
nice  time.  And  the  ministry  could  not  but  approve 
of  it.  So  great  a  weight  was  then  at  stake,  as  could 
not  be  trusted  to  men  of  doubtful  principles,  or  such 
as  anything  might  tempt  to  desert  them.  While  he 
sat  in  the  Court  of  King's  Bench,  he  gave  the  rule 
to  the  general  satisfaction  of  the  lawyers.  But  his 
course  of  life  was  so  different  from  what  it  had  been, 
his  business  incessant  and  withal  crabbed  ;  and  his 
diet  and  exercise  changed,  that  the  constitution  of 
his  body,  or  head  rather,  could  not  sustain  it,  and  he 
(ell  into  an  apoplexy  and  palsy,  which  numbed  his 
parts ;  and  he  never  recovered  the  strength  of  them. 
He  outlived  the  judgment  in  the  quo  Warranto  ;  but 
was  not  present  otherwise  than  by  sending  his  opinion 
by  one  of  the  judges,  to  be  for  the  king,  who  at  the 
pronouncing  of  judgment,  declared  it  to  the  court 
accordingly,  which  is  frequently  done  in  like  cases. 


ESSAY   III. 


Proinde  si  videbitur,  fingant  isti  me  latrunculis  interim  animi 
causa  lusisse,  aut  ai  malint,  cquitasse  in  arundine  longa. 
Nam  qua;  tandem  est  iniquitae,  cum  omni  vita;  instituto 
suos  laBsm  concedamus,  studtis  nullum  omnino  lusum  per- 
mittere:  maxime  si  ita  tracteotur  ludicra,  ut  ex  his  ali- 
quando  plus  frugis  referat  lector  non  omnino  naris  obesae 
'liium  ex  quorundum  tetricis  ac  splendidis  argumentis. 

ERAS.MI,  Pr,ef.  ad  Mor.  Enc. 

Translation. — Thpy  may  pretend,  if  they  like,  that  I  amuse 
myself  with  playing  Fox  and  Goose,  or.  if  they  prefer  it, 
equitasse  in  arundine  longa,  that  I  ride  ihe  cock-horse  on 
my  grandam's  crutch.  But  wherein,  I  pray,  consists  the 
unfairness  or  impropriety,  when  every  trade  and  profession 
is  allowed  its  own  spot  and  travesty,  in  extending  the  same 
permission  to  literature  :  especially  if  trifles  are  so  handled, 
that  a  reader  of  tolerable  quickness  may  occasionally  de- 
rive more  food  for  profitable  reflection  than  from  many  a 
work  of  grand  or  gloomy  argument  1 


Irus,  the  forlorn  Irus,  whose  nourishment  con- 
sisted in  bread  and  water,  whose  clothing  of  one  tat- 
tered mantle,  and  whose  bed  of  an  arm-full  of  straw, 
this  same  Irus,  by  a  rapid  transition  of  fortune,  be- 
came the  most,  prosperous  mortal  under  Ihe  sun.  It 
pleased  the  Gods  to  snatch  him  at  once  out  of  the 
dust,  and  to  place  him  by  the  side  of  princes.  He 
beheld  himself  in  the  possession  of  incalculable  trea- 
sures. His  palace  excelled  even  the  temple  of  the 
gods  in  the  pomp  of  its  ornaments ;  his  least  sumptu- 
ous clothing  was  of  purple  and  gold,  and  his  table 
might  well  have  been  named  the  compendium  of 
luxury,  the  summary  of  all  that  the  voluptuous  inge- 
nuity of  men  had  invented  for  the  gratification  of  the 
palate.  A  numerous  train  of  admiring  dependants 
followed  him  at  every  step:  those  to  whom  he 
vouchsafed  a  gracious  look,  were  esteemed  already 
in  the  high  road  of  fortune,  and  the  favored  individ- 
ual who  was  permitted  to  kiss  his  hand,  appeared  to 
be  the  object  of  common  envy.  The  name  of  Irus 
sounding  in  his  ears  an  unwelcome  memento  and 
perpetual  reproach  of  his  former  poverty,  he  for  this 
!  reason  named  himself  Ceraunius,  or  the  Lightning- 
flasher,  and  the  whole  people  celebrated  this  splendid 
change  of  title  by  public  rejoicings.  The  poet,  who 
a  few  years  ago  had  personified  poverty  itself  under 
his  former  name  of  Irus,  now  made  a  discovery  which 
had  till  that  moment  remained  a  profound  secret,  but 
was  now  received  by  all  with  implicit  faith  and 
warmest  approbation.  Jupiter,  forsooth,  had  become 
enamored  of  the  mother  of  Ceraunius,  and  assumed 
the  form  of  a  mortal  in  order  to  enjoy  her  love. 
Henceforward  they  erected  altars  to  him,  they  swore 
by  his  name,  and  the  priests  discovered  in  the  entrails 
of  the  sacrificial  victim,  that  the  great  Ceraunius, 
this  worthy  son  of  Jupiter,  was  the  sole  pillar  of  the 
western  world.  Toxaris,  his  former  neighbor,  a 
man  whom  good  fortune,  unwearied  industry,  and 
rational  frugality,  had  placed  among  the  richest  citi- 
zens, became  the  first  victim  of  the  pride  of  this  new 
demi-god.  In  the  time  of  his  poverty,  Irus  had  re- 
pined at  his  luck  and  prosperity,  and  irritable  from 


THE  FRIEND. 


479 


distress  and  envy,  had  conceived  that  Toxaris  had 
looked  contemptuously  on  him;  and  now  was  the 
time  that  Ceraunius  would  make  him  feel  the  power 
of  him  whose  father  grasped  the  thunder-bolt.  Three 
advocates,  newly  admitted  into  the  recently  estab- 
lished order  of  the  Cygnet  gave  evidence  that  Toxa- 
aris  had  denied  the  gods,  committed  peculations  on 
the  sacred  Treasury,  and  increased  his  treasure  by 
acts  of  sacrdege.  lie  was  hurried  off  to  prison  and 
sentenced  to  an  ignominious  death,  and  his  wealth 
confiscated  to  the  use  of  Ceraunius,  the  earthly  re- 
presentative of  the  deities.  Ceraunius  now  found 
nothing  wanting  to  his  felicity  but  a  bride  worthy  of 
his  rank  and  blooming  honors.  The  most  illustrious 
of  the  land  were  candidates  for  his  alliance.  Eu- 
phorbia, the  daughter  of  the  noble  Austrius,  was 
honored  with  his  final  choice.  To  nobility  of  birth 
nature  had  added  lor  Kuphorbia  a  rich  dowry  of 
beauty,  a  nobleness  both  of  look  and  stature.  The 
flowing  ringlets  of  her  hair,  her  lofty  forehead,  her 
brilliant  eyes,  her  stately  figure,  her  majestic  gait, 
had  enchanted  the  haughty  Ceraunius  :  and  all  the 
bards  told  what  the  inspiring  muses  had  revealed  to 
thern,  that  Venus  more  than  once  had  pined  with 
jealousy  at  the  sight  of  her  superior  charms.  The 
day  of  espousal  arrived,  and  the  illustrious  son  of 
Jove  was  proceeding  in  pomp  to  the  temple,  when 
the  anguish-stricken  wife  of  Toxaris,  with  his  inno- 
cent children,  suddenly  threw  themselves  at  his  feet, 
and  with  loud  lamentations  entreated  him  to  spare 
the  life  of  her  husband.  Enraged  by  this  interrup- 
tion, Ceraunius  spurned  her  from  him  with  his  feet 
and — Irus  awakened,  and  found  himself  lying  on  the 
same  straw  on  which  he  had  lain  down,  and  with 
his  old  tattered  mantle  spread  over  him.  With  his 
returning  reason,  conscience  too  returned.  He 
praised  the  gods  and  resigned  himself  to  his  lot. 
Ceraunius  indeed  had  vanished,  but  the  innocent 
Toxaris  was  still  alive,  and  Irus  poor  yet  guiltless. 

Can  my  reader  recolject  no  character  now  on  earth, 
who  sometime  or  other  will  awake  from  his  dream  of 
empire,  poor  as  Irus,  with  all  the  guilt  and  impiety 
of  Ceraunius? 

P.  S.  The  reader  will  bear  in  mind,  that  this  fable 
was  written  and  first  published  at  the  close  of  1809. 


CHRISTMAS  WITHIN  DOORS,  IN  THE 
NORTH  OF  GERMANY. 

EXTRACTED  FROM   SATVRAN'E's   LETTERS. 

Ratzeburg. 
There  is  a  Christmas  custom  here  which  pleased 
and  interested  me. — The  children  make  little  pres- 
ents to  their  parents,  and  to  each  other ;  and  the  pa- 
rents to  their  children.  For  three  or  four  months 
before  Christmas  the  girls  are  all  busy,  and  the  boys 
five  up  their  pocket-money,  to  make  or  purchase 
tnese  presents.  What  the  present  is  to  be  is  cau- 
tiously kept  secret,  and  the  girls  have  a  world  of  con- 
trivances to  conceal  it — such  as  working  when  they 
are  out  on  visits  and  the  others  are  not  with  them; 
32  £r2 


getting  up  in  the  morning  before  day-light,  &c.  Then 
on  the  evening  before  Christmas  day  one  of  the  par- 
lors is  lighted  up  by  the  children,  into  which  the  pa 
rents  must  not  go.  A  great  yew  bough  is  fastened 
on  the  table  at  a  little  distance  from  the  wall,  a  mul 
titude  of  little  tapers  are  fastened  in  the  bough,  bir 
so  as  not  to  catch  it  till  they  are  nearly  burnt  out,  and 
coloured  paper,  Ac.  hangs  and  flutters  from  the  twigs 
— Under  this  bough  the  children  layout  in  great  order 
the  presents  they  mean  for  their  parents,  still  conceal- 
ing in  their  pockets  what  they  intend  for  each  other 
Then  the  parents  are  introduced — and  each  presents 
his  little  gift — and  then  bring  out  the  rest  one  by  one 
from  their  pockets,  and  present  them  with  kisses  and 
embraces. — Where  I  witnessed  this  scene,  there  were 
eight  or  nine  children,  and  the  eldest  daughter  and 
the  mother  wept  aloud  for  joy  and  tenderness ;  and 
the  tears  ran  down  the  face  of  the  father,  and  he 
clasped  all  his  children  so  tight  to  his  breast  —  it 
seemed  as  if  he  did  it  to  stifle  the  sob  that  was  rising 
within  him, — I  was  very  much  affected. — The  sha- 
dow of  the  bough  and  its  appendages  on  the  wall, 
and  arching  over  on  the  ceiling,  made  a  pretty  pic- 
ture— and  then  the  raptures  of  the  very  little  ones, 
when  at  last  the  twigs  and  their  needles  began  to 
take  fire  and  snaj) — O  it  was  a  delight  for  them ! — On 
the  next  day,  in  the  great  parlor,  the  parents  lay  out 
on  the  table  the  presents  for  the  children ;  a  scene  of 
more  sober  joy  succeeds,  as  on  this  day,  after  an  old 
custom,  the  mother  says  privately  to  each  of  her 
daughters,  and  the  father  to  his  sons,  that  which  he 
has  observed  most  praise-worthy  and  that  which  was 
most  faulty  in  their  conduct. — Formerly,  and  still  in 
the  smaller  towns  and  villages  throughout  North 
Germany,  these  presents  were  sent  by  all  the  parents 
to  someone  fellow  who  in  high  buskins, a  white  robe, 
a  mask,  and  an  enormous  flax  wig,  personates  Knecht 
Rupert,  i.  e  the  servant  Rupert.  On  Christmas  night 
he  goes  round  to  every  house  and  says,  that  Jesus 
Christ  his  master  sent  him  thither — the  parents  and 
elder  children  receive  him  with  great  pomp  of  reve- 
rence, while  the  little  ones  are  most  terribly  fright- 
ened— He  then  inquires  for  the  children,  and  accord- 
ing to  the  character  which  he  hears  from  the  parent, 
he  gives  them  the  intended  present — as  if  they  came 
out  of  heaven  from  Jesus  Christ. — Or,  if  they  should 
have  been  bad  children,  he  gives  the  parents  a  rod, 
and  in  the  name  of  his  master  recommends  them  to 
use  it  frequently- — About  seven  or  eight  years  old 
the  children  are  let  into  the  secret,  and  it  is  curious 
how  faithfully  they  keep  it! 


CHRISTMAS  OUT  OF  DOORS. 
The  whole  Lake  of  Ratzeburg  is  one  mass  of 
thick  transparent  ice — a  spotless  mirror  of  nine  miles 
in  extent!  The  lowness  of  the  hills,  which  rise  from 
the  shore  of  the  lake,  preclude  the  awful  sublimit', 
of  Alpine  scenery,  yet  compensate  for  the  want  of  it 
by  beauties,  of  which  this  very  lowness  is  a  necessary 
condition.  Yester-morning  1  saw  the  lesser  lake  com- 
pletely hid  by  mist;  but  the  moment  the  sun  peeped 
over  the  hill,  the  mist  broke  in  the  middle,  and  in  a 
489 


480 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


few  seconds  stood  divided,  leaving  a  broad  road  all 
across  the  lake;  and  between  these  two  walls  of  mist 
the  sunlight  burnt  upon  the  ice,  forming  a  road  of 
golden  fire,  intolerably  bright !  and  the  mist-walls 
themselves  partook  of  the  blaze  in  a  multitude  of 
shining  colors.  This  is  our  second  frost.  About  a 
month  ago,  before  the  thaw  came  on,  there  was  a 
storm  of  wind ;  during  the  whole  night,  such  were 
the  thunders  and  howlings  of  the  breaking  ice,  that 
they  have  left  a  conviction  on  my  mind,  that  there 
are  sounds  more  sublime  than  any  sight  can  be,  more 
absolutely  suspending  the  power  of  comparison,  and 
more  utterly  absorbing  the  mind's  self-consciousness 
in  its  total  attention  to  the  objecl  working  upon  it. 
Part  of  the  ice  which  the  vehemence  of  the  wind 
had  shattered,  was  driven  shore- ward  and  froze  anew. 
On  the  evening  of  the  next  day,  at  sun-set,  the  shat- 
tered ice  thus  frozen,  appeared  of  a  deep  blue  and 
in  shape  like  an  agitated  sea ;  beyond  this,  the  water, 
that  ran  up  between  the  great  islands  of  ice  which 
had  preserved  their  masses  entire  and  smooth,  shone 
of  a  yellow  green:  but  all  these  scattered  ice-islands, 
themselves,  were  of  an  intensely  bright  blood  color — 
they  seemed  blood  and  light  in  union !  On  some  of 
the  largest  of  these  islands,  the  fishermen  stood  pull- 
ing out  their  immense  nets  through  the  holes  made  in 
the  ice  for  this  purpose,  and  the  men,  their  net-poles, 
and  their  huge  nets,  were  a  part  of  the  glory;  say 
rather,  it  appeared  as  if  the  rich  crimson  light  had 
shaped  itself  into  these  forms,  figures,  and  attitudes, 
to  make  a  glorious  vision  in  mockery  of  earthly 
things. 

The  lower  lake  is  now  all  alive  with  skaters,  and 
with  ladies  driven  onward  by  them  in  their  ice  cars. 
Mercury,  surely,  was  the  first  maker  of  skates,  and 
the  wings  at  his  feet  are  symbols  of  the  invention.  In 
skating  there  are  three  pleasing  circumstances :  the 
infinitely  subtle  particles  of  ice  which  the  skate  cuts 
up,  and  which  creep  and  run  before  the  skate  like  a 
low  mist,  and  in  sun-rise  or  sun-set  become  colored; 
second,  the  shadow  of  the  skater  in  the  water,  seen 
through  the  transparent  ice;  and  third,  the  melan- 
choly undulating  sound  from  the  skate,  not  without 
variety;  and  when  very  many  are  skating  together, 
the  sounds  and  the  noises  give  an  impulse  to  the  icy 
trees,  and  the  woods  all  round  the  lake  tinkle. 

Here  I  stop,  having  in  truth  transcribed  the  pre- 
ceding in  great  measure,  in  order  to  present  the  lovers 
of  poetry  with  a  descriptive  passage,  extracted,  with 
the  author's  permission,  from  an  unpublished  Poen» 
on  the  Growth  and  Revolutions  of  an  Individual 
Mind,  by  Wordsworth. 

an  Orphic  tale  indeed, 


A  tale  divine  of  high  and  passionate  thoughts 
To  their  own  music  chanted  ! S.  T.  C. 


GROWTH     OF    GENIUS,     FROM     THE     INFLUENCES     OF 
NATURAL    ODJECTS    ON    THE   IMAGINATION,    IN 
BOYHOOD   AND   EARLY    YOUTH. 
Wisdom  !  and  Spirit  of  the  Universe  ! 
Thou  Soul,  that  art  the  Eternity  of  Thought! 
And  giv'st  to  forms  and  images  a  breath 
And  everlasting  motion  !  not  in  vain, 


By  day  or  star-light,  thus  from  my  first  dawn 
Of  Childhood  didst.  Thou  intertwine  for  me 
The  passions  that  build  up  our  human  Soul, 
Nor  wilh  the  mean  and  vulgar  works  of  man 
But  with  high  objects,  with  enduring  things, 
With  Life  and  Nature  :  purifying  thus 
The  elements  of  feeling  and  of  thought, 
And  sanctifying  by  such  discipline 
Both  pain  and  fear,  until  we  recognize 
A  grandeur  in  the  beatings  of  the  heart. 

Nor  was  this  fellowship  vouchsafed  to  me 
With  stinted  kindness.    In  November  days 
When  vapors  rolling  down  the  valleys  made 
A  lonely  scene  more  lonesome ;  among  wood3 
At  noon,  and  'mid  the  calm  of  summer  nights, 
When  by  the  margin  of  the  trembling  lake, 
Beneath  the  gloomy  hills  I  homeward  went 
In  solitude,  such  intercourse  was  mine; 
'Twas  mine  among  the  fields  both  day  and  night 
And  by  the  waters  all  the  summer  long. 

And  in  the  frosty  season  when  the  sun 
Was  set,  and,  visible  for  many  a  mile 
The  cottage  windows  through  the  twilight  blazed, 
I  heeded  not  the  summons  : — happy  time 
It  was  indeed  for  all  of  us.  to  me 
It  was  a  time  of  rapture  !   clear  and  loud 
The  village  clock  toll' d  six  !  1  wheel'd  about, 
Proud  and  exulting,  like  an  untired  horse 
That  cared  not  for  its  home. — All  shod  with  steel 
We  hiss'd  along  the  polish'd  ice,  in  games 
Confederate,  imitative  of  the  chase 
And  woodland  pleasures,  the  resounding  horn, 
The  pack  loud  bellowing,  and  the  hunted  hare. 
So  through  the  darkness  and  the  cold  we  flew, 
And  not  a  voice  was  idle  :  with  the  din 
Meanwhile  the  precipices  rang  aloud, 
The  leafless  trees  and  every  icy  crag 
Tinkled  like  iron,  while  the  distant  hills 
Into  the  tumult  sent  an  alien  sound 
Of  melancholy — not  unnoticed,  while  the  stars 
Eastward,  were  sparkling  clear,  and  in  the  west 
The  orange  sky  of  evening  died  away. 

Not  seldom  from  the  uproar  I  retired 
Into  a  silent  bay  or  sportively 
Glanced  sideway,  leaving  the  tumultuous  throng 
To  cut  across  the  image  of  a  star 
That  gleam'd  upon  the  ice :  and  oftentimes 
When  we  had  given  our  bodies  to  the  wind, 
And  all  the  shadowy  banks  on  either  side 
Came  sweeping  through  the  darkness  spinning  still 
The  rapid  line  of  motion,  then  at  once 
Have  I  reclining  back  upon  my  heels 
Stopp'd  short  :  yet  still  the  solitary  cliffs 
Wheel'd  by  me  even  as  if  the  earth  had  roll'd 
With  visible  motion  her  diurnal  round  ! 
Behind  me  did  they  stretch  in  solemn  train 
Feebler  and  feebler,  and  I  stood  and  watch'd 
Till  all  was  tranquil  as  a  summer  sea. 


ESSAY   IV. 


Es  ist  fast  traurig  zu  sehen,  wie  man  von  der  Hebraischen 
Quellen  so  ganz  sich  abgewendet  hat.  In  yEsyptens  selbst 
dunkeln  unentrathselbaren  Hieroglyphen  hat  mandenSchlus- 
sel  alter  Weisheit  suchen  wollen  ;  jetzt  ist  von  nichts  ali 
Indiens  Sprache  und  Weisheit  die  Rede  ;  aber  die  Rabbin- 
ische  Schriften  liegen  unerforscht. SCHELLING. 

Translation. — It  is  mournful  to  observe,  how  entirely  we 
have  turned  our  backs  upon  the  Hebrew  sources.  In  the 
obscure  insolvable  riddles  of  the  Egyptian  Hieroglyphics 
the  Learned  have  been  hoping  to  find  the  key  of  ancient 
doctrine,  and  now  we  hear  nothing  but  the  language  and 
wisdom  of  India,  while  the  writings  and  traditions  of  tho 
Rabbins  are  consigned  to  neglect  without  examination. 
490 


THE  FRIEND. 


481 


THE   LORD   HELPETH   MAX   AND   BEAST. 

During  his  march  to  conquer  the  world,  Alexander 
the  Macedonian,  came  to  a  people  in  Africa,  who 
dwelt  in  a  remote  and  secluded  corner  in  peaceful 
huts,  and  knew  neither  war  nor  conqueror.  They 
led  him  to  the  hut  of  their  Chief,  who  received  him 
hospitably  and  placed  before  him  golden  dates,  gold- 
en figs,  and  bread  of  gold.  Do  you  eat  gold  in  this 
country?  said  Alexander.  I  take  it  for  granted  (re- 
plied the  Chief)  that  thou  wert  able  to  find  eatable 
food  in  thine  own  country.  For  what  reason  then 
art  thou  come  among  us  ?  Your  gold  has  not  tempted 
me  hither,  said  Alexander,  but  I  would  willingly  be- 
come acquainted  with  your  manners  and  customs. 
So  be  it,  rejoined  the  other,  sojourn  among  us  as  long 
as  it  pleaseth  thee.  At  the  close  of  this  conversation 
two  citizens  entered  as  into  their  Court  of  Justice. 
The  plaintiff  said.  I  bought  of  this  man  a  piece  of 
land,  and  as  I  was  making  a  deep  drain  through  it  I 
found  a  treasure.  This  is  not  mine,  lor  I  only  bar- 
gained for  the  land,  and  not  for  any  treasure  that 
might  be  concealed  beneath  it :  and  yet  the  former 
owner  of  the  land  will  not  receive  it.  The  defend- 
ant answered :  I  hope  I  have  a  conscience  as  well  as 
my  fellow-citizen.  I  sold  him  the  land  with  all  its 
contingent,  as  well  as  existing  advantages,  and  con- 
sequently the  treasure  inclusively. 

The  Chief,  who  was  at  the  same  time  their  su- 
preme judge,  recapitulated  their  words,  in  order  that 
the  parties  mitrht  see  whether  or  no  he  understood 
them  aright  Then  after  some  reflection  said :  Thou 
hast  a  Son,  Friend,  I  believe?  Yes!  and  thou  (ad- 
dressing the  other)  a.  Daughter  ?  Yes ! — Well  then, 
let  thy  Son  marry  thy  Daughter,  and  bestow  the 
treasure  on  the  young  couple  for  their  marriage  por- 
tion. Alexander  seemed  surprised  and  perplexed. 
Think  you  my  sentence  unjust  ?  the  Chief  asked  him 
— O  no,  replied  Alexander,  but  it  astonishes  me.  And 
how,  then  rejoined  the  Chief,  would  the  case  have  been 
decided  in  your  country? — To  confess  the  truth,  said 
Alexander,  we  should  have  taken  both  parties  into 
custody  and  have  seized  the  treasure  for  the  king's 
use.  For  the  king's  use !  exclaimed  the  Chief,  now 
in  his  turn  astonished.  Does  the  sun  shine  on  that 
country? — O  ves  !  Does  it  rain  there? — Assuredly. 
Wonderful!  but  are  there  tame  Animals  in  the  coun- 
try that  live  on  the  grass  and  green  herbs  ?  Very 
manv,  and  of  many  kinds. — Ay,  that  must  be  the 
cause,  said  the  Chief:  for  the  sake  of  those  innocent 
Animals  the  All-gracious  Being  continues  to  let  the 
sun  shine  and  the  rain  drop  down  on  your  country. 


spread  a  white  covering  over  their  bodies.  In  the 
evening  Rabbi  Meir  came  home.  Where  are  my  two 
sons  he  asked,  that  I  may  give  them  my  blessing  ? 
They  are  gone  to  the  school,  was  the  answer.  I  re- 
peatedly looked  round  the  school,  he  replied,  and  I 
did  not  see  them  there.  She  reached  to  him  a  gob- 
let, he  praised  the  Lord  at  the  going  out  of  the  Sab- 
bath, drank  and  again  asked  :  where  are  my  Sons  that 
I  hey  too  may  drink  of  the  cup  of  blessing  ?  They  will 
not  be  far  off,  she  said,  and  placed  lood  before  him 
that  he  might  eat.  He  was  in  a  gladsome  and  genial 
mood,  and  when  he  had  said  grace  after  the  meal, 
she  thus  addressed  him.  Rabbi,  with  thy  permission 
I  would  fain  propose  to  thee  one  question.  Ask  it 
then,  my  love !  he  replied  :  A  few  days  ago,  a  person 
entrusted  some  jewels  to  my  custody,  and  now  he 
demands  them  again :  should  I  give  them  back  again  ? 
This  is  a  question,  said  Rabbi  Meir,  which  my  wife 
should  not  have  thought  it  necessary  to  ask.  What, 
wouldst  thou  hesitate  or  be  reluctant  to  restore  to 
every  one  his  own  ? — No,  she  replied  j  but  yet  I 
thought  it  best  not  to  restore  them  without  acquaint- 
ing thee  therewith.  She  then  led  him  to  their  cham- 
ber, and  stepping  to  the  bed,  took  the  white  covering 
from  the  dead  bodies. — Ah,  my  Sons,  my  Sons,  thus 
loudly  lamented  the  Father,  my  Sons,  the  Light  of 
mine  Eyes  and  the  Light  of  my  Understanding,  I  was 
your  Father,  but  ye  were  my  Teachers  in  the  Law. 
The  mother  turned  away  and  wept  bitterly.  At 
length  she  took  her  husband  by  the  hand  and  said, 
Rabbi,  didst  thou  not  teach  me  that  we  must  not  be 
reluctant  to  restore  that  which  was  intrusted  to  our 
keeping  ?  See  the  Lord  gave,  the  Lord  has  taken 
away,  and  blessed  be  the  name  of  the  Lord !  Blessed 
be  the  name  of  the  Lord !  echoed  Rabbi  Meir,  and 
blessed  be  his  name  for  thy  sake  too!  for  well  is  it 
written ;  whoso  hath  found  a  virtuous  Wife  hath  a 
greater  Treasure  than  costly  Pearls;  She  openetb. 
her  mouth  with  wisdom,  and  in  her  tongue  is  the  law 
of  kindness. 


WHOSO    HATH    FOUND    A    VIRTUOUS    WIFE    HATH    A 
GREATER    TREASURE   THAN*    COSTLY    PEARLS. 

Such  a  treasure  had  the  celebrated  Teacher  Rabbi 
Meir  found.  He  sat  during  the  whole  of  one  sab- 
bath day  in  the  public  school,  and  instructed  the  peo- 
ple. During  his  absence  from  his  house  his  two  sons 
died,  both  of  them  of  uncommon  beauty  and  enlight- 
ened in  the  law.  His  wife  bore  them  to  her  bed- 
chamber, laid    them    upon    the  marriage-bed,  and 


COXVERSATI0X   OF   A   PHILOSOPHER  WITH   A   RABBI. 

Your  God  in  his  Book  calls  himself  a  jealous  God, 
who  can  endure  no  other  God  beside  himself,  and  on 
all  occasions  makes  manifest  his  abhorrence  of  idol- 
atry. How  comes  it  then  that  he  threatens  and  seems 
to  hate  the  worshippers  of  false  Gods  more  ihan  the 
Gods  themselves.  A  certain  king,  replied  the  Rabbi, 
had  a  disobedient  Son.  Among  other  worthless 
tricks  of  various  kinds,  he  had  the  baseness  to  give 
his  Dogs  his  Father's  names  and  titles.  Should  the 
King  show  his  anger  on  the  Prince  or  the  Dogs  ? — 
Well  turned,  rejoined  the  Philosopher:  but  if  your 
God  destroyed  the  objects  of  idolatry,  he  would  take 
away  the  temptation  to  it.  Yea.  retorted  the  Rabbi, 
if  the  Fools  worshipped  such  things  only  as  were  of 
no  further  use  than  that  to  which  their  Folly  applied 
them,  if  the  Idol  were  always  as  worthless  as  the 
Idolatry  is  contemptible.  But  they  worship  the  Sun, 
Moon,  the  Host  of  Heaven,  the  Rivers,  the  Sea,  Fire, 
Air,  and  what  not  ?  Would  you  that  the  Creator,  for 
491 


482 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


the  sake  of  these  Fools,  should  ruin  his  own  Works, 
and  disturb  the  laws  appointed  to  Nature  by  his  own 
Wisdom  ?  If  a  man  steals  grain  and  sows  it,  should 
the  seed  not  shoot  up  out  of  the  earth,  because  it  was 
stolen?  O  no!  the  wise  Creator  lets  Nature  run  her 
own  course;  for  her  course  is  his  own  appointment. 
And  what  if  the  children  of  folly  abuse  it  to  evil? 
The  day  of  reckoning  is  not  far  off,  and  men  will 
then  learn  that  human  actions  likewise  re-appear  in 
their  consequences  by  as  certain  a  law  as  the  green 
blade  rises  up  out  of  the  buried  corn-seed. 


INTRODUCTION.* 


liana  Xffrou  rr\v  ivvoiav  rbv  Kara  ipvcriv  £r)v,  kcu  rb 
oifuvov  aTrXaVuf,  wf£  Ko\aKcias  i*£v  Trdo-rjg  npoatvtgtpav 
tlvai  rr)v  bfii\iav  avrov,  aiitaij/Liorarov  &£  Trap'  dvrbv 
Ikuvov  rbv  Kaipov  aval'  <cai  <i/ia  ftiv  airaSi^arov  eivai, 
2/ia  Se  <pi\osoay6TaToV  xai  rb  ISelv  avSpwxov  caiptos 
IXdyigov  tiov  iavrov  Ka\wv  yyov/jicvov  rrtv  avrbv 
iroXt)//aWi7i/.  M.  ANTJ1N.    /?i;3.  a. 

Translation. — From  Sexlus,  and  from  the  contemplation  of 
his  character,  I  learnt  what  it  was  to  live  a  life  in  harmony 
with  nature  ;  and  that  seemliness  and  dignity  of  deportment, 
which  ensured  the  profoundest  reverence  at  the  very  same 
time  that  his  company  was  more  winning  than  all  the  flat- 
tery in  the  world.  To  him  I  owe  likewise  that  I  have 
known  a  man  at  once  the  most  dispassionate,  and  the  most 
affectionate,  and  who  of  all  his  attractions  set  the  least 
value  on  the  multiplicity  of  his  literary  acquisitions. 

M.  ANTON.  Book  I. 

To  the  Editor  of  The  Friend. 
Sir, 

I  hope  you  will  not  ascribe  to  presumption,  the 
liberty  I  take  in  addressing  you,  on  the  subject  of 
your  Work.  I  feel  deeply  interested  in  the  cause 
you  have  undertaken  to  support;  and  my  object  in 
writing  this  letter  is  to  describe  to  you,  in  part  from 
my  own  feelings,  what  I  conceive  to  be  the  state  of 
many  minds,  which  may  derive  important  advantage 
from  your  instructions. 

I  speak,  sir,  of  those  who,  though  bred  up  under 
our  unfavorable  system  of  education,  have  yet  held 
at  times  some  intercourse  with  nature,  and  with  those 


*  With  this  introduction  commences  the  third  volume  of 
the  English  edition  of  The  Friend;  to  which  volume  the 
following  lines  are  prefixed  as  a  motto  : 

Now  for  the  writing  of  this  werke, 
I,  who  am  a  lonesome  clerke. 
Purposed  for  to  write  a  book 
After  the  world,  that  whilome  took 
Its  course  in  olde  days  long  passed: 
But  for  men  sayn,  it  is  now  lassed 
In  worser  plight  than  it  was  tho, 
I  thought  me  for  to  touch  also 
The  world  which  neweth  every  day — 
So,  as  I  can,  so  ns  1  may. 
Albeit  I  sickness  have  and  pain. 
And  long  have  had,  yet  would  I  fain 
Do  my  mind's  hestand  besiness, 
That  in  some  part,  so  as  1  guess. 
The  gentle  mind  may  be  advised. 

GO WER,  Pro.  to  the  Confess.  Jlmantis. 


great  minds  whose  works  have  been  moulded  by  the 
spirit  of  nature:  who,  therefore,  when  they  pass  from 
the  seclusion  and  constraint  of  early  study,  bring 
with  them  into  the  new  scene  of  the  world,  much  of 
the  pure  sensibility  which  is  the  spring  of  all  that  is 
greatly  good  in  thought  and  action.  To  such  the 
season  of  that  entrance  into  the  world  is  a  season  of 
fearful  importance ;  not  for  the  seduction  of  its  pas- 
sions, but  of  its  opinions.  Whatever  be  their  intel- 
lectual powers,  unless  extraordinary  circumstances 
in  their  lives,  have  been  so  favorable  to  the  growth 
of  meditative  genius,  that  their  speculative  opinions 
must  spring  out  of  their  early  feelings,  their  minds 
are  still  at  the  mercy  of  fortune  ;  they  have  no  in- 
ward impulse  steadily  to  propel  them  :  and  must 
trust  to  the  chances  of  the  world  for  a  guide.  And 
such  is  our  present  moral  and  intellectual  state,  that 
these  chances  are  little  else  than  variety  of  danger. 
There  will  be  a  thousand  causes  conspiring  to  com- 
plete the  work  of  a  false  education,  and  by  enclosing 
the  mind  on  every  side  from  the  influences  of  natural 
feeling,  to  degrade  its  inborn  dignity,  and  finally  bring 
the  heart  itself  under  subjection  to  a  corrupted  under- 
standing. I  am  anxious  to  describe  to  you  what  I 
have  experienced  or  seen  of  the  dispositions  and  feel- 
ings that  will  aid  every  other  cause  of  danger,  and 
tend  to  lay  the  mind  open  to  the  infection  of  all  those 
falsehoods  in  opinion  and  sentiment,  which  constitute 
the  degeneracy  of  the  age.  Though  it  would  not  be 
difficult  to  prove,  that  the  mind  of  the  country  is 
much  enervated  since  the  days  of  her  strength,  and 
brought  down  from  its  moral  dignity,  it  is  not  yet  so 
forlorn  of  all  good, — there  is  nothing  in  the  face  of 
the  times  so  dark  and  saddening,  and  repulsive — as 
to  shock  the  first  feelings  of  a  generous  spirit,  and 
drive  it  at  once  to  seek  refuge  in  the  elder  ages  of 
our  greatness.  There  yet  survives  so  much  of  the 
character  bred  up  through  long  years  of  liberty,  dan- 
ger, and  glory,  that  even  what  this  age  produces 
bears  traces  of  those  that  are  past,  and  it  still  yields 
enough  of  beautiful,  and  splendid,  and  bold,  to  capti- 
vate an  ardent  but  untutored  imagination.  And  in 
this  real  excellence  is  the  beginning  of  danger:  for  it 
is  the  first  spring  of  that  excessive  admiration  of  the 
age  which  at  last  brings  down  to  its  own  level  a 
mind  born  above  it.  If  there  existed  only  the  gene- 
ral disposition  of  all  who  are  formed  with  a  high  ca- 
pacity for  good,  to  be  rather  credulous  of  excellence 
than  suspiciously  and  severely  just,  the  error  would 
not  be  carried  far: — but  there  are  to  a  young  mind, 
in  this  country  and  at  this  time,  numerous  powerful 
causes  concurring  to  inflame  this  disposition,  till  the 
excess  of  the  affection  above  the  worth  of  its  object, 
is  beyond  all  computation.  To  trace  these  causes  it 
will  be  necessary  to  follow  the  history  of  a  pure  and 
noble  mind  from  the  first  moment  of  that  critical  pas- 
sage from  seclusion  to  the  world,  which  changes  all 
the  circumstances  of  its  intellectual  existence,  shows 
it  for  the  first  time  the  real  scene  of  living  men,  and 
calls  up  the  new  feeling  of  numerous  relations  by 
which  it  is  to  be  connected  with  them. 

To  the  young  adventurer  in  life,  who  enters  upon 
his  course  with  such  a  mind,  everything  seems  made 
492 


THE  FRIEND. 


483 


for  delusion.  He  comes  with  a  spirit  whose  dearest 
feelings  and  highest  thoughts  have  sprung  up  under 
the  influences  of  nature.  l]c  transfers  to  the  reali- 
ties of  life  the  high  wild  fancies  of  visionary  boy- 
hood: he  brings  with  him  into  the  world  the  passions 
of  solitary  and  untamed  imagination,  and  hopes 
which  he  has  learned  from  dreams.  Those  dreams 
have  been  of  the  great  and  wonderful,  and  lovely,  of 
all  which  in  these  has  yet  been  disclosed  to  him :  his 
thoughts  have  dwelt  among  the  wonders  of  nature, 
among  the  loftiest  spirits  of  men — heroes,  and  sages, 
and  saints; — those  whose  deeds,  and  thoughts,  and 
hopes,  were  high  above  ordinary  mortality,  have 
been  the  familiar  companions  of  his  soul.  To  love 
and  to  admire  has  been  the  joy  of  his  existence. 
Love  and  admiration  are  the  pleasures  he  will  de- 
mand of  the  world.  For  these  he  has  searched 
eagerly  into  the  ages  that  are  gone  :  but  with  more 
ardent  and  peremptory  expectation  lie  requires  them 
of  that  in  which  his  own  lot  is  cast :  for  to  look  on 
life  with  hopes  of  happiness  is  a  necessity  of  his  na- 
ture, and  to  him  there  is  no  happiness  but  such  as  is 
surrounded  with  excellence. 

See  first  how  this  spirit  will  affect  his  judgment  of 
moral  character,  in  those  with  whom  chance  may 
connect  him  in  the  common  relations  of  life.  It  is 
of  those  with  whom  he  is  to  live,  that  his  soul  first 
demands  this  food  of  her  desires.  From  their  conver- 
sation, their  looks,  their  actions,  their  lives,  she  asks 
for  excellence.  To  ask  from  all  and  to  ask  in  vain, 
would  be  too  dismal  to  bear:  it  would  disturb  him 
too  deeply  with  doubt  and  perplexity  and  fear.  In 
this  hope,  and  in  the  revolting  of  his  thoughts  from 
the  possibility  of  disappointment,  there  is  a  prepara- 
tion for  self-delusion :  there  is  an  unconscious  deter- 
mination that  his  soul  shall  be  satisfied ;  an  obstinate 
will  to  find  good  every  where.  And  thus  his  first 
study  of  mankind  is  a  continued  effort  to  read  in  them 
the  expression  of  his  own  feelings.  He  catches  at 
every  uncertain  show  and  shadowy  resemblance  of 
what  he  seeks ;  and  unsuspicious  in  innocence,  he  is 
first  won  with  those  appearances  of  good  which  are 
in  fact  only  false  pretensions.  But  this  error  is  not 
carried  far;  for  there  is  a  sort  of  instinct  of  rectitude, 
which  like  the  pressure  of  a  talisman  given  to  baffle 
the  illusions  of  enchantment,  warns  a  pure  mind 
against  hypocrisy.— There  is  another  delusion  more 
difficult  to  resist  and  more  slowly  dissipated.  It  is 
when  he  finds,  as  he  often  will,  some  of  the  real  fea- 
tures of  excellence  in  the  purity  of  their  native  form. 
For  then  his  rapid  imagination  will  gather  round 
them  all  the  kindred  features  that  are  wanting  to  per- 
fect beauty ;  and  make  for  him,  where  he  could  not 
find,  the  moral  creature  of  his  expectation:  —  peo- 
pling, even  from  this  human  world,  his  little  circle 
of  affection,  with  forms  as  fair  as  his  heart  desired  for 
its  love. 

But  when,  from  the  eminence  of  life  which  he  has 
reached,  he  lifts  up  his  eyes,  and  sends  out  his  spirit 
to  range  over  the  great  scene  that  is  opening  before 
him  and  around  him, — the  whole  prospect  of  civilized 
life — so  wide  and  so  magnificent : — when  he  begins 
to  contemplate,  in  their  various  stations  of  power  or 


splendor,  the  leaders  of  mankind  —  those  men  on 
whose  wisdom  are  hung  the  fortunes  of  nations  — 
those  whose  genius  and  valor  wield  the  heroism  of  a 
people  ; — or  those,  in  no  inferior  "  pride  of  place," 
whose  sway  is  over  the  mind  of  society, — chiefs  in 
the  realm  of  imagination, — interpreters  of  the  secrets 
of  nature, — rulers  of  human  opinion what  won- 
der, when  he  looks  on  all  this  living  scene,  that  his 
heart  should  burn  with  strong  affection,  that  he  should 
feci  that  his  own  happiness  will  be  for  ever  intervvo- 
un  with  the  interests  of  mankind  ? — Here  then  the 
Banguine  hope  with  which  he  looks  on  life,  will  again 
be  blended  with  his  passionate  desire  of  excellence ; 
ami  ho  will  still  be  impelled  to  single  out  some,  on 
whom  his  imagination  and  his  hopes  may  repose.  To 
whatever  department  of  human  thought  or  action  his 
mind  is  turned  with  interest,  either  by  the  sway  of 
public  passion  or  by  its  own  impulse,  among  states- 
men, and  warriors,  and  philosophers,  and  poets,  he 
will  distinguish  some  favored  names  on  which  he  may 
satisfy  his  admiration.  And  there,  just  as  in  the  little 
circle  of  his  own  acquaintance,  seizing  eagerly  on 
every  merit  they  possess,  he  will  supply  more  from 
his  own  credulous  hope,  completing  real  with  ima- 
gined excellence,  till  living  men,  with  all  their  imper- 
fections, become  to  him  the  representatives  of  his 
perfect  ideal  creation  : — Till,  multiplying  his  objects 
of  reverence,  as  he  enlarges  his  prospect  of  life,  he 
will  have  surrounded  himself  with  idols  of  his  own 
hands,  and  his  imagination  will  seem  to  discern  a 
glory  in  the  countenance  of  the  age,  which  is  but  the 
reflection  of  its  own  effulgence. 

He  will  possess,  therefore,  in  the  creative  power 
of  generous  hope,  a  preparation  for  illusory  and  ex- 
aggerated admiration  of  the  age  in  which  he  lives  : 
— and  his  pre-d  is  position  will  meet  with  many  favor- 
ing circumstances,  when  he  has  grown  up  under  a 
system  of  education  like  ours,  which  (as  perhaps  all 
education  must  that  is  placed  in  the  hands  of  a  dis- 
tinct and  embodied  class,  who  therefore  bring  to  it 
the  peculiar  and  hereditary  prejudices  of  their  order) 
has  controlled  his  imagination  to  a  reverence  of 
former  times,  with  an  unjust  contempt  of  his  own. — 
For  no  sooner  does  he  break  loose  from  this  control, 
and  begin  to  feel,  as  he  contemplates  the  world  for 
himself,  how  much  there  is  surrounding  him  on  all 
sides,  that  gratifies  his  noblest  desires,  than  there 
springs  up  in  him  an  indignant  sense  of  injustice, 
both  to  the  age  and  to  his  own  mind  :  and  he  is  im- 
pelled warmly  and  eagerly  to  give  loose  to  the  feel- 
ings that  have  been  held  in  bondage,  to  seek  out  and 
to  delight  in  finding  excellence  that  will  vindicate 
the  insulted  world,  while  it  justifies  too,  his  resent- 
ment of  his  own  undue  subjection,  and  exalts  the 
value  of  his  new-found  liberty. 

Add  to  this,  that  secluded  as  he  has  been  from 
knowledge,  and,  in  the  imprisoning  circle  of  one  sys- 
tem of  ideas,  cut  off  from  his  share  in  the  thoughts 
and  feelings  that  are  stirring  among  men,  he  finds 
himself,  at  the  first  steps  of  his  liberty,  in  a  new  in- 
|  tellectual  world.  Passions  and  powers  which  he  knew 
not  of,  start  up  in  his  soul.  The  human  mind,  which 
|  he  had  seen  but  under  one  aspect,  now  presents  to 

493 


484 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


him  a  thousand  unknown  and  beautiful  forms.  He 
sees  it,  in  its  varying  powers,  glancing  over  nature 
with  restless  curiosity,  and  with  impetuous  energy 
striving  for  ever  against  the  barriers  which  she  has 
placed  around  it;  sees  it  with  divine  power  creating 
from  dark  materials  living  beauty,  and  fixing  all  its 
high  and  transported  fancies  in  imperishable  forms. — 
In  the  world  of  knowledge,  and  science,  and  art,  and 
genius,  he  treads  as  a  stranger: — in  the  confusion  of 
new  sensations,  bewildered  in  delights,  all  seems 
beautiful ;  all  seems  admirable.  And  therefore  he 
engages  eagerly  in  the  pursuit  of  false  or  insufficient 
philosophy ;  he  is  won  by  the  allurements  of  licen- 
tious art;  he  follows  with  wonder  the  irregular  trans- 
ports of  undisciplined  imagination. — Nor  where  the 
objects  of  his  admiration  are  worthy,  is  he  yet  skilful  to 
distinguish  between  the  acquisitions  which  the  age  has 
made  for  itself,  and  that  large  proportion  of  its  wealth 
which  it  has  only  inherited ;  but  in  his  delight  of  dis- 
covery and  growing  knowledge,  all  that  is  new  to  his 
own  mind  seems  to  him  new-born  to  the  world. — To 
himself  every  fresh  idea  appears  instruction :  every 
new  exertion,  acquisition  of  power:  he  seems  just 
called  to  the  consciousness  of  himself,  and  to  his  true 
place  in  the  intellectual  world ;  and  gratitude  and 
reverence  towards  those  to  whom  he  owes  this  re- 
covery of  his  dignity,  tend  much  to  subject  him  to 
the  dominion  of  minds  that  were  not  formed  by  na- 
ture to  be  the  leaders  of  opinion. 

All  the  tumult  and  glow  of  thought  and  imagina- 
tion, which  seizes  on  a  mind  of  power  in  such  a  scene, 
tends  irresistibly  to  bind  it  by  stronger  attachment  of 
love  and  admiration  to  its  own  age.  And  there  is 
one  among  the  new  emotions  which  belong  to  its  en- 
trance on  the  world — one — almost  the  noblest  of  all 
— in  which  this  exaltation  of  the  age  is  essentially 
mingled.  The  faith  in  the  perpetual  progression  of 
human  nature  towards  perfection,  gives  birth  to  such 
lofty  dreams,  as  secure  to  it  the  devout  assent  of  ima- 
gination ;  and  it  will  be  yet  more  grateful  to  a  heart 
just  opening  to  hope,  flushed  with  the  consciousness 
of  new  strength,  and  exulting  in  the  prospect  of  des- 
tined achievements.  There  is,  therefore,  almost  a 
compulsion  on  generous  and  enthusiastic  spirits,  as 
they  trust  that  the  future  shall  transcend  the  present, 
to  believe  that  the  present  transcends  the  past.  It  is 
only  on  an  undue  love  and  admiration  of  their  own 
age,  that  they  can  build  their  confidence  in  the  ame- 
lioration of  the  human  race.  Nor  is  this  faith, — which 
in  some  shape,  will  always  be  the  creed  of  virtue, — 
without  apparent  reason,  even  in  the  erroneous  form 
in  which  the  young  adopt  it.  For  there  is  a  perpet- 
ual acquisition  of  knowledge  and  art, — an  unceasing 
process  in  many  of  the  modes  of  exertion  of  the  hu- 
man mind, — a  perpetual  unfolding  of  virtues  with 
the  changing  manners  of  society: — and  it  is  not  for  a 
young  mind  to  compare  what  is  gained  with  what  has 
passed  away  ;  to  discern  that  amidst  the  incessant  in- 
tellectual activity  of  the  race,  the  intellectual  power 
of  individual  minds  may  be  falling  ofT;  and  that  amidst 
accumulating  knowledge  lofty  science  may  disap- 
pear;— and  still  less,  to  judge,  in  the  more  compli- 


cated moral  character  of  a  people,  what  is  progression, 
and  what  is  decline. 

Into  a  mind  possessed  w7ith  this  persuasion  of  the 
perpetual  progress  of  man,  there  may  even  impercep- 
tibly steal  both  from  the  belief  itself,  and  from  many 
of  the  views  on  which  it  rests — something  like  a  dis- 
trust of  the  wisdom  of  great  men  of  former  ages,  and 
with  the  reverence — which  no  delusion  will  ever 
overpower  in  a  pure  mind — for  their  greatness,  a  fan- 
cied discernment  of  imperfection  ; — of  incomplete  ex- 
cellence, which  wanted  for  its  accomplishment  the 
advantages  of  later  improvements:  there  will  he  a 
surprise,  that  so  much  should  have  been  possible  in 
limes  so  ill-prepared ;  and  even  the  study  of  iheir 
works  may  be  sometimes  rather  the  curious  research 
of  a  speculative  inquirer,  than  the  devout  contempla- 
tion of  an  enthusiast;  the  watchful  and  obedient 
heart  of  a  disciple  listening  to  the  inspiration  of  his 
master. 

Here  then  is  the  power  of  delusion  that  will  gather 
round  the  first  steps  of  a  youthful  spirit,  and  throw 
enchantment  over  the  world  in  which  it  is  to  dwell. 
Hope  realizing  its  own  dreams: — Ignorance  dazzled 
and  ravished  with  sudden  sunshine  : — Power  awaken- 
ed and  rejoicing  in  its  own  consciousness: — Enthusi- 
asm kindling  among  multiplying  images  of  greatness 
and  beauty ;  and  enamoured,  above  all,  of  one  splen- 
did error :  and,  springing  from  all  these,  such  a  rap- 
ture of  life  and  hope,  and  joy,  that  the  soul,  in  the 
power  of  its  happiness,  transmutes  things  essentially 
repugnant  to  it,  into  the  excellence  of  its  own  nature  : 
these  are  the  spells  that  cheat  the  eye  of  the  mind 
with  illusion.  It  is  under  these  influences  that  a 
young  man  of  ardent  spirit  gives  all  his  love,  and  rev- 
erence, and  zeal,  to  productions  of  art,  to  theories  of 
science,  to  opinions,  to  systems  of  feeling,  and  to  cha- 
racters distinguished  in  the  world,  that  are  far  be- 
neath his  own  original  dignity. 

Now  as  this  delusion  springs  not  from  his  worse 
but  his  better  nature,  it  seems  as  if  there  could  be  no 
warning  to  him  from  within  of  his  danger  :  for  even 
the  impassioned  joy  which  he  draws  at  times  from 
the  works  of  Nature,  and  from  those  of  her  mightier 
sons,  and  which  would  startle  him  from  a  dream  of 
unworthy  passion,  serves  only  to  fix  the  infatuation  : 
— for  those  deep  emotions,  proving  to  him  that  his 
heart  is  nncorrupted,  justify  to  him  all  its  workings, 
and  his  mind  confiding  and  delighting  in  itself,  yields 
to  the  guidance  of  its  own  blind  impulses  of  pleasure. 
His  chance,  therefore,  of  security,  is  the  chance  that 
the  greater  number  of  objects  occurring  to  attract 
his  honorable  passions,  may  be  worthy  of  them. 
But  we  have  seen  that  the  whole  power  of  circum- 
I  stances  is  collected  to  gather  round  him  such  objects 
'  and  influences  as  will  bend  his  high  passions  to  un- 
worthy enjoyment.  He  engages  in  it  with  a  heart 
and  understanding  unspoiled  ;  but  they  cannot  long 
be  misapplied  with  impunity.  They  are  drawn 
gradually  into  closer  sympathy  with  the  falsehoods 
they  have  adopted,  till,  his  very  nature  seeming  to 
change  under  the  corruption,  there  disappears  from 
it  the  capacity  of  those  higher  perceptions  and 
494 


THE  FRIEND. 


485 


pleasures  to  which  lie  was  born :  and  he  is  cast  off 
from  the  communion  of  exalted  minds,  to  live  and  to 
perish  with  the  age  to  which  he  has  surrendered 
himself. 

If  minds  under  these  circumstances  of  danger  are 
preserved  from  decay  and  overthrow,  it  can  seldom, 
I  think,  be  to  themselves  that  they  owe  their  deliver- 
ance. It  must  be  a  fortunate  chance  which  places 
them  under  the  influence  of  some  more  enlightened 
mind,  from  which  they  may  first  gain  suspicion  and 
afterwards  wisdom.  There  is  a  philosophy,  which, 
leading  them  by  the  light  of  their  best  emotions  to 
the  principles  which  should  give  life  to  thought  and 
law  to  genius,  will  discover  to  them  in  clear  and 
perfect  evidence,  the  falsehood  of  the  errors  that 
have  misled  them :  and  restore  them  to  themselves. 
And  this  philosophy  they  will  be  willing  to  hear  and 
wise  to  understand ;  but  they  must  be  led  into  its 
mysteries  by  some  guiding  hand  ;  for  they  want  the 
impulse  or  the  power  to  penetrate  of  themselves  the 
recesses. 

If  a  superior  mind  should  assume  the  protection 
of  others  just  beginning  to  move  among  the  dangers 
I  have  described,  it  would  probably  be  found,  that 
delusions  springing  from  their  own  virtuous  activity, 
were  not  the  only  difficulties  to  be  encountered. 
Even  after  suspicion  is  awakened,  the  subjection  to 
falsehood  may  be  prolonged  and  deepened  by  many 
weaknesses  both  of  the  intellectual  and  moral  nature; 
weaknesses  that  will  sometimes  shake  the  authority 
af  acknowledged  truth.  There  may  be  intellectual 
indolence  ;  an  indisposition  in  the  mind  to  the  effort 
of  combining  the  ideas  it  actually  possesses,  and 
bringing  into  distinct  form  the  knowledge,  which  in 
its  elements  is  already  its  own :  —  there  may  be, 
where  the  heart  resists  the  sway  of  opinion,  mis- 
givings and  modest  self-mistrust,  in  him  who  sees, 
that  if  he  trusts  his  heart,  he  must  slight  the  judg- 
ment of  all  around  him  : — there  may  be  too  habitual 
yielding  to  authority,  consisting,  more  than  in  indo- 
lence or  diffidence,  in  a  conscious  helplessness,  and 
incapacity  of  the  mind  to  maintain  itself  in  its  own 
place  against  the  weight  of  general  opinion ; — and 
there  may  be  too  indiscriminate,  too  undisciplined  a 
sympathy  with  others,  which  by  the  mere  infection 
of  feeling  will  subdue  the  reason. — There  must  be  a 
weakness  in  dejection  to  him  who  thinks,  with  sad- 
ness, if  his  faith  be  pure,  how  gross  is  the  error  of 
the  multitude,  and  that  multitude  how  vast : — a  re- 
luctance to  embrace  a  creed  that  excludes  so  many 
whom  he  loves,  so  many  whom  his  youth  has  revered  : 
—  a  difficulty  to  his  understanding  to  believe  that 
those  whom  he  knows  to  be,  in  much  that  is  good 
and  honorable,  his  superiors,  can  be  beneath  him  in 
this  which  is  the  most  important  of  all: — a  sympathy 
pleading  importunately  at  his  heart  to  descend  to  the 
fellowship  of  his  brothers,  and  to  take  their  faith  and 
wisdom  lor  his  own. — How  often,  when  under  the 
impulses  of  those  solemn  hours,  in  which  he  has  felt 
with  clearer  insight  and  deeper  faith  his  sacred 
truths,  he  labors  to  win  to  his  own  belief  those  whom 
he  loves,  will  he  be  checked  by  their  indifference  or 
their  laughter!  and  will  he  not  bear  back  to  his 


meditations  a  painful  and  disheartening  sorrow, — a 
gloomy  discontent  in  that  faith  which  takes  in  but  a 
portion  of  those  whom  he  wishes  to  include  in  alt 
his  blessings  ?  Will  he  not  be  enfeebled  by  a  dis- 
traction of  inconsistent  desires,  when  he  feels  so 
strongly  that  the  faith  which  fills  his  heart,  the  cir- 
cle within  which  he  would  embrace  all  he  loves — 
would  repose  all  his  wishes  and  hopes,  and  enjoy- 
ments, is  yet  incommensurate  with  his  affections? 

Even  when  the  mind,  strong  in  reason  and  just 
feeling  united,  and  relying  on  its  strength,  has  attach- 
ed itself  to  Truth,  how  much  is  there  in  the  course 
and  accidents  of  life  that  is  for  ever  silently  at  work 
for  its  degradation.  There  are  pleasures  deemed 
harmless,  that  lay  asleep  the  recollections  of  inno- 
cence : — there  are  pursuits  held  honorable,  or  impos- 
ed by  duty,  that  oppress  the  moral  spirit ; — above  all 
there  is  that  perpetual  connection  with  ordinary 
minds  in  the  common  intercourse  of  society  ; — that 
restless  activity  of  frivolous  conversation,  where  men 
of  all  characters  and  all  pursuits  mixing  together, 
nothing  may  be  talked  of  that  is  not  of  common  inte- 
rest to  all  —  nothing,  therefore,  but  those  obvious 
thoughts  and  feelings  that  float  over  the  surface  of 
things : — and  all  which  is  drawn  from  the  depth  of 
Nature,  all  which  impassioned  feeling  has  made  ori- 
ginal in  thought,  would  be  misplaced  and  obtrusive. 
The  talent  that  is  allowed  to  show  itself  is  that  which 
can  repay  admiration  by  furnishing  entertainment : — 
and  the  display  to  which  it  is  invited  is  that  which 
flatters  the  vulgar  pride  of  society,  by  abasing  what 
is  too  high  in  excellence  for  its  sympathy.  A  danger- 
ous seduction  to  talents  —  which  would  make  lan- 
guage— that  was  given  to  exalt  the  soul  by  the  fer- 
vid expression  of  its  pure  emotions — the  instrument 
of  its  degradation.  And  even  when  there  is,  as  in  the 
instance  I  have  supposed,  too  much  uprightness  to 
choose  so  dishonorable  a  triumph,  there  is  a  necessity 
of  manners,  by  which  every  one  must  be  controlled 
who  mixes  much  in  society,  not  to  offend  those  with 
whom  he  converses  by  his  superiority  ;  and  whatever 
be  the  native  spirit  of  a  mind,  it  is  evident  that  this 
perpetual  adaptation  of  itself  to  others — this  watch- 
fulness against  its  own  rising  feelings,  this  studied 
sympathy  with  mediocrity — must  pollute  and  impo- 
verish the  sources  of  its  strength. 

From  much  of  its  own  weakness,  and  from  all  the 
errors  of  its  misleading  activities,  may  generous  youth 
be  rescued  by  the  interposition  of  an  enlightened 
mind  ;  and  in  some  degree  it  may  be  guarded  by  in- 
struction against  the  injuries  to  which  it  is  exposed  in 
the  world.  His  lot  is  happy  who  owes  this  protec- 
tion to  friendship :  who  has  found  in  a  friend  the 
watchful  guardian  of  his  mind.  lie  will  not  be  de- 
luded, having  that  light  to  guide:  he  will  not  slum- 
ber with  that  voice  to  inspire;  he  will  not  be  de- 
sponding or  dejected,  with  that  bosom  to  lean  on. — 
But  how  many  must  there  be  w  horn  Heaven  has  left 
unprovided,  except  in  their  own  strength  ;  who  must 
maintain  themselves,  unassisted  and  solitary,  against 
their  own  infirmities  and  the  opposition  of  the  world  ! 
For  such  there  may  be  yet  a  protector.  If  a  teacher 
should  stand  up  in  their  generation,  conspicuous 
495 


486 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


above  the  multitude  in  superior  power,  and  yet  more 
in  the  assertion  and  proclamation  of  disregarded 
Truth — to  Him — to  his  cheering  or  summoning  voice 
all  hearts  would  turn,  whose  deep  sensibility  has 
been  oppressed  by  the  indifference,  or  misled  by  the 
seduction  of  the  times.  Of  one  such  teacher  who  has 
been  given  to  our  own  age,  you  have  described  the 
power  when  you  said,  that  in  his  annunciation  of 
truths  he  seemed  to  speak  in  thunders.  I  believe 
that  mighty  voice  has  not  been  poured  out  in  vain ; 
that  there  are  hearts  that  have  received  into  their  in- 
most depths  all  its  varying  tones;  and  that  even  now, 
there  are  many  to  whom  the  name  of  Wordsworth 
calls  up  the  recollection  of  their  weakness,  and  the 
consciousness  of  their  strength. 

To  give  to  the  reason  and  eloquence  of  one  man, 
this  complete  control  over  the  minds  of  others,  it  is 
necessary,  1  think,  that  he  should  be  born  in  their 
own  times.  For  thus  whatever  false  opinion  of  pre- 
eminence is  attached  to  the  Age,  becomes  at  once  a 
title  of  reverence  to  him  :  and  when  with  distinguish- 
ed powers  he  sets  himself  apart  from  the  Age,  and 
above  it  as  the  Teacher  of  high  but  ill-understood 
Truths,  he  will  appear  at  once  to  a  generous  imagi- 
nation, in  the  dignity  of  one  whose  superior  mind 
outsteps  the  rapid  progress  of  society,  and  will  derive 
from  illusion  itself  the  power  to  disperse  illusions.  It 
is  probable  too,  that  he  who  labors  under  the  errors  I 
have  described,  might  feel  the  power  of  Truth  in  a 
writer  of  another  age,  yet  fail  in  applying  the  full 
force  of  his  principles  to  his  own  times ;  but  when  he 
receives  them  from  a  living  Teacher,  there  is  no  room 
for  doubt  or  misapplication.  It  is  the  errors  of  his 
own  generation  that  are  denounced ;  and  whatever 
authority  he  may  acknowledge  in  the  instructions  of 
his  Master,  strikes,  with  inevitable  force,  at  his  vene- 
ration for  the  opinions  and  characters  of  his  own 
times. — And  finally  there  will  be  gathered  round  a 
living  Teacher,  who  speaks  to  the  deeper  soul,  many 
feelings  of  human  love,  that  will  place  the  infirmities 
of  the  heart  peculiarly  under  his  control ;  at  the 
same  time  that  they  blend  with  and  animate  the  at- 
tachment to  his  cause.  So  that  there  will  flow  from 
him  something  of  the  peculiar  influence  of  a  friend  : 
while  his  doctrines  will  be  embraced  and  asserted, 
and  vindicated  with  the  ardent  zeal  of  a  disciple, 
such  as  can  scarcely  be  earned  hack  to  distant  times, 
or  connected  with  voices  that  speak  only  from  the 
grave. 

I  have  done  what  I  proposed.  I  have  related  to 
you  as  I  have  had  opportunities  of  knowing  of  the 
difficulties  from  within  and  from  without,  which  may 
oppose  the  natural  development  of  true  feeling  and 
right  opinion,  in  a  mind  formed  with  some  capacity 
for  good :  and  the  resources  which  such  a  mind  may 
derive  from  an  enlightened  contemporary  writer. — If 
what  I  have  said  be  just,  it  is  certain  that  this  influ- 
ence will  be  felt  more  particularly  in  a  work,  adapted 
by  its  mode  of  publication  to  address  the  feelings  of 
the  time,  and  to  bring  to  its  readers  repeated  admoni- 
tion and  repeated  consolation. 

I  have  perhaps  presumed  too  far  in  trespassing  on 
your  attention,  and  in  giving  way  to  my  own  thoughts : 


but  I  was  unwilling  to  leave  any  thing  unsaid  which 
might  induce  you  to  consider  with  favor  the  request 
I  was  anxious  to  make,  in  the  name  of  all  whose 
state  of  mind  I  have  described,  that  you  would  at 
times  regard  us  more  particularly  in  your  instruc- 
tions. I  cannot  judge  to  what  degree  it  may  be  in 
your  power  to  give  the  Truth  you  teach,  a  control 
over  understandings  that  have  matured  their  strength 
in  error:  but  in  our  class  I  am  sure  you  will  have 
docile  learners. Mathetes. 

The  Friend  might  rest  satisfied  that  his  exertions 
thus  far  have  not  been  wholly  unprofitable,  if  no 
other  proof  had  been  given  of  their  influence,  than 
that  of  having  called  forth  the  foregoing  letter,  with 
which  he  has  been  so  much  interested,  that  he  could 
not  deny  himself  the  pleasure  of  communicating  it  to 
his  readers. — In  answer  to  his  Correspondent,  it  need 
scarcely  here  be  repeated,  that  one  of  the  main  pur- 
poses of  his  work  is  to  weigh,  honestly  and  thought- 
fully, the  moral  worth  and  intellectual  power  of  the 
age  in  which  we  live ;  to  ascertain  our  gain  and  our 
loss;  to  determine  what  we  are  in  ourselves  positive- 
ly, and  what  we  are  compared  with  our  ancestors ; 
and  thus,  and  by  every  other  means  within  his  power, 
to  discover  what  may  be  hoped  for  future  times,  what 
and  how  lamentable  are  the  evils  to  be  feared,  and 
how  far  there  is  cause  for  fear.  If  this  attempt 
should  not  be  made  wholly  in  vain,  my  ingenuous 
Correspondent,  and  all  who  are  in  a  state  of  mind 
resembling  that  of  which  he  gives  so  lively  a  picture, 
will  be  enabled  more  readily  and  surely  to  distin- 
guish false  from  legitimate  objects  of  admiration:  and 
thus  may  the  personal  errors  which  he  would  guard 
against,  be  more  effectually  prevented  or  removed, 
by  the  development  of  general  truth  for  a  general 
purpose,  than  by  instructions  specifically  adapted  to 
himself  or  to  the  class  of  which  he  is  the  able  repre- 
sentative. There  is  a  life  and  spirit  in  knowledge 
which  we  extract  from  truths  scattered  for  the  bene- 
fit of  all,  and  which  the  mind,  by  its  own  activity, 
has  appropriated  to  itself — a  life  and  spirit,  which  is 
seldom  found  in  knowledge  communicated  by  formal 
and  direct  precepts,  even  when  they  are  exalted  and 
endeared  by  reverence  and  love  for  the  teacher. 

Nevertheless,  though  I  trust  that  the  assistance 
which  my  Correspondent  has  done  me  the  honor  to 
request,  will  in  course  of  time  flow  naturally  from  my 
labors,  in  a  manner  that  will  best  serve  him,  I  cannot 
resist  the  inclination  to  connect,  at  present,  with  his 
letter  a  few  remarks  of  direct  application  to  the  sub- 
ject of  it — remarks,  I  say,  for  to  such  I  shall  confine 
myself,  independent  of  the  main  point  out  of  which 
his  complaint  and  request  both  proceed,  I  mean  the 
assumed  inferiority  of  the  present  age  in  moral  dig- 
nity and  intellectual  power,  to  those  which  have  pre- 
ceded. For  if  the  fact  were  true,  that  we  had  even 
surpassed  our  ancestors  in  the  best  of  what  is  good, 
the  main  part  of  the  dangers  and  impediments  which 
my  Correspondent  has  feelingly  portrayed,  could  not 
cease  to  exist  for  minds  like  his,  nor  indeed  would 
they  be  much  diminished ;  as  they  arise  out  of  the 
constitution  of  things,  from  the  nature  of  youth,  from 
496 


THE  FRIEND. 


487 


the  laws  that  govern  the  growth  of  the  faculties,  and 
from  the  necessary  condition  of  the  great  body  of 
mankind.  Let  us  throw  ourselves  back  to  the  age  of 
Elizabeth,  and  call  up  to  mind  the  heroes,  the  warri- 
ors, the  statesmen,  the  poets,  the  divines,  and  the 
moral  philosophers,  with  which  the  reign  of  the  vir- 
gin queen  was  illustrated.  Or  if  we  be  more  strongly 
attracted  by  the  moral  purity  and  greatness,  and  that 
sanctity  of  civil  and  religious  dutv.  with  which  the 
tyranny  of  Charles  the  First  was  struggled  against, 
let  us  cast  our  eyes,  in  the  hurry  of  admiration,  round 
that  circle  of  glorious  patriots — but  do  not  let  us  be 
persuaded,  that  each  of  these,  in  his  course  of  disci- 
pline, was  uniformly  helped  forward  by  those  with 
whom  he  associated,  or  by  those  whose  care  it  was 
to  direct  him.  Then  as  now,  existed  objects,  to 
which  the  wisest  attached  undue  importance ;  then, 
as  now,  judgment  was  misled  by  factions  and  parties 
— time  wasted  in  controversies  fruitless,  except  as  far 
as  they  quickened  the  faculties;  then  as  now,  minds 
were  venerated  or  idolized,  which  owed  their  influ- 
ence to  the  weakness  of  their  contemporaries  rather 
than  to  their  own  power.  Then,  though  great  ac- 
tions were  wrought,  and  great  works  in  literature 
and  science  produced,  yet  the  general  taste  was  ca- 
pricious, fantastical,  or  grovelling:  and  in  this  point  as 
in  all  others,  was  youth  subject  to  delusion,  frequent 
in  proportion  to  the  liveliness  of  the  sensibility,  and 
strong  as  the  strength  of  the  imagination.  Every  age 
hath  abounded  in  instances  of  parents,  kindred,  and 
friends,  who,  by  indirect  influence  of  example,  or  by 
positive  injunction  and  exhortation,  have  diverted  or 
discouraged  the  youth,  wrho,  in  the  simplicity  and 
purity  of  nature,  had  determined  to  follow  his  intel- 
lectual genius  through  good  and  through  evil,  and 
had  devoted  himself  to  knowledge,  to  the  practice 
of  virtue  and  the  preservation  of  integrity,  in  slight 
of  temporal  rewards.  Above  all,  have  not  the  com- 
mon duties  and  cares  of  common  life,  at  all  times  ex- 
posed men  to  injury,  from  causes  whose  action  is  the 
more  fatal  from  being  silent  and  unremitting,  and 
which,  wherever  it  was  not  jealously  watched  and 
steadily  opposed,  must  have  pressed  upon  and  con- 
sumed the  diviner  spirit. 

There  are  two  errors,  into  which  we  easily  slip 
when  thinking  of  past  times.  One  lies  in  forgetting 
in  the  excellence  of  what  remains,  the  large  over- 
balance of  worthlessness  that  has  been  swept  away. 
Ranging  over  the  wide  tracts  of  antiquity,  the  situa- 
tion of  the  mind  may  be  likened  to  that  of  a  travel- 
ler* in  some  unpeopled  part  of  America,  who  is  at- 
tracted to  the  burial-place  of  one  of  the  primitive  in- 
habitants. It  is  conspicuous  upon  an  eminence,  "  a 
mount  upon  a  mount!"  fie  digs  into  it,  and  finds 
that  it  contains  the  bones  of  a  man  of  might'/  stature  : 
and  he  is  tempted  to  give  way  to  a  belief,  that  as 
there  were  giants  in  those  days,  so  that  all  men  were 
giants.  But  a  second  and  wiser  thought  may  suggest 
to  him,  that  this  tomb  would  never  have  forced  itself 
upon  his  notice,  if  it  had  not  contained  a  body  that 
was  distinguished  from  others,  that  of  a  man  who  had 

*  Vide  Ashe's  Travels  in  America. 
8s 


been  selected  as  a  chieftain  or  ruler  for  the  very  rea- 
son that  he  surpassed  the  rest  of  his  tribe  in  stature, 
and  who  now  lies  thus  conspicuously  inhumed  upon 
the  mountain-top,  while  the  bones  of  his  followers  are 
laid  unobtrusively  together  in  their  burrows  upon  the 
plain  below.  The  second  habitual  error  is,  that  in 
this  comparison  of  ages  we  divide  time  merely  into 
past  and  present,  and  place  these  into  the  balance  to 
be  weighed  against  each  other,  not  considering  that 
the  present  is  in  our  estimation  not  more  than  a  peri- 
od of  thirty  years,  or  half  a  century  at  most,  and  that 
the  past  is  a  mighty  accumulation  of  many  such  pe- 
riods, perhaps  the  whole  of  recorded  time,  or  at  least 

.  the  whole  of  that  portion  of  it  in  which  our  own 
country  has  been  distinguished.  We  may  illustrate 
this  by  the  familiar  use  of  the  words  Ancient  and 
Modern,  when  applied  to  poetry — what  can  be  more 

!  inconsiderate  or  unjust  than  to  compare  a  few  exist- 

,  ing  writers  with  the  whole  succession  of  their  pro- 
genitors ?    The  delusion,  from  the  moment  that  our 

i  thoughts  are  directed  to  it,  seems  too  gross  to  deserve 
mention ;  yet  men  will  talk  lor  hours  upon  poetry, 
balancing  against  each  other  the  words  Ancient  and 
Modern,  and  be  unconscious  that  they  have  fallen 
into  it. 

These  observations  are  not  made  as  implying  a  dis- 
sent from  the  belief  of  my  Correspondent,  that  the 
moral  spirit  and  intellectual  powers  of  this  country 

I  are  declining;  but  to  guard  against  unqualified  admira- 
tion, even  in  cases  where  admiration  has  been  rightly 

;  fixed,  and  to  prevent  that  depression,  which  must  ne- 
cessarily follow,  where  the  notion  of  the  peculiar  nn- 
favorableness  of  the  present  times  to  dignity  of  mind, 

■  has  been  carried  too  far.  For  in  proportion  as  we 
imagine  obstacles  to  exist  out  of  ourselves  to  retard 
our  progress,  will,  in  fact,  our  progress  be  retarded. 
— Deeming  then,  that  in  all  ages  an  ardent  mind  will 
be  baffled  and  led  astray  in  the  manner  under  con- 
templation, though  in  various  degrees,  I  shall  at  pre- 
sent content  myself  with  a  few  practical  and  desul- 
tory comments  upon  some  of  those  general  causes,  to 
which  my  correspondent  justly  attributes  the  errors 
in  opinion,  and  the  lowering  or  deadening  of  senti- 
ment, to  which  ingenuous  and  aspiring  youth  is  ex- 
posed. And  first,  for  the  heart-cheering  belief  in  the 
perpetual  progress  of  the  species  towards  a  point  of 
unattainable  perfection.  If  the  present  age  do  indeed 
transcend  the  past  in  what  is  most  beneficial  and  ho- 
norable, he  that  perceives  this,  being  in  no  error,  has 
no  cause  for  complaint ;  but  if  it  be  not  so,  a  youth 
of  genius  might,  it  should  seem,  be  preserved  from 
anv  wrong  influence  of  this  faith,  by  an  insight  into  a 
simple  truth,  namely,  that  it  is  not  necessary,  in  order 
to  satisfy  the  desires  of  our  nature,  or  to  reconcile  us 
to  the  economy  of  Providence,  that  there  should  be 
at  all  times  a  continuous  advance  in  what  is  of  high- 
est worth.  In  fact  it  is  not,  as  a  writer  of  the  present 
day  has  admirably  observed,  in  the  power  of  fiction, 
to  portray  in  words,  or  of  the  imagination  to  con- 
ceive in  spirit,  actions  or  characters  of  more  exalted 
virtue,  than  those  which  thousands  of  years  ago  have 
existed  upon  earth,  as  we  know  from  the  records  of 

|  authentic  history.    Such  is  the  inherent  dignity  of 

497 


488 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


human  nature,  that  there  belong  to  it  sublimities  of 
virtues  which  all  men  may  attain,  and  which  no  man 
can  transcend  :  and  though  this  be  not  true  in  an 
equal  degree,  of  intellectual  power,  yet  in  the  persons 
of  Plato,  Demosthenes,  and  Homer, — and  in  those  of 
Shakspeare,  Milton,  and  Lord  Bacon, — were  en- 
shrined as  much  of  the  divinity  of  intellect  as  the  in- 
habitants of  this  planet  can  hope  will  ever  take  up 
its  abode  among  them.  But  the  question  is  not  of  the 
power  or  worth  of  individual  minds,  but  of  the  gene- 
ral moral  or  intellectual  merits  of  an  age — or  a  peo- 
ple, or  of  the  human  race.  Be  it  so — let  us  allow 
and  believe  that  there  is  a  progress  in  the  species  to- 
wards unattainable  perfection,  or  whether  this  be  so 
or  not,  that  it  is  a  necessity  of  a  good  and  greatly-gift- 
ed nature  to  believe  it — surely  it  does  not  follow,  that 
this  progress  should  be  constant  in  those  virtues,  and 
intellectual  qualities,  and  in  those  departments  of 
knowledge,  which  in  themselves  absolutely  consid- 
ered are  of  most  value — things  independent  and  in 
their  degree  indispensable.  The  progress  of  the  spe- 
cies neither  is  nor  can  be  like  that  of  a  Roman  road 
in  a  right  line.  It  may  be  more  justly  compared  to 
that  of  a  river,  which  both  in  its  smaller  reaches  and 
larger  turnings,  is  frequently  forced  back  towards  its 
fountains,  by  objects  which  cannot  otherwise  be  elu- 
ded or  overcome  ;  yet  with  an  accompanying  impulse 
that  will  ensure  its  advancement  hereafter,  it  is  either 
gaining  strength  every  hour,  or  conquering  in  secret 
some  difficulty,  by  a  labor  that  contributes  as  effectu- 
ally to  further  it  in  its  course,  as  when  it  moves  for- 
ward uninterrupted  in  a  line,  direct  as  that  of  the  Ro- 
man road  with  which  we  began  the  comparison. 

It  suffices  to  content  the  mind,  though  there  may 
be  an  apparent  stagnation,  or  a  retrograde  movement 
in  the  species,  that  something  is  doing  which  is  ne- 
cessary to  be  done,  and  the  effects  of  which,  will  in 
due  time  appear; — that  something  is  unremittingly 
gaining,  either  in  secret  preparation  or  in  open  and 
triumphant  progress.  But  in  fact  here,  as  every 
where,  we  are  deceived  by  creations  which  the  mind 
is  compelled  to  make  for  itself,  we  speak  of  the  spe- 
cies not  as  an  aggregate,  but  as  endued  with  the  form 
and  separate  life  of  an  individual.  But  human  kind, 
what  is  it  else  than  myriads  of  rational  beings  in  va- 
rious degrees  obedient  to  their  Reason;  some  torpid, 
some  aspiring  ;  some  in  eager  chase  to  the  right  hand, 
some  to  the  left;  these  wasting  down  their  moral  na- 
ture, and  these  feeding  it  for  immortality?  A  whole 
generation  may  appear  even  to  sleep,  or  may  be  ex- 
asperated with  rage — they  that  compose  it,  tearing 
each  other  to  pieces  with  more  than  brutal  fury.  It 
is  enough  for  complacency  and  hope,  that  scattered 
and  solitary  minds  are  always  laboring  somewhere  in 
the  service  of  truth  and  virtue;  and  that  by  the  sleep 
of  the  multitude,  the  energy  of  the  multitude  ma)'  be 
prepared  ;  and  that  by  the  furv  of  the  people,  the 
chains  of  the  people  may  be  broken.  Happy  moment 
was  it  for  England  when  her  Chaucer,  who  has  right- 
ly been  called  the  morning  star  of  her  literature,  ap- 
peared above  the  horizon— when  her  Wickliffi  like 
the  sun,  "shot  orient  beams"  through  the  night  of  Ro- 
mish superstition! — Yet  may  the  darkness  and  the 


desolating  hurricane  which  immediately  followed  in 
the  wars  of  Y(5rk  and  Lancaster,  be  deemed  in  their 
turn  a  blessing,  with  which  the  land  has  been  visited. 

May  I  return  to  the  thought  of  progress,  of  accu- 
mulation, of  increasing  light,  or  of  any  other  image 
by  which  it  may  please  us  to  represent  the  improve- 
ment of  the  species  ?  The  hundred  years  that  fol- 
lowed the  usurpation  of  Henry  the  Fourth,  were  a 
hurling-back  of  the  mind  of  the  country,  a  dilapida- 
tion, an  extinction ;  yet  institutions,  laws,  customs, 
and  habits,  were  then  broken  down,  which  would  not 
have  been  so  readily,  nor  perhaps  so  thoroughly  de- 
stroyed by  the  gradual  influence  of  increasing  know- 
ledge ;  and  under  the  oppression  of  which,  if  they 
had  continued  to  exist,  the  virtue  and  intellectual 
prowess  of  the  succeeding  century  could  not  have  ap- 
peared at  all,  much  less  could  they  have  displayed 
themselves  with  that  eager  haste,  and  with  those  be- 
neficent triumphs  which  will'  to  the  end  of  time  be 
looked  back  upon  with  admiration  and  gratitude. 

If  the  foregoing  obvious  distinctions  be  once  clearly 
perceived,  and  steadily  kept  in  view,  I  do  not  see 
why  a  belief  in  the  progress  of  human  nature  towards 
perfection,  should  dispose  a  youthful  mind,  however 
enthusiastic,  to  an  undue  admiration  of  his  own  age, 
and  thus  tend  to  degrade  that  mind. 

But  let  me  strike  at  once  at  the  root  of  the  evil 
complained  of  in  my  Correspondent's  letter. — Protec- 
tion from  any  fatal  effects  of  seductions,  and  hin- 
drances which  opinion  may  throw  in  the  way  of 
pure  and  high-minded  youth,  can  only  be  obtained 
with  certainty  at  the  same  price  by  which  everything 
great  and  good  is  obtained,  namely,  steady  depend- 
ence upon  voluntary  and  self-originating  effort,  and 
upon  the  practice  of  self-examination,  sincerely  aimed 
at  and  rigorously  enforced.  But  how  is  this  to  be 
expected  from  youth  ?  Is  it  not  to  demand  the  fruit 
when  the  blossom  is  barely  put  forth,  and  is  hourly 
at  the  rpercv  of  frosts  and  winds  ?  To  expect  from 
youth  these  virtues  and  habits,  in  that  degree  of  ex- 
cellence to  which  in  mature  years  they  may  be  car- 
ried, would  indeed  be  preposterous.  Yel  has  youth 
many  helps  and  aptitudes,  for  the  discharge  of  these 
difficult  duties,  which  are  withdrawn  for  the  most 
part  from  the  more  advanced  stages  of  life.  For 
youth  has  its  own  wealth  and  independence ;  it  is 
rich  in  health  of  body  and  animal  spirits,  in  its  sensi- 
bility to  the  impressions  of  the  natural  universe,  in 
the  conscious  growth  of  knowledge,  in  lively  sympa- 
thy and  familiar  communion  with  the  generous  ac- 
tions recorded  in  history,  and  with  the  high  passions 
of  poetry;  and,  above  all,  youth  is  rich  in  the  pos- 
session of  time,  and  the  accompanying  consciousness 
of  freedom  and  power,  The  young  man  feels  that 
he  stands  at  a  distance  from  the  season  when  his 
harvest  is  to  be  reaped, — that  he  has  leisure  and  may 
look  around — may  defer  both  the  choice  and  the  exe- 
cution of  his  purposes.  If  he  make  an  attempt  and 
shall  fail,  new  hopes  immediately  rush  in,  and  new 
promises.  Hence,  in  the  happy  confidence  of  his 
feelings,  and  in  the  elasticity  of  his  spirit,  neither 
worldly  ambition,  nor  the  love  of  praise,  nor  dread 
of  censure,  nor  the  necessity  of  world]  v  maintenance, 
498 


THE  FRIEND. 


489 


nor  any  of  those  causes  which  tempt  or  compel  the 
mind  habitually  to  look  out  of  itself  for  support ;  nei- 
ther these,  nor  the  passions  of  envy,  fear,  hatred, 
despondency,  and  the  rankling  of  disappointed  hopes, 
(all  which  in  after  life  give  birth  to,  and  regulate  the 
efforts  of  men,  and  determine  their  opinion-  have 
power  to  preside  over  the  choice  of  the  young,  if  the 
disposition  be  not  naturally  bad,  or  the  circumstances 
have  not  been  in  an  uncommon  degree  unfavorable. 
In  contemplation,  then,  of  this  disinterested  and 
free  condition  of  the  youthful  mind,  I  deem  it  in 
many  points  peculiarly  capable  of  searching  into  it- 
self, and  of  profiting  bv  a  few  simple  questions — such 
as  these  that  follow.  Am  1  chiefly  gratified  by  the 
exertion  of  my  power  from  the  pleasure  of  intellec- 
tual activity,  and  from  the  knowledge  thereby  ac- 
quired ?  In  other  words,  to  what  degree  do  1  value 
my  faculties  and  my  attainments  for  their  own  sakes  ? 
or  are  they  chiefly  prized  by  me  on  account  of  the 
distinction  which  they  confer,  or  the  superiority 
which  they  give  me  over  others  ?  Am  1  aware  that 
immediate  influence  and  a  general  acknowledgment 
of  merit,  are  no  necessary  adjuncts  of  a  successful 
adherence  to  study  and  meditation,  in  those  depart- 
ments of  knowledge  which  are  of  most  value  to  man- 
kind ?  that  a  recompense  of  honors  and  emoluments 
is  far  less  to  be  expected — in  fact,  that  there  is  little 
natural  connexion  between  them  ?  Have  I  perceived 
this  truth  ?  and,  perceiving  it,  does  the  countenance 
of  philosophy  continue  to  appear  as  bright  and  beau- 
tiful in  my  eves  ? — Has  no  haze  bedimmed  it !  has  no 
cloud  passed  over  and  hidden  from  me  that  look 
which  was  before  so  encouraging  ?  Knowing  that  it 
is  my  duty,  and  feeling  that  it  is  my  inclination,  to 
mingle  as  a  social  being  with  my  fellow  men;  pre- 
pared also  to  submit  cheerfully  to  the  necessity  that 
will  probably  exist  of  relinquishing,  for  the  purpose 
of  gaining  a  livelihood,  the  greatest  portion  of  my 
time  to  employments  where  I  shall  have  little  or  no 
choice  how  or  when  I  am  to  act;  have  I,  at  this  mo- 
ment, when  I  stand  as  it  were  upon  the  threshold  of 
the  busy  world,  a  clear  intuition  of  that  pre-eminence 
in  which  virtue  and  truth  (involving  in  this  latter 
word  the  sanctities  of  religion)  sit  enthroned  above 
all  denominations  and  dignities  which,  in  various  de- 
grees of  exaltation,  rule  over  the  desires  of  men  ? — Do 
I  feel  that,  if  their  solemn  mandates  shall  be  forgot- 
ten, or  disregarded,  or  denied  the  obedience  due  to 
them  when  opposed  to  others,  I  shall  not  only  have 
lived  for  no  good  purpose,  but  that  I  shall  have  sacri- 
ficed my  birth-right  as  a  rational  being ;  and  that 
everv  other  acquisition  will  be  a  bane  and  disgrace  to 
me?  This  is  not  spoken  with  reference  to  such  sa- 
crifices as  present  themselves  to  the  youthful  imagi- 
nation in  the  shape  of  crimes,  acts  by  which  the  con- 
science is  violated  ;  such  a  thought,  I  know,  would 
be  recoiled  from  at  once,  not  without  indignation  ; 
but  I  write  in  the  spirit  of  the  ancient  fable  of  Prodi- 
cus,  representing  the  choice  of  Hercules — Here  is 
the  World,  a  female  figure  approaching  at  the  head 
of  a  train  of  willing  or  giddy  followers: — her  air  and 
deportment  are  at  once  careless,  remiss,  self-satisfied, 
and  haughty : — and  there  is  Intellectual  Prowess, 


with  a  pale  cheek  and  serene  brow,  leading  in  chains 
Truth,  her  beautiful  and  modest  captive.  The  one 
makes  her  salutation  with  a  discourse  of  ease,  plea- 
sure, freedom,  and  domestic  tranquillity;  or,  if  she 
invite  to  labor,  it  is  labor  in  the  busy  and  beaten 
track,  with  assurance  of  the  complacent  regards  of 
parents,  friends,  and  of  those  with  whom  we  associ- 
ate. The  promise  also  may  be  upon  her  lip  of  the 
huzzas  of  the  multitude,  of  the  smile  of  kin 
the  munificent  rewards  of  senates.  The  other  doe° 
not  venture  to  hold  forth  any  of  these  allurements 
she  does  not  conceal  from  him  whom  she  addresses 
the  impediments,  the  disappointments,  the  ignorance 
and  prejudice  which  her  follower  will  have  to  en- 
counter, if  devoted  when  duty  calls,  to  active  life; 
and  if  to  contemplative,  she  lays  nakedly  befor 
a  scheme  of  solitary  and  unremitting  labor,  a  life  of 
entire  neglect  perhaps,  or  assuredly  a  life  exposed  to 
scorn,  insult,  persecution,  and  hatred ;  but  cheered 
bv  encouragement  from  a  grateful  few,  by  applaud 
ing  conscience,  and  by  a  prophetic  anticipation,  pei 
haps,  of  fame — a  late,  though  lasting  consequence 
Of  these  two,  each  in  this  manner  soliciting  you  lj 
become  her  adherent,  you  doubt  not  which  to  prefer, 
— but  oh  !  the  thought  of  moment  is  not  preference, 
but  the  degree  of  preference  ;  the  passionate  and  pure 
choice,  the  inward  sense  of  absolute  and  unchange- 
able devotion. 

I  spoke  of  a  few  simple  questions — the  question 
involved  in  this  deliberation  is  simple;  but  at  the 
same  time  it  is  high  and  awful :  and  I  would  gladly 
know  whether  an  answer  can  be  returned  saiisfac- 
tory  to  the  mind. — We  will  for  a  moment  a 
that  it  cannot;  that  there  is  a  startling  and  a  hesita- 
tion.— Are  we  then  to  despond  ?  to  retire  from  all 
contest  ?  and  to  reconcile  ourselves  at  once  to  cares 
without  a  generous  hope,  and  to  efforts  in  which 
(here  is  no  more  moral  life  than  that  which  is  found 
in  the  business  and  labors  of  the  unfavored  and  un- 
aspiring many?  ?so — but  if  the  inquiry  have  not 
been  on  just  grounds  satisfactorily  answered,  we  may 
refer  confidently  our  youth  to  that  nature  of  w  hich  he 
deems  himself  an  enthusiastic  follower, and  one  who 
wishes  to  continue  no  less  faithful  and  eniLusiastic. — 
We  would  tell  him  that  there  are  paths  which  he 
has  not  trodden ;  recesses  which  he  has  not  pene- 
trated, that  there  is  a  beauty  which  he  has  not  seen, 
a  pathos  which  he  has  not  felt — a  sublimity  to  which 
lie  hath  not  been  raised.  If  he  have  trembled  be- 
cause there  has  occasionally  taken  place  in  him  a 
lapse  of  which  he  is  conscious ;  if  he  foresee  open 
or  secret  attacks,  which  he  has  had  intimations  that 
he  will  neither  be  strong  enough  to  resist,  nor  watch- 
ful enough  to  elude,  let  him  not  hastily  ascribe  this 
weakness,  this  deficiency,  and  the  painful  apprehen- 
sions accompanying  them,  in  any  degree  to  the  virtues 
or  noble  qualities  with  which  youth  by  nature  is  fur- 
nished ;  but  let  him  first  be  assured,  before  he  looks 
about  for  the  means  of  attaining  the  insight,  the  dis- 
criminating powers,  and  the  confirmed  wisdom  of 
manhood,  that  his  soul  has  more  to  demand  of  the 
appropriate  excellencies  of  youth,  than  youth  has  yet 
supplied  to  it ; — that  the  evil  under  which  he  labors 
499 


490 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


is  not  a  superabundance  of  the  Instincts  and  the  ani- 
mating spirit  of  that  age,  but  a  tailing  short,  or  a 
failure. — But  what  can  he  gain  from  this  admonition? 
he  cannot  recall  past  time ;  he  cannot  begin  his 
journey  afresh  ;  he  cannot  untwist  the  links  by  which, 
m  no  undelightful  harmony,  images  and  sentiments 
are  wedded  in  his  mind.  Granted  that  the  sacred 
light  of  childhood  is  and  must  be  for  him  no  more 
than  a  remembrance.  He  may,  notwithstanding,  be 
remanded  to  nature;  and  with  trust-worthy  hopes; 
founded  less  upon  his  sentient  than  upon  his  intellec- 
tual being — to  nature,  as  leading  on  insensibly  to  the 
society  of  reason  ;  but  to  reason  and  will,  as  leading 
back  to  the  wisdom  of  nature.  A  re-union,  in  this 
order  accomplished,  will  bring  reformation  and  a 
timely  support ;  and  the  two  powers  of  reason  and 
nature,  thus  reciprocally  teacher  and  taught,  may 
advance  together  in  a  track  to  which  there  is  no 
limit 

We  have  been  discoursing  (by  implication  at  least) 
of  infancy,  childhood,  boyhood,  and  youth,  of  plea- 
sures lying  upon  the  unfolding  intellect  plenteonsly 
as  morning  dew  drops — of  knowledge  inhaled  insen- 
sibly like  the  fragrance — of  dispositions  stealing  into 
the  spirit  like  music  from  unknown  quarters — of  im- 
ages uncalled  for  and  rising  up  like  exhalations — of 
hopes  plucked  like  beautiful  wild  flowers  from  the 
ruined  tombs  that  border  the  highways  of  antiquity, 
to  make  a  garland  for  a  living  forehead  : — in  a  word, 
we  have  been  treating  of  nature  as  a  teacher  of 
truth  through  joy  and  through  gladness,  and  as  a 
creatress  of  the  faculties  by  a  process  of  smoothness 
and  delight.  We  have  made  no  mention  of  fear, 
shame,  sorrow,  nor  of  ungovernable  and  vexing 
thoughts;  because,  although  these  have  been  and 
have  done  mighty  service,  they  are  overlooked  in 
that  stage  of  life  when  youth  is  passing  into  manhood 
— overlooked,  or  forgotten.  We  now  apply  for  suc- 
cor which  we  need,  to  a  faculty  that  works  after  a 
different  course  :  that  faculty  is  Reason  :  she  gives 
more  spontaneously,  but  she  seeks  for  more  ;  she 
works  by  thought,  through  feeling;  yet  in  thoughts 
she  begins  and  ends. 

A  familiar  incident  may  elucidate  this  contrast  in 
the  operations  of  nature,  may  render  plain  the  man- 
ner in  which  a  process  of  intellectual  improvements, 
the  reverse  of  that  which  nature  pursues,  is  by  reason 
introduced:  There  never  perhaps  existed  a  school- 
boy who,  having  when  he  retired  to  rest,  carelessly 
blown  out  his  candle,  and  having  chanced  to  notice, 
as  he  lay  upon  his  bed  in  the  ensuing  darkness,  the 
sullen  light  which  had  survived  the  extinguished 
flame,  did  not,  at  some  time  or  other,  watch  that 
light  as  if  his  mind  were  bound  to  it  by  a  spell.  It 
fades  and  revives — gathers  to  a  point — seems  as  if  it 
would  go  out  in  a  moment — again  recovers  its 
strength,  nay  becomes  brighter  than  belore :  it  con- 
tinues to  shine  with  an  endurance,  which  in  its  ap- 
parent weakness  is  a  mystery — it  protracts  its  exist- 
ence so  long,  clinging  to  the  power  which  supports 
it,  that  the  observer,  who  had  laid  down  in  his  bed 
so  easy-minded,  becomes  sad  and  melancholy  :  his 
sympathies  are  touched — it  is  to  him  an  intimation 


and  an  image  of  departing  human  life, — the  thought 
comes  nearer  to  him  —  it  is  the  life  of  a  venerated 
parent,  of  a  beloved  brother  or  sister,  or  of  an  aged 
domestic  ;  who  are  gone  to  the  grave,  or  whose  des- 
tiny it  soon  may  be  thus  to  linger,  thus  to  hang  upon 
the  last  point  of  mortal  existence,  thus  finally  to  de- 
part and  be  seen  no  more.  This  is  nature  teaching 
seriously  and  sweetly  through  the  affections — melt- 
ing the  heart,  and,  through  that  instinct  of  tenderness, 
developing  the  understanding. — In  this  instance  the 
object  of  solicitude  is  the  bodily  life  of  another.  Let 
us  accompany  this  same  boy  to  that  period  between 
youth  and  manhood,  when  a  solicitude  may  be 
awakened  for  the  moral  life  of  himself. — Are  there 
any  powers  by  which,  beginning  with  a  sense  of  in- 
ward decay  that  affects  not  however  the  natural  life, 
he  could  call  to  mind  the  same  image  and  hang  over 
it  with  an  equal  interest  aa  a  visible  type  of  his  own 
perishing  spirit? — Oh!  surely,  if  the  being  of  the 
individual  be  under  his  own  care  —  if  it  be  his  first 
care  —  if  duty  begin  from  the  point  of  accountable- 
ness  to  our  conscience,  and  through  that,  to  God  and 
human  nature;  —  if  without  such  primary  sense  of 
duty,  all  secondary  care  of  teacher,  of  friend,  or  pa- 
rent, must  be  baseless  and  fruitless;  if,  lastly,  the 
motions  of  the  soul  transcend  in  worth  those  of  the 
animal  functions,  nay  give  to  them  their  sole  value ; 
then  truly  are  there  such  powers  :  and  the  image  of 
the  dying  taper  may  be  recalled  and  contemplated, 
though  with  no  sadness  in  the  nerves,  no  disposition 
to  tears,  no  unconquerable  sighs,  yet  with  a  melan- 
choly in  the  soul,  a  sinking  inward  into  ourselves 
from  thought  to  thought,  a  steady  remonstrance,  and 
a  high  resolve. — Let  then  the  youth  go  back,  as  oc- 
casion will  permit,  to  nature  and  to  solitude,  thus 
admonished  by  reason,  and  relying  upon  this  newly 
acquired  support.  A  world  of  fresh  sensations  will 
gradually  open  upon  him  as  his  mind  puts  off  its  in- 
firmities, and  as  instead  of  being  propelled  restlessly 
towards  others  in  admiration,  or  too  hasty  love,  he 
makes  it  his  prime  business  to  understand  himself. 
New  sensations,  I  affirm,  will  be  opened  out — pure, 
and  sanctioned  by  that  reason  which  is  their  original 
author;  and  precious  feelings  of  disinterested,  that  is 
self-disregarding  joy  and  love  may  be  regenerated 
and  restored  : — and,  in  this  sense,  he  may  be  said  to 
measure  back  the  track  of  life  he  has  trod. 

In  such  disposition  of  mind  let  the  youth  return  to 
the  visible  universe :  and  to  conversation  with  an- 
cient books  ;  and  to  those,  if  such  there  be,  which  in 
the  present  day  breathe  the  ancient  spirit;  and  let 
him  feed  upon  that  beauty  which  unfolds  itself,  vot 
to  his  eye  as  it  sees  carelessly  the  things  which  can- 
not possibly  go  unseen,  and  are  remembered  or  not 
as  accident  shall  decide,  but  to  the  thinking  mind ; 
which  searches, discovers,  and  treasures  up, — infusing 
by  meditation  into  the  objects  with  which  it  converses 
an  intellectual  life;  whereby  they  remain  planted  in 
the  memory,  now,  and  for  ever.  Hitherto  the  youth, 
I  suppose,  has  been  content  for  the  most  part  to  look 
at  his  own  mind,  after  the  manner  in  which  he  ranges 
along  the  stars  in  the  firmament  with  naked  unaided 
sight :  let  him  now  apply  the  telescope  of  art — to  call 
500 


THE  FRIEND. 


491 


the  invisible  stars  out  of  their  hiding  places;  and  let 
him  endeavor  to  look  through  the  svstem  of  his  be- 
ing, with  the  organ  of  reason ;  summoned  to  pene- 
trate, as  far  as  it  has  power,  in  discovery  of  the 
impelling  forces  and  the  governing  laws. 

These  expectations  are  not  immoderate  :  they  de- 
mand nothing  more  than  the  perception  of  a  few- 
plain  truths;  namelv,  that  knowledge  efficacious  for 
the  production  of  virtue  is  the  ultimate  end  of  all 
effort,  the  sole  dispenser  of  complacency  and  repose. 
A  perception  also  is  implied  of  the  inherent  superior- 
ity of  contemplation  to  action.  The  Friend  does  not 
in  this  contradict  his  own  words,  where  he  has  said 
heretofore,  that  "doubtless  it  is  nobler  to  act  than  to 
think."  In  those  words,  it  was  his  purpose  to  censure 
that  barren  contemplation,  which  rests  satisfied  with 
itself  in  cases  where  the  thoughts  are  of  such  quality 
that  they  may  be,  and  ought  to  be  imbodied  in  action. 
But  he  speaks  now  of  the  general  superiority  of 
thought  to  action : — as  proceeding  and  governing  all 
action  that  moves  to  salutarv purposes;  and, secondly, 
as  leading  to  elevation,  the  absolute  possession  of  the 
individual  mind,  and  to  a  consistency  or  harmony  of 
the  being  within  itself,  which  no  outward  agency  can 
reach  to  disturb  or  to  impair: — and  lastly,  as  pro- 
ducing works  of  pure  science ;  or  of  the  combined 
faculties  of  imagination,  feeling,  and  reason  ; — works 
which,  both  from  their  independence  in  their  origin 
upon  accident,  their  nature,  their  duration,  and  the 
wide  spread  of  their  influence,  are  entitled  rightly  to 
take  place  of  the  noblest  and  most  beneficent  deeds 
of  heroes,  statesmen,  legislators,  or  warriors. 

Yet,  beginning  from  the  perception  of  this  estab- 
lished superiority,  we  do  not  suppose  that  the  youth, 
whom  we  wish  to  guide  and  encourage,  is  to  be  in- 
sensible to  those  influences  of  wealth,  or  rank,  or  sta- 
tion, by  which  the  bulk  of  mankind  are  swayed.  Our 
e\-'5s  have  not  been  fixed  upon  virtue  which  lies  apart 
from  human  nature,  or  transcends  it.  In  fact  there 
is  no  such  virtue.  We  neither  suppose  nor  wish  him 
to  undervalue  or  slight  these  distinctions  as  modes  of 
power,  things  that  may  enable  him  to  be  more  useful 
to  his  contemporaries;  nor  as  gratifications  that  may 
confer  dignity  upon  his  living  person;  and,  through 
him,  upon  those  who  love  him  ;  nor  as  they  may  con- 
nect his  name,  through  a  family  to  be  founded  by  his 
success,  in  a  closer  chain  of  gratitude  with  some  por- 
tion of  posterity,  who  shall  speak  of  him,  as  among 
their  ancestry,  with  a  more  tender  interest  than  the 
mere  general  bond  of  patriotism  or  humanity  would 
supply.  We  suppose  no  indifference  to,  much  less  a 
contempt  of,  these  rewards;  but  let  them  have  their 
due  place;  let  it  be  ascertained,  when  the  soul  is 
searched  into,  that  they  are  only  an  auxiliary  motive 
to  exertion,  never  the  principal  or  originating  force. 
If  this  be  too  much  to  expect  from  a  youth  who,  I 
take  for  granted,  possesses  no  ordinary  endowments, 
and  whom  circumstances  with  respect  to  the  more 
dangerous  passions  have  favored,  then,  indeed,  must 
the  noble  spirit  of  the  country  be  wasted  away :  then 
would  our  institutions  be  deplorable;  and  the  educa- 
tion prevalent  among  us  utterly  vile  and  debasing. 
But  my  Correspondent,  who  drew  forth  these 
SaS 


thoughts,  has  said  rightly,  that  the  character  of  the  age 
may  not  without  injustice  be  thus  branded  :  he  will 
not  deny  that,  without  speaking  of  other  countries, 
there  is  in  these  islands,  in  the  departments  of  natural 
philosophy,  of  mechanic  ingenuity,  in  the  general 
acth  ities  of  the  country,  and  in  the  particular  excel- 
lence of  individual  minds,  in  high  stations  civil  or 
military,  enough  to  excite  admiration  and  love  in  the 
sober-minded,  and  more  than  enough  to  intoxicate 
the  youthful  and  inexperienced.  I  will  compare, 
then,  an  aspirins  youth,  leaving  the  schools  in  which 
lie  has  been  disciplined,  and  preparing  to  bear  a  part 
in  the  concerns  of  the  world.  I  will  compare  him  in 
this  season  of  eager  admiration,  to  a  newly-invested 
knight  appearing  with  his  blank  unsignalized  shield, 
upon  some  day  of  solemn  tournament,  at  the  Court 
of  the  Fairy  -queen,  as  that  sovereignty  was  conceived 
to  exist  by  the  moral  and  imaginative  genius  of  our 
divine  Spenser.  He  does  not  himself  immediately 
enter  the  lists  as  a  combatant,  but  he  looks  round  him 
with  a  beating  heart :  dazzled  by  the  gorgeous  pa- 
geantry, the  banners,  the  impresses,  the  ladies  of 
overcoming  beauty,  the  persons  of  the  knights — now- 
first  seen  by  him,  the  fame  of  whose  actions  is  car- 
ried by  the  traveller,  like  merchandise,  through  the 
world  ;  and  resounded  upon  the  harp  of  the  minstrel. 
— But  I  am  not  at  liberty  to  make  this  comparison. 
If  a  youth  were  to  begin  his  career  in  such  an  as- 
semblage, with  such  examples  to  guide  and  to  ani- 
mate, it  will  be  pleaded,  there  should  be  no  cause 
for  apprehension .-  he  could  not  falter,  he  could  not  be 
misled.  But  ours  is,  notwithstanding  its  manifold 
excellencies,  a  degenerate  age:  and  recreant  knights 
are  among  us  far  outnumbering  the  true.  A  false 
Gloriana  in  these  days  imposes  worthless  services, 
which  they  who  perform  them,  in  their  blindness, 
know  not  to  be  such  ;  and  which  are  recompensed  by 
rewards  as  worthless — yet  eagerly  grasped  at,  as  if 
they  were  the  immortal  guerdon  of  virtue. 

I  have  in  this  declaration  insensibly  overstepped 
the  limits  which  I  had  determined  not  to  pass;  let  me 
be  forgiven:  for  it  is  hope  which  hath  carried  me 
forward.  In  such  a  mixed  assemblage  as  our  age 
presents,  with  its  genuine  merit  and  its  large  over- 
balance of  alloy,  I  may  boldly  ask  into  what  errors, 
either  with  respect  to  person  or  thing,  could  a  young 
man  fall,  who  had  sincerely  entered  upon  the  course 
of  moral  discipline  which  has  been  recommended, 
and  to  which  the  condition  of  youth,  it  has  been 
proved,  is  favorable  ?  His  opinions  could  nowhere 
deceive  him  beyond  the  point  to  which,  after  a  sea- 
son, he  would  find  that  it  was  salutary  for  him  to 
have  been  deceived.  For,  as  that  man  cannot  set  a 
right  value  upon  health  who  has  never  known  sick- 
ness, nor  feel  the  blessing  of  ease  who  has  been 
through  his  life  a  stranger  to  pain,  so  can  there  be  no 
confirmed  and  passionate  love  of  truth  for  him  who 
has  not  experienced  the  hollowness  of  error. — Range 
against  each  other  as  advocates,  oppose  as  combat- 
ants, two  several  intellects,  each  strenuously  assert- 
ing doctrines  which  he  sincerely  believes ;  but  the 
one  contending  for  the  worth  and  beauty  of  that  gar- 
ment which  the  other  has  outgrown  and  cast  away 
501 


492 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Mark  the  superiority,  the  ease,  the  dignity,  on  the 
side  of  the  more  advanced  mind,  how  he  overlooks 
his  subject,  commands  it  from  centre  to  circumfer- 
ence, and  hath  the  same  thorough  knowledge  of  the 
tenets  which  his  adversary,  with  impetuous  zeal,  but 
in  confusion  also,  and  thrown  off  his  guard  at  every 
turn  of  the  argument,  is  laboring  to  maintain  !  If  it 
be  a  question  of  the  fine  arts  (poetry  for  instance)  the 
riper  mind  not  only  sees  that  his  opponent  is  deceived  ; 
but,  what  is  of  far  more  importance,  sees  how  he  is 
deceived.  The  imagination  stands  before  him  with 
all  its  imperfections  laid  open ;  as  duped  by  shows, 
enslaved  by  words,  corrupted  by  mistaken  delicacy 
and  false  refinement, — as  not  having  even  attended 
with  rare  to  the  reports  of  the  senses,  and  therefore 
deficient  grossly  in  the  rudiments  of  her  own  power. 
He  has  noted  how,  as  a  supposed  necessary  condition, 
the  understanding  sleeps  in  order  that  the  fancy  may 
dream.  Studied  in  the  history  of  society  and  versed 
in  the  secret  laws  of  thought,  he  can  pass  regularly 
through  all  the  gradations,  can  pierce  infallibly  all 
the  windings,  which  false  taste  through  ages  has  pur- 
sued— from  the  very  time  when  first,  through  inex- 
perience, heedlessness,  or  affectation,  she  took  her 
departure  from  the  side  of  Truth,  her  original  pa- 
rent.  Can  a  disputant  thus  accoutred  be  with- 
stood ? — to  whom,  further,  every  movement  in  the 
thoughts  of  his  antagonist  is  revealed  by  the  light  of 
his  own  experience ;  who,  therefore,  sympathises  with 
weakness  gently,  and  wins  his  way  by  forbearance; 
and  hath,  when  needful,  an  irresistible  power  of 
onset, — arising  from  gratitude  to  the  truth  which  he 
vindicates,  not  merely  as  a  positive  good  for  man- 
kind, but  as  his  own  especial  rescue  and  redemption. 

I  might  here  conclude :  but  my  Correspondent  to- 
wards the  close  of  his  letter,  has  written  so  feelingly 
upon  the  advantages  to  be  derived,  in  his  estimation, 
from  a  living  instructor,  that  I  must  not  leave  this 
part  of  the  subject  without  a  word  of  direct  notice.  The 
Friend  cited,  some  time  ago,  a  passage  from  the  prose 
works  of  Milton,  eloquently  describing  the  manner 
in  which  good  and  evil  grow  up  together  in  the  field 
of  the  world  almost  inseparably;  and  insisting,  conse-  j 
quently,  upon  the  knowledge  and   survey  of  vice  as  ; 
necessary  to  the  constituting  of  human  virtue,  and  , 
the  scanning  of  error  to  the  confirmation  of  Truth. 

If  this  be  so,  and  I  have  been  reasoning  to  the  same 
effect  in  the  preceding  paragraph,  the  fact,  and  the 
thoughts  which  it  may  suggest,  will,  if  rightly  applied,  ' 
tend  to  moderate  an  anxiety  for  the  guidance  of  a 
more  experienced  or  superior  mind.  The  advantage, 
where  it  is  possessed,  is  far  from  being  an  absolute 
good :  nay,  such  a  preceptor,  ever  at  hand,  might 
prove  an  oppression  not  to  be  thrown  off,  and  a  fatal 
hinderance.  Grant  that  in  the  general  tenor  of  his 
intercourse  with  his  pupil  he  is  forbearing  and  cir- 
cumspect, inasmuch  as  he  is  rich  in  that  knowledge 
(above  all  other  necessary  for  a  teacher)  which  can- 
not exist  without  a  liveliness  of  memory,  preserving 
for  him  an  unbroken  image  of  the  winding,  excursive,  . 
and  often  retrograde  course,  along  which  his  own  in-  | 
tellect  has  passed.  Grant  that,  furnished  with  these 
distinct  remembrances,  he  wishes  that  the  mind  of  , 


his  pupil  should  be  free  to  luxuriate  in  the  enjoy 
ments,  loves,  and  admirations  appropriated  to  its  age; 
that  he  is  not  in  haste  to  kill  what  he  knows  will  in  due 
time  die  of  itself;  or  be  transmuted,  and  put  on  a  no- 
bler form  and  higher  faculties  otherwise  unattaina- 
ble. In  a  word,  that  the  teacher  is  governed  habit- 
ually by  the  wisdom  of  patience  waiting  with  plea- 
sure. Yet  perceiving  how  much  the  outward  help 
of  art  can  facilitate  the  progress  of  nature,  he  may  be 
betrayed  into  many  unnecessary  or  pernicious  mis- 
takes where  he  deems  his  interference  warranted  by 
substantial  experience.  And  in  spite  of  all  his  cau- 
tion, remarks  may  drop  insensibly  from  him  which 
may  wither  in  the  mind  of  his  pupil  a  generous  sym- 
pathy, destroy  a  sentiment  of  approbation  or  dislike, 
not  merely  innocent  but  salutary;  and  for  the  expe- 
rienced disciple  how  many  pleasures  may  thus  be  cut 
off  what  joy,  what  admiration  and  what  love!  while 
in  their  stead  are  introduced  into  the  ingenuous  mind 
misgivings,  a  mistrust  of  its  own  evidence,  disposi- 
tions  to  affect  to  feel  where  there  can  be  no  real  feel- 
ing, indecisive  judgments,  a  superstructure  of  opin- 
ions that  has  no  base  to  support  it,  and  words,  uttered 
by  rote  with  the  impertinence  of  a  parrot  or  a  mock- 
ing-bird, yet  which  may  not  be  listened  to  with  the 
same  indifference,  as  they  cannot  be  heard  without 
some  feeling  of  moral  disapprobation. 

These  results,  I  contend,  whatever  may  be  the  ben- 
efit to  be  derived  from  such  an  enlightened  Teacher, 
are  in  their  degree  inevitable.  And  by  this  process, 
humility  and  docile  dispositions  may  exist  towards  the 
Master,  endued  as  he  is  with  the  power  which  per- 
sonal presence  confers ;  but  at  the  same  time  they 
will  be  liable  to  overstep  their  due  bounds,  and  to 
degenerate  into  passiveness  and  prostration  of  mind. 
This  towards  him !  while,  with  respect  to  other  liv- 
ing men,  nay  even  to  the  mighty  spirits  of  past  times, 
there  may  be  associated  with  such  weakness  a  want 
of  modesty  and  humility.  Insensibly  may  steal  in 
presumption  and  a  habit  of  sitting  in  judgment  in 
cases  where  no  sentiment  ought  to  have  existed  but 
diffidence  or  veneration.  Such  virtues  are  the  sacred 
attributes  of  Youth ;  its  appropriate  calling  is  not  to 
distinguish  in  the  fear  of  being  deceived  or  degraded, 
not  to  analyze  with  scrupulous  minuteness,  but  to  ac- 
cumulate in  genial  confidence;  its  instinct,  its  safety, 
its  benefit,  its  glory,  is  to  love,  to  admire,  to  feel,  and 
to  labor.  Nature  has  irrevocably  decreed,  that  our 
prime  dependence  in  all  stages  .of  life  after  Infancy 
and  Childhood  have  been  passed  through  (nor  do  I 
know  that  this  latter  ought  to  be  excepted)  must  be 
upon  our  own  minds ;  and  that  the  way  to  know  ledge 
shall  be  long,  difficult,  winding,  and  oftentimes  re- 
turning upon  itself. 

What  has  been  said  is  a  mere  sketch  ;  and  that  only 
of  a  part  of  the  interesting  country  into  which  we 
have  been  led :  but  my  Correspondent  will  be  able 
to  enter  the  paths  that  have  been  pointed  out.  Should 
he  do  this  and  advance  steadily  for  a  while,  he  needs 
not  fear  any  deviations  from  the  truth  which  will  be 
finally  injurious  to  him.  He  will  not  long  have  his 
admiration  fixed  upon  unworthy  objects  ;  he  will  nei- 
ther be  clocrged  nor  drawn  aside  by  the  love  of  friends 
502 


THE  FRIEND. 


493 


or  kinditd,  betraying  his  understanding  through  his 
affections ;  he  will  neither  be  bowed  down  by  con- 
ventional arrangements  of  manners  producing  too  of- 
ten a  lifeless  decency :  nor  will  the  rock  of  his  spirit 
wear  away  in  the  endless  beating  of  the  waves  of 
the  world :  neither  will  that  portion  of  his  own  time, 
which  he  must  surrender  to  labors  by  which  his  live- 
lihood is  to  be  earned  or  his  social  duties  performed, 
be  unprofitable  to  himself  indirectly,  while  it  is  di- 
rectly useful  to  others :  for  that  time  has  been  prima- 
rily surrendered  through  an  act  of  obedience  to  a  mo- 
ral law  established  by  himself,  and  therefore  he 
moves  then  also  along  the  orbit  of  perfect  liberty. 

Let  it  be  remembered,  that  the  advice  requested 
does  not  relate  to  the  government  of  the  more  dan- 
gerous passions,  or  to  the  fundamental  principles  of 
right  and  wrong  as  acknowledged  by  the  universal 
conscience  of  mankind.  I  mav  therefore  assure  my 
youthful  Correspondent,  if  he  will  endeavor  to  look 
into  himself  in  the  manner  in  which  I  have  exhorted 


him  to  do,  that  in  him  the  wish  will  be  realized,  to 
him  in  due  time  the  prayer  granted,  which  was  ut- 
tered by  that  living  Teacher  of  whom  he  speaks  with 
gratitude  as  a  benefactor,  when,  in  his  character  of  a 
philosophical  Poet,  having  thought  of  Morality  as  im- 
plying in  its  essence  voluntary  obedience,  and  pro- 
ducing the  effect  of  order,  he  transfers  in  the  trans- 
port of  imagination,  the  law  of  moral  to  physical  na- 
tures, and  having  contemplated,  through  the  medium 
of  that  order,  all  modes  of  existence  as  subservient  to 
one  spirit,  concludes  his  address  to  the  power  of  Duty 
in  the  following  words : 

To  humbler  functions,  awful  Power ! 
1  call  thee  :  I  myself  commend 
Unto  thy  guidance  from  this  hour ; 
Oh.  let  my  weakness  have  an  end  ; 
Give  unto  me,  made  lowly  wise, 
The  spirit  of  self-sacrifice  ; 
The  confidence  of  reason  give! 
And  in  the  light  of  Truth  thy  Bondman  let  me  live! 

W.  W. 


Efte  ffivitvrt. 

SECTION     THE     SECOND. 

ON  THE  GROUNDS  OF  MORALS  AND  RELIGION, 

A>D    THE 
DISCIPLINE  OF  THE  MIND  REQUISITE  FOR  A  TRUE  UNDERSTANDING  OF  THE  SAME 


I  know,  the  seeming  and  self-pleasing  wisdom  of  our  times  consists  much  in  cavilling  and  unjustly  carping  at  all  things 
that  see  light,  and  that  there  are  many  who  earnestly  hunt  after  the  publicke  fame  of  Learning  and  Judgment  by  this 
easily-trod  and  despicable  path,  which,  notwithstanding,  they  tread  with  as  much  confidence  as  folly :  for  that,  often- 
times, which  they  vainly  and  unjustly  brand  with  opprobrie,  outlives  their  fate,  and  flourisheth  when  it  is  forgot  that  ever 
any  such,  as  they,  had  Being.  —  Dedication  to  Lord  Herbert  of  Ambrose  Parey's  Works  by  Thomas  Johnson,  Vie 
Translator,  1634. 


ESSAY   I. 

We  cannot  but  look  up  with  reverence  to  the  advanced 
natures  of  the  naturalists  and  moralists  in  highest  repute 
amongst  us  :  and  wish  they  had  been  heightened  by  a  more 
noble  principle,  which  had  crowned  all  their  various  sciences 
with  the  principal  science,  and  in  their  brave  strayings  afrer 
truth  helpt  them  to  belter  fortune  than  only  to  meet  with 
her  handmaids,  and  kept  them  from  the  fate  of  Ulysses, 
who  wandering  through  the  shades  met  all  the  ghost*,  yet 

could  not  see  the  queen. J.  H.  (JOHN  HALL  ?   his 

Motion  to  the  Parliament  of  England  concerning  the  Ad- 
vancement of  Learning. 


The  preceding  section  had  for  its  express  object  the 
principles  of  our  duty  as  citizens,  or  morality  as  ap- 
plied to  politics.    According  to  his  scheme  there  re- 


mained for  the  Friend  first,  to  treat  of  the  principle* 
of  morality  generally,  and  then  on  those  of  religion. 
But  since  the  commencement  of  this  edition,  the 
question  has  repeatedly  arisen  in  my  mind,  whether 
moralitv  can  be  said  to  have  any  principle  distinguish- 
able from  religion,  or  religion  any  substance  divisible 
from  morality  ?    Or  should  I  attempt  to  distinguish 

1  them  by  their  objects,  so  that  morality  were  the  reli- 
eion  which  we  owe  to  things  and  persons  of  this  life, 
and  religion  our  morality  toward  God  and  the  perma- 
nent concerns  of  our  own  souls,  and  those  of  our  bre- 

1  thren  :  vet  it  would  be  evident,  that  the  latter  must 
involve  the  former,  while  any  pretence  to  the  former 
without  the  latter  would  be  as  bold  a  mockery  as,  if 

|  having  withheld  an  estate  from  the  rightful  owner, 

503 


494 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


we  should  seek  to  appease  our  conscience  by  the 
plea,  that  we  had  not  failed  to  bestow  alms  on  him 
in  his  beggary.  It  was  never  my  purpose,  and  it  does 
not  appear  to  be  the  want  of  the  age,  to  bring  toge- 
ther the  rules  and  inducements  of  worldly  prudence. 
But  to  substitute  these  for  the  laws  of  reason  and  con- 
science, or  even  to  confound  them  under  one  name, 
is  a  prejudice,  say  rather  a  profanation,  which  I  be- 
came more  and  more  reluctant  to  flatter  by  even  an 
appearance  of  assent,  though  it  were  only  in  a  point 
of  form  and  technical  arrangement. 

At  a  time,  when  my  thoughts  were  thus  employed, 
I  met  with  a  volume  of  old  tracts,  published  during 
the  interval  from  the  captivity  of  Charles  the  First  to 
the  restoration  of  his  son.  Since  my  earliest  manhood 
it  had  been  among  my  fondest  regrets,  that  a  more 
direct  and  frequent  reference  had  not  been  made  by 
our  historians  to  the  books,  pamphlets,  and  flying 
sheets  of  that  momentous  period,  during  which  all 
the  possible  forms  of  truth  and  error  (the  latter  being 
themselves  far  the  greater  part  caricatures  of  truth) 
bubbled  up  on  the  surface  of  the  public  mind,  as  in 
the  ferment  of  a  chaos.  It  would  be  difficult  to  con- 
ceive a  notion  or  a  fancy,  in  politics,  ethics,  theology, 
or  even  in  physics  and  physiology,  which  had  not  been 
anticipated  by  the  men  of  that  age  :  in  this  as  in  most 
other  respects  sharply  contrasted  with  the  products 
of  the  French  revolution,  which  was  scarcely  more 
characterized  by  its  sanguinary  and  sensual  abomina- 
tions than  (to  borrow  the  words  of  an  eminent  living 
poet)  by 

A  dreary  want  at  once  of  books  and  men. 

The  parliament's  army  was  not  wholly  composed  of 
mere  fanatics.  There  was  no  mean  proportion  of  en- 
thusiasts :  and  that  enthusiasm  must  have  been  of  no 
ordinary  grandeur,  which  could  draw  from  a  common 
soldier,  in  an  address  to  his  comrades,  such  a  dissua- 
sive from  acting  in  "  the  cruel  spirit  of  fear !"  such 
words  and  such  sentiments,  as  are  contained  in  the 
following  extract  which  I  would  fain  rescue  from 
oblivion,*  both  for  the  honor  of  our  fore-fathers,  and 
in  proof  of  the  intense  difference  between  the  repub- 
licans of  that  period,  and  the  democrats,  or  rather  de- 
magogues, of  the  present.  "I  judge  it  ten  times 
more  honorable  for  a  single  person,  in  witnessing  a 
truth  to  oppose  the  world  in  its  power,  wisdom  and 
authority,  this  standing  its  full  strength,  and  he  singly 
and  nakedly,  than  fighting  many  battles  by  force  of 
arms,  and  gaining  them  all.  I  have  no  life  but  truth : 
and  if  truth  be  advanced  by  my  suffering,  then  my 
life  also.  If  truth  live,  I  live  :  if  justice  live,  I  live  : 
and  these  cannot  die,  but  by  any  man's  suffering  for 
them  are  enlarged,  enthroned.  Death  cannot  hurt 
me.  I  sport  with  him,  am  above  his  reach.  1  live 
an  immortal  life.  What  we  have  within,  that  only 
can  we  see  without.     I  cannot  see  death  ;  and  he  that 

*The  more  bo  because  every  year  consumes  its  quota. 
The  late  Sir  Wilfred  Lawson's  predecessor,  from  some 
pique  or  other,  left  a  large  and  unique  collection,  of  the 
pamphlets  published  from  the  commencement  of  the  Parlia- 
ment war  to  the  restoration,  to  his  butler,  and  it  supplied  (he 
chandlers'  and  druggists'  shops  of  Penrith  and  Kendal  for 
many  years. 


hath  not  his  freedom  is  a  slave.  He  is  in  the  8rms  of 
that,  the  phantom  of  which  he  beholdeth  and  seem- 
eth  to  himself  to  flee  from.  Thus,  you  see  that  the 
king  hath  a  will  to  redeem  his  present  loss.  You  see 
it  by  means  of  the  lust  after  power  in  your  own 
hearts.  For  my  part  I  condemn  his  unlaw  -fill  seeking 
after  it.  I  condemn  his  falsehood  and  indirectness 
therein.  But  if  he  should  not  endeavor  the  restoring 
of  the  kingliness  to  the  realm,  and  the  dignity  of  its 
kings,  he  were  false  to  his  trust,  false  to  the  majesty 
of  God  that  he  is  intrusted  with.  The  desire  of  re- 
covering his  loss  is  justifiable.  Yea,  I  should  con- 
demn him  as  unbelieving  and  pusillanimous,  if  he 
should  not  hope  for  it.  But  here  is  his  misery  and 
yours  too  at  present,  that  ye  are  unbelieving  and  pu- 
sillanimous, and  are,  both  alike,  pursuing  things  of 
hope  in  the  spirit  of  fear.  Thus  you  condemn  the 
parliament  for  acknowledging  the  king's  power  so  far 
as  to  seek  to  him  by  a  treaty ;  while  by  taking  such 
pains  against  him  you  manifest  your  own  belief  that 
he  hath  a  great  power — which  is  a  wonder,  that  a 
prince  despoiled  of  all  his  authority,  naked,  a  prison- 
er, destitute  of  all  friends  and  helps,  wholly  at  the 
disposal  of  others,  tied  and  bound  too  with  all  obliga- 
tions that  a  parliament  can  imagine  to  hold  him, 
should  yet  be  such  a  terror  to  you,  and  fright  you  into 
such  a  large  remonstrance,  and  such  perilous  proceed- 
ings to  save  yourselves  from  him.  Either  there  is 
some  strange  power  in  him,  or  you  are  full  of  fear 
that  are  so  affected  with  a  shadow. 

But  as  you  give  testimony  to  his  power,  so  you 
take  a  course  to  advance  it;  for  there  is  nothing  that 
hath  any  spark  of  God  in  it,  but  the  more  it  is  sup- 
pressed, the  more  it  rises.  If  you  did  indeed  believe, 
that  the  original  of  power  were  in  the  people,  you 
would  believe  likewise  that  the  concessions  extorted 
from  the  king  would  rest  with  you,  as  doubtless,  such 
of  them  as  in  righteousness  ought  to  have  been  given, 
would  do;  but  that  your  violent  courses  disturb  the 
natural  order  of  things,  on  which  they  still  tend  to 
their  centre :  and  so  far  from  being  the  way  to  secure 
what  we  have  got,  they  are  the  way  to  lose  them, 
and  (for  a  time  at  least)  to  set  up  princes  in  a  higher 
form  than  ever.  For  all  things  by  force  compelled 
from  their  nature  will  fly  back  with  the  greater  ear- 
nestness on  the  removal  of  that  force  :  and  this,  in 
the  present  case,  must  soon  weary  itself  out,  and 
hath  no  less  an  enemy  in  its  own  satiety  than  in  the 
disappointment  of  the  people. 

Again:  you  speak  of  the  king's  reputation — and 
do  not  consider  that  the  more  you  crush  him,  the 
sweeter  the  fragrance  that  comes  from  him.  While 
he  suffers,  the  spirit  of  God  and  glory  rests  upon  him. 
There  is  a  glory  and  a  freshness  sparkling  in  him  by 
suffering,  an  excellency  that  was  hidden,  end  which 
you  have  drawn  out.  And  naturally  men  are  ready 
to  pity  sufferers.  When  nothing  will  gain  me,  afflic- 
tion will.  I  confess  his  sufferings  make  me  a  royalist, 
who  never  cared  for  him.  He  that  doth  and  can 
suffer  shall  have  my  heart:  you  had  it  while  you 
suffered.  But  now  your  severe  punishment  of  him 
for  his  abuses  in  government,  and  your  own  usurpa- 
tions, will  not  only  win  the  hearts  of  the  people  to 
504 


THE  FRIEND. 


495 


the  oppressed  suffering  king,  but  provoke  them  to 
rage  against  you,  aa  having  robbed  them  of  the  inter- 
est which  they  had  in  his  royalty-  For  the  king  is  in 
the  people,  and  the  people  in  the  king.  The  king's 
being  is  not  solitary,  but  as  he  is  in  union  with  Ins 
people,  who  are  his  strength  in  which  he  lives;  and 
the  people's  being  is  not  naked,  but  an  interest  in  the 
greatness  and  wisdom  of  the  king  who  is  their  honor 
which  lives  in  them.  And  though  you  will  disjoin 
yourselves  from  kings,  Cod  will  not,  neither  will  I. 
God  is  Kin;;  of  kings,  kings'  and  princes'  God,  as 
well  a  people's,  theirs  as  well  as  ours,  and  theirs 
eminently  (as  the  speech  enforces,  Cod  of  Israel,  that 
is,  Israel's  God  above  all  other  nations:  and  so  king 
of  kings,)  bv  a  near  and  especial  kindred  and  com- 
munion. Kingliness  agrees  with  all  Christians,  who 
are  indeed  Christians.  For  they  are  themselves  of  a 
royal  nature,  made  kings  with  Christ,  and  cannot  but 
be  friends  to  it,  being  of  kin  to  it :  and  if  there  were 
not  kings  to  honor,  they  would  want  one  of  the  ap- 
pointed objects  to  bestow  that  fulness  of  honor  which 
is  in  their  breasts.  A  virtue  would  lie  unemployed 
within  them,  and  in  prison,  pining  and  restless  from 
the  want  of  its  outward  correlative.  It  is  a  bastard 
religion,  that  is  inconsistent  with  the  majesty  and  the 
greatness  of  the  most  splendid  monarch.  Such  spi- 
rits are  strangers  from  the  kingdom  of  heaven. 
Either  thev  know  not  the  glory  in  which  God  lives: 
or  they  are  of  narrow  minds  that  are  corrupt  them- 
selves, and  not  able  to  bear  greatness,  and  so  think 
that  God  will  not,  or  cannot  qualify  men  for  such 
high  places  with  correspondent  and  proportionable 
power  and  goodness.  Is  it  not  enough  to  have  re- 
moved the  malignant  bodies  which  eclipsed  the  royal 
sun,  and  mixed  their  bad  influences  with  his?  And 
would  you  extinguish  the  sun  itself  to  secure  your- 
selves >.  O  this  is  the  spirit  of  bondage  to  fear,  and 
not  of  love  and  a  sound  mind.  To  assume  the  office 
and  the  name  of  champions  for  the  common  interest, 
and  of  Christ's  soldiers,  and  yet  to  act  for  self  safety, 
is  so  poor  and  mean  a  thing  that  it  must  produce  most 
vile  and  absurd  actions,  the  scorn  of  the  old  pagans, 
but  for  Christians  who  in  all  things  are  to  love  their 
neighbor  as  themselves,  and  God  above  both,  it  is  of 
all  affections  the  unworthiest.  Let  me  be  a  fool  and 
boast,  if  so  I  may  show  you,  while  it  is  yet  time,  a 
little  of  that  rest  and  security  which  I  and  those  of 
the  same  spirit  enjoy,  and  which  you  have  turned 
your  backs  upon ;  self,  like  a  banished  thing,  wan- 
dering in  strange  ways.  First,  then,  I  fear  no  party, 
or  interest,  for  I  love  all,  I  am  reconciled  to  all,  and 
therein  I  find  all  reconciled  to  me.  I  have  enmity  to 
none  but  the  son  of  perdition.  It  is  enmity  begets 
insecurity :  and  while  men  live  in  the  flesh,  and  in 
enmity  to  any  party,  or  interest,  in  a  private,  divided, 
and  self  good,  there  will  be.  there  cannot  but  be, 
perpetual  wars :  except  that  one  particular  should 
quite  ruin  all  other  parts  and  live  alone,  which  the 
universal  must  not,  will  not  suffer.  For  to  admit  a 
part  to  devour  and  absorb  the  others,  were  to  destroy 
the  whole,  which  is  God's  presence  therein;  and 
such  a  mind  in  any  part  doth  not  only  fight  with 
another  part,  but  against  the  whole.  Every  faction 
33 


of  men,  therefore,  striving  to  make  themselves  abso- 
lute, and  to  owe  their  safety  to  their  strength,  and 
not  to  their  sympathy,  do  directly  war  against  God 
who  is  love,  peace,  and  a  general  good,  gives  being 
to  all  and  cherishes  all,  and,  therefore,  can  have  nei- 
ther peace  or  security.  But  we  being  enlarged  into 
the  largeness  of  God,  and  comprehending  all  things 
in  our  bosoms  by  the  divine  spirit,  are  at  rest  with 
all,  and  delight  in  all ;  for  we  know  nothing  but  what 
is,  in  its  essence,  in  our  own  hearts.  Kings,  nobles, 
are  much  beloved  of  us,  because  they  are  in  us,  of 
us,  one  with  us,  we  as  Christians  being  kings  and 
lords  by  the  anointing  of  God." 

But  such  sentiments,  it  will  be  said,  are  the  flights 
of  Speculative  Minds.  Be  it  so!  Yet  to  soar  is 
nobler  than  to  creep.  We  attach,  likewise,  some 
value  to  a  thing  on  the  mere  score  of  its  rarity  ;  and 
Speculative  Minds,  alas!  have  been  rare,  though  not 
equally  rare,  in  all  ages  and  countries  of  civilized 
man.  With  us  the  very  word  seems  to  have  abdi- 
cated its  legitimate  sense.  Instead  of  designating  a 
mind  so  constituted  and  disciplined  as  to  find  in  its 
own  wants  and  instincts  an  interest  in  truths  for  their 
truth's  sake,  it  is  now  used  to  signify  a  practical 
schemer,  one  who  ventures  beyond  the  bounds  of 
experience  in  the  formation  and  adoption  of  new 
ways  and  means  for  the  attainment  of  wealth,  or 
power.  To  possess  the  end  in  the  means,  as  it  is 
essential  to  morality  in  the  moral  world,  and  the  con- 
tra-distinction  of  goodness  from  mere  prudence,  so  is 
it,  in  the  intellectual  world,  the  moral  constituent  of 
genius,  and  that  by  which  true  genius  is  contra-dis- 
tinguished from  mere  talent.  (See  the  postscript  at  the 
end  of  this  essai/.) 

The  man  of  talent,  who  is,  if  not  exclusively,  yet 
chiefly  and  characteristically  a  man  of  talent,  seeks 
and  values  the  means  wholly  in  relation  to  some  ob- 
ject not  therein  contained.  His  means  may  be  pe- 
culiar; but  his  ends  are  conventional,  and  common 
to  the  mass  of  mankind.  Alas!  in  both  cases  alike, 
in  that  of  genius,  as  well  as  in  that  of  talent,  it  too 
often  happens,  that  this  diversity  in  the  "  morale"  of 
their  several  intellects,  extends  to  the  feelings  and 
impulses  properly  and  directly  moral,  to  their  dispo- 
sitions, habits,  and  maxims  of  conduct.  It  character- 
izes not  the  intellect  alone,  but  .the  whole  man. 
The  one  substitutes  prudence  for  virtue,  legality  in 
act  and  demeanor,  for  warmth  and  purity  of  heart : 
and  too  frequently  becomes  jealous,  envious,  a  covet- 
er  of  other  men's  good  gifts,  and  a  detractor  from 
their  merits,  open  or  secretly,  as  his  fears  or  his  pas- 
sions chance  to  preponderate.* 


♦According  to  the  principles  of  Spurzheim's  Cranioscopy 
(a  scheme,  the  indicative  or  gnomonic  parts  of  which  have  a 
stronger  support  in  facts  than  the  theory  in  reason  or  common 
sense)  we  should  find  in  the  skull  of  such  an  individual  the 
organs  of  circumspection  and  appropriation  disproportion- 
ately large  and  prominent  compared  with  those  of  ideality 
and  bcyierolence.  It  is  certain  that  the  organ  of  appropriation 
or  (more  correctly)  the  part  of  the  skull  asserted  to  he  signifi- 
cant of  that  tendency  and  correspondent  to  the  organ,  is 
strikingly  large  in  a  cast  of  the  head  nf  the  famous  Dr.  Dodd  ; 
and  it  was  founil  of  eo,ual  dimension  in  a  literary  man, 
whose  skull  puzzled  the  cranioscopist  more  than  it  did  me. 
505 


496 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


The  other,  on  the  contrary,  might  remind  us  of  the 
zealots  for  legitimate  succession  after  the  decease  of 
our  sixth  Edward,  who  not  content  with  having 
placed  the  rightful  sovereign  on  the  throne,  would 
wreak  their  vengeance  on  "  the  meek  usurper,"  who 
had  been  seated  on  it  by  a  will  against  which 
she  had  herself  been  the  first  to  remonstrate.  For 
with  that  unhealthful  preponderance  of  impulse  over 
motive,  which,  though  no  part  of  genius,  is  too  often 
its  accompaniment,  he  lives  in  continued  hostility  to 
prudence,  or  banishes  it  altogether ;  and  thus  deprives 
virtue  of  her  guide  and  guardian,  her  prime  function- 
ary, yea,  the  very  organ  of  her  outward  life.  Hence 
a  benevolence  that  squanders  its  shafts  and  still 
misses  its  aim,  or  like  the  charmed  bullet  that,  level- 
led at  the  wolf  brings  down  the  shepherd  !  Hence 
dcsultoriness,  extremes,  exhaustion 

And  thereof  comes  in    the  end  despondency  and  madness  ! 
WORDSWORTH. 

Let  it  not  be  forgotten,  however,  that  these  evils 
are  the  disease  of  the  man,  while  the  records  of 
biography  furnish  ample  proof,  that  genius,  in  the 
higher  degree,  acts  as  a  preservative  against  them  : 
more  remarkably,  and  in  more  frequent  instances, 
when  the  imagination  and  preconstructive  power 
have  taken  a  scientific  or  philosophical  direction:  as 
in  Plato,  indeed  in  almost  all  the  first-rate  philoso- 
phers— in  Kepler,  Milton,  Boyle,  Newton,  Leibnitz, 
and  Berkley.  At  all  events,  a  certain  number  of 
speculative  minds  is  necessary  to  a  cultivated  state 
of  society,  as  a  condition  of  its  progressiveness ;  and 
nature  herself  has  provided  against  any  too  great  in- 
crease in  this  class  of  her  productions.  As  the  gifted 
masters  of  the  divining  Rod  to  the  ordinary  miners, 
and  as  the  miners  of  a  country  to  the  husbandmen, 
mechanics,  and  artisans,  such  is  the  proportion  of  the 
Trismegisti,  to  the  sum  total  of  speculative  minds, 
even  of  those,  I  mean,  that  are  truly  such ;  and  of 
these  again,  to  the  remaining  mass  of  useful  laborers 
and  "  operatives  "  in  science,  literature,  and  the  learn- 
ed professions. 

This  train  of  thought  brings  to  my  recollection  a 
conversation  with  a  friend  of  my  youth,  an  old  man 
of  humble  estate ;  but  in  whose  society  I  had  great 
pleasure.  The  reader  will,  I  hope,  pardon  me  if  I 
embrace  the  opportunity  of  recalling  old  affections, 
afforded  me  by  its  fitness  to  illustrate  the  present  sub- 
ject. A  sedate  man  he  was,  and  had  been  a  miner 
from  his  boyhood.  Well  did  he  represent  the  old 
"  long  si/7ie,"  when  every  trade  was  a  mystery  and 
had  its  own  guardian  saint;  when  the  sense  of  self- 
importanee  was  gratified  at  home,  and  Ambition  had 
a  hundred  several  lotteries,  in  one  or  other  of  which 
every  freeman  had  a  ticket,  and  the  only  blanks  were 
drawn  by  Sloth,  Intemperance,  or  inevitable  Calam- 
ity ;  when  the  detail  of  each  art  and  trade  (like  the 
oracles  of  the  prophets,  interpretable  in  a  double 
sense)  was  ennobled  in  the  eyes  of  its  professors  by 
being  spiritually  improved  into  symbols  and  memen- 
tos of  all  doctrines  and  all  duties,  and  every  crafts- 


man had,  as  it  were,  two  versions  of  his  Bible,  one 
in  the  common  language  of  the  country,  another  in 
acts,  objects,  and  products  of  his  own  particular  craft 
There  are  not  many  things  in  our  elder  popular  lite- 
rature, more  interesting  to  me  than  those  contests,  or 
Amoibean  eclogues,  between  workmen  for  the  su- 
perior worth  and  dignity  of  their  several  callings, 
which  used  to  be  sold  at  our  village  fairs,  in  stitched 
sheets,  neither  untitled  or  undecorated,  though  with- 
out the  superfluous  costs  of  a  separate  title-page. 

With  this  good  old  miner  I  was  once  walking 
through  a  corn-field  at  harvest  time,  when  that  part 
of  the  conversation  to  which  I  have  alluded,  took 
place.  At  times,  said  I,  when  you  were  delving  in 
the  bowels  of  the  arid  mountain  or  foodless  rock,  it 
must  have  occurred  to  your  mind  as  a  pleasant 
thought,  that  in  providing  the  scythe  and  sword  vou 
were  virtually  reaping  the  harvest  and  protecting  the 
harvest-man.  Ah  !  he  replied  with  a  sigh,  that  gave 
a  fuller  meaning  to  his  smile,  out  of  all  earthly 
things  there  come  both  good  and  evil:  the  good 
through  God,  and  the  evil  from  the  evil  heart.  From 
the  look  and  weight  of  the  ore  I  learnt  to  make  a 
near  guess,  how  much  iron  it  would  yield ;  but 
neither  its  heft,  nor  its  hues,  nor  its  breakage  would 
prophesy  to  me,  whether  it  was  to  become  a  thievish 
pick-lock,  a  murderer's  dirk,  a  slave's  collar,  or  the 
woodman's  axe,  the  feeding  ploughshare,  the  defend- 
er's sword,  or  the  mechanic's  tool.  So  perhaps,  my 
young  friend  !  I  have  cause  to  be  thankful,  that  the 
opening  upon  a  fresh  vein  gives  me  a  delight  so  full 
as  to  allow  no  room  for  other  fancies,  and  leaves 
behind  it  a  hope  and  a  love  that  support  me  in  my 
labor,  even  for  the  labor's  sake. 

As,  according  to  the  eldest  philosophy,  life  being 
in  its  own  nature  aeriform,  is  under  the  necessity  of 
renewing  itself  by  inspiring  the  connatural,  and 
therefore  assimilable  air,  so  is  it  with  the  intelligen- 
tial  soul  with  respect  to  truth  :  for  it  is  itself  of  the 
nature  of  truth.  Tevofiiirj  iic  Stupias,  Kai  S-eapa  $uov, 
(pvcriv  £Xeiv  (pi^o^cdfiova  virdp^i.  PLOTINUS.  But 
the  occasion  and  brief  history  of  the  decline  of  true 
speculative  philosophy,  with  the  origin  of  the  sepa- 
ration of  ethics  from  religion,  I  must  defer  to  the 
following  number. 


Nature,  it  should  6eem,  makes  no  distinction  between  manu- 
scripts and  money-drafts,  though  the  law  does. 


POSTSCRIPT. 

As  I  see  many  good,  and  can  anticipate  no  ill  con- 
sequences, in  the  attempt  to  give  distinct  and  appro- 
priate meanings  to  words  hitherto  synonymous,  or  at 
least  of  indefinite  and  fluctuating  application,  if  only 
the  proposed  sense  be  not  passed  upon  the  reader  as 
the  existing  and  authorized  one,  I  shall  make  no  other 
apology  for  the  use  of  the  word,  Talent,  in  this  pre- 
ceding Essay  and  elsewhere  in  my  works  than  by 
annexing  the  following  explanation.  I  have  been  in 
the  habit  of  considering  the  qualities  of  intellect,  the 
comparative  eminence  in  which  characterizes  indi- 
viduals and  even  countries,  under  four  kinds  — 
Genius,  Talent,  Sense,  and  Clevernkss.  The 
first  I  use  in  the  sense  of  most  general  acceptance, 
as  the  faculty  which  adds  to  the  existing  stock  of 
506 


THE  FRIEND. 


497 


power  and  knowledge  by  new  views,  new  combina- 
tions, &:c.  In  short,  I  iletine  Genus,  as  originality  in 
intellectual  construction  s  the  moral  accompaniment 
and  actuating  principle  of  which  consists,  perhaps, 
in  the  carrying  on  of  the  freshness  and  feelings  of 
childhood  into  the  powers  of  manhood. 

By  Talent,  on  the  other  hand,  I  mean  the  com- 
parative facility  of  acquiring,  arranging,  and  applying 
the  slock  furnished  by  others  and  already  existing  in 
books  or  other  conservatories  of  intellect. 

B\-  Sense  I  understand  that  just  balance  of  the 
faculties  which  is  to  the  judgment  what  health  is  to 
the  body.  The  mind  seems  to  act  en  masse,  by  a  syn- 
thetic rather  than  an  analytic  process  i  even  as  the 
outward  senses,  from  which  the  metaphor  is  taken, 
perceive  immediately,  each  as  it  were  by  a  peculiar 
tact  or  intuition,  without  any  consciousness  of  the  me- 
chanism by  which  the  perception  is  realized.  This 
is  often  exemplified  in  well-bred,  unaffected,  and  in- 
nocent women.  I  know  a  lady,  on  whose  judgment, 
from  constant  experience  of  its  rectitude,  I  could  rely 
almost  as  on  an  oracle.  But  when  she  has  sometimes 
proceeded  to  a  detail  of  the  grounds  and  reasons  for 
her  opinion — then,  led  by  similar  experience,  I  have 
been  tempted  to  interrupt  her  with  —  "I  will  take 
your  advice,"  or,  "  I  shall  act  on  your  opinion  ;  for  I 
am  sure  you  are  in  the  right  But  as  to  the  fors  and 
becauses,  leave  them  to  me  to  find  out."  The  gene- 
ral accompaniment  of  Sense  is  a  disposition  to  avoid 
extremes,  whether  in  theory  or  in  practice,  with  a  de- 
sire to  remain  in  sympathy  with  the  general  mind  of 
the  age  or  country,  and  a  feeling  of  the  necessity  and 
utility  of  compromise.  If  Genius  be  the  initiative, 
and  Talent  the  administrative,  Sense  is  the  conserva- 
tive branch,  in  the  intellectual  republic. 

Bv  Cleverness  which  I  dare  not  with  Dr.  John- 
son call  a  low  word,  while  there  is  a  sense  to  be  ex- 
pressed which  it  alone  expresses)  I  mean  a  compara- 
tive readiness  in  the  invention  and  use  of  means,  for 
the  realizing  of  objects  and  ideas — often  of  such  ideas, 
which  the  man  of  genius  only  could  have  originated, 
and  which  the  clever  man  perhaps  neither  fully  com- 
prehends nor  adequately  appreciates,  even  at  the  mo- 
ment that  he  is  prompting  or  executing  the  machine- 
ry of  their  accomplishment.  In  short,  Cleverness  is 
a  sort  of  genius  for  instrumentality.  It  is  the  brain 
in  the  hand.  In  literature  Cleverness  is  more  fre- 
quently accompanied  by  wit.  Genius  and  Sense  by 
humor. 

If  I  take  the  three  great  countries  of  Europe,  in 
respect  of  intellectual  character,  namelv.  Germany, 
England,  and  France,  I  should  characterize  them 
thus — premising  only  that  in  the  first  line  of  the  two 
first  tables  I  mean  to  imply  that  Genius,  rare  in  all 
countries,  is  equal  in  both  of  these,  the  instances 
equally  numerous — and  characteristic  therefore  not 
in  relation  to  each  other,  but  in  relation  to  the  third 
country.  The  other  qualities  are  more  general  cha- 
racteristics. 

GERMANY. 

Grants, 

Talent, 
Fancy. 


The  latter  chiefly  as  exhibited  in  wild  combination 
and  in  pomp  of  ornament.  N  B.  Imagination  is  im- 
plied in  Genius. 

ENGLAND. 

Genus, 
Sense, 

HlMOR. 

FRANCE. 
Cleverness, 
Talent, 
Wit. 
So  again  with  regard  to  the  forms  and  effects,  in 
which  the  qualities  manifest  themselves,  i.  e.  intel- 
lectually. 

GERMANY. 
Idea,  or  Law  anticipated,* 

TOTALITY.t 

Distinctness. 

ENGLAND. 
Law  discovered^ 
Selection, 
Clearness. 

FRANCE. 
Theory  invented, 
Particularity^ 
Palpability". 

Lastly,  we  might  exhibit  the  same  qualities  in  their 
moral,  religious,  and  political  manifestations:  in  the 
cosmopolitism  of  Germany,  the  contemptuous  nation- 
ality of  the  Englishman,  and   the  ostentatious  and 

*  ThU  as  co-ordinate  with  Genios  in  the  first  table,  applies 
likewise  to  the  few  only :  and  conjoined  with  the  two  follow- 
ing qualities,  as  general  characteristics  of  German  intellect, 
includes  or  supposes,  as  its  consequences  and  accompaniments, 
speculation,  system,  method ;  which  in  a  somewhat  lower 
ciass  of  minds  appear  as  nolionaliiy  (or  a  predilection  for 
noumena,  mundus  inteliigibilis,  as  contra-distinguished  from 
ph&nomena,  or  mundus  sensibilis)  scheme;  arrangement; 
orderliness. 

Tln  totality  I  imply  encyclopaedic  learning,  exhaustion  of 
the  subjects  treated  of,  and  the  passion  for  completing  and 
the  love  of  the  complete. 

1  See  the  following  Essays  on  Method.  It  might  have 
been  expressed — as  the  contemplation  of  ideas  objectively,  as 
existing  powers,  while  the  German  of  equal  genius  is  predis- 
posed to  contemplate  law  subjectively,  with  anticipation  of  a 
correspondent  in  nature. 

6  Tendency  to  individualize,  embody,  insulate,  ex.  gr.  the 
vitreous  and  the  resinous  fluids  instead  of  the  positive  and 
negative  forces  of  the  power  of  electricity.  Thus  too,  it  was 
not  sufficient  that  oxygen  was  the  principal,  and  with  one 
exception,  the  only  then  known  acidifying  substance  ;  the 
power  and  principle  of  acidification  must  be  embodied  and 
as  it  were  impersmated  and  kypostasized  in  this  gas.  Hence 
the  idolism  of  the  French,  here  expressed  in  one  of  its  results, 
viz.  palpability.  Ideas  are  here  out  of  the  question.  1  had 
almost  said,  that  Ideas  and  a  Parisian  Philosopher  are  incom- 
patible terms,  since  the  latter  half,  I  mean,  of  the  reign  of 
Lewis  XVI.  But  even  the  Conceptions  of  a  Frenchman, 
whatever  he  admits  to  be  conceivable.  mu=t  be  imageable, 
and  the  imageable  must  be  fancied  tangible — the  non-ap- 
parency  of  either  or  both  being  accounted  for  by  the  dispro- 
portion of  our  senses,  not  by  the  nature  of  the  conceptions. 
507 


498 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


boastful  nationality  of  the  Frenchman.  The  craving 
of  sympathy  marks  the  German:  inward  pride  the 
Englishman:  vanity  the  Frenchman.  So  again,  en- 
thusiasm, visionariness  seems  the  tendency  of  the 
German  :  zeal,  zealotry  of  the  English  :  fanaticism  of 
the  French.  But  the  thoughtful  reader  will  find 
these  and  many  other  characteristic  points  contained 
in,  and  deducible  from  the  relations  in  which  the 
mind  of  the  three  countries  bears  to  Time. 

GERMANY. 

Past  and  Future. 

ENGLAND. 

Past  and  Present. 

FRANCE. 

The  Present. 

A  whimsical  friend  of  mine,  of  more  genius  than 
discretion,  characterizes  the  Scotchman  of  literature 
(confining  his  remark,  however,  to  the  period  since 
the  Union)  as  a  dull  Frenchman  and  a  superficial 
German.  But  when  I  recollect  the  splendid  excep- 
tions of  Hume,  Robertson,  Smollett,  Reid,  Thom- 
son (if  this  last  instance  be  not  objected  to  as  savor- 
ing of  geographical  pedantry,  that  truly  amiable  man, 
and  genuine  poet  having  been  born  but  a  few  fur- 
longs from  the  English  border,)  Dugald  Stewart, 
Burns,  Walter  Scott,  Hogg  and  Campbell — not 
to  mention  the  very  numerous  physicians  and  promi- 
nent dissenting  ministers,  born  and  bred  beyond  the 
Tweed — I  hesitate  in  recording  so  wild  an  opinion, 
which  derives  its*  plausibility,  chiefly  from  the  cir- 
cumstance so  honorable  to  our  northern  sister,  that 
Scotchmen  generally  have  more,  and  a  more  learned, 
education  than  the  same  ranks  in  other  countries,  be- 
low the  first  class;  but  in  part  likewise,  from  the 
common  mistake  of  confounding  the  general  charac- 
ter of  an  emigrant,  whose  objects  are  in  one  place 
and  his  best  affections  in  another,  with  the  particular 
character  of  a  Scotchman :  to  which  we  may  add, 
perhaps,  the  clannish  spirit  of  provincial  literature, 
fostered  undoubtedly  by  the  peculiar  relations  of 
Scotland,  and  of  which  therefore  its  metropolis  may 
be  a  striking,  but  is  far  from  being  a  solitary,  instance. 


ESSAY   II. 


r  H  o&os  Karu). 

The  road  downward. 

HERACL1T.  Fragment. 


Amour  de  moi  moi-meme;  mais  bien  calcule;  was 
the  motto  and  maxim  of  a  French  philosopher.  Our 
fancy  inspirited  by  the  more  imaginative  powers  of 
hope  and  fear  enables  us  to  present  to  ourselves  the 
future  as  the  present:  and  thence  to  accept  a  scheme 
of  self-love  for  a  system  of  moralitv.  And  doubtless, 
an  enlightened  self-interest  would  recommend  the 
same  course  of  outward  conduct,  as  the  sense  of  duty 
would  do;  even  though  the  motives  in  the  former 


case  had  respect  to  this  life  exclusively.  But  to  show 
the  desirableness  of  an  object,  or  the  contrary,  is  one 
thing :  to  excite  the  desire,  to  constitute  the  aversion, 
is  another :  the  one  being  to  the  other  as  a  common 
guide-post  to  the  "  chariot  instinct  with  spirit,"  which 
at  once  directs  and  conveys,  or  (to  use  a  more  trivial 
image)  as  the  hand,  and  hour-plate,  or  at  the  utmost 
the  regulator,  of  a  watch  to  the  spring  and  wheel 
work,  or  rather  to  the  whole  watch.  Nay,  where  the 
sufficiency  and  exclusive  validity  of  the  former  are 
adopted  as  the  maxim  (regula  maxima)  of  the  moral 
sense,  it  would  be  a  fairer  and  fuller  comparison  to 
say,  that  it  is  to  the  latter  as  the  dial  to  the  sun,  indi- 
cating its  path  by  intercepting  its  radiance. 

But  let  it  be  granted,  that  in  certain  individuals 
from  a  happy  evenness  of  nature,  formed  into  a  habit 
by  the  strength  of  education,  the  influence  of  exam- 
ple, and  by  favorable  circumstances  in  general,  the 
actions  diverging  from  self-love  as  their  centre  should 
be  precisely  the  same  as  those  produced  from  the 
Christian  principle,  which  requires  of  us  that  we 
should  place  our  self  and  our  neighbor  at  an  equi- 
distance, and  love  both  alike  as  modes  in  which  we 
realize  and  exhibit  the  love  of  God  above  all :  where- 
in would  the  difference  be  then  ?  I  answer  boldly: 
even  in  that,  for  which  all  actions  have  their  whole 
worth  and  their  main  value — in  the  agents  them- 
selves. So  much  indeed  is  this  of  the  very  substance 
of  genuine  morality,  that  wherever  the  latter  has 
given  way  in  the  general  opinion  to  a  scheme  of 
ethics  founded  on  utility,  its  place  is  soon  challenged 
by  the  spirit  of  honor.  Paley,  who  degrades  the 
spirit  of  honor  into  a  mere  club-law  among  the 
higher  classes  originating  in  selfish  convenience,  and 
enforced  by  the  penalty  of  excommunication  from  the 
society  which  habit  had  rendered  indispensable  to  the 
happiness  of  the  individuals,  has  misconstrued  it  not 
less  than  Shaftsbury,  who  extols  it  as  the  noblest  in- 
fluence of  noble  natures.  The  spirit  of  honor  is  more 
indeed  than  a  mere  conventional  substitute  for  ho- 
nesty ;  but  on  the  other  hand  instead  of  being  a  finer 
form  of  moral  life,  it  may  be  more  truly  described  as 
the  shadow  or  ghost  of  virtue  deceased.  For  to  take 
the  word  in  a  sense,  which  no  man  of  honor  would 
acknowledge,  may  be  allowed  to  the  writer  of  sa- 
tires, but  not  to  the  moral  philosopher.  Honor  im- 
plies a  reverence  for  the  invisible  and  supersensual 
in  our  nature,  and  so  far  it  is  virtue  ;  but  it  is  a  virtue 
that  neither  understands  itself  or  its  true  source,  and 
therefore  often  unsubstantial,  not  seldom  fantastic, 
and  always  more  or  less  capricious.  Abstract  the 
notion  from  the  lives  of  Lord  Herbert  of  Cherbury, 
or  Henry  the  Fourth  of  France:  and  then  compare  it 
with  the  1  Corinth,  xiii.  and  the  epistle  to  Philemon, 
or  rather  with  the  realization  of  this  fair  ideal  in  the 
character  of  St.  Paul*  himself.    I  know  not  a  better 


*Tbia  has  struck  the  better  class  even  of  inlid-;ls.  Collins, 
one  of  Ihe  most  learned  of  our  English  Deists,  is  said  to  have 
declared,  that  contradictory  as  miracles  appeared  to  his 
reason,  he  would  believe  in  them  notwithstanding,  if  it  could 
be  proved  to  him  that  St.  Paul  had  asserted  any  one  as  hav- 
ing been  worked  by  himself  \n  the  modern  sense  of  the  word, 
miracle ;  adding,  "  St.  Paul  was  an  perfect  a  gentleman  and 
a  man  of  honor!"    When  I  call  duelling,  and  similar  aberra- 

508 


THE  FRIEND. 


499 


test  Nor  can  I  think  of  any  investigation,  that  |  immanem  tamque  barbaram,  qua;  non  significari  fu- 
would  bo  more  instructive  vvliere  it  would  be  safe,  '  tura  et  a  quibusdam  intelligi  praedicique  |>osse  cen- 
but  none  likewise  of  greater  delicacy  from  the  pro-  seat.*  I  confess,  1  ca/i  never  read  the  l)c  Divinatione 
buhility  of  misinterpretation,  than  a  history  of  the  rise  of  this  great  orator,  statesman,  and  patriot,  without 
of  honor  in  the  European  monarchies  as  connected  feeling  myself  inclined  to  consider  this  opinion  as  an 
with  the  corruptions  of  Christianity ;  and  an  inquiry  instanoe  of  the  second  class,  namely,  of  fractional 
into  the  specific  causes  of  the  inefficacy  which  has  truths  integrated  by  tancy,  passion,  accident,  and  that 
attended  the  combined  efforts  of  divines  and  moral- 
ists against  the  practice  and  obligation  of  duelling. 

Of  a  widely  different  character  from  this  moral 
aipeais,  yet  as  a  derivative  from  the  same  root,  we 
may  contemplate  the  heresies  of  the  Gnostics  in  the 
early  ages  of  the  church,  and  of  the  family  of  love, 
with  other  forms  of  Antinomianism,  since  the  Refor- 
mation to  the  present  day.  But  lest  in  uttering  truth 
I  should  convey  falsehood  and  fall  myself  into  the 
error  which  it  is  my  object  to  expose,  it  will  be  requi- 
site to  distinguish  an  apprehension  of  the  whole  of  a 
truth,  even  where  that  apprehension  is  dim  and  in- 
distinct, from  sl  partial  perception  of  the  same  rashly 
assumed,  as  a  preception  of  the  whole.  The  first  is 
rendered  inevitable  in  many  things  for  many,  in  some 
points  for  all,  men  from  the  progressiveness  no  less 
than  from  the  imperfection  of  humanity,  which  itself 
dictates  and  enforces  the  precept.  Believe  that  thou 
mayest  understand.  The  most  knowing  must  at 
times  be  content  with  the  facit  of  a  sum  too  complex 
or  subtle  for  us  to  follow  nature  through  the  antece- 
dent process.  The  Greek  verb,  evvisvai,  which  we 
render  by  the  word,  understand,  is  literally  the  same 
as  our  own  idiomatic  phrase,  to  go  along  with.  Hence 
in  subjects  not  under  the  cognizance  of  the  senses 
wise  men  have  always  attached  a  high  value  to  gen- 
eral and  long-continued  assent,  as  a  presumption  of 
truth.  After  all  the  subtle  reasonings  and  fair  analo- 
gies which  logic  and  induction  could  supply  to  a 
mighty  intellect,  it  is  yet  on  this  ground  that  the 
Socrates  of  1'lato  mainly  rests  his  faith  in  the  immor- 
tality of  the  soul,  and  the  moral  Government  of  the 
universe.  It  had  been  held  by  all  nations  in  all 
ages,  but  with  deepest  conviction  by  the  best  and 
wisest  men,  as  a  belief  connatural  with  goodness  and 
akin  to  prophecy.  The  same  argument  is  adopted  by 
Cicero,  as  the  principal  ground  of  his  adherence  to 


preponderance  of  the  positive  over  the  negative  in 
the  memory,  which  makes  it  no  less  tenacious  of  co- 
incidences than  forgetful  of  failures. 

Countess.  What '.  dost  thou  not  believe,  that  oft  in  dreams 
A  voice  of  warning  speaks  prophetic  to  us? 

H'alltnsu-in.    I  will  not  doubt  that  there  may  have  been 
such  voices ; 
Yet  I  would  DOl  Call  tl:nn 
Voices  of  learning,  that  announce  to  us 
Only  the  inevitable.    As  the  sun. 
Ere  it  is  risen,  sometimes  paints  its  image 
In  the  atmosphere ;  so  often  do  the  spirits 
Of  great  events  stride  on  before  events 
And  in  to-day  already  iralks  to-morrow. 
That  which  we  read  of  the  Fourth  Henry's  death 
Did  ever  vex  and  li  mint  me,  like  a  tale 
Of  tny  own  future  destiny.    The  king 
Felt  in  his  breast  the  phantom  of  the  knife, 
Long  ere  Ravaillac  artn'd  himself  therewith. 
His  quiet  mind  forsook  him:  the  phantasma 
Started  him  in  Ins  Louvre,  chased  him  forth 
Into  the  open  air.    Like  funeral  knells 
Bounded  that  coronation  festival; 
And  still  with  boding  sense  he  heard  the  tread 
Of  those  feet,  that  even  then  were  seeking  him 
Throughout  the  sir  ets  of  Paris. 

WALLENSTEIN,  part  ii.  act  v.  scene  i. 

I  am  indeed  firmly  persuaded,  that  no  doctrine  was 
ever  widely  diffused,  among  various  nations  through 
successive  ages,  and  under  different  religions  (such 
for  instance,  as  the  tenets  of  original  sin  and  redemp- 
tion, those  fundamental  articles  of  every  known  reli- 
gion professing  to  have  been  revealed,)  which  is  not 
founded  either  in  the  nature  of  things,  or  in  the  ne- 
cessities of  human  nature.    Kay,  the  more  strange 

*  (Translation.) — I  find  indeed  no  people  or  nation,  how- 
ever civilized  or  cultivated,  or  however  wild  and  barbarous, 
but  have  deemed  that  there  are  antecedent  signs  of  future 
events,  and  some  men  capable  of  understanding  and  predict- 
ing them. 

I  am  tempted  to  add  a  passage  from  my  own  translation  of 


extant  only  by  (as  I  would  fain  flatter  myself)  Ihe  kind  par- 
tiality of  the  trunk-makers  :  though  with  exception  of  works 
for  which  public  admiration  supersedes  or  includes  individual 


divination.     Gentemquidem  nullam  video  neque  tarn  I  Schiller's  Wallenatein,  the  more  so  that  the  work  has  been 
i  long  ago  used  up,  as"  winding  sheets  for  pilchards,"  " 

tions  of  honor,  a  moral  heresy;  I  refer  to  the  force  of  the 

Greek  aiptots  as  signifying  a  principle  or  opinion  taken  up 

by  the  will  Tor  the  will's  sake,  as  a  proof  and  pledee  to  itself    commendations,  1   scat    ■   remember  a  book  that   has   been 

more  honored  liy  the  express  attestations  in  its  favor  of  emi- 
nent and  even  of  popular  literati,  among  whom  I  take  this 
opportunity  of  expressing  my  acknowledgments  to  the  author 
of  VVaverley,  Guy  Mannering,  &.c.  How  (asked  Ulysses,  ad- 
dressing  his  guardian  goddess)  shall  I  be  able  to  recoenize 
Proteus,  in  the  swallow  that  r^kims  round  our  houses  whom  I 
have  been  accustomed  to  behold  as  a  swun  of  Phcebus 
measuring  his  movements  to  a  celestial  music?  In  both 
alike,  she  replied,  thou  canst  recognize  the  cod. 

So  supported,  I  dare  avow  that  I  have  thought  my  transla- 
tion worthy  of  a  more  favorable  reception  from  the  public  and 
their  literary  gu  des  and  purveyors.  But  when  I  recollect, 
that  a  much  better  and  very  far  more  valuable  work,  tbe 
Rev.  Mr.  Carey's  incomparable  translation  of  Dante,  had 
very  nearly  met  with  the  same  fate,  I  lose  all  right,  and,  I 
trust,  all  inclination  to  complain:  an  inclination,  which  Ihe 
mere  sense  of  its  lolly  and  uselessnese  will  not  always  suffice 
to  preclude. 

509 


of  its  own  power  of  self-determination,  independent  of  all 
other  motives.  In  the  gloomy  gratification  derived  or  antici- 
pated from  the  exercise  of  this  awful  power — the  condition 
of  all  moral  eood  while  it  is  latent,  and  hidden,  as  it  were,  in 
ihe  centre ;  but  the  essential  cause  of  fiendish  guilt,  when  it 
makes  itself  existential  and  peripheric — si  quando  in  circum- 
ferentiam  erumpat  :  (in  both  cases  Iharr  purposely  adopted 
the  language  of  the  old  mystic  theosophers) — I  find  the  only 
explanation  of  a  moral  phenomenon  not  very  uncommon  in 
the  last  moments  of  condemned  felons — viz.  the  obstinate  de- 
nial, not  of  the  main  guilt,  which  might  be  accounted  for  by 
ordinary  motives,  but  of  some  particular  act  which  had  been 
proved  beyond  all  possibility  of  doubt,  and  attested  by  Ihe 
criminal's  own  accomplices  and  fellow  sufferers  in  their  last 
eonfessions :  and  this  loo  an  act,  Ihe  non-perpetration  of 
which,  if  believed,  could  neither  mitigate  the  sentence  of  the 
law.  nor  even  the  opinions  of  men  after  the  sentence  had  been 
carried  into  execution. 

Tt 


500 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


and  irreconcileable  such  a  doctrine  may  appear  to  the 
understanding,  the  judgments  of  which  are  ground- 
ed on  general  rules  abstracted  from  the  world  of  the 
senses,  the  stronger  is  the  presumption  in  its  favor. 
For  whatever  satirist  may  say,  or  sciolists  imagine, 
the  human  mind  has  no  predilection  for  absurdity.  I 
would  even  extend  the  principle  (proportionately  I 
mean)  to  sundry  tenets,  that  from  their  strangeness  or 
dangerous  tendency,  appear  only  to  be  generally  re- 
probated, as  eclipses  in  the  belief  of  barbarous  tribes 
are  to  be  frightened  away  by  noises  and  execrations  ; 
but  which  rather  resemble  the  luminary  ilself  in  this 
one  respect,  that  after  a  longer  or  shorter  interval  of 
occultation,  they  are  still  found  to  re-emerge.  It  is 
these,  the  re-appearance  of  which  (nomine  tantum 
mutato,)  from  age  to  age,  gives  to  ecclesiastical  his- 
tory a  deeper  interest  than  that  of  romance  and 
scarcely  less  wild,  for  every  philosophic  mind.  I  am 
far  from  asserting  that  such  a  doctrine  (the  Antino- 
mian,  for  instance,  or  that  of  a  latent  mystical  sense 
in  the  words  of  Scripture,  according  to  Emanuel 
Swedenborg)  shall  be  always  the  best  possible,  or  not 
a  distorted  and  dangerous,  as  well  as  partial,  repre- 
sentation of  the  truth,  on  which  it  is  founded.  For 
the  same  body  casts  strangely  different  shadows  in 
different  positions  and  different  degrees  of  light.  But 
I  dare,  and  do,  affirm  that  it  always  does  shadow  out 
some  important  truth,  and  from  il  derives  its  main  in- 
fluence over  the  faith  of  its  adherents,  obscure  as 
their  perception  of  this  truth  may  be,  and  though 
they  may  themselves  attribute  their  belief  to  the  su- 
pernatural gifts  of  the  founder,  or  the  miracles  by 
which  his  preaching  had  been  accredited.  See  Wes- 
ley's Journal.  But  we  have  the  highest  possible  au- 
thority, that  of  Scripture  itself,  to  justify  us  in  putting 
the  question:  Whether  miracles  can,  of  themselves, 
work  a  true  conviction  in  the  mind  ?  There  are  spi- 
ritual truths  which  must  derive  their  evidence  from 
within,  which  whoever  rejects,  "neither  will  he  be- 
lieve though  a  man  were  to  rise  from  the  dead  "  to 
confirm  them.  And  under  the  Mosaic  law  a  miracle 
in  attestation  of  a  false  doctrine  subjected  the  mira- 
cle-worker to  death:  whether  really  or  only  seem- 
ingly supernatural,  makes  no  difference  in  the  pre- 
sent argument,  its  power  of  convincing,  whatever 
that  power  may  be,  whether  great  or  small,  depend- 
ing on  the  fulness  of  the  belief  in  its  miraculous  na- 
ture. Est  quibus  esse  videtur.  Or  rather,  that  1  may 
express  the  same  position  in  a  form  less  likely  to  of- 
fend, is  not  a  true  efficient  conviction  of  a  moral  truth, 
is  not  "  the  creating  of  a  new  heart,"  which  collects 
the  energies  of  a  man's  whole  being  in  the  focus  of 
the  conscience,  the  one  essential  miracle,  the  same 
and  of  the  same  evidence  to  the  ignorant  and  learn- 
ed, which  no  superior  skill  can  counterfeit,  human  or 
dcomoniacal  ?  Is  it  not  emphatically  that  leading  of 
the  Father,  without  which  no  man  can  come  to 
Christ  1.  Is  it  not  that  implication  of  doctrine  in  the 
miracle,  and  of  miracle  in  the  doctrine,  which  is  the 
bridge  of  communication  between  the  senses  and  the 
soul  ?  That  predisposing  warmth  that  renders  the 
understanding  susceptible  of  the  specific  impression 
from  the  historic,  and  from  all  other  outward  seals  of 


testimony  ?  Is  not  this  the  one  infallible  criterion  of 
miracles,  by  which  a  man  can  know  whether  they  be 
of  God  ?  The  abhorrence  in  which  the  most  savage 
or  barbarous  tribes  hold  witchcraft,  in  which  how- 
ever their  belief  is  so  intense  *  as  even  to  control  the 
springs  of  life, — is  not  this  abhorrence  of  witchcraft 
under  so  full  a  conviction  of  its  reality  a  proof,  how 
little  of  divine,  how  little  fitting  to  our  nature,  a  mira- 
cle is,  when  insulated  from  spiritual  truths,  and  dis. 
connected  from  religion  as  its  end  ?  What  then  can 
we  think  of  a  theological  theory,  which  adopting  a 
scheme  of  prudential  legality,  common  to  it  with 
"  the  sty  of  Epicurus  "  as  far  at  least  as  the  springs 
of  moral  action  are  concerned,  makes  its  whole  reli- 
gion consist  in  the  belief  of  miracles !  As  well 
might  the  poor  African  prepare  for  himself  a  fetisch 
by  plucking  out  the  eyes  from  the  eagle  or  the  lynx, 
and,  enshrining  the  same,  worship  in  them  the  power 
of  vision.  As  the  tenet  of  professed  Christians  ([ 
speak  of  the  principle  not  of  the  men,  whose  hearts 
will  always  more  or  less  correct  the  errors  of  their 
understandings)  it  is  even  more  absurd,  and  the  pre- 
text for  such  a  religion  more  inconsistent  than  the  re- 
ligion itself.  For  they  profess  to  derive  from  it  their 
whole  faith  in  that  futurity,  which  if  they  had  not 
previously  believed  on  the  evidence  of  their  own 
consciences,  of  Moses  and  the  Prophets,  they  are  as- 
sured by  the  great  Founder  and  Object  of  Christian- 
ity, that  neither  will  they  believe  it,  in  any  spiritual 
and  profitable  sense,  though  a  man  should  rise  from 
the  dead. 

For  myself,  I  cannot  resist  the  conviction,  built  on 
particular  and  general  history,  that  the  extravagances 
of  Antinomianism  and  Solifidianism  are  little  more 
than  the  counteractions  to  this  Christian  paganism  : 
the  play,  as  it  wrere,  of  antagonist  muscles.  The  feel- 
ings will  set  up  their  standard  against  the  understand- 
ing, whenever  the  understanding  has  renounced  its 
allegiance  to  the  reason :  and  what  is  faith  but  the 
personal  realization  of  the  reason  by  its  union  with 
the  will  ?  If  we  would  drive  out  the  demons  of  fa- 
naticism from  the  people,  we  must  begin  by  exorcising 
the  spirit  of  Epicureanism  in  the  higher  ranks,  and 
restore  to  their  teachers  the  true  Christian  enthusi- 
asm,^ the  vivifying  influences  of  the  altar,  the  censer, 
and  the  sacrifice.  They  must  neither  be  ashamed 
of,  nor  disposed  to  explain  away,  the  articles  of  pre- 
venient  and  auxiliary  grace,  nor  the  necessity  of  being 
born  again  to  the  life  from  which  our  nature  had  be- 
come apostate.  They  must  administer  indeed  the 
necessary  medicines  to  the  sick,  the  motives  of  fear 
as  well  as  of  hope;  but  they  must  not  withhold  from 
them  the  idea  of  health,  or  conceal  from  them  that 
the  medicines  for  the  sick  are  not  the  diet  of  the 
healthy.  Nay,  they  must  make  it  a  part  of  the  cura- 
tive process  to  induce  the  patient,  on  the  first  symp- 

*  I  refer  the  reader  to  Heume's  Travels  amon;  the  Copper 
Indians,  ami  to  Bryan  Edwards's  account  of  (he  Oby  in  the 
West  Indies,  grounded  on  judicial  documents  and  personal 
observation. 

t  The  original  meaning  of  the  Greek,  Enthousinsmos,  is : 
the  influence  of  the  divinity,  such  ns  whs  supposed  to  take 
possession  of  the  priest  during  the  performance  of  the  ser- 
vices  at  the  altar. 

510 


THE  FRIEND. 


501 


toms  of  recovery,  to  look  forward  with  prayer  and 
aspiration  to  that  state,  in  which  perfect  love  shuttelh 
out  fear.  Above  all,  they  must  not  seek  to  make  the 
mysteries  of  faith  what  the  world  calls  rational  by 
theories  of  original  sin  and  redemption  borrowed 
analogically  from  the  imperfection  of  human  law  and 
the  contrivances  of  state  expedience. 

Among  the  numerous  examples  with  which  I  might 
enforce  this  warning,  I  refer,  not  without  reluctance,  lo 
the  most  eloquent,  and  one  of  the  most  learned  of  our 
divines ;  a  rigorist,  indeed,  concerning  the  authority 
of  the  Church,  but  a  Latitudinarian  in  the  articles  of 
its  faith ;  who  stretched  the  latter  almost  to  the  ad- 
vanced posts  of  Socinianism,  and  strained  the  former 
to  a  hazardous  conformity  with  the  assumptions  id'  the 
Roman  hierarchy.  With  what  emotions  must  not  a 
pious  mind  peruse  such  passages  as  the  follow  ing  : — 
"  Death  reigned  upon  them  whose  sins  could  not  be 
imputed  as  Adam's  was;  but  although  it  was  not 
wholly  imputed  upon  their  own  account,  yet  it  was 
imputed  upon  theirs  and  Adam's.  For  God  was  so 
exasperated  with  mankind,  that  being  angry  he  would 
still  continue  that  punishment  to  lesser  sins  and  sin- 
ners, which  he  had  first  threatened  to  Adam  only. 
The  case  is  this :  Jonathan  and  Michal  were  Saul's 
children.  It  came  to  pass,  that  seven  of  Saul's  issue 
were  to  be  hanged  ;  all  equally  innocent — equally  cul- 
pable.* David  took  the  five  sons  of  Michal,  for  she 
had  left  him  unhandsomely.  Jonathan  was  his  friend, 
and  therefore  he  spared  his  son,  Mephibosheth.  Here 
it  was  indifferent  as  to  the  guilt  of  the  persons  (ob- 
serve, no  guilt  was  attached  to  either  of  them)  whether 
David  should  take  the  sons  of  Michal  or  of  Jona- 
than ;  but  it  is  likely,  that,  as  upon  the  kindness  which 
David  had  to  Jonathan,  he  saved  his  son,  so  upon  the 
just  provocation  of  Michal,  he  made  that  evil  to  fall 
upon  them,  which,  it  may  be,  they  should  not  have 
suffered,  if  their  mother  had  been  kind.  Adam  was 
to  God,  as  Michal  to  David  "  ! ! !  (Taylor's  Polem. 
Tracts,  p.  711.)  And  this,  with  many  passages  equally 
gross,  occurs  in  a  refutation  of  the  doctrine  of  original 
sin,  on  the  ground  of  its  incongruity  with  reason,  and 
its  incompatibility  with  God's  justice  !  Exasperated 
with  those  whom  the  Bishop  has  elsewhere,  in  the 
same  treatise,  declared  to  have  been  "  innocent  and 
most  unfortunate" — the  two  things  that  most  concili- 
ate love  and  pity !  Or,  if  they  did  not  remain  inno- 
cent, yet,  those  whose  abandonment  to  a  mere  nature, 
while  they  were  subjected  to  a  law  above  nature,  he 
affirms  to  be  the  irresistible  cause  that  they,  one  and 
all,  did  sin  ! — and  this  at  once  illustrated  and  justified 
by  one  of  the  worst  actions  of  an  imperfect  mortal ! 
So  far  could  the  resolve  to  coerce  all  doctrines  within 
the  limits  of  reason  (i.  e.  the  individual's  power  of 
comprehension)  and  the  prejudices  of  an  Arminian 
against  the  Calvinist  preachers,  carry  an  highly-gifted 
and  exemplary  divine.  Let  us  be  on  our  guard,  lest 
similar  effects  should  result  from  the  zeal,  however 
well-grounded  in  some  respects,  against  the  Church 


Calvinists  of  our  days.  The  writer's  belief  is  per- 
haps, equi-distant  from  that  of  both  parties,  the  Gro- 
tian  and  the  Genevan.  But,  confining  my  remark 
exclusively  lo  the  doctrines  and  the  practical  deduc- 
tions from  them,  1  could  never  read  Bishop  Taylor's 
Tract  on  the  doctrine  and  practice  of  Repentance, 
without  being  tempted  to  characterize  high  Calvin- 
ism as  (comparatively)  a  lamb  in  wolf's  skin,  and 
strict  Arminianism  as  approaching  to  the  reverse. 

Actuated  by  these  motives,  I  have  devoted  the  fol- 
lowing essay  to  a  brief  history  of  the  rise  and  occa- 
sion of  the  Latitudinarian  system  in  its  first  birth- 
place in  Greece,  and  a  faithful  exhibition  both  of  its 
parentage  and  its  offspring.  The  reader  will  find  it 
strictly  correspondent  to  the  motto  of  both  essays, 
i}  b&oi  icary — the  way  downwards. 


ESSAY   III. 

ON  THE  ORIGIN  AND  PROGRESS  OF  THE 
SECT  OF  SOPHISTS  IN  GREECE.. 


'H  8Sos  Kara. 
The  road  downward. 

HERACLIT.  Fragment. 


*  These  two  words  are  added  without  the  least  ground  in 
scripture,  according  to  which  (2  Samuel,  xxi.)  no  charge  was 
laid  to  them  but  that  they  were  the  children  of  Saul !  and 
sacrificed  lo  a  point  of  state  expedience. 


As  Pythagoras,  (584  a.  c.)  declining  the  title  of  the 
wise  man,  is  said  to  have  first  named  himself  Philo- 
sopher, or  lover  of  wisdom,  so  Protagoras,  followed 
by  Gorgias,  Prodicus,  &c.  (444  a.  c.)  found  even  the 
former  word  too  narrow  for  his  own  opinion  of  him- 
self, and  first  assumed  the  title  of  Sophist  :  this  word 
originally  signifying  one  who  professes  the  power  of 
making  others  wise,  a  wholesale  and  retail  dealer  in 
wisdom — a  wisdom-monger,  in  the  same  sense  as  we 
say,  an  iron-monger.  In  this  and  not  in  their  abuse 
of  the  arts  of  reasoning,  have  Plato  and  Aristotle 
placed  the  essential  of  the  sophistic  character.  Their 
sophisms  were  indeed  its  natural  products  and  accom- 
paniments, but  must  yet  be  distinguished  from  it,  as 
the  fruits  from  the  tree.  '^Einropo;  rig,  KJ-nbos, 
avro-wXns  -nipt  ra  tijs  -Jyii^r/j  pa$nna.Ta — a  vender,  a 
market  man,  in  moral  and  intellectual  knowledges 
(connoissances)— one  who  hires  himself  out  or  puis 
himself  up  at  auction,  as  a  carpenter  and  upholsterer 
to  the  heads  and  hearts  of  his  customers — such  are 
the  phrases,  by  which  Plato  at  once  describes  and 
satirizes  the  proper  sophist  Nor  does  the  Stagyrite 
fall  short  of  his  great  master  and  rival  in  the  reproba- 
tion of  these  professors  of  wisdom,  or  differ  from  him 
in  the  grounds  of  it.  He  too  gives  the  baseness  of 
the  motives  joined  with  the  impudence  and  delusive 
nature  of  the  pretence  as  the  generic  character. 

Next  to  this  pretence  of  selling  wisdom  and  elo- 
quence, they  were  distinguished  by  their  itineracy. 
Athens  was,  indeed,  their  great  emporium  and  place 
of  rendezvous;  but  by  no  means  their  domicile. 
Such  were  Protagoras,  Gorgias,  Prodicus,  Hippias, 
Polus,  Callicles,  Trasyraachus,  and  a  whole  host  of 
511 


502 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


sophists  minorum  gentium:  and  though  many  of  the 
tribe,  like  the  Euthydemus  and  Dionysiodorus  so 
dramatically  portrayed  by  Plato,  were  mere  empty 
disputants,  sleigkt-of-word  jugglers,  this  was  far  from 
being  their  common  character.  Both  Plato  and  Aris- 
totle repeatedly  admit  the  brilliancy  of  their  talents 
and  the  extent  of  their  acquirements.  The  following 
passage  from  the  Timseus  of  the  former  will  be  my 
best  commentary  as  well  as  authority.  '•  The  race 
sophists,  again,  I  acknowledge  for  men  of  no  common 
powers,  and  of  eminent  skill  and  experience  in  many 
and  various  kinds  of  knowledge,  and  these  too  not 
seldom  truly  fair  and  ornamental  of  our  nature;  but 
I  fear  that  somehow,  as  being  itinerants  from  city  to 
city,  loose  from  all  permanent  ties  of  house  and  home, 
and  everywhere  aliens,  they  shoot  wide  of  the  pro- 
per aim  of  man  whether  as  philosopher  or  as  citizen." 
The  few  remains  of  Zeno  the  Eleatic,  his  paradoxes 
against  the  reality  of  motion,  are  mere  identical  pro- 
positions spun  out  into  a  sort  of  whimsical  conun- 
drums, as  in  the  celebrated  paradox  entitled  Achilles 
and  the  Tortoise,  the  whole  plausibility  of  which 
rests  on  the  trick  of  assuming  a  minimum  of  time 
while  no  minimum  is  allowed  to  space,  joined  with 
that  of  exacting  from  Intelligibilia  (NS/itua)  the  con- 
ditions peculiar  to  objects  of  the  senses  ((patvd/jtva.) 
The  passages  still  extant  from  the  works  of  Gorgias, 
on  the  other  hand,  want  nothing  but  the  form*  of  a 
premise  to  undermine  by  a  legitimate  deductio  ad 
absurdum  all  the  philosophic  systems  that  had  been 
hitherto  advanced  with  the  exception  of  the  Hera- 
clitic,  and  of  that  too  as  it  was  generally  understood 
and  interpreted.  Yet  Zeno's  name  was  and  ever 
will  be  held  in  reverence  by  philosophers;  for  his 
object  was  as  grand  as  his  motives  were  honorable — 
that  of  assigning  the  limits  to  the  claims  of  the 
senses,  and  of  subordinating  them  to  the  pure  reason: 
while  Gorgias  will  ever  be  cited  as  an  instance  of 
prostituted  genius  from  the  immoral  nature  of  his 
object  and  the  baseness  of  his  motives.  These  and 
not  his  sophisms  constituted  him  a  sophist,  a  sophist 
whose  eloquence  and  logical  skill  rendered  him  only 
the  more  pernicious. 

Soon  after  the  repulse  of  the  Persian  invaders,  and 
as  a  heavy  counter-balance  to  the  glories  of  Mara- 
thon and  Plataea,  we  may  date  the  commencement 
of  that  corruption  first  in  private  and  next  in  public 
life,  which  displayed  itself  more  or  less  in  all  the 
free  states  and  communities  of  Greece,  but  most  of 
all  in  Athens.  The  causes  are  obvious,  and  such  as 
in  popular  republics  have  always  followed,  and  are 
themselves  the  effects  of,  that  passion  for  military 
glory  and  political  preponderance,  which  may  be 
well  called  the  bastard  and  the  parricide  of  liberty. 
In  reference  to  the  fervid  but  light  and  sensitive 
Athenians,  we  may  enumerate,  as  the  most  operative, 
the  giddiness  of  sudden  aggrandizement ;  the  more 


*Viz.  //  either  tlio  world  itself  as  an  animated  whole  ac- 
cording to  the  Italian  school;  or  if  atoms,  according  to 
Democritus  ;  or  anyone  primal  element,  as  water  or  fire 
according  to  Thales  or  Empedocles,  or  if  a  nous,  as  explain- 
ed by  Anaxagoras ;  bo  assumed  as  the  absolutely  first; 
then,  &.c. 


intimate  connection  and  frequent  intercourse  with  the 
Asiatic  states;  the  intrigues  with  the  court  of  Persia; 
the  intoxication  of  the  citizens  at  large,  sustained  and 
increased  by  the  continued  allusions  to  their  recent 
exploits,  in  the  flatteries  of  the  theatre,  and  the  fune- 
real panegyrics  ;  the  rage  for  amusement  and  public 
shows  ;  and  lastly  the  destruction  of  the  Athenian 
constitution  by  the  ascendency  of  its  democratic  ele- 
ment. During  the  operation  of  these  causes,  at  an 
early  period  of  the  process,  and  no  unimportant  part 
of  it,  the  Sophists  made  their  first  appearance. 
Some  of  these  applied  the  lessons  of  their  art  in  their 
persons,  and  traded  for  gain  and  gainful  influence  in 
the  character  of  demagogues  and  public  orators  ;  but 
the  greater  number  offered  themselves  as  instructors 
in  the  arts  of  persuasion  and  temporary  impression,  to 
as  many  as  could  come  up  to  the  high  prices  at  which 
they  rated  their  services.  Newv  xai  -rrXovmuiv  e/^kt-Soj 
SiipcvTai  (these  are  Plato's  viords) — Hireling  hunters 
of  the  young  and  rich,  they  offered  to  the  vanity  of 
youth  and  the  ambition  of  wealth  a  substitute  for 
that  authority,  which  by  the  institutions  of  Solon  had 
been  attached  to  high  birth  and  property,  or  rather  to 
the  moral  discipline,  the  habits,  attainments,  and  di- 
recting motives,  on  which  the  great  legislator  had 
calculated  (not  indeed  as  necessary  or  constant  ac- 
companiments, but  yet)  as  the  regular  and  ordinary 
results  of  comparative  opulence  and  renowned  an- 
cestry. 

The  loss  of  this  stable  and  salutary  influence  was 
to  be  supplied  by  the  arts  of  popularity.  But  in  order 
to  the  success  of  this  scheme,  it  was  necessary  that 
the  people  themselves  should  be  degraded  into  a 
populace.  The  cupidity  for  dissipation  and  sensual 
pleasure  in  nil  ranks  had  kept  pace  with  the  in- 
creasing inequality  in  the  means  of  gratifying  it. 
The  restless  spirit  of  republican  ambition,  engender- 
ed by  their  success  in  a  just  war,  and  by  the  roman- 
tic character  of  that  success,  had  already  formed  a 
close  alliance  with  luxury  in  its  early  and  most 
vigorous  state,  when  it  acts  as  an  appetite  to  enkin- 
dle, and  before  it  has  exhausted  arid  dulled  the  vital 
energies  by  the  habit  of  enjoyment.  But  this  corrup- 
tion was  now  to  be  introduced  into  the  cila/iel  of  the 
moral  being,  and  to  be  openly  defended  by  the  very 
arms  and  instruments  which  had  been  given  for  the 
purpose  of  preventing  or  chastising  its  approach. 
The  understanding  was  to  be  corrupted  by  the  per- 
version of  the  reason,  and  the  feelings  through  the 
medium  of  the  understanding.  For  this  purpose  all 
fixed  principles,  whether  grounded  on  reason,  religion, 
law  or  antiquity,  were  to  be  undermined,  and  then 
as  now,  chiefly  by  the  sophistry  of  submitting  all 
positions  alike,  however  heterogeneous,  to  the  crite- 
rion of  the  mere  understanding,  disguising  or  con- 
cealing the  fact,  that  the  rules  which  alone  they 
applied,  were  abstracted  from  the  objects  of  the 
senses,  and  applicable  exclusively  to  things  of  quan- 
tity and  relation.  At  all  events,  the  minds  of  men 
were  to  be  sensualized;  and  even  if  the  arguments 
themselves  failed,  yet  the  principles  so  attacked  were 
to  be  brought  into  doubt  by  the  mere  frequency  of 
hearing  all  things  doubted,  and  the  most  sacred  of  all 
512 


THE  FRIEND. 


503 


now  openly  denied,  and  now  insulted  by  sneer  and 
ridicule.  For  by  the  constitution  of  our  nature,  as 
far  as  it  is  human  nature,  so  awful  is  truth,  that  as 
long  as  we  have  faith  in  its  attainability  and  hopes  of 
its  attainment,  there  exists  no  bribe  strong  enough 
to  tempt  us  wholly  and  permanently  from  our  alle- 
giance. 

Religion,  in  its  widest  sense,  signifies  the  ad  and 
habit  of  reverencing  the  Invisible,  as  the  highest 
both  in  ourselves  and  in  nature.  To  this  the  senses 
and  their  immediate  objects  are  to  be  made  subser- 
vient, the  one  as  its  organs,  the  other  as  its  exponents  : 
and  as  such  therefore,  having  on  their  own  account 
no  true  value,  because  no  inherent  worth.  They  are 
a  language,  in  short:  and  taken  independently  of 
their  representative  function,  from  words  they  be- 
come mere  emptv  sounds,  and  differ  from  noise  only 
by  exciting  expectations  which  they  cannot  gratify — 
fit  ingredients  of  the  idolatrous  charm,  the  potent 
Abracadabra,  of  a  sophisticated  race,  who  had  sacri- 
ficed the  religion  of  faith  to  the  superstition  of  the 
senses,  a  race  of  animals,  in  whom  the  presence  of 
reason  is  manifested  solely  by  the  absence  of  instinct. 

The  same  principle,  which  in  its  application  to  the 
whole  of  our  being  becomes  religion,  considered 
speculatively  is  the  basis  of  metaphysical  science,  that, 
namely,  which  requires  an  evidence  beyond  that  of 
sensible  concretes,  which  latter  the  ancients  genera- 
lized in  the  word,  physica,  and  therefore,  (prefixing 
the  preposition,  meta,  i.  e.  beyond  or  transcending) 
named  the  superior  science,  metaphysics.  The  In- 
visible was  assumed  as  the  supporter  of  the  apparent, 
riiiv  <paivofiivu)v — as  their  substance,  a  term  which,  in 
any  other  interpretation,  expresses  only  the  striving 
of  the  imaginative  power  under  conditions  that  in- 
volve the  necessity  of  its  frustration.  If  the  Invisible 
be  denied,  or  (which  is  equivalent)  considered  invisi- 
ble from  the  defect  of  the  senses  and  not  in  its  own 
nature,  the  science  even  of  observation  and  experi- 
ment lose  their  essential  copula.  The  component 
parts  can  never  be  reduced  into  an  harmonious  whole, 
but  must  owe  their  systematic  arrangement  to  acci- 
dents of  an  ever-shifting  perspective.  Much  more 
then  must  this  apply  to  the  moral  world  disjoined 
from  religion.  Instead  of  morality,  we  can  at  best 
have  only  a  scheme  of  prudence,  and  this  too  a  pru- 
dence fallible  and  short-sighted  :  for  were  it  of  such 
a  kind  as  to  be  bona  fida  coincident  with  morals  in 
reference  to  the  agent  as  well  as  to  the  outward  ac- 
tion, its  first  act  would  be  that  of  abjuring  its  own 
usurped  primacy.  By  celestial  observations  alone  can 
even  terrestrial  charts  be  constructed  scienlificallu. 

The  first  attempt  therefore  of  the  sophists  was  to 
separate  ethics  from  the  faith  in  the  Invisible,  and  to 
stab  morality  through  the  side  of  religion — an  attempt 
to  which  the  idolatrous  polytheism  of  Greece  fur- 
nished too  many  facilities.  To  the  zeal  with  which 
he  counteracted  this  plan  by  endeavours  to  purify 
and  ennoble  that  popular  belief,  which,  from  obedi- 
ence to  the  laws,  he  did  not  deem  himself  permitted 
to  subvert,  did  Socrates  owe  his  martyr-cup  of  hem- 
lock. Still  while  any  one  principle  of  morality  re- 
mained, religion  in  some  form  or  other  must  remain 
Tt2 


inclusively.  Therefore,  as  they  commenced  by  as- 
sailing the  former  through  the  latter,  so  did  they  con- 
tinue their  warfare  by  reversing  the  operation.  The 
principle  was  confounded  with  the  particular  acts,  in 
which  under  the  guidance  of  the  understanding  or 
judgment  it  was  to  manifest  itself. 

Tims  the  rule  of  expediency,  which  properly  be- 
longed to  one  and  the  lower  part  of  morality,  was 
made  to  be  the  whole.  And  so  far  there  was  at  least 
a  consistency  in  this:  for  in  two  ways  only  could  it 
subsist.  It  must  either  be  the  mere  servant  of  reli- 
gion,  or  its  usurper  and  substitute.  Viewed  as  prin- 
ciples, they  were  so  utterly  heterogeneous,  that  by  no 
grooving  could  the  two  be  fitted  into  each  other — by 
no  intermediate  could  (hey  lie  preserved  in  lasting 
adhesion.  The  one  or  the  other  was  sure  to  decom- 
pose the  cement.  We  cannot  have  a  stronger  histo- 
rical authority  for  the  truth  of  this  statement,  than 
the  words  of  Polybius,  in  which  he  attributes  the 
ruin  of  the  Greek  states  to  the  frequency  of  perjury, 
which  they  had  learnt  from  the  sophists  to  laugh  at 
as  a  trifle  that  broke  no  bones,  nay,  as  in  some  cases, 
an  expedient  and  justifiable  exertion  of  the  power 
given  us  by  nature  over  our  own  words,  without 
which  no  man  could  have  a  secret  that  might  not  be 
extorted  from  him  by  the  will  of  others.  In  the  same 
spirit,  the  sage  and  observant  historian  attributes  the 
growth  and  strength  of  the  Roman  republic  to  the 
general  reverence  of  the  invisible  powers,  and  the 
consequent  horror  in  which  the  breaking  of  an  oath 
was  held.  This  he  states  as  the  causa  causarum,  as 
the  ultimate  and  inclusive  cause  of  Roman  grandeur. 

Under  such  convictions  therefore  as  the  sophists 
labored  with  such  fatal  success  to  produce,  it  needed 
nothing  but  the  excitement  of  the  passions  under  cir- 
cumstances of  public  discord  to  turn  the  arguments 
of  expedience  and  self-love  against  the  whole  scheme 
of  morality  founded  on  them,  and  to  procure  a  favor- 
able hearing  of  the  doctrines,  which  Plato  attributes 
to  the  sophist  Callicles.  The  passage  is  curious,  and 
might  be  entitled,  a  Jacobin  Head,  a  genuine  antique, 
in  high  preservation.  "  By  nature,"  exclaims  this 
Napoleon  of  old,  "  the  worse  off  is  always  the  more 
infamous,  that,  namely,  which  suffers  wrong;  but  ac- 
cording to  the  law  it  is  the  doing  of  wrong.  For  no 
man  of  noble  spirit  will  let  himself  be  wronged  :  this 
a  slave  only  endures,  who  is  not  worth  the  life  he 
has.  and  under  injuries  and  insults  can  neither  help 
himself  or  those  that  belong  to  him.  Those,  who 
first  made  the  laws,  were,  in  my  opinion,  feeble  crea- 
tures, which  in  fact  the  greater  number  of  men  are ; 
or  they  would  not  remain  entangled  in  these  spider- 
webs.  Such,  however,  being  the  case,  laws,  honor, 
and  ignominy  were  all  calculated  for  the  advantage 
of  the  law-makers.  But  in  order  to  frighten  away 
the  stroneer,  whom  they  could  not  coerce  by  fair  con- 
test, and  to  secure  greater  advantages  for  themselves 
than  their  feebleness  could  otherwise  have  procured 
thev  preached  up  the  doctrine,  that  it  was  base  an<i 
contrary  to  right  to  wish  to  have  any  thing  beyond 
others ;  and  that  in  this  wish  consisted  the  essence  of 
injustice.  Doubtless  it  was  very  agreeable  to  them, 
if  being  creatures  of  a  meaner  class  thev  were  allowed 
513 


504 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


to  share  equally  with  their  natural  superiors.  But 
nature  dictates  plainly  enough  another  code  of  right, 
namely,  that  the  nobler  and  stronger  should  possess 
more  than  the  weaker  and  more  pusillanimous. 
Wliere  the  power  is,  there  lies  the  substantial  right. 
The  whole  realm  of  animals,  nay  the  human  rare 
itself  as  collected  in  independent  states  and  nations, 
demonstrate,  that  the  stronger  has  a  right  to  control 
the  weaker  for  his  own  advantage.  Assuredly,  they 
have  the  genuine  notion  of  right,  and  follow  the  law 
of  nature,  though  truly  not  that  which  is  held  valid 
in  our  governments.  But  the  minds  of  our  youths 
are  preached  away  from  them  by  declamations  on  the 
beauty  and  fitness  of  letting  themselves  be  mastered, 
till  by  these  verbal  conjurations  the  noblest  nature  is 
tamed  and  cowed,  like  a  young  lion  born  and  bred  in 
a  cage.  Should  a  man  with  full  untamed  force  but 
once  step  forward,  he  would  break  all  your  spells  and 
conjurations,  frample  your  contra-natural  laws  under 
his  feet,  vault  into  the  seat  of  supreme  power,  and  in 
a  splendid  style  make  the  right  of  nature  be  valid 
among  you." 

It  would  have  been  well  for  mankind,  if  such  had 
always  been  the  language  of  sophistry !  A  selfishness, 
that  excludes  partnership,  all  men  have  an  interest  in 
repelling.  Yet  the  principle  is  the  same;  and  if  for 
power  we  substitute  pleasure  and  the  means  of  plea- 
sure, it  is  easy  to  construct  a  system  well  fitted  to  cor- 
rupt natures,  and  the  more  mischievous  in  proportion 
as  it  is  less  alarming.  As  long  as  the  spirit  of  philoso- 
phy reigns  in  the  learned  and  highest  class,  and  that 
of  religion  in  all  classes,  a  tendency  to  blend  and 
unite  will  be  found  in  all  objects  of  pursuit,  and  the 
whole  discipline  of  mind  and  manners  will  be  calcu- 
lated in  relation  to  the  worth  of  the  agents.  With 
the  prevalence  of  sophistry,  when  the  pure  will  (if 
indeed  the  existence  of  a  will  be  admitted  in  any 
other  sense  than  as  the  tempore  ry  main  current  in 
the  wide  gust-eddying  stream  of  our  desires  and  aver- 
sions) is  ranked  among  the  means  to  an  alien  end,  in- 
stead of  being  itself  the  one  absolute  end,  in  the  par- 
ticipation of  which  all  things  are  worthy  to  be  called 
good — with  this  revolution  commences  the  epoch  of 
division  and  separation.  Things  are  rapidly  improv- 
ed, persons  as  rapidly  deteriorated;  and  for  an  indefi- 
nite period  the  powers  of  the  aggregate  increase,  as 
the  strength  of  the  individual  declines.  Still,  how- 
ever, sciences  may  be  estranged  from  philosophy,  the 
practical  from  the  speculative,  and  one  of  the  two  at 
least  may  remain.  Music  may  be  divided  from  poe- 
try, and  both  may  continue  to  exist,  though  with  di- 
minished influence.  But  religion  and  morals  cannot 
be  disjoined  without  the  destruction  of  both:  and 
that  this  does  not  take  place  to  the  full  extent,  we 
owe  to  the  frequency  with  which  both  take  shelter 
in  the  heart,  and  that  men  are  always  better  or  worse 
than  the  maxims  which  they  adopt  or  concede. 

To  demonstrate  the  hollowness  of  the  present  sys- 
tem, and  to  deduce  the  truth  from  its  sources,  is  not  j 
possible  for  me  without  a  previous  agreement  as  to  j 
the  principles  of  reasoning  in  general.     The  attempt 
could  neither  be  made  within  the  limits  of  the  pre- 
sent work,  nor  would  its  success  greatly  affect  the  im- 


mediate moral  interests  of  the  majority  of  the  read- 
ers for  whom  this  work  was  especially  written.  For 
as  sciences  are  systems  on  principles,  so  in  the  life  of 
practice  is  morality  a  principle  without  a  system. 
Systems  of  morality  are  in  truth  nothing  more  than 
the  old  books  of  casuistry  generalized,  even  of  that 
casuistry,  which  the  genius  of  Protestantism  gradu- 
ally worked  off  from  itself  like  an  heterogeneous  hu- 
mor, together  with  the  practice  of  auricular  confes- 
sion :  a  fact  the  more  striking,  because  in  both  in- 
stances it  was  against  the  intention  of  the  first  teach- 
ers of  the  reformation :  and  the  revival  of  both  was 
not  only  urged,  but  provided  for,  though  in  vain,  by 
no  less  men  than  Bishops  Saunderson  and  Jeremy 
Taylor. 

But  there  is  yet  another  prohibitory  reason — and 
this  I  cannot  convey  more  effectually  than  in  the  words 
of  Plato  to  Dionysius — 

AXAa  irotdv  ti  fifjv  tovt'  i$iv,  u)  ttat  Aiwvvaiov  Kat 
Awof'Aoj,  to  ipoJTi/f/a,  8  irdvTwv  6'itiov  ij-i  kukuv;  /uaX- 
Aov  Si  j]  ncpl  tovtov  (L £l{  kv  rr\  Tv^rj  iyyiyvojitvt],  f/V  ii 
fit)  rig  ea^ipcStiotTai,  ri);  aAijviia;  Svtojs  dv  fif/-0Te 
rtr^oi.  nXarwi/  Aiwvuitkj)  £-(;■•  Stir. 

(Translation) — But  what  a  question  is  this  which  you  pro- 
pose. Oh  sun  of  Dionysius  and  Doris! — what  is  the  origin  rnd 
cause  of  all  evil  1  But  rather  is  the  darkness  and  Iravail  con- 
cerning this,  that  ihorn  in  the  soul  which  unless  a  man  shall 
have  had  removed,  never  can  he  partake  of  the  truth  that  is 
verily  and  indeed  truth. 

Yet  that  I  may  fulfil  the  original  scope  of  the 
Friend,  I  shall  attempt  to  provide  the  preparatory 
steps  for  such  an  investigation  in  the  following  Es- 
says on  the  Principles  of  Method  common  to  all  in- 
vestigations :  which  I  here  present,  as  the  basis  of  my 
future  philosophical  and  theological  writings,  and  as 
the  necessary  introduction  to  the  same.  And  in  ad- 
dition to  this,  I  can  conceive  no  object  of  inquiry 
more  appropriate,  none  which,  commencing  with  the 
most  familiar  truths,  with  facts  of  hourly  experience, 
and  gradually  winning  its  way  to  positions  the  most 
comprehensive  and  sublime,  will  more  aptly  prepare 
the  mind  for  the  reception  of  specific  know  ledge, 
than  the  full  exposition  of  a  principle  which  is  the 
condition  of  all  intellectual  progress;  and  which  may 
be  said  even  to  constitute  the  science  of  education, 
alike  in  the  narrowest  and  in  the  most  extensive 
sense  of  the  word.  Yet  as  it  is  but  fair  to  let  the 
public  know  beforehand,  what  the  genius  of  my  phi- 
losophy is,  and  in  what  spirit  it  will  be  applied  by 
rne,  whether  in  politics  or  religion,  I  conclude  with 
the  following  brief  history  of  the  last  130  years,  by  a 
lover  of  Old  England  : 

Wise  and  necessitated  confirmation  and  explana- 
tion of  the  la'w  of  England,  erroneously  entitled  The 
English  Revolution  of  1688— Mechanical  Philosophy, 
hailed  as  a  kindred  revolution  in  philosophy,  and  es- 
poused, as  a  common  cause,  by  the  parlizans  of  the 
revolution  in  the  state. 

The  consequence  is,  or  was,  a  system  of  natural 

rights  instead  of  social  and  hereditary  privileges — 

acquiescence   in    historic  testimony   substituted   for 

faith — and  yet  the  true  historical  feeling,  the  feeling 

514 


THE  FRIEND. 


505 


of  being  an  historical  people,  generation  linked  to 
generation  by  ancestral  reputation,  by  tradition,  by 
heraldry — this  noble  feeling,  I  say,  openly  stormed  or 
perilously  undermined. 

Imagination  excluded  from  poesy;  and  fancy  para- 
mount in  physics;  the  eclipse  of  the  ideal  by  the 
mere  shadow  of  the  sensible — subfiction  for  supposi- 
tion. Plebs  pro  Senalu  Populoque — the  wealth  of 
nations  for  the  well-being  of  nations,  and  of  man ! 

Anglo-mania  in  France;  followed  by  revolution  in 
America — constitution  of  America  appropriate,  per- 
haps, to  America;  but  elevated  from  a  particular  ex- 
periment to  an  universal  model.  The  word  constitu- 
tion altered  to  mean  a  capitulation,  a  treaty,  imposed 
by  the  people  on  their  own  government,  as  on  a  con- 
quered enemy — hence  giving  sanction  to  falsehood, 
and  universality  to  anomaly  !!.' 

Despotism  !  Despotism  !  Despotism  ! of  finance 

in  statistics  —  of  vanity  in  social  converse — of  pre- 
sumption and  overweening  contempt  of  the  ancients 
in  individuals  ! 

French  Revolution  ! — Pauperism,  revenue  laws, 
government  by  clubs,  committees,  societies,  reviews, 
and  newspapers ! 

Thus  it  is  that  nation  first  sets  fire  to  ajieighboring 
nation  ;  then  catches  fire  and  burns  backward. 

Statesmen  should  know  that  a  learned  class  is  an 
essential  element  of  state — at  least  of  a  Christian 
state.  But  you  wish  for  general  illumination  !  You 
begin  with  the  attempt  to  popularize  learning  and 
philosophy;  but  you  will  end  in  the  plebeificalion  of 
knowledge.  A  true  philosophy  in  the  learned  class 
is  essential  to  a  true  religious  feeling  in  all  classes. 

In  fine,  religion,  true  or  false,  is  and  ever  has  been 
the  moral  centre  of  gravity  in  Christendom,  to  which 
all  other  things  must  and  will  accommodate  them- 
selves. 


ESSAY   IV. 


O  <?£  cixaiov  £;■(  ttuiuv,  ukovc  rrui?  xpv  e%ctv  ifii  Kai  ac 
irpig  &\Arj\ov;.  El  piv  6'Xw;  <pi\oootptas  Karai:e<pp6vn- 
Kas,  eav  Kalpziv  a  Si  7rup'  erlpov  aKfjxoas  jj  avrds 
ficXrtova  ivpTi<as  t&v  rrap'  e/tdi,  cue'iva  rijia.  it  <5'  apa 
ri  nap1  rijuHv  col  aptcrKtt,  ri/i^riov  Kai  ifit  /idXi^a, 
ITAATfiN-  AUZN:  nri-'  Sevrepa. 

Translation — Hear  then  what  are  the  terms  on  which  you 
and  I  ought  to  stand  toward  each  other.  It'  you  hold 
philosophy  altogether  in  contempt,  bid  it  farewell.  Or  if  yon 
have  heard  from  any  other  person,  or  have,  yourself  found 
out  a  better  than  mine,  then  give  honor  to  th.it,  whichever 
it  be.  But  if  the  doctrine,  taught  in  these  oiv  works  please 
you,  then  it  is  but  just  that  you  should  honor  me  too  in  the 
same  proportion. PLATO'S  2d  Letter  to  Dion. 


What  is  that  which  first  strikes  us,  and  strikes  us 
at  once,  in  a  man  of  education  ?  And  which,  among 
educated  men,  so  instantly  distinguishes  the  man  of 
superior  mind,  that  (as  was  observed  with  eminent 
propriety  of  the  late  Edmund  Burke)  "  we  cannot 


stand  under  the  same  arch-way  during  a  shower  of 
rain,  irithout  finding  him  out?"  Not  the  weight  or 
novelty  of  his  remarks  ;  not  any  unusual  interest  of 
facts  communicated  by  him ;  for  we  may  suppose 
both  the  one  and  the  other  precluded  by  the  shortness 
of  our  intercourse,  and  the  triviality  of  the  subjects. 
The  difference  will  be  impressed  and  felt,  though  the 
conversation  should  be  confined  to  the  state  of  the 
weather  or  the  pavement.  Still  less  will  it  arise  from 
any  peculiarity  in  his  words  and  phrases.  For  if  he 
be,  as  we  now  assume,  a  well-educated  man  as  well 
as  a  man  of  superior  powers,  he  will  not  fail  to  fol- 
low the  golden  rule  of  Julius  Caesar,  Insolensverbum, 
lanquam  scopulum,  evitare.  Unless  where  new  th  ngs 
necessitate  new  terms,  he  will  avoid  an  unusual  word 
as  a  rock.  It  must  have  been  among  the  earliest  les- 
sons of  his  youth,  that  the  breach  of  this  precept,  at 
all  times  hazardous,  becomes  ridiculous  in  the  topics 
of  ordinary  conversation.  There  remains  but  one 
other  point  of  distinction  possible;  and  this  must  be, 
and  in  fact  is,  the  true  cause  of  the  impression  made 
on  us.  It  is  the  unpremeditated  and  evidently  habi- 
tual arrangement  of  his  words,  grounded  on  the  habit 
of  foreseeing,  in  each  integral  part,  or  (more  plainly) 
in  every  sentence,  the  whole  that  he  then  intends  to 
communicate.  However  irregular  and  desultory  his 
talk,  there  is  method  in  the  fragments. 

Listen,  on  the  other  hand,  to  an  ignorant  man, 
though  perhaps  shrewd  and  able  in  his  particular  call- 
ing; whether  he  be  describing  or  relating.  We  im- 
mediately perceive,  that  his  memory  alone  is  called 
into  action  ;  and  that  the  objects  and  events  recur  in 
the  narration  in  the  same  order,  and  with  the  same 
accompaniments,  however  accidental  or  impertinent, 
as  they  had  first  occurred  to  the  narrator.  The  ne- 
cessity of  taking  breath,  the  efforts  of  recollection, 
and  the  abrupt  rectification  of  its  failures,  produce  all 
his  pauses;  and  with  exception  of  the  "and  then" 
the  "and  there"  and  the  still  less  significant,  "and 
so,"  they  constitute  likewise  all  his  connections. 

Our  discussion,  however,  is  confined  to  Method  as 
employed  in  the  formation  of  the  understanding,  and 
in  the  constructions  of  science  and  literature.  It 
would  indeed  be  superfluous  to  attempt  a  proof  of  its 
importance  in  the  business  and  economy  of  active  or 
domestic  life.  From  the  cotter's  hearth  or  the  work- 
shop of  the  artisan,  to  the  palace  or  the  arsenal,  the 
first  merit,  that  which  admits  neither  substitute  nor 
equivalent,  is  that  every  thing  is  in  its  place.  Where 
this  charm  is  wanting,  every  other  merit  either  loses 
its  name,  or  becomes  an  additional  ground  ol  accusa- 
tion and  regret.  Of  one,  by  whom  it  is  eminently 
possessed,  we  say  proverbially,  he  is  like  clockwork. 
The  resemblance  extends  beyond  the  point  of  regu- 
larity, and  yet  falls  short  of  the  truth.  Both  do,  in- 
deed, at  once  divide  and  announce  the  silent  and 
otherwise  indistinguishable  lapse  of  time.  But  the 
man  of  methodical  industry  and  honorable  pursuits, 
does  more:  he  realizes  its  ideal  divisions,  and  gives 
a  character  and  individuality  to  its  moments.  If  the 
idle  are  described  as  killing  time,  he  may  be  justly 
said  to  call  it  into  life  and  moral  being,  while  he 
makes  it  the  distinct  object  not  only  of  the  conscious 
515 


506 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


ness,  but  of  the  conscience.  He  organizes  the  hours, 
and  gives  them  a  soul :  and  that,  the  very  essence 
of  which  is  to  fleet  away,  and  evermore  to  have  been, 
he  takes  up  into  his  own  permanence,  and  communi- 
cates to  it  the  imperishableness  of  a  spiritual  nature. 
Of  the  good  and  faithful  servant,  whose  energies, 
thus  directed,  are  thus  methodized,  it  is  less  truly 
affirmed,  that  He  lives  in  time,  than  that  Time  lives 
in  him.  His  days,  months,  and  years,  as  the  stops  and 
punctual  marks  in  the  records  of  duties  performed, 
will  survive  the  wreck  of  worlds,  and  remain  extant 
when  time  itself  shall  be  no  more. 

But  as  the  importance  of  Method  in  the  duties  of 
social  life  is  incomparably  greater,  so  are  its  practical 
elements  proportionably  obvious,  and  such  as  relate 
to  the  will  far  more  than  to  the  understanding. 
Henceforward,  therefore,  we  contemplate  its  bear- 
ings on  the  latter. 

The  difference  between  the  products  of  a  well- 
disciplined  and  those  of  an  uncultivated  understand- 
ing, in  relation  to  what  we  will  now  venture  to  call 
the  Science  of  Method,  is  often  and  admirably  exhi- 
bited by  our  Dramatist.  We  scarcely  need  refer  our 
readers  to  the  Clown's  evidence,  in  the  first  scene  of 
the  second  act  of  "  Measure  for  Measure,"  or  the 
Tsurse  in  "  Romeo  and  Juliet."  But  not  to  leave  the 
position,  without  an  instance  to  illustrate  it,  we  will 
take  the  "  easy-yielding"  Mrs.  Quickly's  relation  of 
the  circumstances  of  Sir  John  Falstaff's  debt  to  her. 

Falstaff.    What  is  the  gross  sum  that  I  owe  thee  ? 

Mrs.  Quickly.  Marry,  it"  thou  wert  an  honest  man,  thy- 
self and  the  money  too.  Thou  didst  swear  to  me  upon  a 
parcel-gilt  goblet,  sitting  in  my  dolphin  chamber,  at  the  round 
table,  by  a  sea-coal  fire,  on  Wednesday  in  Whitsun  week 
when  the  prince  broke  thy  head  for  likening  his  father  to  a 
singing-man  in  Windsor — thou  didst  swear  to  me  then,  as  I 
was  washing  thy  wound,  to  marry  me  and  make  me  my  lady 
thy  wife.  Canst  thou  deny  it  ?  Did  not  good-wife  Keech, 
the  butcher's  wife,  come  in  then  and  call  me  gossip  Quick- 
ly 1 — coming  in  to  borrow  a  mess  of  vinegar  :  telling  us  she 
had  a  good  dish  of  prawns — wherpby  thou  didst  desire  to  eat 
some — whereby  I  told  thee  they  were  ill  for  a  green  wound, 
&c.  &c.  &c. HENRY  IV.  1st  pt.  act.ii.  sc.  1. 

And  this,  be  it  observed,  is  so  far  from  being  car- 
ried beyond  the  bounds  of  a  fair  imitation,  that  "  the 
poor  soul's  "  thoughts  and  sentences  are  more  closely 
interlinked  than  the  truth  of  nature  would  have  re- 
quired, but  that  the  connections  and  sequence,  which 
the  habit  of  Method  can  alone  give,  have  in  this  in- 
stance a  substitute  in  the  fusion  of  passion.  For  the 
absence  of  Method,  which  characterizes  the  unedu- 
cated, is  occasioned  by  an  habitual  submission  of  the 
understanding  to  mere  events  and  images  as  such, 
and  independent  of  any  power  in  the  mind  to  classify 
or  appropriate  them.  The  general  accompaniments 
of  time  and  place  are  the  only  relations  which  per- 
sons of  this  class  appear  to  regard  in  their  statements. 
As  this  constitutes  their  leading  feature,  the  contrary 
excellence,  as  distinguishing  the  well-educated  man, 
must  be  referred  to  the  contrary  habit.  Method, 
therefore,  becomes  natural  to  the  mind  which  has 
been  accustomed  to  contemplate  not  things  only,  or 
for  their  own  sake  alone,  but  likewise  and  chiefly  the 
relations  of  things,  either  their  relations  to  each  other, 
or  to  the  observer,  or  to  the  state  and  apprehension  of 


the  hearers.  To  enumerate  and  analyze  these  rela- 
tions, with  the  conditions  under  which  alone  they  are 
discoverable,  is  to  teach  the  science  of  Method. 

The  enviable  results  of  this  science,  when  know- 
ledge has  been  ripened  into  those  habits  which  at 
once  secure  and  evince  its  possession,  can  scarcely  be 
exhibited  more  forcibly  as  well  as  more  pleasingly, 
than  by  contrasting  with  the  former  extract  from 
Shakspeare  the  narration  given  by  Hamlet  to  Horatio 
of  the  occurrences  during  his  proposed  transportation 
to  England,  and  the  events  that  interrupted  his  voy- 


Ham.    Sir,  in  my  heart  there  was  a  kind  of  fighting 
That  would  not  let  me  sleep  :  methought  I  lay 
Worse  than  the  mutines  in  the  bilboes.    Rashly, 

And  prais'd  be  rashness  for  it Let  us  know. 

Our  indiscretion  sometimes  serves  us  well, 

When  our  deep  plots  do  fail :  and  that  should  teach  us, 

There's  a  divinity  that  shapes  our  ends, 

Rough-hew  them  how  we  will. 

Hor.    That  is  most  certain. 

Ham.    Up  from  my  cabin, 
My  sea-gown  scarf'd  about  me,  in  the  dark 
Grop'd  I  to  find  out  them  ;  had  my  desire; 
Finger'd  their  pocket  ;  and,  in  fine,  withdrew 
To  my  own  room  again;  making  so  bold. 
My  fears  forgetting  manners,  to  unseal 
Their  grand  commission  :  where  /found,  Horatio, 
A  royal  knavery — an  exact  command, 
Larded  with  many  several  sorts  of  reasons 
Importing  Denmark's  health,  and  England's  too. 
With,  ho  !  such  bugs  and  goblins  in  my  life, 
That  on  the  supervize,  no  leisure  bated, 
No,  not  to  stay  the  grinding  of  the  axe. 
My  head  should  be  struck  off! 

Hor.    Is  't  possible  1 

Ham.    Here's  the  commission. — Read  it  at  more  leisure. 

Act.  v.  sc.  2. 

Here  the  events,  with  the  circumstances  of  time 
and  place,  are  all  stated  with  equal  compression  and 
rapidity,  not  one  introduced  which  could  have  been 
omitted  without  injury  to  the  intelligibility  of  the 
whole  process.  If  any  tendency  is  discoverable,  as 
far  as  the  mere  facts  are  in  question,  it  is  the  tenden- 
cy to  omission :  and,  accordingly,  the  reader  will  ob- 
serve, that  the  attention  of  the  narrator  is  called  back 
to  one  material  circumstance,  which  he  was  hurrying 
by,  by  a  direct  question  from  the  friend  to  whom  the 
story  is  communicated,  "  How  was  this  sealed  V 
But  by  a  trait  which  is  indeed  peculiarly  character- 
istic of  Hamlet's  mind,  ever  disposed  to  generalize, 
and  meditative  to  excess  (but  which,  with  due  abate- 
ment and  reduction,  is  distinctive  of  every  powerful 
and  methodizing  intellect),  all  the  digressions  and  en- 
largements consist  of  reflections,  truths,  and  princi- 
ples of  general  and  permanent  interest,  either  directly 
expressed  or  disguised  in  playful  satire. 


■  I  sat  me  down  ; 


Devis'd  a  new  commission  ;  wrote  it  fair, 
/  once  did  hold  it,  as  our  statists  do, 
A  baseness  to  write  fair,  and  labored  much 
How  to  forget  that  learning :  but,  sir,  now 
It  did  me  yeoman's  service.    Wilt  thou  know 
The  effect  of  what  I  wrote  f 

Hor.    Ay,  good  my  lord.. 

Ham.    An  earnest  conjuration  from  the  king, 
As  England  was  his  faithful  tributary  ; 
As  love  between  them,  like  the  palm,  might  flourish; 
As  peace  should  still  her  wheatcn  garland  wear, 
And  many  such  like  As's  of  great  charge — 

516 


THE  FRIEXD. 


507 


That  on  the  view  and  knowing  of  these  contents 
He  should  the  bearers  put  to  sudden  death. 
No  shriving  time  allowed. 

Hot.    How  was  this  sealed  ? 

Ham.    Why,  even  in  ihat  was  heaven  ordinant. 
I  had  my  father's  signet  i/t  my  purse, 
Which  was  the  model  of  that  Danish  seal : 
Folded  the  writ  up  in  the  form  of  the  other; 

>■  J  it;  eave't  the  impression  ;  placed  it  safely. 
The  changeling  never  known.    Now,  the  next  day 
Was  our  sea-fight  ;  and  what  to  this  was  sequent. 
Thou  koowesl  already. 

Jior.    So  Guildenstern  and  Rosencraniz  go  to  't7 

rVby,  mao,  they  did  make  love  to  this  employment. 
They  are  not  near  my  conscience  :  their  defeat 
Doth  by  the ir  own  insinuation  grow. 
'Tis  danscrous  ichen  the  baser  nature  comes 
Between  the  pass  and  fell  incensed  points 
Qf  mighty  apposites. 

It  would,  perhaps,  be  sufficient  to  remark  of  the 
preceding;  passage,  in  connection  with  the  humorous 
specimen  of  narration, 

"  Fermenting  o'er  with  frothy  circumstances," 
in  Henry  IV. j  that  if  overlooking  the  different  value 
of  the  matter  in  each,  we  considered  the  form  alone, 
we  should  find  both  immelhodical ;  Hamlet  from  the 
excess,  Mrs.  Quickly  from  the  want,  of  reflection 
and  generalization  ;  and  that  Method,  therefore,  must 
result  from  the  due  mean  or  balance  between  our 
passive  impressions  and  the  mind's  own  re-action  on 
the  same.  (Whether  this  re-action  do  not  suppose  or 
implva  primary  act  positively  originating  in  the  mind 
itself,  and  prior  to  the  object  in  order  of  nature,  though 
co-instantaneous  in  its  manifestation,  will  be  hereafter 
discussed.)  But  we  had  a  further  purpose  in  thus 
contrasting  these  extracts  from  our  "  myriad-minded 
Bard,"  (^upiovduc  ainp.)  We  wished  to  bring  forward, 
each  for  itself,  these  two  elements  of  Method,  or  (to 
adopt  an  arithmetical  term)  its  two  main  factors. 

Instances  of  the  want  of  generalization  are  of  no 
rare  occurrence  in  real  life:  and  the  narrations  of 
Shakspeare's  Hostess  and  the  Tapster,  differ  from 
those  of  the  ignorant  and  unthinking  in  general,  by 
their  superior  humor,  the  poet's  own  gift  and  infu- 
sion, not  by  their  want  of  Method,  which  is  not 
greater  than  we  often  meet  with  in  that  class,  of 
which  they  are  the  dramatic  representatives.  In- 
stances of  the  opposite  fault,  arising  from  the  excess 
of  generalization  and  reflection  in  minds  of  the  oppo- 
site class,  will,  like  the  minds  themselves,  occur  less 
frequently  in  the  course  of  our  own  personal  experi- 
ence. Yet  they  will  not  have  been  wanting  to  our 
readers,  nor  will  they  have  passed  unobserved,  though 
the  great  poet  himself  (<5  rf/v  iavrov  ^Iniyhv  dcu  6AJ» 
riva  acruifiarov  poprjiais  xoiKiXais  ftop(pu>cas*)  has  more 

conveniently  supplied  the  illustrations.  To  complete, 
therefore,  the  purpose  aforementioned,  that  of  pre- 
senting each  of  the  two  components  as  separatelv  as 
possible,  we  chose  an  instance  in  which,  by  the  sur- 
plus of  its  own  activity,  Hamlet's  mind  disturbs  the 
arrangement,  of  which  that  very  activity  had  been 
the  cause  and  impulse.  Thus  exuberance  of  mind, 
on  the  one  hand,  interferes  with  the  forms  of  Meth- 


Translation.— He  that  moulded  his  own  soul,  as  some  in- 
corporeal material,  into  various  forms. THEMISTIUS. 


od ;  but  sterility  of  mind,  on  the  other,  wanting  the 
spring  and  impulse  to  mental  action,  is  wholly  de- 
structive of  Method  itself.  For  in  attending  too 
exclusively  to  the  relations  which  the  past  or  passing 
events  and  objects  bear  to  general  truth,  and  the 
moods  of  his  own  Thought,  the  most  intelligent  man 
is  sometimes  in  danger  of  overlooking  that  other  re- 
lation, in  which  they  are  likewise  to  be  placed  to  the 
apprehension  and  sympathies  of  his  hearers.  His 
discourse  appears  like  soliloquy  intermixed  with  dia- 
logue. But  the  uneducated  and  unreflecting  talker 
overtake  all  mental  relations,  both  logical  and  psy- 

|  chological ;  and  consequently  precludes  all  Method, 

1  that  is  not  purely  accidental.     Hence  the  nearer  the 

!  things  and  incidents  in  time  and  place,  the  more  dis- 
tant, disjointed,  and  impertinent  to  each  other,  and  to 
any  common  purpose,  will  they  appear  in  his  narra- 

i  tion  :  and  this  from  the  want  of  a  staple,  or  starting- 
post,  in  the  narrator  himself;  from  the  absence  of  the 
le<idin<!  Thought,  which,  borrowing  a  phrase  from 
the  nomenclature  of  legislation,  we  may  not  inaptly 
call  the  Initiative.  On  the  contrary,  where  the 
habit  of  Method  is  present  and  effective,  things  the 
most  remote  and  diverse  in  time,  place,  and  outward 
circumstance,  are    brought   into    mental  contiguity 

!  and  succession,  the  more  striking  as  the  less  ex- 
pected. But  while  we  would  impress  the  necessity 
of  this  habil,  the  illustrations  adduced  give  proof  that 
in  undue  preponderance,  and  when  the  prerogative 
of  the  mind  is  stretched  into  despotism,  the  discourse 
may  degenerate  into  the  grotesque  or  the  fantas- 
tical. 
With  what  a  profound  insight  into  the  constitution 

'  of  the  human  soul  is  this  exhibited  to  us  in  the  char- 
acter of  the  Prince  of  Denmark,  where  flying  from 
the  sense  of  reality,  and  seeking  a  reprieve  from  the 
pressure  of  its  duties,  in  that  ideal  activity,  the  over- 
balance of  which,  with  the  consequent  indisposition 
to  action,  is  his  disease,  he  compels  the  reluctant  good 
sense  rf  the  high  yet  healthful-minded  Horatio,  to 
follow  him  in  his  wayward  meditation  amid  the 
graves  ?  "  To  what  base  uses  we  may  return.  Hora- 
tio .'  ^Yhy  may  not  imagination  trace  the  noble  dust 
qf  Alexander,  till  he  find  it  slopping  a  bung-hole? 
lloR.  It  were  to  consider  loo  curiously  to  consider  so. 
Ham.  Xo.  faith,  not  a  jot ;  but  to  follow  him  thither 
with  modesty  enough  and  likelihood  to  lead  it.    As 

I  thus :  Alexander  died,  Alexander  was  buried,  Alexan- 
der returneth  to  dust — the  dust  is  earth  ;  of  earth  we 
male  loam :  and  why  of  that  loam,  whereto  he  was  con- 
verted, might  they  not  stop  a  beer-barrel? 

Imperial  Gzsar  dead  and  turn'd  to  clay, 
Might  stop  a  hole  to  keep  the  wind  away!" 

But  let  it  not  escape  our  recollection,  that  when 
the  objects  thus  connected  are  proportionate  to  the 
connecting  energy,  relatively  to  the  real,  or  at  least 
1  to  the  desirable  sympathies  of  mankind  ;  it  is  from 
'  the  same  character  that  we  derive  the  genial  method 
;  in  the   famous  soliloquy,   "To  be?  or  no'  to  be?" 
1  which,  admired  as  it  is,  and  has  been,  has  yet  re- 
ceived only  the  first  fruits  of  the  admiration  due  to  it 
We  have  seen  that  from  the  confluence  of  innu- 
517 


508 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


merable  impressions  in  each  moment  of  time  the 
passive  memory  must  needs  tend  to  confusion  —  a 
rule,  the  seeming  exceptions  to  which  (the  thunder- 
bursts  in  Lear,  for  instance)  are  really  confirmations 
of  its  truth.  For,  in  many  instances,  the  predomi- 
nance of  some  mighty  Passion  takes  the  place  of  the 
guiding  Thought,  and  the  result  prevents  the  method 
of  Nature,  rather  than  the  habit  of  the  Individual. 
For  Thought,  Imagination,  (and  we  may  add,  Passion,) 
are,  in  their  very  essence,  the  first,  connective,  the 
latter  co-adunative :  and  it  has  been  shown,  that  if 
the  excess  lead  to  Method  misapplied,  and  to  connec- 
tions of  the  moment,  the  absence,  or  marked  defici- 
ency, either  precludes  Method  altogether,  both  form 
and  substance :  or  (as  the  following  extract  will  ex- 
emplify) retains  the  outward  form  only. 

My  liege  and  madam  I  to  expostulate 

What  majesty  should  be,  what  duty  is. 

Why  day  is  day,  night  night,  and  time  is  time. 

Were  nothing  but  to  waste  night,  day,  and  time. 

Therefore — since  brevity  is  the  soul  of  wit, 

rfnd  tediousness  the  limbs  and  outward  flourishes, 

I  will  be  brief.     Your  noble  soyi  is  mad : 

Mad  call  1  it— for  to  define  true  madness, 

What  is't,  but  to  be  nothing  else  but  mad! 

But  let  that  go. 

Queen.    More  matter  with  less  art. 

Pol.    Madam  I  I  swear,  I  use  no  art  at  all. 
That  he  is  mad,  His  true :  'tis  true,  'tis  pity  : 
Jlnd  pity  'tis,  'tis  true  (a  foolish  figure  ! 
But  farewell  it,  for  I  will  use  no  art.) 
Mad  let  us  grant  him  then  :  and  now  remains, 
That  we  find  out  the  cause  of  this  effect : 
Or  rather  say  the  cause  of  this  defect : 
For  this  effect  defective  comes  by  cause. 
Thus  it  remains,  and  the  remainder  thus 
Perpend.  HAMLET,  act  ii.  scene  2. 

Does  not  the  irresistible  sense  of  the  ludicrous  in 
this  flourish  of  the  soul-surviving  body  of  old  Poloni- 
us's  intellect,  not  less  than  in  the  endless  confirma- 
tions and  most  undeniable  matters  of  fact,  of  Tapster 
Pompey,  or  "  the  hostess  of  the  tavern,"  prove  to  our 
feelings,  even  before  the  word  is  found  which  pre- 
sents the  truth  to  our  understandings,  that  confusion 
and  formality  are  but  the  opposite  poles  of  the  same 
null-point. 

It  is  Shakspeare's  peculiar  excellence,  that  through- 
out the  whole  of  his  splendid  picture  gallery  (the 
reader  will  excuse  the  confest  inadequacy  of  this 
metaphor),  we  find  individuality  every  where,  mere 
portrait  no  where.  In  all  his  various  characters,  we 
still  feel  ourselves  communing  with  the  same  human 
nature,  which  is  every  where  present  as  the  vegeta- 
ble sap  in  the  branches,  sprays,  leaves,  buds,  blos- 
soms, and  fruits,  their  shapes,  tastes,  and  odors. 
Speaking  of  the  effect,  i.  e.  his  works  themselves, 
we  may  define  the  excellence  of  their  method  as 
consisting  in  that  just  proportion,  that  union  and  in- 
terpenetration  of  the  universal  and  the  particular, 
which  must  ever  pervade  all  works  of  decided  genius 
and  true  science.  For  Method  implies  a  progressive 
transition,  and  it  is  the  meaning  of  the  word  in  the 
original  language.  The  Greek  MtSoSos,  is  literally 
a  way,  or  path  of  Transit.  Thus  we  extol  the  Ele- 
ments of  Euclid,  or  Socrates'  discourse  with  the 
s'tave  in  the  Menon,  as  methodical,  a  term  which  no 


one  who  holds  himself  bound  to  think  or  6peak  cor- 
rectly, would  apply  to  the  alphabetic  order  or  ar- 
rangement of  a  common  dictionary.  But  as,  without 
continuous  transition,  there  can  be  no  Method,  so 
without  a  pre-conception  there  can  be  no  transition 
with  continuity.  The  term,  Method,  cannot  there- 
fore, otherwise  than  by  abuse,  be  applied  to  a  mere 
dead  arrangement,  containing  in  itself  no  principle 
of  progression. 


ESSAY   V. 


Scientiis  idem  quod  plantis.  Si  planta  aliqua  uti  in  animo 
habeas,  de  radice  quid  fiat,  nil  refert :  si  vero  transferre 
cupias  in  aliud  solum,  tUtius  est  radicibus  uti  quam  surcu- 
lis.  Sic  traditio,  qua;  nunc  in  usu  eBt,  exhibet  plane  lanquam 
truncos  (pulcbros  illos  quidem)  scientiarum  ;  eed  tamen 
absque  radicibus  fabro  lignario  certe  commodos,  at  plantatori 
inulileB.  Quod  si,  disciplinse  lit  crescant,  tibi  cordi  sit,  de 
truncis  minus  sis  solicitus :  ad  id  curam  adhibe,  ut  radices 
illsesBe  etiam  cum  aliquantulo  terra;  adhaerentis,  extrahantur : 
dummodo  hoc  pacto  et  ecientiam  propriam  revisere,  vesti- 
gia que  cognitionis  tuae  remeteri  possis;  et  earn  sic  trans 
plantare  in  animum  alienum,  sicut  crevit  in  tuo. 

BACON  de  Augment.  Scient.  I.  vi.  c.  )i. 

Translation. — It  is  with  science  as  with  trees.  If  it  be  your 
purpose  to  make  some  particular  use  of  the  tree,  you  need 
not  concern  yourself  about  the  roots.  But  if  you  wish  to 
transfer  it  into  another  soil,  it  is  then  safer  to  employ  the 
roots,  than  the  scyons.  Thus  the  mode  of  teaching  most 
common  at  present  exhibits  clearly  enough  the  trunks,  as  it 
were,  of  the  sciences,  and  those  too  of  handsome  growth ; 
but  nevertheless,  without  the  roots,  valuable  and  convenient 
as  they  undoubtedly  are  to  the  carpenter,  they  are  useless 
to  the  planter.  But  if  you  have  at  heart  the  advancement 
of  education,  as  that  which  proposes  to  itself  the  general 
discipline  of  the  mind  for  its  end  and  aim,  be  less  anxious 
concerning  the  trunks,  and  let  it  be  your  care,  that  the 
roots  should  be  extracted  entire,  even  though  a  small  por- 
tion of  the  soil  should  adhere  to  them  :  so  that  at  all  events 
you  may  be  able,  by  this  means,  both  to  review  your  scien- 
tific acquirements,  re-measuring  as  it  were,  the  steps  of 
your  knowledge  fur  your  own  satisfaction,  and  at  the  same 
lime  to  transplant  it.  into  the  minds  of  others,  just  as  it 
gtew  in  your  own. 


It  has  been  observed,  in  a  preceding  page,  that  the 
relations  of  objects  are  prime  materials  of  Method, 
and  that  the  contemplation  of  relations  is  the  indis- 
pensable condition  of  thinking  methodically.  It  be- 
comes necessary  therefore  to  add,  that  there  are  two 
kinds  of  relation,  in  which  objects  of  mind  may  be 
contemplated.  The  first  is  that  of  Law,  which,  in 
its  absolute  perfection,  is  conceivable  only  of  the  Su- 
preme Being,  whose  creative  idea  not  only  appoints 
to  each  thing  its  position,  but  in  that  position,  and  in 
consequence  of  that  position,  gives  it  its  qualities, 
yea,  it  gives  its  very  existence,  as  that  particular  thing. 
Yet  in  whatever  science  the  relation  of  the  parts  to 
each  other  and  to  the  whole  is  predetermined  by  a 
truth  originating  in  the  mind,  and  not  abstracted  or 
generalized  from  observation  of  the  parts,  there  we 
affirm  the  presence  of  a  law,  if  we  are  speaking  of 
the  physical  sciences,  as  of  Astronomy  for  instance; 
or  the  presence  of  fundamental  ideas,  if  our  discourse 
be  upon  those  sciences,  the  truths  of  which,  as  truths 
518 


THE  FRIEND. 


509 


absolute,  not  merely  have  an  independent  origin  in 
the  mind,  but  continue  to  exist  in  and  for  the  mind 
alone.  Such,  for  instance,  is  Geometry,  and  such  are 
the  ideas  of  a  perfect  circle,  of  asymptote,  &:c. 

We  have  thus  assigned  the  first  place  in  the  science 
of  Method  to  Law  ;  and  first  of  the  first,  to  Law,  as 
the  absolute  kind  which  comprehending  in  itself  the 
substance  of  every  possible  degree  precludes  from  its 
conception  all  degree,  not  by  generalization  but  by 
its  own  plenitude.  As  such,  therefore,  and  as  the 
sufficient  cause  of  the  reality  correspondent  thereto, 
we  contemplate  it  as  exclusively  an  attribute  of  the 
Supreme  Being,  inseparable  from  the  idea  of  God  : 
adding,  however,  that  from  the  contemplation  of  law 
in  this,  its  only  perfect  form,  must  be  derived  all  true 
insight  into  all  other  grounds  and  principles  necessary 
to  Method,  as  the  science  common  to  all  sciences, 
which  in  each  rvy^dru  iv  a\\o  nvrij;-  -ijj  nn^fifiv^. 
Alienated  from  this  (intuition  shall  we  call  it  ?  or 
steadfast  faith  ?)  ingenious  men  may  produce  schemes, 
conducive  to  the  peculiar  purposes  of  particular  sci- 
ences, but  no  scientific  system. 

But  though  we  cannot  enter  on  the  proof  of  this 
assertion,  we  dare  not  remain  exposed  to  the  suspi- 
cion of  having  obtruded  a  mere  private  opinion,  as  a 
fundamental  truth.  Our  authorities  are  such  that 
our  only  difficulty  is  occasioned  by  their  number. 
The  following  extract  from  Arislocles  (preserved  with 
other  interesting  fragments  of  the  same  writer  by  Eu- 
sebius)  is  as  explicit  as  peremptory.  'EQtXoacxpnec 
fiiv  IlAarwv,  it  Kai  tic  aWo;  rwv  rcirort,  yvnciiiic  Kai 
rtXficjf'  !]£tS  &£  at)  bivaaSai  ra  avSptintva  Kariil.iv  f)uac, 
ii  fi!)  rd  Sua  -xpirtpov  if&etn-  Euseb.  Pnep.  Evan, 
xi.  3*  And  Plato  himself  in  his  De  Republica,  hap- 
pily still  extant,  evidently  alludes  to  the  same  doc- 
trine. For  personating  Socrates  in  the  discussion  of 
a  most  important  problem,  namely,  whether  political 
justice  is  or  is  not  the  same  as  private  honestv.  after 
many  inductions,  and  much  analytic  reasoning,  he 
breaks  off  with  these  words — el  y  "a$i,  d>  TXavxwv, 
d){  fi  luncofr,  AKPIBS2S  MEN  TOTTO  'EK  TOIOT- 
TflH  MEGOACN,  0IAI2  NTH  EN  TOIS  AOroiS 
XPflME8A,OT  MHnOTE  AABHMEN-  AAAA  TAP 
MAKPOTEPA  KAI  rjAEIflN  OAOS  H  EIII  TOYTO 
ArOVSAT — not  however,  he  adds,  precluding  the 
former  (the  analytic,  and  inductive,  to  wit)  which 
have  their  place  likewise,  in  which  (but  as  subordi- 
nate to  the  other)  they  are  both  useful  and  requisite. 
If  any  doubt  could  be  entertained  as  to  the  purport 
of  these  words,  it  would  be  removed  bv  the  fact 
statr-d  by  Aristotle  in  his  Ethics,  that  Plato  had  dis- 

*  Translation. — Plato,  who  philosophized  legitimately  and 
perfectively  if  ever  any  man  did  in  any  aee,  held  it  for  an 
axiom,  that  it  is  not  possible  for  us  to  have  an  insisht  inlo 
things  human  (i.  e.  the  nature  and  relations  of  man,  and 
the  objects  presented  by  nature  for  his  inrcstitration.) 
without  any  previous  contemplation  (or  intellectual  vision) 
of  thinas  divine  :  that  is.  of  truths  that  are  to  be  affirmed 
concerning  ihe  absolute,  as  far  as  they  can  be  made  known 
to  us. 

t  (Translation). — But  know  well,  O  Glaucon,  as  my  firm 
persnasioD,  that  by  such  methods,  as  we  have  hitherto  used 
in  this  inquisition,  we  can  never  attain  to  a  satisfactory  in- 
sight: for  it  is  a  longer  and  ampler  way  that  conducts  to  this. 
PLATO  De  revublica,  iv. 


cussed  the  problem,  whether  in  order  to  scientific 
ends  we  must  set  out  from  principles,  or  ascend  to- 
wards them  :  in  other  words,  whether  the  synthetic 
or  analytic  be  the  right  method.  But  as  no  such 
question  is  directly  discussed  in  the  published  works 
of  the  great  master,  Aristotle  must  either  have  re- 
ceived it  orally  from  Plato  himself,  or  have  found  it 
in  the  aypa<pa  loyuara,  the  private  text  book  or  ma- 
nuals constructed  by  his  select  disciples,  and  intelli- 
gible to  those  only  who  like  themselves  had  been  en- 
trusted with  the  esoteric  (interior  or  unveiled)  doc- 
trines of  Platonism.  Comparing  this  therefore  with 
the  writings,  which  he  held  it  safe  or  not  profane  to 
make  public,  we  may  safely  conclude,  that  Plato  con- 
sidered the  investigation  of  truth  a  posteriori  as  that 
which  is  employed  in  explaining  the  results  of  a  more 
scientific  process  to  those,  for  whom  the  knowledge 
of  the  results  was  alone  requisite  and  sufficient ;  or 
in  preparing  the  mind  for  legitimate  method,  by  ex- 
posing the  insufficiency  or  self-contradictions  of  the 
proofs  and  results  obtained  by  the  .contrary  process. 
Hence  therefore  the  earnestness  with  which  the  ge- 
nuine Platonists  opposed  the  doctrine  (that  all  demon- 
stration consisted  of  identical  propositions)  advanced 
by  Stilpo,  and  maintained  by  the  Megaric  school,  who 
denied  the  synthesis,  and  as  Hume  and  others  in 
recent  times,  held  geometry  itself  to  be  merely  ana- 
i  lytical. 

The  grand  problem,  the  solution  of  which  forms, 
according  to  Plato,  the  final  object  and  distinctive 
character  of  philosophy  is  this :  for  all  that  exists  con- 
ditionally (i.  e.  the  existence  of  which  is  inconceiva- 
ble except  under  the  condition  of  its  dependency  on 
some  other  as  its  antecedent)  to  find  a  ground  that  is 
unconditional  and  absolute,  and  thereby  to  reduce  the 
aggregate  of  human  knowledge  to  a  system.  For  the 
relation  common  to  all  being  known,  the  appropriate 
orbit  of  each  becomes  discoverable,  together  with  its 
peculiar  relations  to  its  concentrics  in  the  common 
sphere  of  subordination.  Thus  the  centrality  of  the 
sun  having  been  established,  and  the  law  of  the  dis- 
tances of  the  planets  from  the  sun  having  been  deter- 
mined, we  possess  ihe  means  of  calculating  the  dis- 
tance of  each  from  the  other.  But  as  all  objects  of 
sense  are  in  continual  flux,  and  as  the  notices  of  them 
by  the  senses  must,  as  far  as  they  are  true  notices, 
change  with  them,  while  scientific  principles  (or  laws) 
are  no  otherwise  principles  of  science  than  as  they 
are  permanent  and  always  the  same,  the  latter  were 
appointed  to  the  pure  reason,  either  as  its  products  or 
asj  implanted  in  it.  And  now  the  remarkable  fact 
forces  itself  on  our  attention,  viz.  that  the  material 
world  is  found  to  obey  the  same  laws  as  had  been  de- 
duced independently  from  the  reason :  and  that  the 
masses  act  by  a  force,  which  cannot  be  conceived  to 


i  of  these  two  doctrines  was  Plato's  own  opinion,  it 
is  hard  to  say.  In  many  passages  of  his  works,  the  latter  (i. 
e.  the  docirine  of  innate,  or  rather  of  connate,  ideas)  seems  to 
be  it;  but  from  the  character  and  avowed  purpose  of  these 
works,  as  addressed  to  a  promiscuous  public,  and  therefore 
preparatory  Hnd  for  the  discipline  of  the  mind  rather  than  di- 
rectly doctrinal,  it  is  not  improbable  that  Plato  chose  it  as  the 
more  popular  representation,  and  as  belonging  to  the  poetic 
drapery  of  his  Philusophemela. 

519 


510 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


result  from  the  component  parts,  known  or  imagina- 
ble. In  the  phenomena  of  magnetism,  electricity, 
galvanism,  and  in  chemistry  generally,  the  mind  is 
led  instinctively,  as  it  were,  to  regard  the  working 
powers  as  conducted,  transmitted,  or  accumulated  by 
the  sensible  bodies,  and  not  as  inherent.  This  fact 
has,  at  all  times,  been  the  strong  hold  alike  of  the  ma- 
terialists and  of  the  spiritualists,  equally  solvable  by 
the  two  contrary  hypotheses,  and  fairly  solved  by 
neither.  In  the  clear  and  masterly*  review  of  the 
elder  philosophies,  which  must  be  ranked  among  the 
most  splendid  proofs  of  judgment  no  less  than  of  ge- 
nius :  and  more  expressly  in  the  critique  on  the  atomic 
orcorpusculardoctrineof  Demoerittisand  his  followers 
as  the  one  extreme,  and  that  of  the  pure  rationalism 
of  Zeno  and  the  Eleatic  school  as  the  other,  Plato  has 
proved  incontrovertibly,  that  in  both  alike  the  basis 
is  too  narrow  to  support  the  superstructure;  that  the 
grounds  of  both  are  false  or  disputable  ;  and  that,  if 
these  were  conceded,  yet  neither  the  one  nor  the 
other  is  adequate  to  the  solution  of  the  problem:  viz. 
what  is  the  ground  of  the  coincidence  between  rea- 
son and  experience?  Or  between  the  laws  of  matter 
and  the  ideas  of  the  pure  intellect?  The  only  an- 
swer which  Plato  deemed  the  question  capable  of 
receiving,  compels  the  reason  to  pass  out  of  itself  and 
seek  the  ground  of  this  agreement  in  a  supersensual 
essence,  which  being  at  once  the  ideal  of  the  reason 
and  the  cause  of  the  material  world,  is  the  pre-estab- 
lisher  of  the  harmony  in  and  between  both.  Reli- 
gion therefore  is  the  ultimate  aim  of  philosophy,  in 
consequence  of  which  philosophy  itself  becomes  the 
supplement  of  the  sciences,  both  as  the  convergence 
of  all  to  the  common  end,  namely,  wisdom;  and  as 
supplying  the  copula,  which  modified  in  each  in  the 
comprehension  of  its  parts  to  one  whole,  is  in  its  prin- 

*  I  can  conceive  no  better  remedy  for  the  overweening  self- 
complacency  of  modern  philosophy,  than  the  annulment  of  its 
pretended  originality.  The  attempt  has  been  made  by  Dutens, 
but  he  failed  in  it  by  flying  to  the  opposite  extreme.  When 
he  should  have  confined  himself  to  the  philosophies,  he  ex- 
tended his  attack  to  the  sciences  and  even  to  the  main  disco- 
veries of  later  times  :  and  thus  instead  of  vindicating  the  an- 
cients, he  became  the  calumniator  of  the  moderns  :  as  far  at 
least  as  detraction  is  calumny.  It  is  my  intention  to  give  a 
course  of  lectures  in  the  course  of  the  present  season,  com- 
prising the  origin,  and  progress,  the  fates  and  fortunes  of  phi- 
losophy, from  Pythagoras  to  Locke,  with  the  lives  and  succes- 
sion of  the  philosophers  in  each  sect:  tracing  the  progress  of 
speculative  science  chiefly  in  relation  to  the  gradual  develop- 
ment of  the  human  mind,  hut  without  omitting  the  favorable  or 
inauspicious  influence  of  circumstances  and  the  accidents  of 
individual  genius.  The  main  divisions  will  be.  I.  From  Thales 
and  Pythagoras  to  the  appearance  of  the  Sophists.  '2.  And  of 
Socrates.  The  character  and  effects  of  Socrates'  life  and  doc- 
trines, illustrated  in  the  instances  of  Xenophon,  as  his  most 
faithful  representative,  and  of  Antisthenes  or  the  Cynic  sect  as 
the  one  partial  view  of  his  philosophy,  and  of  Arislippus  or 
the  Cyrenaic  sect  as  the  other  and  opposite  extreme.  3.  Pla- 
to and  Platonism.  4.  Aristotle  and  the  Peripatetic  school.  5. 
Zeno  and  Stoicism,  Epicurus  and  Epicurianism,  with  the  ef- 
fects of  these  in  the  Roman  Republic  and  empire.  6.  The 
rise  of  the  Eclectic  or  Alexandrian  philosophy,  the  attempt  to 
set  up  a  pseudo-Platonic  Polytheism  against  Christianity,  the 
degradation  of  philosophy  itself  into  mysticism  and  magic, 
and  its  final  disappearance,  as  philosophy,  under  Justinian. 
7.  The  resumption  of  the  Aristotelian  philosophy  in  the  thir- 
teenth century,  and  the  successive  re-appearance  of  the  differ- 
ent sects  from  the  restoration  of  literature  to  our  own  times 

S.T.  C 


c.iples  common  to  all,  as  integral  parts  of  one  system. 
And  this  is  Method,  itself  a  distinct  science,  the  im- 
mediate offspring  of  philosophy,  and  the  link  or  mor- 
dant by  which  philosophy  becomes  scientific  and  the 
sciences  philosophical. 

The  second  relation  is  that  of  Theory,  in  which 
the  existing  forms  and  qualities  of  objects,  discovered 
by  observation  or  experiment,  suggest  a  given  arrange- 
ment, of  many  under  one  point  of  view:  and  this  not 
merely  or  principally  in  order  to  facilitate  the  remem- 
brance, recollection,  or  communication  of  the  same; 
but  for  the  purposes  of  understanding,  and  in  most 
instances  of  controlling  them.  In  other  words,  all 
Theory  supposes  the  general  idea  of  cause  and  ef- 
fect. The  scientific  arts  of  Medicine,  Chemistry,  and 
Physiology  in  general,  are  examples  of  a  method  hith- 
erto founded  on  this  second  sort  of  relation. 

Between  these  two  lies  the  Method  in  the  Fine 
Arts,  which  belongs  indeed  to  this  second  or  exter- 
nal relation,  because  the  effect  and  position  of  the 
parts  is  always  more  or  less  influenced  by  the  know- 
ledge and  experience  of  their  previous  qualities;  but 
which  nevertheless  constitute  a  link  connecting  the 
second  form  of  relation  with  the  first.  For  in  all,  that 
truly  merits  the  name  of  Poetry  in  its  most  compre- 
hensive sense,  there  is  a  necessary  predominance  of 
the  Ideas  (i.  e.  of  that  which  originates  in  the  artist 
himself,  and  a  comparative  indifference  of  the  mate- 
rials. A  true  musical  taste  is  soon  dissatisfied  with 
the  Harmonica,  or  any  similar  instrument  of  glass  or 
steel,  because  the  body  of  the  sound  (as  the  Italians 
phrase  it,)  or  that  effect  which  is  derived  from  the 
materials,  encroaches  too  far  on  the  effect  from  the 
proportions  of  the  notes,  or  that  which  is  given  to  Mu- 
sic by  the  mind.  To  prove  the  high  value  as  well 
as  the  superior  dignity  of  the  first  relation;  and  to 
evince,  that  on  this  alone  a  perfect  Method  can  be 
grounded,  and  that  the  methods  attainable  by  the  se- 
cond are  at  best  but  approximations  to  the  first,  or 
tentative  exercise  in  the  hope  of  discovering  it,  form 
the  first  object  of  the  present  disquisition. 

These  truths  we  have  (as  the  most  pleasing  and 
popular  mode  of  introducing  the  subject)  hitherto  il- 
lustrated from  Shakspeare.  But  the  same  truths, 
namely  the  necessity  of  a  mental  Initiative  to  all  Me- 
thod, as  well  as  a  careful  attention  to  the  conduct  of 
the  mind  in  the  exercise  of  Method  itself,  may  be 
equally,  and  here  perhaps  more  characteristically, 
proved  from  the  most  familiar  of  the  Sciences.  We 
may  draw  our  elucidation  even  from  those  which  are 
at  present  fashionable  among  us :  from  Botany  or 
from  Chemistry.  In  the  lowest  attempt  at  a  me- 
thodical arrangement  of  the  former  science,  that  of 
artificial  classification  for  the  preparatory  purpose  of 
a  nomenclature,  some  antecedent  must  have  been 
contributed  by  the  mind  itself;  some  purpose  must 
have  been  in  view ;  or  some  question  at  least  must 
have  been  proposed  to  nature,  grounded,  as  all  ques- 
tions are,  upon  some  idea  of  the  answer.  As  for  in- 
stance, the  assumption, 

"  That  two  great  sexes  animate  the  world." 

For  no  man  can  confidently  conceive  a  fact  to  be 
universally  true  who  does  not  with  equal  confidence 
520 


THE  FRIEND. 


511 


anticipate  its  necessity,  and  who  does  not  believe  that 
necessity  to  be  demonstrable  by  an  insight  into  its 
nature,  whenever  and  wherever  such  insight  can  be 
obtained.  We  acknowledge,  we  reverence  the  obli- 
gations of  Botany  to  Linnieus,  who,  adopting  from 
Bartholinus  and  others  the  sexuality  of  plants,  ground- 
ed thereon  a  scheme  of  classific  and  distinctive  marks, 
by  which  one  man's  experience  may  be  communicaled 
to  others,  and  the  objects  safely  reasoned  on  while 
absent,  and  recognized  as  soon  ;is  and  whenever  they 
are  met  with.  He  invented  an  universal  character 
for  the  language  of  Botany,  chargeable  with  no  great- 
er imperfections  than  are  to  be  found  in  the  alphabets 
of  every  particular  language.  As  for  the  study  of  the 
ancients,  so  of  the  works  of  nature,  an  accidence  and 
a  dictionary  are  the  first  and  indispensable  requisites: 
and  to  the  illustrious  Swede,  Botany  is  indebted  for 
both.  But  neither  was  the  central  idea  of  vegetation 
itself,  by  the  light  of  which  we  might  have  seen  the 
collateral  relations  of  the  vegetable  to  the  inorganic 
and  to  the  animal  world ;  nor  the  constitutive  nature 
and  inner  necessity  of  sex  itself,  revealed  to  Lin- 
naeus.*   Hence,  as  in  all  other  cases  where  the  mas- 


ter-light is  missing,  so  in  this:  the  reflective  mind 
avoids  Scylla  only  to  lose  itself  on  Charybdis.  If  we 
adhere  to  the  general  notion  of  sex,  as  abstracted 
from  the  more  obvious  modes  and  forms  in  which  the 
sexual  relation  manifests  itself,  we  soon  meet  with 
whole  classes  of  plants  to  which  it  is  found  inappli- 
cable. If  arbitrarily,  we  give  it  infinite  extension,  it 
is  dissipated  into  the  barren  truism,  that  all  specific 
products  suppose  specific  means  of  production. 


ESSAY  VI. 


*  The  word  nature  has  been  used  in  two  senses,  viz.  active- 
ly and  passively  ;  energetic  (=lbrma  formans,)  and  material 
(=forma  formaia.)  In  the  first  (the  sense  in  which  the  word 
is  used  in  the  text)  it  signifies  the  inward  principle  of  what- 
ever is  requisite  for  the  reality  of  a  thing  as  existent :  while 
the  essence,  or  essential  property,  signifies  the  inner  principle 
of  all  that  appertains  to  the  possibility  ofa  thing.  Hence,  in 
accurate  language,  we  say  the  essence  of  a  mathematical  cir- 
cle or  other  geometrical  figure,  not  the  nature :  because  in 
the  conception  of  forms  purely  geometrical  there  is  no  ex- 
pression or  implication  of  their  real  existence.  In  the  second, 
or  material  sense,  of  the  word  Nature,  we  mean  by  it  the  sum 
total  of  all  things,  so  far  as  they  are  objects  of  our  senses, 
and  consequently  of  possible  experience — the  aggregate  of 
phenomena,  whether  existing  for  our  outward  senses,  or  fur 
our  inner  sense.  The  doctrine  concerning  material  nature 
would  therefore  (the  word  Physiology  being  both  ambiguous 
in  itself,  and  already  otherwise  appropriated)  be  more  proper- 
ly entitled  Phenomenology,  distinguished  into  its  two  grand 
divisions,  Soroataloey  and  Psychology.  The  doctrine  con- 
cerning energetic  nature  is  comprised  in  the  science  of  Dyna- 
mics :  the  union  of  which  with  Phenomenology,  and  the  alli- 
ance of  both  with  the  sciences  of  the  Possible,  or  of  the  Con- 
ceivable, viz.  Logic  and  Mathematics,  constitute  -Xatural 
Philosophy. 

Having  thus  explained  the  term  Nature,  we  now  more  espe- 
cially entreat  the  reader's  attention  to  the  sense,  in  which 
here,  and  every  where  through  this  Essay,  we  use  the  woul 
Idea.  We  assert,  that  the  very  impulse  to  universalize  any 
phenomenon  involves  the  prior  assumption  of  some  efficient 
law  in  nature,  which  in  a  thousand  different  forms  is  evermore 
one  and  the  same  ;  entire  in  each,  yet  comprehending  all ;  and 
incapable  of  being  abstracted  or  generalized  from  any  number 
of  phenomena,  because  it  is  itself  presupposed  in  each  and 
all  as  their  common  ground  and  condition;  and  because 
every  definition  of  a  genus  is  the  adequate  definition  of  the 
lowest  species  alone,  while  the  efficient  law  must  contain  the 
ground  of  all  in  all.  It  is  attributed,  never  derived.  The  ut- 
most we  ever  venture  to  say  is.  that  the  falling  of  an  apple 
suggested  the  law  of  gravitation  to  Sir  I.  Newton.  Now  a 
law  and  an  idea  are  correlative  terms,  and  differ  only  as  ob- 
ject and  subject,  as  being  and  truth. 

Such  is  the  doctrine  of  the  Novum  Organum  of  Lord  Ba- 
con, agreeing  (as  we  shall  more  largely  show  in  the  text)  in 
all  essential  points  with  the  true  doctrine  of  Plato,  the  appa- 
rent differences  being  for  the  greater  part  occasioned  by  the 
Grecian  sage  having  applied  his  principles  chiefly  to  the  in- 
vestigation of  the  mind,  and  the  method  of  evolving  its  pow- 
ers, and  the  English  philosopher  to  the  developement  of  na- 
ture.   That  our  great  countryman  speaks  too  often  dctract- 

34  L'u 


''A-dvrwv  tyiTuvTCs  \6yov  'ifa$cv,  avaipSai  \6yov. 

Seeking  the  reason  of  all  things  from  without,  they  preclude 
reason. THEOPH.  in  Mel. 


Thus  a  growth  and  a  birth  are  distinguished  by 
the  mere  verbal  definition,  that  the  latter  is  a  whole 
in  itself,  the  former  not :  and  when  we  would  apply 
even  this  to  nature,  we  are  baffled  by  objects  (the 
flower  polypus,  &c.  eke.)  in  which  each  is  the  other. 
All  that  can  be  done  by  the  most  patient  and  active 
industry,  by  the  widest  and  most  continuous  research- 
es ;  all  that  the  amplest  survey  of  the  vegetable 
realm,  brought  under  immediate  contemplation  by 
the  most  stupendous  connections  of  species  and  va- 
rieties, can  suggest;  all  that  minutest  dissection  and 
exaetest  chemical  analysis,  can  unfold ;  all  that 
varied  experiment  and  the  position  of  plants  and  of 
their  component  parts  in  every  conceivable  relation 
to  light,  heat,  (and  whatever  else  we  distinguish  as 
imponderable  substances)  to  earth,  air,  water,  to  the 
supposed  constituents  of  air  and  water,  separate  and 
in  all  proportions — in  short  all  that  chemical  agents 
anoV  re-agents  can  disclose  or  adduce;  —  all  these 
have  been  brought,  as  conscripts,  into  the  field,  with 
the  completest  accoutrement,  in  the  best  discipline, 
under  the  ablest  commanders.    Yet  after  all  that  was 

1  effected  bv  Linnreus  himself,  not  to  mention  the 
labors  of  Casalpinus,  Ray,  Gesner,  Tournefort,  and 
the  other  heroes  who  preceded  the  general  adoption 

!  of  the  sexual  system,  ns  the  basis  of  artificial  arrange- 
ment— after  all  the  successive  toils  and  enterprises 
of  Hedwig,  Jossied,  Mirbel,  Smith,  Knight,  El- 
Lis,  &C&C. — what  is  Botaxy  at  this  present  hour  ? 
Little  more  than  an  enormous  nomenclature  ;  a  huge 
catalogue,  bien  arrange,  yearly  and  monthly  augment- 
ed, in  various  editions,  each  with  its  own  scheme  of 
technical  memory  and  its  own  conveniences  of  re- 

;  ference!     A  dictionary  in  which  (to  carry  on  the 

j  metaphor)   an  Ainsworth  arranges   the  contents  by 


ingly  of  the  divine  Philosopher  must  be  explained,  partly  by 
the  tone  given  to  thinking  minds  by  the  Reformation,  the 
founders  and  fathers  of  which  saw  in  the  Aristotelians,  or 
schoolmpn.  the  antagonists  of  Protestantism,  and  in  the  Italian 
Platonists  the  <iespisers  and  secret  enemies  of  Christianity  ; 
and  partly,  by  his  having  formed  his  notions  of  Plato's  doc- 
trines from  the  absurdities  and  phantasms  of  his  misinterpre- 
ters,  rather  than  from  an  unprejudiced  study  of  the  original 
works. 

521 


512 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


the  initials ;  a  Walker  by  the  endings  ;  a  Scapula  by 
the  radicals;  and  a  Cominius  by  the  similarity  of 
the  uses  and  purposes!  The  terms  system,  method, 
science,  are  mere  improprieties  of  courtesy,  when 
applied  to  a  mass  enlarging  by  endless  oppositions, 
hut  without  a  nerve  that  oscillates,  or  a  pulse  that 
throbs,  in  sign  of  growth  or  inward  sympathy-  The 
innocent  amusement,  the  healthful  occupation,  the 
ornamental  accomplishment  of  amateurs  (most  honor- 
able indeed  and  deserving  all  praise  as  a  preventive 
substitute  for  the  stall,  the  kennel,  and  the  subscrip- 
tion-room), it  has  yet  to  expect  the  devotion  and 
energies  of  the  philosopher. 

So  long  back  as  the  first  appearance  of  Dr.  Dar- 
win's Phytonomia,  the  writer,  then  in  earliest  man- 
hood, presumed  to  hazard  the  opinion,  that  the  phy- 
siological botanists  were  hunting  in  a  false  direction, 
and  sought  lor  analogy  where  they  should  have 
looked  for  antithesis.  He  saw,  or  thought  he  saw, 
that  the  harmony  between  the  vegetable  and  animal 
world,  was  not  a  harmony  of  resemblance,  but  of 
contrast ;  and  their  relation  to  each  other  that  of  cor- 
responding opposites.  They  seemed  to  him  (whose 
mind  had  been  formed  by  observation,  unaided,  but 
at  the  same  time  unenthralled,  by  partial  experiment) 
as  two  streams  from  the  same  fountain  indeed,  but 
flowing  the  one  due  west,  and  the  other  direct  east; 
and  that  consequently,  the  resemblance  would  be  as 
the  proximity,  greatest  in  the  first  and  rudimental 
products  of  vegetable  and  animal  organization. 
Whereas,  according  to  the  received  notion,  the  high- 
est and  most  perfect  vegetable,  and  the  lowest  and 
rudest  animal  forms,  ought  to  have  seemed  the  links 
of  the  two  systems,  which  is  contrary  to  fact.  Since 
that  time,  the  same  idea  has  dawned  in  the  minds  of 
philosophers  capable  of  demonstrating  its  objective 
truth  by  induction  of  facts  in  an  unbroken  series  of 
correspondences  in  nature.  From  these  men,  or 
from  minds  enkindled  by  their  labors,  we  hope  here- 
after to  receive  it,  or  rather  the  yet  higher  idea  to 
which  it  refers  us,  matured  into  laws  of  organic  na- 
ture ;  and  thence  to  have  one  other  splendid  proof, 
that  with  the  knowledge  of  Law  alone  dwell  Power 
and  Prophecy,  decisive  Experiment,  and,  lastly,  a 
scientific  method,  that  dissipating  with  its  earliest 
rays  the  gnomes  of  hypothesis  and  the  mists  of  the- 
ory, may,  within  a  single  generation,  open  out  on 
the  philosophic  seer  discoveries  that  had  baffled 
the  gigantic,  but  blind  and  guideless  industry  of 
ages. 

Such  too,  is  the  case  with  the  assumed  indecom- 
posible  substances  of  the  Laboratory.  They  are 
the  symbols  of  elementary  powers  and  the  exponents 
of  a  law,  which,  as  the  root  of  all  these  powers,  the 
chemical  philosopher,  whatever  his  theory  may  be, 
is  instinctively  laboring  to  extract.  This  instinct, 
again,  is  itself  but  the  form,  in  which  the  idea,  the 
mental  Correlative  of  the  law,  first  announces  its  in- 
cipient germination  in  his  own  mind  :  and  hence 
proceeds  the  striving  after  unity  of  principle  through 
all  the  diversity  of  forms,  with  a  feeling  resembling 
that  which  accompanies  our  endeavors  to  recollect  a 
forgotten  name;  when  we  seem  at  once  to  have  and 


not  to  have  it ;  which  the  memory  feels  but  cannot 
find.  Thus,  as  "  the  lunatic,  the  lover,  and  the  poet,'' 
suggest  each  other  to  Shakspeare's  Theseus,  as  soon 
as  his  thoughts  present  him  the  one  form,  of  which 
they  are  but  varieties  ;  so  water  and  flame,  the  dia- 
mond, the  charcoal,  and  the  mantling  champagne, 
with  its  ebullient  sparkles,  are  convoked  and  frater- 
nized by  the  theory  of  the  chemist.  This  is,  in 
truth,  the  first  charm  of  chemistry,  and  the  secret 
of  the  almost  universal  interest  excited  by  its  dis- 
coveries. The  serious  complacency  which  is  afford- 
ed by  the  sense  of  truth,  utility,  permanence,  and 
progression,  blends  with  and  enobles  the  exhilarating 
surprise  and  the  pleasurable  sting  of  curiosity,  which 
accompany  the  propounding  and  the  solving  of  an 
Enigma.  It  is  the  sense  of  a  principle  of  connection 
given  by  the  mind,  and  sanctioned  by  the  corres- 
pondency of  nature.  Hence  the  strong  hold  which 
in  all  ages  chemistry  has  had  on  the  imagination.  If 
in  Shakspeare  we  find  nature  idealized  into  poetry, 
through  the  creative  power  of  a  profound  yet  ob- 
servant meditation,  so  through  the  meditative  obser- 
vation of  a  Davy,  a  Woollaston,  or  a  Hatchett  ; 

"  By  some  connatural  force, 

Powerful  at  greatest  distance  to  unite 
With  secret  amity  things  of  like  kind," 

we  find  poetry,  as  it  were,  substantiated  and  realized 
in  nature :  yea,  nature  itself  disclosed  to  us,  geminam 
islam  naturam,  qua  fiit  et  facit,  et  crealur,  as  at  once 
the  poet  and  the  poem .' 


ESSAY   VII. 


Tavitj  toivvv  Siatpta  X^?1^  /"•'»  °^f  ""*  ^  ^cYeS  0iAo- 
Std  fiovd;  tc,  Kai  (pi\oT£j(i'ovs,  icai  TrpaKTiKovs,  (cat 
X^Pli  a"  ~fP'  l'-"  °  ^°y°Si  °i>S  liovovi  iv  ri;  opSujf 
TrpoceiTTOL    <pi\o(r6(povs,    wf    filv    yiyvoxjKrivTas,    rivoi 

?5"1V   ITTl^hl"'!   iKlifr]  T0VTU1V   T&V   tTTl$TlH<j)V,    0     Tl'y^(fl'£I 

ov  aWo  au7i);  Tij$£7n;->5/<j;j.  ITAATJ2N. 

(T^ranslatiov.) —  In  the  following  then  1  distinguish,  first, 
llmse  whom  you  indeed  may  call  Philotheurisis,  or  Philo- 
technists,  or  Practicians,  and  secondly  those  whom  alone 
you  may  rightly  denominate  Philosophers,  as  knowing 
what  the  science  of  all  these  branches  of  science  is.  which 
may  prove  to  be  something  more  than  the  mere  aggregate 
of  the  knowledges  in  any  particular  science.  PLATO. 


From  Shakspeare  to  Plato,  from  the  philosophic 
poet  to  the  poetic  philosopher,  the  transition  is  easy, 
and  the  road  is  crowded  with  illustrations  of  our  pre- 
sent subject.  For  of  Plato's  works,  the  larger  and 
more  valuable  portion  have  all  one  common  end, 
which  comprehends  and  shines  through  the  particu- 
lar purpose  of  each  several  dialogue;  and  this  is  to 
establish  the  sources,  to  evolve  the  principles,  and 
exemplify  the  art  of  Method.  This  is  the  clue, 
without  which  it  would  be  difficult  to  exculpate  the 
noblest  productions  of  the  divine  philosopher  from  the 
charge  of  being  tortuous  and  labyrinthine  in  their 
progress,  and  unsatisfactory  in  their  ostensible  results 
The  latter  indeed  appear  not  seldom  to  have  been 
522 


THE  FRIEND. 


513 


drawn  for  the  purpose  of  starting  a  new  problem, 
rather  than  that  of  solving  the  one  proposed  as  the 
subject  of  the  previous  discussion.  But  with  the 
clear  insight  that  the  purpose  of  the  writer  is  not  so 
much  to  establish  any  particular  truth,  as  to  remove 
the  obstacles,  the  continuance  of  which  is  preclusive 
of  all  truth;  the  whole  scheme  assumes  a  different 
aspect,  and  justifies  itself  in  all  its  dimensions.  We 
see,  that  to  open  anew  a  well  of  springing  water,  not 
to  cleanse  the  stagnant  tank,  or  fill,  bucket  by  bucket, 
the  leaden  cistern;  that  the  Education  of  the  intel- 
lect, by  awakening  the  principle  and  method  of  self- 
developement,  was  his  proposed  object,  not  any  spe- 
cific information  that  can  be  conveyed  in  it  from  with- 
out: not  to  assist  in  storing  the  passive  mind  with  the 
various  sorts  of  knowledge  most  in  request,  as  if  the 
human  soul  were  a  mere  repository  or  banqueting- 
room,  but  to  place  it  in  such  relations  of  circumstance 
as  should  gradually  excite  the  germinal  power  that 
craves  no  knowledge  but  what  it  can  take  up  into 
itself,  what  it  can  appropriate,  and  re-produce  in  fruits 
of  its  own.  To  shape,  to  dye,  to  paint  over,  and  to 
mechanize  the  mind,  he  resigned,  as  their  proper 
trade,  to  the  sophists,  against  whom  he  waged  open 
and  unremitting  war.  For  the  ancients,  as  well  as 
the  moderns,  had  their  machinery  for  the  extempora- 
neous mintage  of  intellects,  by  means  of  which,  off- 
hand, as  it  were,  the  scholar  was  enabled  to  make  a 
figure  on  any  and  all  subjects,  on  any  and  all  occa- 
sions. They  too  had  their  glittering  vapors,  that  (as 
the  comic  poet  tells  us)  fed  a  host  of  sophists — 

fttya  \ai  Siai  avipd  atv  apyol; 
Al-rrtp  yvwpTjv  Kal  SidXe^tv  Kal  vovv  rj/i7v  TTapi^ovaiv, 
Kal  rcpariiav  Kal  ircpi\t%iv  Kal  xpovaiv  Kal  KardXpipiv. 
APISTO*.  Ne<p.  Kk.  S. 

IMITATED. 
Great  goddesses  are  they  to  lazy  folks, 
Who  pour  down  on  us  gifts  of  fluent  speech. 
Sense  most  sententious,  wonderful  fine  effect, 
And  how  to  talk  about  it  and  about  it. 
Thoughts  brisk  as  bees,  and  pathos  soft  and  thawy. 

In  fine,  as  improgressive  arrangement  is  not  Me- 
thod, so  neither  is  a  mere  mode  or  set  fashion  of  doing 
a  thing.  Are  further  facts  required  ?  We  appeal  to 
the  notorious  fact  that  Zoology,  soon  after  the  com- 
mencement of  the  latter  half  of  the  last  century,  was 
falling  abroad,  weighed  down  and  crushed,  as  it 
were,  by  the  inordinate  number  and  manifbldness  of 
facts  and  phenomena  apparently  separate,  without 
evincing  the  least  promise  of  systematizing  itself  by 
any  inward  combination,  any  vital  interdependence 
of  its  parts.  John  Hunter,  who  appeared  at  times 
almost  a  stranger  to  the  grand  conception,  which  yet 
never  ceased  to  work  in  him  as  his  genius'  and  go- 
verning spirit,  rose  at  length  in  the  horizon  of  physi- 
ology and  comparative  anatomy.  In  his  printed 
works,  the  one  directing  thought  seems  evermore  to 
flit  before  him,  twice  or  thrice  only  to  have  been 
seized,  and  after  a  momentary  detention  to  have  been 
again  let  go :  as  if  the  words  of  the  charm  had  been 
incomplete,  and  it  had  appeared  at  his  own  will  only 
to  mock  its  calling.     At  length,  in  the  astonishing 


preparations  for  his  museum,  he  constructed  it  for  the 
scientific  apprehension  out  of  the  unspoken  alphabet 
of  nature.  Yet  notwithstanding  the  imperfection  in 
the  annunciation  of  the  idea,  how  exhilarating  have 
been  the  results!  We  dare  appeal  to  *Abeknkthy, 
to  I'.vKiiARD  Home,  to  IIatciiett,  whose  conunimi 
cation  to  Sir  Everard  on  the  egg  and  its  analogies,  in 
a  recent  paper  of  the  latter  (itself  of  high  excellence) 
in  the  Philosophical  Transactions,  we  point  out  as 
being,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  term,  the  develope- 
ment  of  a  fact  in  the  history  of  physiology,  and  to 
which  we  refer  as  exhibiting  a  luminous  instance  of 
what  we  mean  by  the  discovery  of  a  central  phenome- 
non. To  these  we  appeal,  whether  whatever  is 
grandest  in  the  views  of  Cuvier  be  not  either  a  re- 
flection of  this  light  or  a  continuation  of  its  rays,  well 
and  wisely  directed  through  fit  media  to  its  appropri- 
ate object.t 

We  have  seen  that  a  previous  act  and  conception 
of  the  mind  is  indispensable  even  to  the  mere  sem- 
blances of  Method  ;  that  neither  fashion,  mode,  nor 
orderly  arrangement  can  be  produced  without  a 
prior  purpose,  and  a  "  pre-cogitation  ad  intern 
ejus  quod  quceritur,"  though  this  pur|»se  have  been 
itself  excited,  and  this  "  pre-cogitation "  itself  ab- 
stracted from  the  perceived  likenesses  and  differences 
of  the  objects  to  be  arranged.  But  it  has  likewise 
been  shown,  that  fashion,  mode,  ordonnance,  are  not 
Method,  inasmuch  as  all  Method  supposes  a  princi- 
ple of  unity  with  progression;  in  other  words, 
progressive  transition  without  breach  of  continuity. 
But  such  a  principle,  it  has  been  proved,  can  never 
in  the  sciences  of  experiment  or  in  those  of  observa- 
tion be  adequately  supplied  bv  a  theory  built  on  gen- 
eralization. For  what  shall  determine  the  mind  to 
abstract  and  generalize  one  common  point  rather 
than  another?  and  within  what  limits,  from  what 
number  of  individual  objects,  shall  the  generalization 
be  made?  The  theory  must  still  require  a  prior  the- 
ory for  its  own  legitimate  construction.  With  the 
mathematician  the  definition  makes  the  object,  and 
pre-establishes  the  terms  which,  and  which  alone, 
can  occur  in  the  after- reasoning.  If  a  circle  be  found 
not  to  have  the  radii  from  the  centre  to  the  circum- 
ference perfectly  equal,  which  in  fact  it  would  be 
absurd  to  expect  of  any  material  circle,  it  follows 
that  it  was  not  a  circle :  and  the  tranquil  geometri- 
cian would  content  himself  with  smiling  at  the  Quid 

*  Since  the  first  delivery  of  this  sheet,  Mr.  Abernethy  has 
realized  this  anticipation,  dictated  solely  by  the  writer's 
wishes,  and  at  that  time  justified  only  by  his  general  admira- 
tion of  Mr.  A's  talents  and  principles  ;  but  composed  without 
the  least  knowli  dge  that  he  was  then  actually  engaged  in 
proving  the  assertion  here  hazarded,  at  large  and  in  detail. 
See  his  eminent  "Physiological  Lectures,"  lately  published 
in  one  volume  octavo. 

t  Nor  should  it  be  wholly  unnoticed,  that  Cuvier,  who,  we 
understand,  was  not  born  in  France,  and  is  not  of  unmixed 
French  extraction,  had  prepared  himself  for  his  illustrious 
labors  (as  we  learn  from  a  reference  in  the  first  chapter  of 
his  great  work,  and  should  have  concluded  from  the  general 
style  of  thinking,  though  the  language  betrays  suppression,  as 
one  who  doubted  the  sympathy  of  his  readers  or  audience) 
in  a  very  different  school  of  methodology  and  philosophy  than 
Paris  could  have  afforded. 

523 


514 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


pro  Quo  of  the  simple  objector.  A  mathematical 
Ikeoria  seu  conlemplatio  may  therefore  be  perfect. 
For  the  mathematician  can  be  certain,  that  he  has 
contemplated  all  that  appertains  to  his  proposition. 
The  celebrated  EuLXK,  treating  on  some  point  re- 
specting arches,  makes  this  curious  remark,  "  All 
experience  is  in  contradiction  to  this;  sed  potius 
fidendum  est  analysi ;  i.  e.  but  this  is  no  reason  for 
doubting  the  analysis."  The  words  sound  paradoxi- 
cal ;  but  in  truth  mean  no  more  than  this,  that  the 
properties  of  space  are  not  less  certainly  the  proper- 
ties of  space  because  they  can  never  be  entirely 
transferred  to  material  bodies.  But  in  physics,  that 
is,  in  all  the  sciences  which  have  for  their  objects 
the  things  of  nature,  and  not  the  cutia  ralionis — more 
philosophically,  intellectual  acts  and  the  products  of 
those  acts,  existing  exclusively  in  and  for  the  intellect 
itself— the  definition  must  follow,  and  not  precede  the 
reasoning.  It  is  representative  not  constitutive,  and 
is  indeed  little  more  than  an  abbreviature  of  the  pre- 
ceding observation,  and  the  deductions  therefrom. 
But  as  the  observation  though  aided  by  experiment, 
is  necessarily  limited  and  imperfect,  the  definition 
must  be  equally  so.  The  history  of  theories,  and  the 
frequency  of  their  subversion  by  the  discovery  of  a 
single  new  fact,  supply  the  best  illustrations  of  this 
truth.* 

As  little  can  a  true  scientific  method  be  grounded 
on  an  hypothesis,  unless  where  the  hypothesis  is  an 
exponential  image  or  picture-language  of  an  idea 
which  is  contained  in  it  more  or  less  clearly;  or  the 
symbol  of  an  undiscovered  law,  like  the  characters 
of  unknown  quantities  in  algebra,  lor  the  purpose  of 


*  The  following  extract  from  a  most  respectable  scientific 
Journal  contains  an  exposition  of  the  impossibility  of  a  per- 
fect Theory  in  Physics,  the  more  striking  because  it  is  di- 
rectly against  the  purpose  and  intention  of  the  writer.  We 
content  ourselves  with  one  question,  What  if  Kepler,  what  if 
Newton  in  his  investigations  concerning  the  Tides,  had  held 
themselves  bound  to  this  canon,  and  instead  of  propounding  a 
law,  had  employed  themselves  exclusively  in  collecting  mate- 
rials for  a  Theory  ? 

"The  magnetic  influence  has  lone  been  known  to  have  a 
variation  which  is  constantly  changing  ;  but  that  change  is  so 
slow,  and  at  the  same  time  so  different  in  various  (dijfercnt?) 
parts  of  the  world,  that  it  would  be  in  vain  to  seek  for  the 
means  of  reducing  it  to  established  rules,  until  all  its  local 
and  particular  circumstances  are  clearly  ascertained  and  re- 
corded by  accurate  observations  made  in  various  parts  of  the 
globe.  The  necessity  and  importance  of  such  observations 
are  now  pretty  generally  understood,  and  they  have  been  act- 
ually carrying  on  for  some  years  past ;  but  these  (and  by  pari- 
ty of  reason  the  incomparably  greater  number  that  remain 
to  be  made)  must  be  collected,  collated,  proved,  and  after- 
wards brought  together  into  one  focus  before  ever  a  founda- 
tion can  be  formed  upon  which  any  thing  like  a  sound  and 
stable  Theory  can  be  constituted  lor  the  explanation  of  such 
changes." — Journal  of  Science  and  the  Jirts,  No.  vii.  p.  103. 

An  intelligent  friend,  on  reading  the  words  "into  one 
focus,"  observed:  But  what  and  where  is  the  lens?  I  how- 
ever fully  agree  with  the  writer.  All  this  and  much  more 
must  have  been  achieved  before  "  a  sound  and  stable  Theo- 
ry "  could  be  "  constituted  "—which  even  then  (except  as  far 
as  it  might  occasion  the  discovery  of  a  law)  might  possibly 
explain  (ex  plicis  plana  reddere,)  but  never  account  for.  the 
facts  in  question.  But  the  most  satisfactory  comment  on  these 
and  similar  assertions  would  be  afforded  by  a  matter  of  fact 
history  of  the  rise  and  progress,  the  accelerating  and  retarding 
momenta,  of  science  in  the  civilized  world. 


submitting  the  phenomena  to  a  scientific  calculus.  In 
all  other  instances,  it  is  itself  a  real  or  supposed  phe- 
nomenon, and  therefore  a  part  of  the  problem  which 
it  is  to  solve.  It  may  be  among  the  foundation-stones 
of  the  edifice,  but  can  never  be  the  ground. 

But  in  experimental  philosophy,  it  may  be  said  how 
much  do  we  not  owe  to  accident?  Doubtless:  but 
let  it  not  be  forgotten,  that  if  the  discoveries  so  made 
stop  there;  if  they  do  not  excite  to  some  master  idea; 
if  they  do  not  lead  to  some  law  (in  whatever  dress 
of  theory  or  hypothesis  the  fashion  and  prejudices 
of  the  time  may  disguise  or  disfigure  it:  the  discover- 
ies may  remain  for  ages  limited  in  their  uses,  insecure 
and  unproductive.  How  many  centuries,  we  might 
have  said  millennia,  have  passed,  since  the  first  acci- 
dental discovery  of  the  attraction  and  repulsion  of 
light  bodies  by  rubbed  amber,  &c.  Compare  the  in- 
terval with  the  progress  made  within  less  than  a  cen- 
tury, after  the  discovery  of  the  phenomena  that  led 
immediately  to  a  theory  of  electricity.  That  here 
as  in  many  other  instances,  the  theory  was  supported 
by  insecure  hypotheses ;  that  by  one  theorist  two  he- 
terogeneous fluids  are  assumed,  the  vitreous  and  the 
resinous;  by  another,  a  plus  and  minus  of  the  same 
fluid  ;  that  a  third  considers  it  a  mere  modification  of 
light;  while  a  fourth  composes  the  electrical  aura  of 
oxygen,  hydrogen,  and  caloric:  this  does  but  place 
the  truth  we  have  been  evolving  in  a  stronger  and 
clearer  light.  For  abstract  from  all  these  supposi- 
tions, or  rather  imaginations,  that  which  is  common 
to,  and  involved  in  them  all ;  and  we  shall  have  nei- 
ther notional  fluid  or  fluids,  nor  chemical  compounds, 
nor  elementary  matter, — but  the  idea  of  two — opposite 
—forces,  tending  to  rest  by  equilibrium.  These  are 
the  sole  factors  of  the  calculus,  alike  in  all  the  theo- 
ries. These  give  the  law,  and  in  it  the  method,  both 
of  arranging  the  phenomena  and  of  substantiating 
appearances  into  facts  of  science ;  with  a  success 
proportionate  to  the  clearness  or  confusedness  of  the 
insight  into  the  law.  For  this  reason,  we  anticipate 
the  greatest  improvements  in  the  method,  the  nearest 
approaches  to  a  system  of  electricity  from  these  phi- 
losophers, who  have  presented  the  law  most  purely, 
and  the  correlative  idea  as  an  idea;  those,  namely, 
who,  since  the  year  1798,  in  the  true  spirit  of  experi- 
mental dynamics,  rejecting  the  imagination  of  any 
material  substrate,  simple  or  compound,  contemplate 
in  the  phenomena  of  electricity  the  operation  of  a  law 
which  reigns  through  all  nature,  the  law  of  polari- 
ty, or  the  manifestation  of  one  power  by  opposite 
forces :  who  trace  in  these  appearances,  as  the  most 
obvious  and  striking  of  its  innumerable  forms,  the 
agency  of  the  positive  and  negative  poles  of  a  power 
essential  to  all  material  construction ;  the  second, 
namely,  of  the  three  primary  principles,  for  which  the 
beautiful  and  most  appropriate  symbols  are  given  by 
the  mind  in  three  ideal  dimensions  of  space. 

The  time  is,  perhaps,  nigh  at  hand,  when  the  same 
comparison  between  the  results  of  two  unequal  peri- 
ods ;  the  interval  between  the  knowledge  of  a  fact, 
and  that  from  the  discovery  of  the  law,  will  be  ap- 
plicable to  the  sister  science  of  magnetism.  But  how 
great  the  contrast  between  magnetism  and  electric* 
524 


THE  FRIEND. 


515 


city,  at  the  present  moment!  From  the  remotest  an- 
tiquity, the  attraction  of  iron  by  the  magnet  was 
known  and  noticed ;  but  century  after  century,  it  re- 
mained the  undisturbed  property  of  poets  and  orators. 
The  fact  of  the  magnet  and  the  fable  of  phoenix 
stood  on  the  same  scale  of  utility.  In  the  thirteenth 
century,  or  perhaps  earlier,  the  polarity  of  the  magnet 
and  its  eommunicability  to  iron  was  discovered;  and 
soon  suggested  a  purpose  so  grand  and  important, 
that  it  may  well  be  deemed  the  proudest  trophy  ever 
raised  by  accident*  in  the  service  of  mankind — the 
invention  of  the  compass.  But  it  led  to  no  idea,  to  no 
law,  and  consequently  to  no  Method  :  though  a  vari- 
ety of  phenomena,  as  startling  as  they  are  mysterious, 
have  forced  on  us  a  presentiment  of  its  intimate  con- 
nection with  all  the  great  agencies  of  nature;  of  a 
revelation,  in  ciphers,  the  key  to  which  is  still  want- 
ing. We  can  recall  no  incident  of  human  history 
that  impresses  the  imagination  more  deeply  than  the 
moment  when  Columbus,t  on  an  unknown  ocean, 
first  perceived  one  of  these  startling  facts,  the  change 
of  the  magnetic  needle  ! 

In  what  shall  we  seek  the  cause  of  this  contrast 
between  the  rapid  progress  of  electricity  and  the  sta- 


*  If  accident  it  were  :  if  the  compass  did  not  obscurely  tra- 
vel to  us  from  the  remotest  east:  if  its  existence  there  does 
not  point  to  an  age  and  a  race,  to  which  scholars  of  highest 
rank  in  the  world  of  letters,  Sir  W.  Jones,  Badly,  Schlegel 
have  attached  faith  !  That  it  was  known  before  the  era  gen- 
erally assumed  for  its  invention,  and  not  spoken  of  as  a  novel- 
ty, has  been  proved  by  Mr.  Soutliey  and  others. 

t  It  cannot  be  deemed  alien  from  the  purposes  of  this  dis- 
quisition, if  we  are  anxious  to  attract  the  attention  of  our 
readers  to  the  importance  of  speculative  meditation,  even  for 
the  worldly  interests  of  mankind  ;  and  to  that  concurrence  of 
nature  and  historic  event  with  the  great  revolutionary  move- 
ments of  individual  genius,  of  which  so  many  instances  occur 
in  the  study  of  History — how  nature  (why  should  we  hesitate 
in  saying,  that  which  in  nature  itself  is  more  than  nature?) 
seems  to  come  forward  in  order  to  meet,  to  aid,  and  to  reward 
every  idea  excited  by  a  contemplation  of  her  methods  in  the 
spirit  of  filial  care,  and  with  the  humility  of  love  !  It  is  with 
this  view  that  we  extract  from  an  ode  of  Chiabrera's  the  fol- 
lowing lines,  which,  in  the  strength  of  the  thought  and  the 
lofty  majesty  of  the  poetry,  has  but  "  few  peers  in  ancient  or 
in  modern  song." 

COLUMBUS. 

Certo  dal  cor,  ch'  alto  Destin  non  scelse, 
Son  1'  imprese  magnanime  neglette; 
Ma  le  bell'  alme  alle  bell'  opre  elette 
Sanno  gioir  nelle  fatidhe  eccelse  : 
Ne  bia9mo  popolar,  frale  catena, 
Spirto  d'  onore  il  suo  cammin  raffrena. 
Cosi  lunga  stagion  per  modi  indegni 
Europa  disprezzo  1'  inclita  speme  : 
Schernendo  il  vulgo  (e  seco  i  Regi  insieme) 
Nudo  nocchier  promettitor  di  regni; 
Ma  per  le  sconosciute  onde  marine 
L'  invitta  prora  ei  pur  sospinse  al  fine. 
Qua!  nom,  che  torni  al  gentil  consorte, 
Tal  ei  da  sua  magion  spiego  1'  antenne  ; 
L>'  ocean  corse,  e  i  turbini  soslenne, 
Vinse  le  crude  imagini  di  morte; 
Poscia,  dell'  ampio  mar  spenta  la  guerra, 
Scorse  la  dianzi  favolosa  Terra. 
Allor  dal  cavo  Pin  scende  veloce 
E  di  grand'  Orma  il  nuovo  mondo  imprime ; 
Ne  men  ratto  per  l'Aria  erge  sublime, 
Segno  del  Ciel,  insuperabil  Croce  ; 
E  porse  umile  esempio.  onde  adorarla 

Debba  sua  Gente. CHIABRERA,  vol.  i. 

Uu2 


tionary  condition  of  magnetism  ?  As  many  theories, 
as  many  hypotheses,  have  been  advanced  in  the  lat- 
ter science  as  in  the  former.  But  the  theories  and 
fictions  of  the  electricians  contained  an  idea,  and  all 
the  same  idea,  which  lias  necessarily  led  to  Method; 
implicit  indeed,  and  only  regulative  hitherto,  which 
requires  little  more  than  the  dismission  of  the  ima- 
gery to  become  constituent  like  the  ideas  of  the  geo- 
metrician. On  the  contrary,  the  assumptions  of  the 
magnetisls  (as  for  instance,  the  hypothesis  that  the 
planet  itself  is  one  vast  magnet,  or  that  an  immense 
magnet  is  concealed  within  it ;  or  lhatof  a  concentric 
globe  within  the  earth,  revolving  on  its  own  indepen- 
;  dent  axis)  are  but  repetitions  of  the  same  fact  or  phe- 
i  nomenon  looked  at  through  a  magnifying  glass  ;  the 
reiteration  of  the  problem,  not  its  solution.  The  na- 
!  turalist,  who  cannot  or  will  not  see,  that  one  fact  is 
I  worth  a  thousand,  as  including  them  all  in  itself,  and 
that  it  first  77iakes  all  the  others  facts ;  who  has  not  the 
head  to  comprehend,  the  soul  to  reverence,  a  central 
experiment  or  observation  (what  the  Greeks  would 
perhaps  have  called  a  prolophenomenon  ;)  will  never 
receive  an  auspicious  answer  from  the  oracle  of  na 
ture. 


ESSAY   VIII. 


The  sun  doth  give 
Brightness  to  the  eye:  and  some  may  say  that  the  sun 
If  not  enlightened  by  the  intelligence 
That  doth  inhabit  it,  would  shine  no  more 
Than  a  dull  clod  of  earth. 

CARTWRIGHT. 


It  is  strange,  yet  characteristic  of  the  spirit  that 
was  at  work  during  the  latter  half  of  the  last  centu- 
ry, and  of  which  the  French  revolution  was,  we  hope, 
the  closing  monsoon,  that  the  writings  of  Plato 
should  be  accused  of  estranging  the  mind  from  sober 
experience  and  substantial  matter-of-fact,  and  of  de- 
bauching it  by  fictions  and  generalities.  Plato, 
whose  method  is  inductive  throughout,  who  argues 
on  all  subjects  not  only  from,  but  in  and  by,  induc- 
tions of  facts!  Who  warns  us  indeed  against  that 
usurpation  of  the  senses,  which  quenching  the  "lu- 
men siccum"  of  the  mind,  sends  it  astray  after  indi- 
vidual cases  for  their  own  sakes;  against  that  "  ten- 
uem  et  manipularem  experientiam  V  which  remains 
ignorant  even  of  the  transitory  relations,  to  which  the 
"  pauca  particularia  "  of  its  idolatry  not  seldom  owe 
their  fluxional  existence  ;  but  who  so  far  oftener,  and 
with  such  unmitigated  hostility,  pursues  the  assump- 
tions, abstractions,  generalities,  and  verbal  legerde- 
main of  the  sophists!  Strange,  but  still  more  strange 
that  a  notion  so  groundless  should  be  entitled  to  plead 
in  its  behalf  the  authority  of  Lord  Bacon,  fron, 
whom  the  Latin  words  in  the  preceding  sentence  are 
taken,  and  whose  scheme  of  logic,  as  applied  to  the 
contemplation  of  nature,  is  Platonic  throughout,  and 
differing  only  in  the  mode  :  which  in  Lord  Bacon  is 
dogmatic,  i.  e.  assertory,  in  Plato  tentative,  and  (to 
525 


516 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


adopt  the  Socratic  phrase)  obstetric.  We  are  not  the 
first,  or  even  among  the  first,  who  have  considered 
Bacon's  studied  depreciation  of  the  ancients,  with  his 
silence,  or  worse  than  silence,  concerning  the  merits 
of  his  contemporaries,  as  the  least  amiable,  the  least 
exhilarating  side  in  the  character  of  our  illustrious 
countryman.  His  detractions  from  the  Divine  Plato 
it  is  more  easy  to  explain  than  to  justify  or  even  than 
to  palliate :  and  that  he  has  merely  retaliated  Aris- 
totle's own  unfair  treatment  of  his  predecessors  and 
contemporaries,  may  lessen  the  pain,  but  should  not 
blind  us  by  the  injustice  of  the  aspersions  on  the 
name  and  works  of  this  philosopher.  The  most  emi- 
nent of  our  recent  zoologists  and  mineralogists  have 
acknowledged  with  respect,  and  even  with  expres- 
sions of  wonder,  the  performances  of  Aristotle,  as 
the  first  clearer  and  breaker-up  of  the  grounds  in  na- 
tural history.  It  is  indeed  scarcely  possible  to  peruse 
the  treatise  on  colors,  falsely  ascribed  to  Theophras- 
tus,  the  scholar  and  successor  of  Aristotle,  after  a  due 
consideration  of  the  state  and  means  of  science  at 
that  time,  without  resenting  the  assertion,  that  he  had 
utterly  enslaved  his  investigations  in  natural  history 
to  his  own  system  of  logic  (logica?  suae  prorsus  manci- 
pavit.)  Nor  let  it  be  forgotten  that  the  sunny  side  of 
Lord  Bacon's  character  is  to  be  found  neither  in  his 
inductions,  nor  in  the  application  of  his  own  method 
to  particular  phenomena,  or  particular  classes  of  phy- 
sical facts,  which  are  at  least  as  crude  for  the  age  of 
Gilbert,  Galileo,  and  Kepler,  as  Aristotle's  for  that  of 
Pbilip  and  Alexander.  Nor  is  it  to  be  found  in  his 
recommendation  (which  is  wholly  independent  of  sci- 
entific method)  of  tabular  collections  of  particulars. 
Let  any  unprejudiced  naturalist  turn  to  Lord  Bacon's 
questions  and  proposals  for  the  investigation  of  single 
problems ;  to  his  Discourse  on  the  Winds ;  or  to  the 
almost  comical  caricature  of  this  scheme  in  the  "Me- 
thod of  improving  Natural  Philosophy;"  (page  22  to 
48,)  by  Robert  Hooke  (the  history  of  whose  multifold 
inventions,  and  indeed  of  his  whole  philosophical 
life,  is  the  best  answer  to  the  scheme,  if  a  scheme  so 
palpably  impracticable  needs  any  answer,)  and  put  it 
to  his  conscience,  whether  any  desirable  end  could 
be  hoped  for  from  such  a  process;  or  inquire  of  his 
own  experience,  or  historical  recollections,  whether 
any  important  discovery  was  ever  made  in  this  way.* 


*  We  refer  the  reader  to  the  Posthumous  works  of  Robert 
Hooke,  M.  D.  F.  R.  S.  &c.  Folio,  published  under  the  au- 
spices of  the  Royal  Society,  by  Richard  Waller :  and  espe- 
cially to  the  pages  from  p.  22  to  42  inclusive,  as  containing 
the  preliminary  knowledges  requisite  or  desirable  for  the  na- 
turalist, before  he  can  form  "  even  a  foundation  upon  which 
any  thing  like  a  sound  and  Btable  Theory  can  be  constituted." 
As  a  small  specimen  of  this  appalling  catalogue  of  prelimina- 
ries with  which  he  is  to  make  himself  conversant,  take  the 
following: — "The  history  of  potters,  tobacco-pipe-makers, 
glaziers,  glass-grinders,  looking-glass-makers  or  foilers,  spec- 
tacle-makers, and  optic-glass-makers,  makers  of  counterfeit 
pearl  and  precious  stones,  bugle-makers,  lamp-blowers,  color- 
makers,  color-grinders,  glass-painters,  enamellers,  varnishers, 
color-sellers,  painters,  limners,  picture-drawers,  makers  of 
baby-heads,  of  little  bowling-stones  or  marbles,  fustian-ma- 
kers, (query  whether  poets  arc  included  in  this  trade  ?)  mu- 
sic-masters, tinsey-makers,  and  taggers. — The  history  of 
schoolmasters,  writing-masters,  printers,  book-binders,  stage- 
players,  dancing-masters,  and  vaulters,  apothecaries,  chirur- 


For  though  Bacon  never  so  far  deviates  from  his  own 
principles,  as  not  to  admonish  the  reader  that  the  par- 
ticulars are  to  be  thus  collected,  only  that  by  careful 
selection  they  may  be  concentrated  into  universals; 
yet  so  immense  is  their  number,  and  so  various  and 
almost  endless  the  relations  in  which  each  is  to  be 
separately  considered,  that  the  life  of  an  ante-dilu- 
vian  patriarch  would  be  expended,  and  his  strength 
and  spirits  have  been  wasted,  in  merely  polling  the 
votes,  and  long  before  he  could  commence  the  pro- 
cess of  simplification,  or  have  arrived  in  sight  of  the 
law  which  was  to  reward  the  toils  of  the  over-tasked 

PsYCHE.t 

We  yield  to  none  in  our  grateful  veneration  of 
Lord  Bacon's  philosophical  writings.  We  are  proud 
of  his  very  name,  as  men  of  science :  and  as  Eng- 
lishmen, we  are  almost  vain  of  it.  But  we  may  not 
permit  the  honest  workings  of  national  attachment  to 
degenerate  into  the  jealous  and  indiscriminate  par- 
tiality of  clanship.  Unawed  by  such  as  praise  and 
abuse  by  wholesale,  we  dare  avow  that  there  are 
points  in  the  character  of  our  Verulam,  from  which 
we  turn  to  the  life  and  labors  of  John  Kepler.t  as 
from  gloom  to  sunshine.  The  beginning  and  the 
close  of  his  life  were  clouded  by  poverty  and  domes- 
tic troubles,  while  the  intermediate  years  were  com- 
prised within  the  most  tumultuous  period  of  the  his- 
tory of  his  country,  when  the  furies  of  religious  and 
political  discord  had  left  neither  eye,  ear,  nor  heart 
for  the  Muses.  But  Kepler  seemed  born  to  prove 
that  true  genius  can  overpower  all  obstacles.  If  he 
gives  an  account  of  his  modes  of  proceeding,  and  of 
the  views  under  which  they  first  occurred  to  his 
mind,  how  unostentatiously  and  in  transitu,  as  it  were, 
does  he  introduce  himself  to  our  notice :  and  yet  ne- 
ver fails  to  present  the  living  germ  out  of  which  the 
genuine  method,  as  the  inner  form  of  the  tree  of  sci- 
ence, springs  up!  With  what  affectionate  reverence 
does  he  express  himself  of  his  master  and  immediate 
predecessor,  Tycho  Brahe!  with  what  zeal  does  he 
vindicate  his  services  against  posthumous  detraction! 


gcons,  seamsters,  butchers,  barbers,  lann-dressers,  and  cos- 
metics !  &c.  Sec.  &c.  &c.  (the  true  nature  of  which  being  ac- 
tually determined)  will  hugely  facilitate  our  inquiries  in 
philosophy ! .'.'" 

As  a  summary  of  Dr.  R.  Hooke's  multifarious  recipe  for 
the  growth  of  Science  may  be  fairly  placed  that  of  the  cele- 
brated Dr.  JVatts  for  the  improvement  of  the  mind,  which 
was  thought  by  Dr.  Knox,  to  be  worthy  of  insertion  in  the 
Elegant  Extracts,  Vol.  ii.  p.  456,  under  the  head  of 

DIRECTIONS   CONCERNING   OUR  IDEAS. 

"  Furnish  yourselves  with  a  rich  variety  of  Ideas.  Ac- 
quaint yourselves  with  things  ancient  and  modern  ;  things 
natural,  civil,  anil  religious;  things  of  your  native  land,  and 
of  foreign  countries  ;  things  domestic  and  national ;  things 
present,  past,  and  future ;  and  above  all,  be  well  acquainted 
with  God  and  yourselves;  with  animal  nature,  and  the  work- 
ings of  your  own  spirits.  Such  a  general  acquaintance  with 
things  will  be  of  very  great  advantage.7' 

t  See  the  beautiful  allegoric  tale  of  Cupid  and  Psyche,  in 
the  original  of  Apuleius.  The  tasks  imposed  on  her  by  the 
jealousy  of  her  mother-in-law,  and  the  agency  by  which  they 
are  at  length  Belf-performed ,  are  noble  instances  of  that  hid- 
den wisdom,  "  where  more  is  meant  than  meets  the  ear." 

X  Born  1571,  ten  years  after  Lord  Bacon:  diod  1630,  four 
years  after  the  death  of  Bacon. 

526 


THE  FRIEND. 


517 


How  often  and  how  gladly  does  he  speak  of  Coper- 
nicus !  and  with  what  fervent  tones  of  faith  and  con- 
solation does  he  proclaim  the  historic  fact  that  the 
great  men  of  all  ages  have  prepared  the  way  for  each 
other,  as  pioneers  and  heralds!  Equally  just  to  the 
ancients  and  to  his  contemporaries,  how  circumstan- 
tiallv.  and  with  what  exactness  of  detail,  does  Kepler 
demonstrate  that  Euclid  copemicises — <Lj  rpo  tov  Ko- 
■zcpiUov  smwtpruuQst  B*cX«(&f$!  and  how  elegant  the 
compliments  which  he  addresses  to  Porta!  with 
what  cordiality  he  thanks  him  for  the  invention  of 
the  camera  obscura,  as  enlarging  his  views  into  the 
laws  of  vision !  But  while  we  cannot  avoid  contrast- 
ing this  generous  enthusiasm  with  Lord  Bacon's  cold 
invidious  treatment  of  Gilbert,  and  his  assertion  that 
the  works  of  Plato  and  Aristotle  had  been  carried 
down  the  stream  of  time,  like  straws,  by  their  levity 
alone,  when  things  of  weight  and  worth  sunk  to  the 
bottom:  still  in  the  Founder  of  a  revolution,  scarcely 
less  important  for  the  scientific,  and  even  for  the  com- 
mercial world,  than  that  of  Luther  for  the  world  of 
religion  and  politics,  we  must  allow  much  to  the  heat 
of  protestation,  much  to  the  vehemence  of  hope,  and 
much  to  the  vividness  of  novelty-  Still  more  must 
we  attribute  to  the  then  existing  and  actual  state  of  the 
Platonic  and  Peripatetic  philosophy,  or  rather  to  the 
dreams  or  verbiage  which  then  passed  current  as  such. 
Had  he  but  attached  to  their  proper  authors  the 
schemes  and  doctrines  which  he  condemns,  our  illus- 
trious countryman  would,  in  this  point  at  least,  have 
needed  no  apology.  And  surely  no  lover  of  truth, 
conversant  with  the  particulars  of  Lord  Bacon's  life, 
with  the  very  early,  almost  boyish  age,  at  which  he 
quitted  the  university,  and  the  manifold  occupations 
and  anxieties  in  which  his  public  and  professional  du- 
ties engaged,  and  his  courtly, — alas !  his  servile,  pros- 
titute, and  mendicant — ambition,  entangled  him  in 
his  after  years,  will  be  either  surprised  or  offended, 
though  we  should  avow  our  conviction,  that  he  had 
derived  his  opinions  of  Plato  and  Aristotle  from  any 
source,  rather  than  from  a  dispassionate  and  patient 
study  of  the  originals  themselves.  At  all  events  it 
will  be  no  easy  task  to  reconcile  many  passages  in 
the  De  Augmenti.-.  and  the  Redargutio  Philosophia- 
rum,  with  the  author's  own  fundamental  principles, 
as  established  in  his  Novum  Organum.  if  we  attach 
to  the  words  the  meaning  which  they  may  bear,  or 
even,  in  some  instances,  the  meaning  which  might 
appear  to  us,  in  the  present  age,  more  obvious ;  in- 
stead of  the  sense  in  which  thev  were  emploved  bv 
the  professors,  whose  false  premises  and  barren  me- 
thods Bacon  was  at  that  time  controverting.  And 
this  historical  interpretation  is  rendered  the  more  ne- 
cessary by  his  fondness  for  point  and  antithesis  in  his 
style,  where  we  must  often  disturb  the  sound  in  order 
to  arrive  at  the  sense.  But  with  these  precautions ; 
and  if,  in  collating  the  philosophical  works  of  Lord 
Bacon  with  those  of  Plato,  we,  in  both  cases  alike, 
separate  the  grounds  and  essential  principles  of  their 
philosophic  systems  from  the  inductions  themselves; 
no  inconsiderable  portion  of  which,  in  the  British  sa?e, 
as  well  as  in  the  divine  Athenian,  is  neither  more  nor 
less  crude  and  erroneous  than  might  be  anticipated 


!  from  the  infant  state  of  natural  history,  chemistry,  and 
physiology,  in  their  several  ages  ;  and  if  we  moreover 
separate  their  principles  from  their  practical  applica- 
tion, which  in  both  is  not  seldom  impracticable,  and, 
in  our  countryman,  not  always  reconcileable  with  the 
principles  themselves:  we  shall  not  only  extract  that 
from  each,  which  is  for  all  ages,  and  which  consti- 
tutes their  true  systems  of  philosophy,  but  shall  con- 
vince ourselves  that  they  are  radically  one  and  the 
same  system :  in  that  namely,  which  is  of  universal 
and  imperishable  worth ! — the  science  of  Method,  and 
the    rounds  and  conditions  of  the  science  of  Method. 


ESSAY   IX. 


A  great  authority  may  be  a  poor  proof,  but  it  is  an  excellent 
presumption :  and  few  things  give  a  wise  man  a  truer  de- 
light than  to  reconcile  two  great  authorities,  that  had  been 
commonly  but  falsely  held  to  be  dissonant. 

BTAPYLTON. 


Under  a  deep  impression  of  the  importance  of  the 
truths  we  have  essayed  to  develope,  we  would  fain 
remove  every  prejudice  that  does  not  originate  in  the 
heart  rather  than  in  the  understanding.  For  Truth, 
savs  the  wise  man,  will  not  enter  a  malevolent  spirit. 

To  offer  or  to  receive  names  in  lieu  of  sound  argu- 
ments, is  only  less  reprehensible  than  an  ostentatious 
contempt  of  the  great  men  of  the  former  ages ;  but 
we  raav  well  and  wisely  avail  ourselves  of  authori- 
ties, in  confirmation  of  truth,  and  above  all.  in  the  re- 
moval of  prejudices  founded  on  imperfect  informa- 
tion. We  do  not  see,  therefore,  how  we  can  more 
appropriately  conclude  this  first  explanatory  and  con- 
troversial section  of  our  inquiry,  than  by  a  brief  state- 
ment of  our  renowned  countryman's  own  principles 
of  Method,  conveyed  for  the  greater  part  in  his  own 
words.  Nor  do  we  see,  in  what  more  precise  form 
we  can  recapitulate  the  substance  of  the  doctrines  as- 
serted and  vindicated  in  the  preceding  pages.  For 
we  rest  our  strongest  pretensions  to  a  calm  and  re- 
spectful perusal,  in  the  first  instance,  on  the  fact,  that 
we  have  only  re-proclaimed  the  coinciding  prescripts 
of  the  Athenian  Yerulam,  and  the  British  Plato — 
genuinam  scilicet  Platoxis  Dialecticem  ;  et  Methc- 
dologiam  Principialem. 

FRANCISCI  DE  VERULAMIO. 
In  the  first  instance,  Lord  Bacon  equally  with  our- 
selves, demands  what  we  have  ventured  to  call  the 
intellectual  or  mental  initiative,  as  the  motive  and 
guide  of  every  philosophical  experiment;  some  well- 
grounded  purpose,  some  distinct  impression  of  the 
probable  results,  some  self-consistent  anticipation  as 
the  ground  of  the  "prudent  quastio"  (the  fore-thought- 
ful query,)  which  he  affirms  to  be  the  prior  half  of 
the  knowledge  sought,  dimidium  $cienti<p.  With  him, 
therefore,  as  with  us,  an  idea  is  an  experiment  pro- 
posed, an  experiment  is  an  idea  realized.  For  so, 
though  in  other  words,  he  himself  informs  us :  "  ne- 
que  scientiam  molimur  tam  sensu  vel  instrumentis 
quam  experimentis ;  etenim  experimentorum  longe 
major  est  subttlitas  quam  eensus  ipsius,  licit  ir.stru- 
527 


518 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


mentis  exquisitis  adjnti.  Nam  de  Us  loquimur  experi- 
ments qua  ad  intenlionem  ejus  quod  quceritur  perile 
el  secundum  artem  excogitata  et  apposita  sunt.  Itaque 
perception^  sensus  immediate  et  propria?  non  multum 
tribuimus .-  sed  eo  rem  dedueimus,  ut  sensus  tantum 
de  experimento,  experimentum  de  re  judicet."  This 
last  sentence  is,  as  the  attentive  reader  will  have 
himself  detected,  one  of  those  faulty  verbal  antitheses, 
not  unfrequent  in  Lord  Bacon's  writings.  Pungent 
antitheses,  and  the  analogies  of  wit  in  which  the  re- 
semblance is  too  often  more  indebted  to  the  double 
or  equivocal  sense  of  a  word,  than  to  any  real  con- 
formity* in  the  thing  or  image,  form  the  dulcia  vitia 
of  his  style,  the  Dalilahs  of  our  philosophical  Samp- 
son. But  in  this  instance,  as  indeed  throughout  all 
his  works,  the  meaning  is  clear  and  evident — namely, 
that  the  sense  can  apprehend,  through  the  organs  of 
sense,  only  the  phenomena  evoked  by  the  experi- 
ment: visvero  mentis  ea,  qua;  experimentum  excogi- 
taverat,  de  Re  judicet:  i.  e.  that  power  which,  out 
of  its  own  conception  had  shaped  the  experiment, 
must  alone  determine  the  true  import  of  the  pheno- 
mena. If  again  we  ask,  what  it  is  which  gives  birth 
to  the  question,  and  then  ad  intentionem  quaestionis 
sue  experimentum  excogilat,  unde  de  Re  judicet,  the 
answer  is:  Lux  Intellectus,  lumen  siccum,  the  pure 
and  impersonal  reason,  freed  from  all  the  various 
idols  enumerated  by  our  great  legislator  of  science 
(idola  tribiis,  specks,  fori,  tlieatri) ;  that  is,  freed  from 
the  limits,  the  passions,  the  prejudices,  the  peculiar 
habits  of  the  human  understanding,  natural  or  ac- 
quired ;  but  above  all,  pure  from  the  arrogance, 
which  leads  man  to  take  the  forms  and  mechanism 
of  his  own  mere  reflective  faculty,  as  the  measure  of 
nature  and  of  Deity.  In  this  indeed  we  find  the 
great  object  both  of  Plato's  and  of  Lord  Bacon's  la- 
bors. They  both  saw  that  there  could  be  no  hope 
of  any  fruitful  and  secure  method,  while  forms  merely 
subjective,  were  presumed  as  the  true  and  proper 
moulds  of  objective  truth.  This  is  the  sense  in  which 
Lord  Bacon  uses  the  phrases, — intellectus  humanus, 
mens  hominis,  so  profoundly  and  justly  characterized 
in  the  preliminary  (Distribulio  Operis)  of  his  De  Aug- 
ment. Scient.  And  with  all  right  and  propriety  did 
he  so  apply  them  :  for  this  was,  in  fact,  the  sense  in 
which  the  phrases  were  applied  by  the  teachers, 
whom  he  is  controverting ;  by  the  doctors  of  the 
schools,  and  the  visionaries  of  the  laboratory.  To 
adopt  the  bold  but  happy  phrase  of  a  late  ingenious 
French  writer,  it  is  the  homme  parliculier,  as  con- 
trasted with  l'homme  generale ;  against  which,  He- 
raclitus  and  Plato,  among  the  ancients,  and  among 
the  moderns,  Bacon  and  Stewart  (rightly  under- 
stood,) warn  and  pre-admonish  the  sincere  inquirer. 
Most  truly,  and  in  strict  consonance  with  his  two 
great  predecessors,  does  our  immortal  Verulam  teach 
— that  the  human  understanding,  even  independent 
of  the  causes  that  always,  previously  to  its  purifica- 
tion by  philosophy,  render  it  more  or  less  turbid  or 

*  Thus  (to  take  the  first  instance  that  occurs).  Bacon  says, 
that  some  knowledges,  like  the  stars,  are  so  high  that  they 
pive  no  light.  Where  the  word  "  high,"  means  deep  or  sub- 
lime in  the  one  case,  and  "  distant"  in  the  other. 


uneven,  "  ipsa  sua  natura  radios  ex  figura  et  sectione 
propria  immutat :"  that  our  understanding  not  only 
reflects  the  objects  subjectively,  that  is,  substitutes,  for 
the  inherent  laws  and  properties  of  the  objects,  the 
relations  which  the  objects  bear  to  its  own  particular 
constitution  ;  but  that  in  all  its  conscious  presentations 
and  reflexes,  it  is  itself  only  a  phenomenon  of  the 
inner  sense,  and  requires  the  same  corrections  as  the 
appearances  transmitted  by  the  outward  senses.  But 
that  there  is  potentially,  if  not  actually,  in  every  ra- 
tional being,  a  somewhat,  call  it  what  you  will,  the 
pure  reason,  the  spirit,  lumen  siccum,  vovs,  0wf  rocpov, 
intellectual  intuition,  &c.  &c. ;  and  that  in  this  are  to 
be  found  the  indispensable  conditions  of  all  science, 
and  scientific  research,  whether  meditative,  contem- 
plative, or  experimental:  is  often  expressed,  and 
everywhere  supposed,  by  Lord  Bacon.  And  that 
this  is  not  only  the  right  but  the  possible  nature  of 
the  human  mind,  to  which  it  is  capable  of  being  re- 
stored, is  implied  in  the  various  remedies  prescribed 
by  him  for  its  diseases,  and  in  the  various  means  of 
neutralizing  or  converting  into  useful  instrumentality 
the  imperfections  which  cannot  be  removed.  There 
is  a  sublime  truth  contained  in  his  favorite  phrase — 
Idola  intellectus.  He  thus  tells  us,  that  the  mind  of 
man  is  an  edifice  not  built  with  human  hands,  which 
needs  only  be  purged  of  its  idols  and  idolatrous  ser- 
vices to  become  the  temple  of  the  true  and  living 
Light.  Nay,  he  has  shown  and  established  the  true 
criterion  between  the  ideas  and  the  idola  of  the  mind 
—  namely,  that  the  former  are  manifested  by  their 
adequacy  to  those  ideas  in  nature,  which  in  and 
through  them  are  contemplated.  "  Non  leve  quiddam 
interest  inter  humanae  mentis  idola  et  divinas  mentis 
ideas,  hoc  est,  inter  placita  quasdam  inania  et  veras 
signaturas  atque  impressiones  factas  in  creaturis, 
prout  Ratione  sana  et  sicci  luminis,  quam  docendi 
causa  interpretem  natura?  vocare  consuevimus,  inve- 
niuntur."  Novum  Organum  xxiii.  &  xxvi.  Thus 
the  difference,  or  rather  distinction  between  Plato 
and  Lord  Bacon  is  simply  this:  that  philosophy  being 
necessarily  bi-polar,  Plato  treats  principally  of  the 
truth,  as  it  manifests  itself  at  the  ideal  pole,  as  the 
science  of  intellect  (i.  e.de  mundointelligibili);  while 
Bacon  confines  himself,  for  the  most  part,  to  the  same 
truth,  as  it  is  manifested  at  the  other,  or  material  pole, 
as  the  science  of  nature  (i.  e.  de  mundo  sensibili.)  It 
is  as  necessary,  therefore,  that  Plato  should  direct  his 
inquiries  chiefly  to  those  objective  truths  that  exist  in 
and  for  the  intellect  alone,  the  images  and  represent- 
atives of  which  we  construct  for  ourselves  by  figure, 
number,  and  word  ;  as  that  Lord  Bacon  should  attach 
his  main  concern  to  the  truths  which  have  their  sig- 
natures in  nature,  and  which  (as  he  himself  plainly 
and  often  asserts)  may  indeed  be  revealed  to  us 
through  and  vith,  but  never  by  the  senses,  or  the  fa- 
culty of  sense.  Otherwise,  indeed,  instead  of  being 
more  objective  than  the  former  (which  they  are  not 
in  any  sense,  both  being  in  this  respect  the  same,) 
they  would  be  less  so,  and,  in  fact,  incapable  of  being 
insulated  from  the  "Idola  tribus  qua?  in  ipsi  natura 
fundata  sunt,  atque  in  ipsa  trtbu  seu  gente  hominum : 
cum  omnes  perceptiones  tarn  sensus  quam  mentis, 
528 


THE  FRIEXD. 


519 


sunt  ex  analogia  hominis  non  ex  analogia  univerai." 
(M.  O.  xli.)  Hence  too,  it  will  not  surprise  us,  that 
Plato  so  often  calls  ideas  living  laws,  in  which  the 
mind  has  its  whole  true  being  and  permanence;  or 
that  Bacon,  vice  versa,  names  the  laws  of  nature, 
ideas;  and  represents  what  we  have,  in  a  former 
part  of  this  disquisition,  called  fads  of.  science  and 
central  phenomena,  as  signature,  impressions,  and 
symbols  of  ideas.  A  distinguished  power  self-affirm- 
ed, and  seen  in  its  unity  with  the  Eternal  Essence, 
is,  according  to  Plato,  an  Idea:  and  the  discipline, 
by  which  the  human  mind  is  purified  from  its  idols 
(tieuXa)  and  raised  to  the  contemplation  of  Ideas,  and 
thence  to  the  secure  and  ever  progressive,  though 
never-ending,  investigation  of  truth  and  reality  by 
scientific  method,  comprehends  what  the  same  philo- 
sopher so  highly  extols  under  the  title  of  Dialectic. 
According  to  Lord  Bacon,  as  describing  the  same 
truth  seen  from  the  opposite  point,  and  applied  to 
natural  philosophy,  an  idea  would  be  defined  as — 
Intuitio  sive  inventio,  qua?  in  perceptione  sensus  non 
est  (ut  quae  puree  et  sicci  luminis  Intellectioni  est  pro- 
pria) idearum  divinne  mentis,  prout  in  creaturis  per 
signaturns  suas  sese  patefaciant.  That  (saith  the  ju- 
dicious Hooker)  which  doth  assign  to  each  thing  the 
kind,  that  which  determines  the  force  and  power, 
that  which  doth  appoint  the  form  and  measure  of 
working,  the  same  we  term  a  Law. 

We  can  now,  as  men  furnished  with  fit  and  re- 
spectable credentials,  proceed  to  the  historic  impor- 
tance and  practical  application  of  Method,  under 
the  deep  and  solemn  conviction,  that  without  this 
guiding  Light  neither  can  the  sciences  attain  to  their 
full  evolution,  as  the  organs  of  one  vital  and  harmo- 
nious body,  nor  that  most  weighty  and  concerning  of 
all  sciences,  the  science  of  Education,  be  under- 
stood in  its  first  elements,  much  less  display  its 
powers,  as  the  nisus  formativus  *  of  social  man,  as 


*So  our  medical  writers  commonly  translate  Professor  Blu- 
menbach's  Bildungstrieb,  the  vis  plastica,  or  vis  vita?  forma- 
Irix  of  the  eldest  physiologists,  and  the  life  or  living  principle 
of  John  Hunter,  the  prolbundest,  we  had  almost  said  the 
only,  physiological  philosopher  of  the  latter  half  of  the  pre- 
ceding century.  For  in  what  other  sense  can  we  understand 
either  his  assertion,  that  this  principle  or  agent  is  "  indepen- 
dent of  organization,"  which  yet  it  animates,  sustains,  and 
repairs,  or  the  purport  of  that  magnificent  commentary  on 
his  9ystem,  the  Hunterian  Musreum,  in  Lincoln's  Inn  Fields. 
The  Hunterian  idea  of  a  life  or  vital  principle,  "  independent 
of  the  organization,"  yet  in  each  organ  working  instinctively 
towards  its  preservation,  as  the  ants  or  termites  in  repairing 
the  nests  of  their  own  fabrication,  demonstrates  that  John 
Hunter  did  not,  as  Stahl  and  others  had  done,  individualize, 
or  make  an  hypostasis  of  the  principle  of  life,  as  a  somewhat 
manifestable  per  se,  and  consequently  itself  a  Phenomenon  ; 
the  latency  of  which  was  to  be  attributed  to  accidental,  or  at 
least  contingent  causes,  ex.  ar.  ;  the  limits  or  imperfection 
of  our  senses,  or  the  inaptness  of  the  media  :  but  that  herein 
he  philosophized  in  the  spirit  of  the  purest  Newtonians,  who 
in  like  manner  refused  to  hypostatize  the  law  of  gravitation 
into  an  ether,  which  even  if  its  existence  wpre  conceded, 
would  need  another  gravitation  for  itself.  The  Hunterian 
position  is  a  genuine  philosophic  idea,  the  negative  test  of 
which  as  of  all  Ideas,  is,  that  it  is  equi-distant  from  an  ens 
logicum  ( — an  abstraction,)  an  ens  repraesentativum  ( — a  ge- 
neralization,) and  an  ens  phantosticum  ( — an  imaginary  thing 
or  phenomenon.) 

Is  not  the  progressive  enlargement,  the  boldness  without 


the  appointed  protoplast  of  true  humanity.  Never 
can  society  comprehend  fully,  and  in  its  whole  prac- 
tical extent,  the  permanent  distinction,  and  the  occa- 
sional contrast,  between  cultivation  and  civilization; 
never  can  it  attain  to  a  due  insight  into  the  momen- 
tous fact,  fearfully  as  it  has  been,  and  even  now  is 
exemplified  in  a  neighboring  country,  that  a  nation 
can  never  be  a  too  cultivated,  but  may  easily  become 
an  over-civilized,  race:  while  we  oppose  ourselves 
voluntarily  to  that  grand  prerogative  of  our  nature, 

A  HUNGERING    AND   THIRSTING    AFTER   TRUTH,  SB  the 

appropriate  end  of  our  intelligentinl,  and  its  point  of 
union  with  our  moral,  nature;  but  therefore  after 
truth,  that  must  be  found  within  us  before  it  can  be 
intelligibly  reflected  back  on  the  mind  from  without, 
and  a  religious  regard  to  which  is  indispensable, 
both  as  a  guide  and  object  to  the  just  formation  of 
the  human  being,  poor  and  rich:  while,  in  a  word, 
we  are  blind  to  the  master-light,  which  we  have 
already  presented  in  various  points  of  view,  and  re- 
commended by  whatever  is  of  highest  authority  with 
the  venerators  of  the  ancient,  and  the  adherents  of 
modern  philosophy. 


ESSAY  X. 


Xlo\vjia^trj    voov  ov   iihaaKtf   uvai   yap   iv   tv   \o<pov, 
nrt^ac&ai  yvwpnv  tjtc  cyKv6cpvt]act  navra  Sia  iravrwv. 

(Translation.) — The  effective  education  of  the  reason  is 
not  to  be  supplied  by  multifarious  acquirements;  for  there  is 
but  one  knowledge  that  merits  to  be  called  wisdom,  a  know- 
ledge that  is  one  with  a  law  which  shall  govern  all  in  and 
through  all. HERAC  apud  Diogenem  Laert.  is.  $  1. 


HISTORICAL  AND  ILLUSTRATIVE. 

There  is  still  preserved  in  the  Royal  Observatory 
at  Richmond  the  model  of  a  bridge,  constructed  by 
the  late  justly  celebrated  Mr.  Atwood  (at  that  lime, 
however,  in  the  decline  of  life,)  in  the  confidence, 
that  he  had  explained  the  wonderful  properties  of  the 

temerity,  of  Chirurzical  views  and  Chirurgical  practice  since 
Hunter's  time  to  the  present  day,  attributable,  in  almost  every 
instance,  to  his  substitution  of  what  may  perhaps  be  called 
experimental  Dynamic,  for  the  mechanical  notions  or  the  Ie9s 
injurious  traditional  empiricism,  of  his  predecessors?  And 
this,  too,  though  the  light  is  still  struggling  through  a  cloud, 
and  though  it  is  shed  on  many  who  see  ( ither  dimly  or  not  at 
all  the  Idea  from  which  it  is  eradicated  7  Willingly  would  we 
designate,  what  we  have  elsewhere  called  the  mental  initiative, 
by  some  term  less  obnoxious  to  the  anti-Platonic  reader,  than 
this  of  Idea —  obnoxious,  we  mean,  as  soon  as  any  precise 
and  peculiar  sense  is  attached  to  the  sound.  Willingly  would 
we  exchange  the  Term,  might  it  be  done  without  sacrifice  of 
the  Import  :  and  did  we  not  see,  too.  clearly,  that  it  is  the 
meaning,  not  the  word,  that  is  the  object  of  that  aversion, 
which,  fleeing  from  inward  alarm,  tries  to  shelter  itself  in 
outward  contempt — that  is  at  once  folly  and  a  stumbling-block 
to  the  partisans  of  a  crass  and  sensual  materialism, the  advo- 
cates of  the  Nihil  nisi  ab  extra. 

They,  like  moles. 
Nature's  mute  monks,  live  mandrakes  of  the  ground, 
Shrink  from  the  light,  then  listen  for  a  sound  ; 
See  but  to  dread,  anil  dread  they  know  not  why. 

The  natural  alien  of  their  negative  eye  ! S.  T.  C. 

529 


520 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


arch  as  resulting  from  compound  action  of  simple 
wedges,  or  of  the  rectilinear  solids  of  which  the  ma- 
terial arch  was  composed :  and  of  which  supposed 
discovery,  his  model  was  to  exhibit  ocular  proof.  Ac- 
cordingly, he  took,  a  sufficient  number  of  wedges  of 
brass  highly  polished.  Arranging  these  at  first  on  a 
skeleton  arch  of  wood,  he  then  removed  this  scaffold- 
ing or  support ;  and  the  bridge  not  only  stood  firm, 
without  any  cement  between  the  squares,  but  he 
could  take  away  any  given  portion  of  them,  as  a  third 
and  a  half,  and  appending  a  correspondent  weight,  at 
either  side,  the  remaining  part  stood  as  before.  Our 
venerable  sovereign,  who  is  known  to  have  had  a 
particular  interest  and  pleasure  in  all  works  and  dis- 
coveries of  mechanic  science  or  ingenuity,  looked  at 
it  for  awhile  steadfastly,  and,  as  his  manner  was,  with 
quick  and  broken  expressions  of  praise  and  courteous 
approbation,  in  the  form  of  answers  to  his  own  ques- 
tions. At  length  turning  to  the  constructor,  he  said, 
"  But,  Mr.  Atvvood,  you  have  presumed  the  figure. 
You  have  put  the  arch  first  in  this  wooden  skeleton. 
Can  you  build  a  bridge  of  the  same  wedges  in  any 
other  figure  ?  A  straight  bridge,  or  with  two  lines 
touching  at  the  apex?  If  not,  is  it  not  evident,  that 
the  bits  of  brass  derive  their  continuance  in  the  pre- 
sent position  from  the  property  of  the  arch,  and  not 
the  arch  from  the  property  of  the  wedge  ?"  The  ob- 
jection was  fatal;  the  justice  of  the  remark  not  to  be 
resisted  ;  and  we  have  ever  deemed  it  a  forcible  il- 
lustration of  the  Aristotelian  axiom,  with  respect  to 
all  just  reasoning,  that  the  whole  is  of  necessity  prior 
to  its  parts ;  nor  can  we  conceive  a  more  apt  illustra- 
tion of  the  scientific  principles  we  have  already  laid 
down. 

All  method  supposes  a  union  of  several  things  to  a 
common  end,  either  by  disposition,  as  in  the  works  of 
man,  or  by  convergence,  as  in  the  operation  and  pro- 
ducts of  nature.  That  we  acknowledge  a  method, 
even  in  the  latter,  results  from  the  religious  instinct 
which  bids  us  "  find  tongues  in  trees ;  books  in  the 
running  streams ;  sermons  in  stones :  and  good  {that 
is,  some  useful  end  answering  to  some  good  purpose) 
in  every  thing."  In  a  self-conscious  and  thence  re- 
flecting being,  no  instinct  can  exist,  without  engen- 
dering the  belief  of  an  object  corresponding  to  it, 
either  present  or  future,  real  or  capable  of  being  re- 
alized :  much  less  the  instinct,  in  which  humanity  it- 
self is  grounded  :  that  by  which,  in  every  act  of  con- 
scious perception,  we  at  once  identify  our  being  with 
that  of  the  world  without  us,  and  yet  place  ourselves 
in  contra-distinction  to  that  world.  Least  of  all  can 
this  mysterious  pre-disposition  exist  without  evolving 
a  belief  that  the  productive  power,  which  is  in  na- 
ture as  nature,  is  essentially  one,  (i.  e.  of  one  kind) 
vvith  the  intelligence,  which  is  in  the  human  mind 
above  nature:  however  disfigured  this  belief  may 
become,  by  accidental  forms  or  accompaniments,  and 
though  like  heat  in  the  thawing  of  ice,  it  may  appear 
only  in  its  effects.  So  universally  has  this  conviction 
leavened  the  very  substance  of  all  discourse,  that 
there  is  no  language  on  earth  in  which  a  man  can 
abjure  it  as  a  prejudice,  without  employing  term*  and 
conjunctions  that  suppose  its  reality,  with  a  feeling 


very  different  from  that  which  accompanies  a  figura- 
tive or  metaphorical  use  of  words.  In  all  aggregates 
of  construction,  therefore,  which  we  contemplate  as 
wholes,  whether  as  integral  parts  or  as  a  system,  we 
assume  an  intention,  as  the  initiative,  of  which  the 
end  is  the  correlative. 

Hence  proceeds  the  introduction  of  final  causes  in 
the  works  of  nature  equally  as  in  those  of  man. 
Hence  their  assumption,  as  constitutive  and  explana- 
tory by  the  mass  of  mankind  ;  and  the  employment  of 
the  presumption,  as  an  auxiliary  and  regulative  prin- 
ciple, by  the  enlightened  naturalist,  whose  office  it  is 
to  seek,  discover,  and  investigate  the  efficient  causes. 
Without  denying,  that  to  resolve  the  efficient  into  the 
final  may  be  the  ultimate  aim  of  philosophy,  he,  of 
good  right,  resists  the  substitution  of  the  latter  for  the 
former,  as  premature,  presumptuous,  and  preclusive 
of  all  science;  well  aware,  that  those  sciences  have 
been  most  progressive,  in  which  this  confusion  has 
been  either  precluded  by  the  nature  of  the  science 
itself,  as  in  pure  mathematics,  or  avoided  by  the  good 
sense  of  its  cultivator.  Yet  even  he  admits  a  teleo- 
logical  ground  in  physics  and  physiology :  that  is,  the 
presumption  of  something  analogous  to  the  causality 
of  the  human  will,  by  which,  without  assigning  to 
nature,  a  conscious  purpose,  he  may  yet  distinguish 
her  agency  from  a  blind  and  lifeless  mechanism. 
Even  he  admits  its  use,  and,  in  many  instances,  its 
necessity,  as  a  regulative  principle ;  as  a  ground  of 
anticipation,  for  the  guidance  of  his  judgment  and  for 
the  direction  of  his  observation  and  experiment: 
briefly  in  all  that  preparatory  process,  which  the 
French  language  so  happily  expresses  by  s'orienter, 
i.  e.  that  is  to  find  out  the  east  for  one's  self.  When 
the  naturalist  contemplates  the  structure  of  a  bird, 
for  instance,  the  hollow  cavity  of  the  bones,  the  posi- 
tion of  the  wings  for  motion,  and  of  the  tail  for  steer- 
ing its  course,  &c.  he  knows  indeed  that  there  must 
be  a  correspondent  mechanism,  as  the  nexus  effeclivus. 
But  he  knows,  likewise,  that  this  will  no  more  ex- 
plain the  particular  existence  of  the  bird,  than  the 
principles  of  cohesion,  &c.  could  inform  him  why  of 
two  buildings,  one  is  a  palace,  and  the  other  a  church. 
Nay,  it  must  not  be  overlooked,  that  the  assumption 
of  the  nexus  effectivus  itself  originates  in  the  mind, 
as  one  of  the  laws  under  which  alone  it  can  reduce 
the  manifold  of  the  impression  from  without  into 
unity,  and  thus  contemplate  it  as  one  thing ;  and 
could  never  (as  hath  been  clearly  proved  by  Mr. 
Hume)  have  been  derived  from  outward  experience, 
in  which  it  is  indeed  presupposed,  as  a  necessary 
condition.  Notio  nexus  causalis  non  oritur,  sed  sup- 
ponitur,  a  sensibus.  Between  the  purpose  and  the 
end  the  component  parts  are  included,  and  thence 
receive  their  position  and  character  as  means,  i.  e. 
parts  contemplated  as  parts.  It  is  in  this  sense,  we 
will  affirm,  that  the  parts,  as  means  to  an  end,  derive 
their  position,  and  therein  their  qualities  (or  charac- 
ter) nay,  we  dare  add,  their  very  existenee — as  par- 
ticular things — from  the  antecedent  method,  or  self- 
organizing  puitrosE;  upon  which  therefore  we  have 
dwelt  so  long. 

We  are  aware,  that  it  is  with  our  cognitions  as  with 

530 


THE  FRIEND. 


521 


our  children.  There  is  a  period  in  which  the  method 
of  nature  is  working  lor  them;  a  period  of  aimless 
activity  and  unregulated  accumulation, during  which 
it  is  enough  if  we  can  preserve  them  in  health  and 
ou>  of  harm's  uxtu.  Again,  there  is  a  period  of  order- 
-  »f  circumspection,  of  discipline,  in  which  we 
porify,  separate,  define,  select,  arrange,  and  settle  the 
nomenclature  of  communication.  There  is  also  a 
period  of  dawning  and  twilight,  a  period  of  anticipa- 
tion, affording  trials  of  strength.  And  all  these,  both 
in  the  growth  of  the  sciences,  and  in  the  mind  of  a 
rightly-educated  individual,  will  precede  the  attain- 
ment of  a  scientific  Method.  But,  notwithstanding 
this,  unless  the  importance  of  the  latter  be  felt  and 
acknowledged,  unless  its  attainment  be  looked  for- 
ward to  and  from  the  very  beginning  prepared  for, 
there  is  little  hope  and  small  chance  that  any  educa- 
tion will  be  conducted  aright;  or  will  ever  prove  in 
reality  worth  the  name. 

Much  labor,  much  wealth  may  have  been  expend- 
ed, yet  the  final  result  will  too  probably  warrant  the 
sarcasm  of  the  Scythian  traveller:  "  Yee  quantum 
nihili!''  and  draw  from  a  wise  man  the  earnest  re- 
commendation of  a  full  draught  from  Lethe,  as  the 
first  and  indispensable  preparative  for  the  waters  of 
the  true  Helicon.  Alas !  how  many  examples  are 
now  present  to  our  memory,  of  young  men  the  most 
anxiously  and  expensively  be-schoolmastered,  be-tu- 
tored,  be-lectured,  any  thing  but  educated ;  who  have 
received  arms  and  ammunition,  instead  of  skill, 
strength,  and  courage ;  varnished  rather  than  pol- 
ished :  perilously  over-civilized,  and  most  pitiably  un- 
cultivated !  And  all  from  inattention  to  the  method 
dictated  by  nature  herself,  to  the  simple  truth,  that  as 
the  forms  in  all  organized  existence,  so  must  all  true 
and  living  knowledge  proceed  from  within ;  that  it 
may  be  trained,  supported,  fed,  excited,  but  can  never 
be  infused  or  impressed. 

Look  back  on  the  History  of  the  Sciences.  Review 
the  Method  in  which  Providence  has  brought  the 
more  favored  portion  of  mankind  to  the  present  state 
of  Arts  and  Sciences.  Lord  Bacon  has  justly  re- 
marked. Antiquitas  temporis  juvenilis  mundi  et  Scien- 
tics — Antiquity  of  time  is  the  youth  of  the  world  and 
of  Science.  In  the  childhood  of  the  human  race,  its 
education  commenced  with  the  cultivation  of  the 
moral  sense ;  the  object  proposed  being  such  as  the 
mind  onlv  could  apprehend,  and  the  principle  of  obe- 
dience being  placed  in  the  will.  The  appeal  in  both 
was  made  to  the  inward  man.  "  Through  faith  we 
understand  that  the  worlds  were  framed  by  the  word 
of  God  :  so  that  things  which  were  seen  were  not 
made  of  things  which  do  appear."  (The  solution  of 
Phenomena  can  never  be  derived  from  Phenomena.) 
T'pon  this  ground,  the  writer  of  the  epistle  to  the  He- 
brews (chap,  xi.)  is  not  less  philosophical  than  elo- 
quent. The  aim,  the  method  throughout  was,  in  the 
first  place,  to  awaken,  to  cultivate,  and  to  mature  the 
truly  human  in  human  nature,  in  and  through  itself, 
or  as  independently  as  possible  of  the  notices  derived 
from  sense,  and  of  the  motives  that  had  reference  to 
the  sensations;  till  the  time  should  arrive  when  the 
senses  themselves  might  be  allowed  to  present  sym- 


bols and  attestations  of  truths,  learnt  previously  from 
deeper  and  inner  sources.  Thus  the  first  period  of 
the  education  of  our  race  was  evidently  assigned  to 
the  cultivation  of  humanity  itself;  or  of  that  in  man, 
which  of  all  known  embodied  creatures  he  alone 
possesses,  the  pure  reason,  as  designed  to  regulate 
the  will.  And  by  what  method  was  this  done  ? 
First,  by  the  excitement  of  the  idea  of  their  Creator 
as  a  spirit,  of  an  idea  which  they  were  strictly  forbid- 
den to  realize  to  themselves  under  any  image;  and, 
secondly,  by  the  injunction  of  obedience  to  the  will 
of  a  super-sensual  Being.  Nor  did  the  method  stop 
here.  For,  unless  we  are  equally  to  contradict  Moses 
and  the  New  Testament,  in  compliment  to  the  para- 
dox of  a  Warburton,  the  rewards  of  their  obedience 
were  placed  at  a  distance.  For  the  time  present 
they  equally  with  us  were  to  "endure,  as  seeing  him 
who  is  invisible."  Their  bodies  they  were  taught 
to  consider  as  fleshly  tents,  which  as  pilgrims  they 
were  bound  to  pitch  wherever  the  invisible  Director 
of  their  route  should  appoint,  however  barren  or 
thorny  the  spot  might  appear.  "  Few  and  evil  have 
the  days  of  the  years  of  my  life  been,"  says  the  aged 
Israel.  But  that  life  was  but  "  his  pilgrimage ;  and 
he  trusted  in  the  promises." 

Thus  were  the  very  first  lessons  in  the  Divine 
School  assigned  to  the  cultivation  of  the  reason  and 
of  the  will :  or  rather  of  both  as  united  in  Faith. 
The  common  and  ultimate  object  of  the  will  and  of 
the  reason  was  purely  spiritual,  and  to  be  present  in 
the  mind  of  the  disciple  —  fiovov  iv  Hi/f,  /i^a/ifj 
ei£wYtK&s  i.  e.  in  the  idea  alone,  and  never  as  an 
image  or  imagination.  The  means  too,  by  which  the 
idea  was  to  be  excited,  as  well  as  the  symbols  by 
which  it  was  to  be  communicated,  were  to  be,  as  iar 
as  possible,  intellectual. 

Those,  on  the  contrary,  who  wilfully  chose  a  mode 
opposite  to  this  method,  who  determined  to  shape 
their  convictions  and  deduce  their  knowledge  from 
without,  by  exclusive  observation  of  outward  and 
sensible  things  as  the  only  realities,  became,  it  ap- 
pears, rapidly  cuuZijed.'  They  built  cities,  invented 
musical  instruments,  were  artificers  in  brass  and  in 
iron,  and  refined  on  the  means  of  sensual  gratification 
and  the  conveniencies  of  courtly  intercourse.  They 
became  the  great  masters  of  the  agreeable,  which 
fraternized  readily  with  cruelty  and  rapacity  :  these 
being,  indeed,  but  alternate  moods  of  the  same  sen- 
sual selfishness.  Thus,  both  before  and  after  the 
flood,  the  vicious  of  mankind  receded  from  all  true 
cultivation,  as  they  hurried  towards  civilization. 
Finally,  as  it  was  not  in  their  power  to  make  them- 
selves wholly  beasts,  or  to  remain  without  a  sem- 
blance of  religion  ;  and  yet  continuing  faithful  to 
their  original  maxim,  and  determined  to  receive 
nothing  as  true,  but  what  they  derived,  or  believed 
themselves  to  derive,  from  their  senses,  or  (in  modern 
phrase)  what  they  could  prove  a  posteriori, — they  be- 
came idolaters  of  the  Heavens  and  the  material 
elements.  From  the  harmonv  of  operation  they  con- 
cluded a  certain  unity  of  nature  and  design,  but 
were  incapable  of  finding  in  the  facts  any  proof  of 
a  unity  of  person.  They  did  not,  in  this  respect, 
531 


522 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


pretend  to  find  what  they  must  themselves  have  first 
assumed.  Having  thrown  away  the  clusters,  which 
had  grown  in  the  vineyard  of  revelation,  they  could 
not — as  later  reasonere,  by  being  born  in  a  Christian 
country,  have  been  enabled  to  do — hang  the  grapes 
on  thorns,  and  then  pluck  them  as  the  native  growth 
of  the  bushes.  But  the  men  of  sense,  of  the  patri- 
archal times,  neglecting  reason  and  having  rejected 
faith,  adopted  what  the  facts  seemed  to  involve  and 
the  most  obvious  analogies  to  suggest.  They  ac- 
knowledged a  whole  bee-hive  of  natural  Gods;  but 
while  they  were  employed  in  building  a  temple* 
consecrated  to  the  material  Heavens,  it  pleased  divine 
wisdom  to  send  on  them  a  confusion  of  lip,  accom- 
panied with  the  usual  einbitterment  of  controversy, 
where  all  parties  are  in  the  wrong,  and  the  grounds 
of  the  quarrel  are  equally  plausible  on  all  sides. 
As  the  modes  of  error  are  endless,  the  hundred 
forms  of  Polytheism  had  each  its  group  of  partisans, 
who,  hostile  or  alienated,  henceforward  formed  seve- 
ral tribes  kept  aloof  from  each  other  by  their  ambi- 
tious leaders.  Hence  arose,  in  the  course  of  a  few 
centuries,  the  diversity  of  languages,  which  has 
sometimes  been  confounded  with  the  miraculous 
event  that  was  indeed  its  first  and  principal,  though 
remote,  cause. 

.  Following  next,  and  as  the  representative  of  the 
youth  and  approaching  manhood  of  the  human  intel- 
lect, we  have  ancient  Greece,  from  Orpheus,  Linus, 
Musaeus,  and  the  other  mythological  bards,  or  perhaps 
the  brotherhoods  impersonated  under  those  names,  to 
the  time  when  the  republics  lost  their  independence, 
and  their  learned  men  sunk  into  copyists  and  com- 
mentators of  the  works  of  their  forefathers.  That  we 
include  these  as  educated  under  a  distinct  providen- 
tial, though  not  miraculous,  dispensation,  will  sur- 
prise no  one,  who  reflects  that  in  whatever  has  a  per- 
manent operation  on  the  destinies  and  intellectual 
condition  of  mankind  at  large — that  in  all  which  has 
been  manifestly  employed  as  a  co-agent  in  the  mighti- 
est revolution  of  the  moral  world,  the  propagation  of 
the  Gospel ;  and  in  the  intellectual  progress  of  man- 
kind, the  restoration  of  Philosophy,  Science,  and  the 
ingenious  Arts — it  were  irreligion  not  to  acknowledge 
the  hand  of  divine  Providence.  The  periods,  too, 
join  on  to  each  other.  The  earliest  Greeks  took  up 
the  religious  and  lyrical  poetry  of  the  Hebrews ;  and 
the  schools  of  the  Prophets  were,  however  partially 
and  imperfectly,  represented  by  the  mysteries,  derived 


*We  are  far  from  being  Hutchinsonians,  nor  have  we 
found  much  to  respect  in  the  twelve  volumes  of  Hutchinson's 
works,  either  as  biblical  comment  or  natural  philosophy  : 
though  we  give  him  credit  for  orthodoxy  and  good  intentions. 
But  his  interpretation  of  the  first  nine  verses  of  Genesis  xi. 
seems  not  only  rational  in  itself,  and  consistent  with  after  ac- 
counts of  the  sacred  historian,  but  proved  to  be  the  literal 
sense  of  the  Hebrew  text.  His  explanation  of  the  cherubim 
is  pleasing  and  plausible  :  we  dare  not  say  more.  Those  who 
would  wish  to  learn  the  most  important  points  of  the  Hutch- 
insonian  doctrine  in  the  most  favorable  form,  and  in  the 
shortest  possible  space,  we  can  refer  to  Duncan  Forbes's 
Letter  to  a  bishop.  If  our  own  judgment  did  not  withhold 
our  assent,  we  should  never  be  ashamed  of  a  conviction 
held,  professed,  and  advocated  by  so  good,  and  wise  a  man, 
as  Duncan  Forbes. 


through  the  corrupt  channel  of  the  Phoenicians 
With  these  secret  schools  of  physiological  theology 
the  mythical  poets  were  doubtless  in  connection :  and 
it  was  these  schools,  which  prevented  Polytheism 
from  producing  all  its  natural  barbarizing  efFects. 
The  mysteries  and  the  mythical  Hymns  and  Preans 
shaped  themselves  gradually  into  epic  Poetry  and 
History  on  the  one  hand,  and  into  the  ethical  Trage- 
dy and  Philosophy  on  the  other.  Under  their  protec 
tion,  and  that  of  a  youthful  liberty  secretly  controlled 
by  a  species  of  internal  Theocracy,  the  Sciences  and 
the  sterner  kinds  of  the  Fine  Arts;  viz.  Architecture 
and  Statuary,  grew  up  together:  followed, indeed, by 
Painting,  but  a  statuesque  and  austerely  idealized 
painting,  which  did  not  degenerate  into  mere  copies 
of  the  sense,  till  the  process,  for  which  Greece  exist- 
ed, had  been  completed.  Contrast  the  rapid  progress 
and  perfection  of  all  the  products,  which  owe  their 
existence  and  character  to  the  mind's  own  acts,  intel- 
lectual or  imaginative,  with  the  rudeness  of  their  ap- 
plication to  the  investigation  of  physical  laws  and 
phenomena :  then  contemplating  the  Greeks  (Tpatot 
ati  isaifas)  as  representing  a  portion  only  of  the 
education  of  man  :  and  the  conclusion  is  inevitable. 
In  the  education  of  the  mind  of  the  race,  as  in  that 
of  the  individual,  each  different  age  and  purpose  re- 
quires different  objects  and  different  means  :  though 
all  dictated  by  the  same  principle,  tending  toward  the 
same  end,  and  forming  consecutive  parts  of  the  same 
method.  But  if  the  scale  taken  be  sufficiently  large 
to  neutralize  or  render  insignificant  the  disturbing 
forces  of  accident,  the  degree  of  success  is  the  best 
criterion  by  which  to  appreciate  both  the  wisdom  of 
the  general  principle,  and  the  fitness  of  the  particular 
objects  to  the  given  epoch  or  period.  Now  it  is  a 
fact,  for  the  greater  part  of  universal  acceptance,  and 
attested  as  to  the  remainder  by  all  that  is  of  highest 
fame  and  authority,  by  the  great,  wise  and  good  dur- 
ing a  space  of  at  least  seventeen  centuries — weighed 
against  whom  the  opinions  of  a  few  distinguished  in- 
dividuals, or  the  fashion  of  a  single  age,  must  be  held 
light  in  the  balance, — that  whatever  could  be  educ- 
ed by  the  mind  out  of  its  own  essence,  by  attention 
to  its  own  acts  and  laws  of  action,  or  as  the  products 
of  the  same;  and  whatever  likewise  could  be  reflect- 
ed from  material  masses  transformed  as  it  were  into 
mirrors,  the  excellence  of  which  is  to  reveal,  in  the 
least  possible  degree,  their  own  original  forms  and 
natures — all  these,  whether  arts  or  sciences,  the  an- 
cient Greeks  carried  to  an  almost  ideal  perfection  : 
while  in  the  application  of  their  skill  and  science  to 
the  investigation  of  the  laws  of  the  sensible  world, 
and  the  qualities  and  composition  of  material  con- 
cretes, chemical,  mechanical,  or  organic,  their  essays 
were  crude  and  improsperous,  compared  with  those 
of  the  moderns  during  the  early  morning  of  their 
strength,  and  even  at  the  first  re-ascension  of  the 
light.  But  still  more  striking  will  the  difference  ap- 
pear, if  we  contrast  the  physiological  schemes  and 
fancies  of  the  Greeks  with  their  own  discoveries  in 
the  region  of  the  pure  intellect,  and  with  their  still 
unrivalled  success  in  arts  of  imagination.  In  the 
aversion  of  their  great  men  from  any  practical  use  of 
532 


THE  FRIEND. 


523 


their  philosophic  discoveries,  as  in  the  well-known 
instance  of  Archimedes,  "  the  soul  of  the  world"  was 
al  work  ;  and  the  few  exceptions  were  but  as  a  rush 
of  billows  driven  shoreward  by  some  chance  gust  be- 
fore the  hour  of  tide,  instantly  retracted,  and  leaving 
the  sands  bare  and  soundless  long  after  the  moment- 
ary glitter  had  been  losi  in  evaporation. 

The  third  period,  that  of  the  Romans,  was  devoted 
to  the  preparations  lor  preserving,  propagating,  and 
realizing  (he  labors  of  the  preceding;  to  war,  empire, 
law  .'  To  this  we  may  refer  the  defect  of  all  origin- 
ality in  the  Latin  poets  and  philosophers,  on  the  one 
ban  Land  on  the  other,  the  predilection  of  the  Ro- 
mans lor  astrology,  magic,  divination,  in  all  its  tonus. 
It  was  the  Roman  instinct  to  appropriate  by  conquest 
and  to  give  (ixture  by  legislation.  And  it  was  the 
bewilderment  and  prematurity  of  the  same  instinct 
which  restlessly  impelled  them  to  materialize  the 
ideas  of  the  Greek  philosophers,  and  to  render  them 
practical  by  superstitious  uses. 

Thus  the  Hebrews  may  be  regarded  as  the  fixed 
mid  point  of  the  living  line,  toward  which  the 
Greeks  as  the  ideal  pole,  and  the  Romans  as  the  ma- 
terial, were  ever  approximating;  till  the  coincidence 
and  final  synthesis  took  place  in  Christianity,  of 
which  the  Bible  is  the  law,  and  Christendom  the 
phenomenon.  So  little  confirmation  from  History, 
from  the  process  of  education  planned  and  conducted 
by  unerring,  providenee,  do  those  theorists  receive, 
who  would  at  least  begin  (too  many,  alas !  both  be- 
gin and  end)  with  the  objects  of  the  senses  ;  as  if  na- 
ture herself  had  not  abundantly  performed  this  part 
of  the  task,  by  continuous,  irresistible  enforcements 
of  attention  to  her  presence,  tothe  direct  beholding, 
to  the  apprehension  and  observation,  of  the  objects 
that  stimulate  the  senses!  as  if  the  cultivation  of  the 
mental  powers,  by  methodical  exercise  of  their  own 
forces,  were  not  the  securest  means  of  forming  the 
true  correspondents  to  them  in  the  functions  of  com- 
parison, judgment,  and  interpretation. 


ESSAY  XI, 


Sapimus  animo,  fruimur  anima:  sine  animo  anima  est  de- 
tails.  L.  ACCII,  Fragmenta. 


As  there  are  two  wants  connatural  to  man,  so 
are  there  two  main  directions  of  human  activity,  per- 
vading in  modern  times  the  whole  civilized  world ; 
and  constituting  and  sustaining  that  nationality  which 
yet  it  is  their  tendency,  and  more  or  less,  their  effect 
to  transcend  and  to  moderate — Trade  and  Literature. 
These  were  they,  which,  after  the  dismemberment 
of  the  old  Roman  world,  gradually  reduced  the  con- 
querors and  the  conquered  at  once  into  several  na- 
tions and  a  common  Christendom.  The  natural  law 
of  increase  and  the  instincts  of  family  may  prod  uce 
tribes,  and  under  rare  and  peculiar  circumstances, 
settlements  and  neighborhoods:  and  conquest  may 
form  empires.  But  without  trade  and  literature,  mu- 
Vv 


tually  commingled,  there  can  be  no  nation  ;  without 
commerce  and  Bcience,  no  lwnd  of  nations.  As  the 
one  hath  for  its  object  the  wants  of  the  body,  real  or 
artificial,  the  desires  for  which  are  for  the  greater 
part,  nay,  as  far  as  respects  the  origination  of  trade 
and  commerce,  altogether  excited  from  without;  so 
the  other  has  for  its  origin,  as  well  as  for  its  object, 
the  wants  of  the  mind,  the  gratification  of  which  is  a 
natural  and  necessary  condition  of  its  growth  and 
sanity.  And  the  man  (or  the  nation,  considered  ac- 
cording  to  its  predominant  character  as  one  man) 
may  be  regarded  under  these  circumstances,  as  act- 
ing in  two  forms  of  method,  inseparably  co-cxislcnt, 
yet  producing  very  different  effects  according  as  one 
or  the  other  obtains  the  primacy.*  As  is  the  rank  as- 
signed to  each  in  the  theory  and  practice  of  the  go- 
verning classes,  and  according  to  its  prevalence  in 
forming  the  foundation  of  their  public  habits  and 
opinions,  so  will  be  the  outward  and  inward  life  of 
the  people  at  large ;  such  will  the  nation  be.  In 
tracing  the  epochs,  and  alternations  of  their  relative 
sovereignty  or  subjection,  consists  the  Philosophy 
of  History.  In  the  power  of  distinguishing  and  ap- 
preciating their  several  results  consists  the  historic 
Sense.  And  that  under  the  ascendency  of  the  men- 
tal and  moral  character  the  commercial  relations  may 
thrive  to  the  utmost  desirable  point,  while  the  reverse 
is  ruinous  to  both,  and  sooner  or  later  effectuates  the 
fall  or  debasement  of  the  country  itself— this  is  the 
richest  truth  obtained  for  mankind  by  historic  Re- 
search ;  though  unhappily  it  is  the  truth,  to  which 
a  rich  and  commercial  nation  listens  with  most  re- 
luctance and  receives  with  least  faith.  Where  the 
brain  and  the  immediate  conductors  of  its  influence 
remain  healthy  and  vigorous,  the  defects  and  diseases 
of  the  eye  will  most  often  admit  either  of  a  cure  or  a 
substitute.  And  so  is  it  with  the  outward  prosperity 
of  a  state,  where  the  well-being  of  the  people  posses- 
ses the  primacy  in  the  aims  of  the  governing  classes, 
and  in  the  public  feeling.  But  what  avails  the  per- 
fect state  of  the  eye, 

Tlio'  clear 
To  outward  view  of  blemish  or  of  spot, 

where  the  optic  nerve  is  paralyzed  by  a  pressure  on 
the  brain  ?  And  even  so  is  it  not  only  with  the  well- 
being,  but  ultimately  with  the  prosperity  of  a  people, 
where  the  former  is  considered  (if  it  be  considered 
at  all)  as  subordinate  and  secondary  to  wealth  and 
revenue. 

In  the  pursuits  of  commerce  the  man  is  called  into 
action  from  without,  in  order  to  appropriate  the  out- 
ward world,  as  far  as  he  can  bring  it  within  his  reach, 
to  the  purposes  of  his  senses  and  sensual  nature.  His 
ultimate  end  is — appearance  and  enjoyment.  Where 
on  the  other  hand  the  nurture  and  evolution  of  hu- 
manity is  the  final  aim,  there  will  soon  be  seen  a  gen- 
eral tendency  toward,  an  earnest  seeking  after,  some 
ground  common  to  the  world  and  to  man,  therein  to 
find  the  one  principle  of  permanence  and  identity,  the 

*  The  senses,  the  memory,  and  the  understanding  (i.  e.  the 
retentive,  reflective,  and  judicial  functions  of  his  mind)  being 
common  to  both  methods. 

533 


524 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


rock  of  strength  and  refuge,  to  which  the  soul  may 
cling  amid  the  fleeting  serge-like  ohjecls  of  the  senses. 
Disturbed  as  by  the  obscure  quickening  of  an  inward 
birth;  made  restless  by  swarming  thoughts,  that,  like 
bees  when  they  iirst  miss  the  queen  and  mother  of 
the  hive,  with  vain  discursion  seek  each  in  the  other 
what  is  the  common  need  of  all ;  man  sallies  forth 
into  nature — in  nature,  as  in  the  shadows  and  reflec- 
tions of  a  clear  river,  to  discover  the  originals  of  the 
forms  presented  to  him  in  his  own  intellect.  Over 
these  shadows,  as  if  they  were  the  substantial  pow- 
ers and  presiding  spirits  of  the  stream,  Narciseua-like, 
he  hangs  delighted  :  till  finding  no  where  a  represen- 
tative of  that  free  agency  which  yet  is  a  fact  of  im- 
mediate consciousness  sanctioned  and  made  fearfully 
significant  by  his  prophetic  conscience,  he  learns  at 
last  that  what  he  seeks  he  has  left  behind  and  but 
lengthens  the  distance  as  he  prolongs  the  search.  Un- 
der the  tutorage  of  scientific  analysis,  haply  first 
given  to  him  by  express  revelation  (e  ccelo  descendit, 
rN&ei  SEAYTON)  he  separates  the  relations  that 
are  wholly  the  creatures  of  his  own  abstracting  and 
comparing  intellect,  and  at  once  discovers  and  recoils 
from  the  discovery,  that  the  reality,  the  objective  truth, 
of  the  objects  he  has  been  adoring,  derives  its  whole 
and  sole  evidence  from  an  obscure  sensation,  which 
he  is  alike  unable  to  resist  or  to  comprehend,  which 
compels  him  to  contemplate  as  without  and  independ- 
ent of  himself  what  yet  he  could  not  contemplate  at 
all,  were  it  not  a  modification  of  his  own  being. 

Earth  fills  her  lap  with  pleasures  of  her  own; 
Yearnings  she  hath  in  her  own  natural  kind, 
And,  even  with  something  of" a  Mother's  mind 
And  no  unworthy  aim, 
The  homely  Nurse  doth  all  she  can 
To  make  her  Foster-child,  her  Inmate  Man, 

Forget  the  glories  he  hath  known, 
And  that  imperial  palace  whence  he  came. 


O  joy !  that  in  our  embers 
Is  something  that  doth  live, 
That  nature  yet  remembers 
What  was  so  fugitive  ! 

The  thought  of  our  past  years  in  me  doth  breed 
Perpetual  benedictions:  not  indeed 
For  that  which  is  most  worthy  to  be  blest; 
Delight  and  liberty,  the  simple  creed 
Of  childhood,  whether  busy  or  at  rest. 
With  new-fledged  hope  still  fluttering  in  his  breast: 
Not  for  these  I  raise 
The  song  of  thanks  and  praise, 

But  for  those  obstinate  questionings 

Of  sense  and  outward  things, 

Fallings  from  us,  vanishings  ; 

Blank  misgivings  of  a  Creature 
Moving  about  in  worlds  not  realized, 
High  instincts  before  which  our  mortal  Nature 
Did  tremble  like  a  guilty  Thing  surprised  ! 

But  for  those  first  affections, 

Those  shadowy  recollections, 

Which,  be  they  what  they  may, 
Are  yet  the  fountain  light  of  all  our  day. 
Are  yet  a  master  fight  of  all  our  seeing; 

Uphold  us — cherish — and  have  power  to  make 
Our  noisy  years  seem  moments  in  the  being 
Of  the  eternal  Silence  :  truths  that  wake. 

To  perish  never ; 
Which  neither  listlessness,  nor  mad  endeavor, 

Nor  Man  nor  Boy, 
Nor  all  that  is  at  enmity  with  joy. 


Can  utterly  abolish  or  destroy  ! 

Hence,  in  a  season  of  calm  weather, 
Though  inland  far  we  be, 

Our  souls  have  sight  of  that  immortal  sea 
Which  brought  us  hither; 
Can  in  a  moment  travel  thither — 

And  see  the  children  sport  upon  the  shore. 

And  hear  the  mighty  waters  rolling  evermore. 

WORDSWORTH.* 
Long  indeed  will  man  strive  to  satisfy  the  inward 
querist  with  the  phrase,  laws  of  nature.  But  though 
the  individual  may  rest  content  with  the  seemly  met- 
aphor, the  race  cannot.  If  a  law  of  nature  be  a  mere 
generalization,  it  is  included  in  the  above  as  an  act 
of  the  mind.  But  if  it  be  other  and  more,  and  yet 
manifestable  only  in  and  to  an  intelligent  spirit,  it 
must  in  act  and  substance  be  itself  spiritual :  for 
things  utterly  heterogeneous  can  have  no  intercom- 
munion. In  order  therefore  to  the  recognition  of 
himself  in  nature,  man  must  first  learn  to  comprehend 
nature  in  himself,  and  its  laws  in  the  ground  of  his 
own  existence.  Then  only  can  he  reduce  Phenome- 
na to  Principles — then  only  will  he  have  achieved 
the  method,  the  self-unravelling  clue,  which  alone 
can  securely  guide  him  to  the  conquest  of  the  former 
— when  he  has  discovered  in  the  basis  of  their  union 
the  necessity  of  their  differences ;  in  the  principle  of 
their  continuance  the  solution  of  their  changes.  It  is 
the  idea  of  the  common  centre,  of  the  universal  law, 
by  which  all  power  manifests  itself  in  opposite  yet 
interdependent  forces  (>;  yap  AYAS  an  itapa  Movaiii 
na§r]Tai,  kui  vospais  aj-pa-ra  Tojiais)  that  enlightening 
inquiry,  multiplying  experiment,  and  at  once  inspir- 
ing humility  and  perseverance,  will  lead  him  to  com- 
prehend gradually  and  progressively  the  relation  of 
each  to  the  other,  of  each  to  all,  and  of  all  to  each. 

Such  is  the  second  of  the  two  possible  directions  in 
which  the  activity  of  man  propels  itself:  and  either 
in  one  or  other  of  these  channels — or  in  some  one  of" 
the  rivulets  which  notwithstanding  their  occasional 
refluenre  (and  though,  as  in  successive  schematisms 
of  Becher,  Stahl,  and  Lavoisier,  the  varying  stream 
may  for  a  time  appear  to  comprehend  and  inisle  some 
particular  department  of  knowledge  which  even  then 
it  only  peninsulates)  are  yet  flowing  towards  this  mid 
channel,  and  will  ultimately  fall  into  it — all  intellect- 
ual method  has  its  bed,  its  banks,  and  its  line  of  pro- 
gression.    For  be  it  not  forgotten,  that  this  discourse 


*  During  my  residence  in  Rome  I  had  the  pleasure  of  recit- 
ing this  sublime  ode  to  the  illustrious  Baron  Von  Humboldt, 
then  the  Prussian  minister  at  the  papal  court,  and  now  at  the 
court  of  St.  Jumes.  By  those  who  knew  and  honored  both 
the  brothers,  the  talents  of  the  plenipotentiary  were  held  equal 
to  those  of  the  scientific  traveller,  his  judgment  superior.  I 
can  only  say,  that  I  know  few  Englishmen,  whom  I  could 
compare  with  hito  in  the  extensive  knowledge  and  just  appre- 
ciation of  Enslish  literature  and  its  various  epochs.  lie  lis- 
tened to  the  ode  with  evident  delight,  and  as  evidently  not 
without  surprise,  and  at  the  close  of  the  recitation  exclaimed, 
"  And  is  this  the  work  of  a  lhing  English  poet"!  I  should 
have  attributed  it  to  the  age  of  Elizabeth,  not  that  1  recollect 
any  writer,  whose  style  it  lesembles  :  but  rather  with  wonder, 
that  so  great  ami  original  a  poet  should  have  escaped  my  no- 
tice."— Often  as  I  repeat  passages  from  it  to  myself,  I  recur 
to  the  words  of  Dante : 

Canzon !  io  credo,  che  saranno  radi 
Che  tua  ragione  bene  intenderanno : 
Tanto  lor  sei  faticoso  td  alto. 

534 


THE  FRIEND. 


525 


is  confined  to  the  evolutions  and  ordonnance  of  know- 
ledge, as  prescribed  by  the  constitution  of  the  human 
intellect.  Whether  there  be  a  correspondent  reality, 
whether  the  Knowing  of  the  Mind  has  its  correlative 
in  the  Being  of  Nature,  doubts  may  be  felt.  Never 
to  have  felt  them,  would  indeed  betray  an  uncon- 
scious unbelief,  which  traced  to  its  extreme  roots  will 
be  seen  grounded  in  a  latent  disbelief.  How  should 
it  not  be  so?  if  to  conquer  these  doubts,  and  out  of 
the  confused  multiplicity  of  seeing  with  which  "  the 
films  of  corruption"  bewilder  us,  and  out  of  the  un- 
substantial shows  of  existence,  which,  like  the  sha- 
dow of  an  eclipse,  or  the  chasms  in  the  sun's  atmo- 
sphere, are  but  negation!)  of  sight,  to  attain  that  siii- 
gleness  of  ei/c,  with  which  "  the  whole  body  shall  be 
full  of  light,"  be  the  purpose,  the  means,  and  the  end 
of  our  probation,  the  METHOD  which  is  "  profitable  to 
all  things,  and  hath  the  promise  in  this  life  and  in  the 
life  to  come!"  Imagine  the  unlettered  African,  or 
rude  yet  musing  Indian,  poring  over  an  illumined 
manuscript  of  the  inspired  volume,  with  the  vague 
yet  deep  impression  that  his  fates  and  fortunes  are  in 
some  unknown  manner  connected  with  its  contents. 
Every  tint,  every  group  of  characters  has  its  several 
dream.  Say  that  after  long  and  dissatisfying  toils,  he 
begins  to  sort,  first  the  paragraphs  that  appear  to  re- 
semble each  other,  then  the  lines,  the  words — nay, 
that  he  has  at  length  discovered  that  the  whole  is 
formed  by  the  recurrence  and  interchanges  of  a  lim- 
ited number  of  cyphers,  letters,  marks,  and  points, 
which,  however,  in  the  very  height  and  utmost  per- 
fection of  his  attainment,  he  makes  twenty  fold  more 
numerous  than  they  are,  by  classing  every  different 
form  of  the  same  character,  intentional  or  accidental, 
as  a  separate  element.  And  the  whole  is  without 
soul  or  substance,  a  talisman  of  superstition,  a  mock- 
ery of  science :  or  employed  perhaps  at  last  to  feather 
the  arrows  of  death,  or  to  shine  and  flutter  amid  the 
plumes  of  savage  vanity.  The  poor  Indian  too  truly 
represents  the  state  of  learned  and  systematic  igno- 
rance— arrangement  guided  by  the  light  of  no  lead- 
ing idea,  mere  orderliness  without  method! 

But  see !  the  friendly  missionary  arrives.  He  ex- 
plains to  him  the  nature  of  written  words,  translates 
them  for  him  into  his  native  sounds,  and  thence  into 
the  thoughts  of  his  heart  —  how  many  of  these 
thoughts  then  first  evolved  into  consciousness,  which 
yet  the  awakening  disciple  receives,  and  not  as 
aliens !  Henceforward,  the  book  is  unsealed  for  him  ; 
the  depth  is  opened  out;  he  communes  with  the 
spirit  of  the  volume  as  a  living  oracle.  The  words 
become  transparent,  and  he  sees  them  as  though  he 
saw  them  not. 

We  have  thus  delineated  the  two  great  directions 
of  man  and  society  with  their  several  objects  and 
ends.  Concerning  the  conditions  and  principles  of 
method  appertaining  to  each,  we  have  affirmed  (for 
the  facts  hitherto  adduced  have  been  rather  for  illus- 
tration than  for  evidence,  to  make  our  position  dis- 
tinctly understood  rather  than  to  enforce  the  convic- 
tion of  its  truth)  that  in  both  there  must  be  a  mental 
antecedent;  but  that  in  the  one  it  may  be  an  image 
or  conception  received  through  the  senses,  and  ori- 


ginating from  without,  the  inspiriting  passion  or  de- 
sire being  alone  the  immediate  and  proper  offspring 
of  the  mind;  while  in  the  other  the  initiative  thought, 
the  intellectual  seed,  must  have  its  birth-place  within, 
whatever  excitement  from  without  may  be  necessary 
for  its  germination.  Will  the  soul  thus  awakened 
neglect  or  undervalue  the  outward  and  conditional 
causes  of  her  growth  ?  For  rather,  might  we  dare 
borrow  a  wild  fancy  from  the  Mantuan  bard,  or  the 
poet  of  Arno,  will  it  be  with  her,  as  if  a  stem  or 
trunk,  suddenly  endued  with  sense  and  reflection, 
should  contemplate  its  green  shoots,  their  leaflets  and 
budding  blossoms,  wondered  at  as  then  first  noticed, 
but  welcomed  nevertheless  as  its  own  growth  :  while 
yet  with  undiminished  gratitude,  and  a  deepened 
sense  of  dependency,  it  would  bless  the  dews  and 
the  sunshine  from  without,  deprived  of  the  awaken- 
ing and  fostering  excitement  of  which,  its  own  pro- 
ductivity would  have  remained  for  ever  hidden  from 
itself,  or  felt  only  as  the  obscure  trouble  of  a  baffled 
instinct. 

Hast  thou  ever  raised  thy  mind  to  the  consideration 
of  EXISTENCE,  in  and  by  itself,  as  the  mere  act  of 
existing?  Hast  thou  ever  said  to  thyself  thought- 
fully, it  is !  heedless  in  that  moment,  whether  it 
were  a  man  before  thee,  or  a  flower,  or  a  grain  of 
sand  ?  Without  reference,  in  short,  to  this  or  that  par- 
ticular mode  or  form  of  existence?  If  thou  hast 
indeed  attained  to  this,  thou  wilt  have  felt  the  pre- 
sence of  a  mystery,  which  must  have  fixed  thy  spirit 
in  awe  and  wonder.  The  very  words,  There  is 
nothing!  or,  There  was  a  time,  when  there  was 
nothing!  are  self-contradictory.  There  is  that  within 
us  which  repels  the  proposition  with  as  full  and  in- 
stantaneous light,  as  if  it  bore  evidence  against  the 
fact  in  the  right  of  its  own  eternity. 

Not  TO  BE,  then,  is  impossible :  TO  BE,  incom- 
prehensible. If  thou  hast  mastered  this  intuition  of 
absolute  existence,  thou  wilt  have  learnt  likewise, 
that  it  was  this,  and  no  other,  which  in  the  earlier 
ages  seized  the  nobler  minds,  the  elect  among  men, 
with  a  sort  of  sacred  horror.  This  it  was  which  first 
caused  them  to  feel  within  themselves  a  something 
ineffably  greater  than  their  own  individual  nature. 
It  was  this  which,  raising  them  aloft,  ami  projecting 
them  to  an  ideal  distance  from  themselves,  prepared 
them  to  become  the  lights  and  awakening  voices  of 
other  men,  the  founders  of  law  and  religion,  the 
educators  and  foster-gods  of  mankind.  The  power, 
which  evolved  this  idea  of  Being,  Beinc  in  its  es- 
sence, Being  limitless,  comprehending  its  own  limits 
in  its  dilatation,  and  condensing  itself  into  its  own 
apparent  mounds — how  shall  we  name  it?  The  idea 
itself,  which  like  a  mighty  billow  at  once  overw  helms 
and  bears  aloft — what  is  it?  Whence  did  it  come  ? 
In  vain  would  we  derive  it  from  the  organs  of  sense: 
for  these  supply  only  surfaces,  undulations,  phantoms ! 
In  vain  from  the  instruments  of  sensation  :  fur  these 
furnish  only  the  chaos,  the  shapeless  elements  of 
sense  !  And  least  of  all  may  we  hope  to  find  its 
origin,  or  sufficient  cause,  in  the  moulds  and  mechan- 
ism of  the  understanding,  the  whole  purport  and 
functions  of  which  consist  in  individualization,  in 
535 


526 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


outlines  and  differencings  by  quantity,  quality  and 
relation.  It  were  wiser  to  seek  substance  in  shadow, 
than  absolute  fulness  in  mere  negation. 

We  have  asked  then  for  its  birth-place  in  all  thai 
constitutes  our  relative  individuality,  in  all  that  each 
man  calls  exclusively  himself.  It  is  an  alien  of 
which  they  know  not:  and  for  them  the  question 
is  purposeless,  and  the  very  words  that  convey  it  are 
as  sounds  in  an  unknown  language,  or  as  the  vision 
of  heaven  and  earth  expanded  by  the  rising  sun, 
which  falls  but  as  warmth  on  the  eye-lids  of  the 
blind.  To  no  class  of  phenomena  or  particulars  can 
it  be  referred,  itself  being  none :  therefore,  to  no 
faculty  by  which  these  alone  are  apprehended.  As 
little  dare  we  refer  it  to  any  form  of  abstraction  or 
generalization  :  for  it  has  neither  co-ordinate  or  anal- 
ogon  !  it  has  absolutely  one,  and  that  it  is,  and 
affirms  itself  to  be,  is  its  only  predicate.  And  yet  this 
power  nevertheless,  is!  In  eminence  of  Being  it  IS! 
And  he  for  whom  it  manifests  itself  in  its  adequate 
idea,  dare  as  little  arrogate  it  to  himself  as  his  own, 
can  as  little  appropriate  it  either  totally  or  by  parti- 
tion, as  he  can  claim  ownership  in  the  breathing  air,  or 
make  an  enclosure  in  the  cope  of  heaven.*  He  bears 
witness  of  it  to  his  own  mind,  even  as  he  describes 
life  and  light :  and,  with  the  silence  of  light,  it  de- 
scribes itself  and  dwells  in  its  only  as  far  as  we  dwell 
in  it.  The  truths  which  it  manifests  are  such  as  it 
alone  can  manifest,  and  in  all  truth  it  manifests  itself! 
By  what  name  then  canst  thou  call  a  truth  so  mani- 
fested ?  Is  it  not  revelation  ?  Ask  thyself  whether 
thou  canst  attach  to  that  latter  word  any  consistent 
meaning  not  included  in  the  idea  of  the  former. 
And  the  manifesting  power,  the  source  and  the  cor- 
relative of  the  idea  thus  manifested — is  it  not  GOD? 
Either  thou  knovvest  it  to  be  GOD,  or  thou  hast  called 
an  idol  by  that  awful  name !  Therefore  in  the  most 
appropriate,  no  less  than  in  the  highest,  sense  of  the 
word  were  the  earliest  teachers  of  humanity  inspired. 
They  alone  were  the  true  seers  of  GOD,  and  there- 
fore prophets  of  the  human  race. 

Look  round  you,  and  you  behold  every  where  an 
adaptation  of  means  To  ends.  Meditate  on  the  nature 
of  a  Being  whose  ideas  are  creative,  and  consequent- 
ly more  real,  more  substantial  than  the  things  that, 
at  the  height  of  their  creature!//  state,  are  but  their 
dim  reflexes :  t  and  the  intuitive  conviction  will 
arise  that  in  such  a  Being  there  could  exist  no  motive 


*  See  p.  11—19  of  the  Appendix  to  the  Statesman's  Man- 
ual :  and  p.  47 — 52  of  the  second  Lay-Sermon. 

t  If  we  may  not  rather  resemble  them  to  the  resurgent 
ashes,  with  which  (according  to  the  tales  of  the  later  al- 
chemists) the  substantia!  forms  of  bird  and  flower  made  them- 
selves visible, 

'Us  to.  xaKrjs  JXr/s  /3Aaeri7  jiara  X?y~<*  Kai  f^^Xa. 
And  let  me  he  permitted  to  add,  in  especial  reference  to  this 
passage,  a  premonition  quoted  from  the  same  work  (Zoroas- 
tri  Qracula,  Francisci  Patricii) 

"A  Ifoes  \lysi,  ru>  voovvTi  <?i)  -zy  \eyti. 

Of  the  flower  apparitions  so  solemnly  affirmed  by  Sir  K. 
Disby.  Kercher,  Helmont.  &c.  see  a  lull  and  most  interesting 
account  in  Soother's  Omniana,  with  a  probable  solution  of 
l«is  chemical  marvel. 


to  the  creation  of  a  machine  for  its  own  sake  ;  that 
therefore,  the  material  world  must  have  been  made 
for  the  sake  of  man,  at  once  the  high-priest  and  re- 
presentative of  the  Creator,  as  far  as  he  partakes  of 
that  reason  in  which  the  essences  of  all  things  co- 
exist in  all  their  distinctions  yet  as  one  and  indivisi- 
ble. But  I  speak  of  man  in  his  idea,  and  as  snbmused 
in  the  divine  humanity,  in  whom  God  alone  loved 
the  world. 

If  then  in  all  inferior  things,  from  the  grass  on  the 
house-top  to  the  giant  tree  of  the  forest,  to  the  eagle 
which  builds  in  its  summit,  and  the  elephant  which 
browses  on  its  branches,  we  behold — first,  a  subjec- 
tion to  the  universal  laws  by  which  each  thing  be- 
longs to  the  Whole,  as  interpenetrated  by  the  powers 
of  the  Whole;  and,  secondly  the  intervention  of  par- 
ticular laws  by  which  the  universal  laws  are  sus- 
pended or  tempered  for  the  weal  and  sustenance  of 
each  particular  class,  and  by  which  each  species,  and 
each  individual  of  every  species,  becomes  a  system 
in  and  for  itself,  a  world  of  its  own — if  we  behold 
this  economy  everywhere  in  the  irrational  creation, 
shall  we  not  hold  it  probable  that  a  similar  tempera- 
ment of  universal  and  general  laws  by  an  adequate 
intervention  of  appropriate  agency,  will  have  been 
effected  for  the  permanent  interest  of  the  creature 
destined  to  move  progressively  towards  that  divine 
idea  which  we  have  learnt  to  contemplate  as  the  final 
cause  of  all  creation,  and  the  centre  in  which  all  its 
lines  converge  ? 

To  discover  the  mode  of  intervention  requisite  for 
man's  developement  and  progression,  we  must  seek 
then  for  some  general  law  by  the  untempered  and 
uncounteracted  action  of  which  both  would  be  pre- 
vented and  endangered.  But  this  we  shall  find  in 
that  law  of  his  understanding  and  fancy,  by  which 
he  is  impelled  to  abstract  the  outward  relations  of 
matter  and  to  arrange  these  phenomena  in  time  and 
space,  under  the  form  of  causes  and  effects.  And 
this  was  necessary,  as  being  the  condition  under 
which  alone  experience  and  intellectual  growth  are 
possible.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  by  the  same  law 
he  is  inevitably  tempted  to  misinterpret  a  constant 
precedence  into  positive  causation,  and  thus  to  break 
and  scatter  the  one  divine  and  invisible  life  of  nature 
into  countless  idols  of  the  sense;  and  falling  pros- 
trate before  lifeless  images,  the  creatures  of  his  own 
abstraction,  is  himself  sensualized,  and  becomes  a 
slave  to  the  things  of  which  he  was  formed  to  be  the 
conqueror  and  sovereign.  From  the  feiisch  of  the 
imbruted  African  to  the  soul-debasing  errors  of  the 
proud  fact-hunting  materialist,  we  may  trace  the  va- 
rious ceremonials  of  the  same  idolatry,  and  shall  find 
selfishness,  hate  and  servitude  as  the  results.  If, 
therefore,  by  the  over-ruling  and  suspension  of  the 
phantom-canse  of  this  superstition;  if  by  separating 
effects  from  their  natural  antecedents;  if  by  present- 
ing the  phenomena  of  time  (as  far  as  is  possible)  in 
the  absolute  forms  of  eternity  ;  the  nursling  of  expe- 
rience should,  in  the  early  period  of  his  pupilage,  be 
compelled,  by  a  more  impressive  experience,  to  seek 
in  the  invisible  life  alone  for  the  true  cause  and  in- 
visible Nexus  of  the  things  that  are  seen,  we  shall 
536 


THE  FRIEND. 


527 


not  demand  the  evidences  of  ordinary  experience  for 
that  which,  if  it  ever  existed,  existed  as  its  antithesis 
ami  i< >r  us  counteraction.  Was  it  an  appropriate 
mean  to  a  necessary'  end  ?  Has  it  been  attested  by 
lovers  of  truth  ;  has  it  been  believed  by  lovers  of 
wisdom  !  Do  we  see  throughout  all  nature  the  oc- 
.1  intervention  of  particular  agencies  in  coun- 
ter-check  of  universal  laws?  (And  of  what  other 
definition  is  a  miracle  susceptible  ?)  These  are  the 
questions:  and  if  to  these  our  answer  must  be  affirm- 
ative, then  we  too  will  acquiesce  in  the  traditions  of 
humanity,  and  yielding,  as  to  a  high  interest  of  our 
own  being,  will  discipline  ourselves  to  the  reverential 
and  kindly  faith,  that  the  guides  and  teachers  of  man- 
kind were  the  handsofpower.no  less  than  the  voices 
of  inspiration  :  and  little  anxious  concerning  the  par- 
ticular forms  and  circumstances  of  each  manifestation 
we  will  give  an  historic  credence  to  the  historic  fact, 
that  men  sent  by  God  have  come  with  signs  and 
wonders  on  the  earth. 

If  it  be  objected,  that  in  nature,  as  distinguished 
from  man,  this  intervention  of  particular  laws  is,  or 
with  the  increase  of  science  will  be,  resolvable  into 
the  universal  laws  which  they  had  appeared  to  coun- 
terbalance— we  will  reply:  Even  so  it  may  be  in  the 
case  of  miracles:  but  wisdom  forbids  her  children  to 
antedate  their  knowledge,  or  to  act  and  feel  other- 
wise, or  further  than  they  know.  But  should  that 
time  arrive,  the  sole  difference,  that  could  result  from 
such  an  enlargement  of  our  view,  would  he  this:  that 
what  we  now  consider  as  miracles  in  opposition  to 
ordinary  experience,  we  should  then  reverence  with 
a  yet  higher  devotion  as  harmonious  parts  of  one 
great  complex  miracle,  when  the  antithesis  between 
experience  and  belief  would  itself  be  taken  up  into 
the  unity  of  intuitive  reason. 

And  what  purpose  of  philosophy  can  this  acquies- 
cence answer  >.  A  gracious  purpose,  a  most  valuable 
end  :  if  it  prevent  the  energies  of  philosophv  from 
being  idly  wasted,  by  removing  the  opposition  with- 
out confounding  the  distinction  between  'philosophy 
and  faith.  The  philosopher  will  remain  a  man  in 
sympathy  with  his  fellow  men.  The  head  will  not 
be  disjointed  from  the  heart,  nor  will  speculative 
truth  be  alienated  from  practical  wisdom.  And 
vainly  without  the  union  of  both  shall  we  expect  an 
opening  of  the  inward  eye  to  the  glorious  vision  of 
that  existence  which  admits  of  no  question  out  of  it- 
self, acknowledges  no  predicate  but  the  I  AM  IN 
THAT  I  AM!  Qaviid^orrts  <j/i\ouo<p5fi€V  <pi\o<xo- 
Qfjc-ivrts  5a^jj»/i£y.  In  wonder  {r<t>  Sav/ia£av)  says 
Aristotle  does  philosphy  begin :  and  in  asloundment 
(ru  cafi(3£?iO  say's  Plato,  does  all  true  philosophy 
finish.  As  every  faculty,  with  every  the  minutest 
four  nature,  owes  its  whole  realitv  and  com- 
prehensibility  to  an  existence  incomprehensible  and 
groundless,  because  the  ground  of  all  comprehension: 
not  without  the  union  of  all  that  is  essential  in  all  the 
functions  of  our  spirit,  not  without  an  emotion  tran- 
quil from  its'  very  intensity,  shall  we  worthily  contem- 
plate in  the  magnitude  and  integrity  of  the  world  that 
life-ebullient  stream  which  breaks  through  every 
momentary  embankment,  again,  indeed,  and  ever- 
35  V>2 


more  to  embank  itself,  but  within  no  banks  to  stag- 
nate or  be  imprisoned. 

P.ut  here  it  behooves  us  to  bear  in  mind,  that  all 
true  reality  has  both  its  ground  and  its  evidence  in 
the  tali,  without  which  as  its  complement  science  it- 
self is  but  an  elaborate  game  of  shadows,  begins  in 
abstractions  and  ends  in  perplexity.  For  cone 
merely  intellectually,  individuality,  as  individuality, 
is  only  conceivable  as  with  and  in  the  I'niversal  and 
infinite,  neither  before  or  after  it.  IVo  transition  is 
possible  from  one  to  the  other,  as  from  the  architect 
to  the  house,  or  the  watch  to  its  maker.  The  finite 
form  can  neither  lie  laid  hold  of,  nor  is  it  any  thing 
of  itself  real,  but  merely  an  apprehension,  a  frame- 
work which  the  human  imagination  forms  by  its  own 
limits,  as  the  foot  measures  itself  on  the  snow;  and 
the  sole  truth  of  which  we  must  again  refer  to  the 
divine  imagination,  in  virtue  of  its  omniformity ;  even 
as  thou  art  capable  of  beholding  the  transparent  ;» ir 
as  little  during  the  absence  as  during  the  presence 
of  light,  so  canst  thou  behold  the  finite  things  as  act- 
ually existing  neither  with  nor  without  the  substance. 
_\ot  without,  for  then  the  forms  cease  to  he,  and  are 
lost  in  night.  IS'ot  with  it,  for  it  is  the  light,  the  sub- 
stance shining  through  it,  which  thou  canst  alone 
really  see. 
The  ground-work,  therefore,  of  all  true  philosophy 

1  is  the  full  apprehension  of  the  difference  between  the 
contemplation  of  reason,  namely,  that   intuition  of 

|  things,  which  arises  when  we  possess  ourselves,  as 
one  with  the  whole,  which  is  substantial  knowledge, 
and  that  which  presents  itself  when  transferring  re- 

i  ality  to  the  negations  of  reality,  to  the  ever-varying 

i  frame-work  of  the  uniform  life,  we  think  of  ourselves 

'  as  separated  beings,  and  place  nature  in  antithesis  to 
the  mind,  as  object  to  subject,  thing  to  thought,  death 

■  to  life.  This  is  abstract  knowledge,  or  the  science  of 
mere  understanding.  By  the  former,  we  know  that 
existence  is  its  own  predicate,  self-affirmation,  the  one 
attribute  in  which  all  others  are  contained,  not  as 
parts,  but  as  manifestations.  It  is  an  eternal  and  in- 
finite self-rejoicing,  self-loving,  with  a  joy  unfathom- 
able, with  a  love  all  comprehensive.  It  is  absolute; 
and  the  absolute  is  neither  singly  that  which  affirms, 
nor  that  which  is  affirmed  ;  but  the  identity  and  living 
copula  of  both. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  abstract  knowledge  which 

I  belongs  to  us  as  finite  beings,  and  which  leads  to  a 
science  of  delusion  then  only,  when  it  would  exist 
lor  itself  instead  of  being  the  instrument  of  the  for- 
mer— instead  of  being,  as  it  were,  a  translation  of  the 
Living  word  into  a  dead  language, for  the  purposes  of 
memory,  arrangement,  and  general  communication — 
it  is  by  this  abstract  knowledge  that  the  understand- 
ing distinguishes  the  affirmed  from  the  affirming. 
Well  if  it  distinguish  without  dividing!  Well!  if  hi 
distinction  it  add  clearness  to  fulness,  and  prepare  for 
the  intellectual  re-union  of  the  all  in  one,  in  that  eter- 

!  nal  reason  whose  fulness  hath  no  opacity,  whose 
transparency  hath  no  vacuum. 

Thus  we  prefaced  our  inquiry  into  the  Science  of 
Method  with  a  principle  deeper  than  science,  more 
certain  than  demonstration.   For  that  the  very  ground, 
537 


528 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


saith  Aristotle,  is  groundless  or  self-grounded,  is  an 
identical  proposition.  From  the  indemonstrable  flows 
the  sap,  that  circulates  through  every  branch  and 
spray  of  the  demonstration.  To  this  principle  we 
referred  the  choice  of  the  final  object,  the  control 
over  time — or,  to  comprise  all  in  one,  the  Method  of 
the  will.  From  this  we  started  (or  rather  seemed  to 
start :  for  it  still  moved  before  us,  as  an  invisible  guar- 
dian and  guide,)  and  it  is  this  whose  re-appearance 
announces  the  conclusion  of  our  circuit,  and  wel- 
comes us  at  our  goal.  Yea,  (saith  an  enlightened 
physician,)  there  is  but  one  principle,  which  alone  re- 
conciles the  man  with  himself,  with  others  and  with 
the  world;  which  regulates  all  relations,  tempers  all 
passions,  and  gives  power  to  overcome  or  support  all 
suffering ;  and  which  is  not  to  be  shaken  by  aught 
earthly,  for  it  belongs  not  to  the  earth — namely,  the 
principle  of  religion,  the  living  and  substantial  faith 
"  which  passeth  all  understanding,"  as  the  cloud 
piercing  rock,  which  overhangs  the  strong-hold  of 
which  it  had  been  the  quarry  and  remains  the  foun- 
dation. This  elevation  of  the  spirit  above  the  sem- 
blances of  custom  and  the  senses  to  a  world  of  spirit, 
this  life  in  the  idea,  even  in  the  supreme  and  godlike, 


which  alone  merits  the  name  of  life,  and  without 
which  our  organic  life  is  but  a  state  of  somnambulism ; 
this  it  is  which  affords  the  sole  sure  anchorage  in  the 
storm,  and  at  the  same  time  the  substantiating  prin- 
ciple of  all  true  wisdom,  the  satisfactory  solution  of 
all  the  contradictions  of  human  nature,  of  the  whole 
riddle  of  the  world.  This  alone  belongs  to  and 
speaks  intelligibly  to  all  alike,  the  learned  and  the 
ignorant,  if  but  the  heart  listens.  For  alike  present 
in  all,  it  may  be  awakened,  but  it  cannot  be  given. 
But  let  it  not  be  supposed,  that  it  is  a  sort  of  know- 
ledge: No  !  it  is  a  form  of  being,  or  indeed  it  is  the 
only  knowledge  that  truly  is,  and  all  other  science  is 
real  only  as  far  as  it  is  symbolical  of  this.  The  ma- 
terial universe,  saith  a  Greek  philosopher,  is  but  one 
vast  complex  Mythos  (i.  e.  symbolical  representa- 
tion :)  and  mythology  the  apex  and  complement  of  all 
genuine  physiology.  But  as  this  principle  cannot  be 
implanted  by  the  discipline  of  logic,  so  neither  can  it 
be  excited  or  evolved  by  the  arts  of  rhetoric.  For  it 
is  an  immutable  truth,  that  what  comes  from  the 

HEART  THAT  ALONE  GOES  TO  THE  HEART:  WHAT 
PROCEEDS  FROM  A  DIVINE  IMPULSE  THAT  THE  GOD- 
LIKE  ALONE   CAN   AWAKEN. 


£tte  EfUrtr  Hautttug  JJlace: 


OR 


ESSAYS   MISCELLANEOUS. 


Etiam  a  musis  si  quando  animum  paulisper  abducamus,  apud  Musas  nihilominus  feriamur :  at  reclines  quidem,  at  otiosas, 
at  de'his  et  illis  inter  se  libere  colloquentes. 


ESSAY  I. 


Fortuna  plerumque  est  veluti 
Galaxia  quarundam  obscurarum 
Virtutum  sine  nomine. VER.ULAM. 

( Translation.) — Fortune  is  for  the  most  part  but  a  galaxy  or 
milky  way,  as  it  were,  of  certain  obscure  virtues  without 
a  name. 

"  Does  fortune  favor  fools  ?  or  how  do  you  explain 
the  origin  of  the  proverb,  which,  differently  worded, 
is  to  be  found  in  all  the  languages  of  Europe  ?" 

This  proverb  admits  of  various  explanations,  ac- 
cording to  the  mood  of  mind  in  which  it  is  used.  It 
may  arise  from  pity,  and  the  soothing  persuasion  that 
Providence  is  eminently  watchful  over  the  helpless, 
and  extends  an  especial  care  to  those  who  are  not 


capable  of  caring  for  themselves.  So  used,  it 
breathes  the  same  feeling  as  "  God  tempers  the  wind 
to  the  shorn  lamb" — or,  the  more  sportive  adage,  that 
"the  fairies  take  care  of  children  and  tipsy  folk." 
The  persuasion  itself,  in  addition  to  the  general  reli- 
gious feeling  of  mankind,  and  the  scarcely  less  gene- 
ral love  of  the  marvellous,  may  be  accounted  for  from 
our  tendency  to  exaggerate  all  effects,  that  seem  dis- 
proportionate to  their  visible  cause,  and  all  circum- 
stances that  are  in  any  way  strongly  contrasted  with 
our  notions  of  the  persons  under  them.  Secondly,  it 
arises  from  the  safety  and  success  which  an  igno- 
rance of  danger  and  difficulty  sometimes  actually  as- 
sists in  procuring;  inasmuch  as  it  precludes  the  de- 
spondence, which  might  have  kept  the  more  fore- 
sighted  from  undertaking  the  enterprise,  the  depres- 
sion which  would  retard  its  progress,  and  those  over- 
whelming influences  of  terror  in  cases  where  the 
538 


THE  FRIEND. 


529 


vivul  perception  of  the  danger  constitutes  the  greater 
part  of  the  danger  itself.  Thus  men  are  said  to  have 
swooned  and  even  died  at  the  sight  of  a  narrow 
bridge,  over  which  they  had  rode,  the  night  before, 
in  perfect  safety  j  or  at  tracing  the  footmarks  along 
the  edge  of  a  precipice  which  the  darkness  had  con- 
cealed from  them.  A  more  obscure  cause,  yet  not 
wholly  to  be  omitted,  is  afforded  by  the  undoubted 
fact,  that  the  exertion  of  the  reasoning  faculties  tends 
to  extinguish  or  bedim  those  mvsterious  instincts  of 
skill,  which,  though  for  the  most  part  latent,  we 
nevertheless  possess  in  common  with  other  animals. 

Or  the  proverb  may  be  used  invidiously :  and  folly 
in  the  vocabulary  of  envy  or  baseness  may  signify 
courage  and  magnanimity.  Hardihood  and  fool-har- 
diness are  indeed  as  different  as  green  and  yellow, 
yet  will  appear  the  same  to  the  jaundiced  eye.  Cou- 
rage multiplies  the  chances  of  success  by  sometimes 
making  opportunities,  and  always  availing  itself  of 
them :  and  in  this  sense  fortune  may  be  said  to  favor 
fools  by  those,  who,  however  prudent  in  their  own 
opinion,  are  deficient  in  valor  and  enterprise.  Again  : 
an  eminently  good  and  wise  man,  for  whom  the 
praises  of  the  judicious  have  procured  a  high  reputa- 
tion even  with  the  world  at  large,  proposes  to  himself 
certain  objects,  and  adapting  the  right  means  to  the 
right  end,  attains  them  :  but  his  objects  not  being 
what  the  world  calls  fortune,  neither  money  nor  arti- 
ficial rank,  his  admitted  inferiors  in  moral  and  intel- 
lectual worth,  but  more  prosperous  in  their  worldly 
concerns,  are  said  to  have  been  favored  by  fortune 
and  he  slighted  :  although  the  fools  did  the  same  in 
their  line  as  the  wise  man  in  his:  they  adapted  the 
appropriate  means  to  the  desired  end  and  so  suc- 
ceeded. In  this  sense  the  proverb  is  current  by  a 
misuse,  or  a  catachresis  at  least,  of  both  the  words, 
fortune  and  fools. 

How  seldom,  friend  !  a  good  great  man  inherits 
Honor  or  wealth  with  all  his  worth  and  pains  ! 
It  sounds,  like  stories  from  the  land  of  spirils, 
If  any  man  obtain  that  which  he  merits, 
Or  any  merit  that  which  he  obtains. 


For  shame,  dear  friend  !  renounce  this  canting  strain, 

What  wouldst  thou  have  a  good  great  man  obtain  f 

Place?  titles?  salary?  a  gilded  chain  ? 

Or  throne  of  corses  which  hie  sword  hath  slain  ? 

Greatness  and  goodness  are  not  means  but  ends! 

Halh  he  not  always  treasures,  always  friends. 

The  good  great  man  ?    Three  treasures,  loce  and  light, 

And  calm  thoughts  regular  as  infant's  breath  : 

And  three  firm  friends,  more  sure  than  day  and  night, 

Himself,  his  Maker,  and  the  angel  Death. S.  T.  C. 

But,  lastly,  there  is,  doubtless,  a  true  meaning  at- 
tached to  fortune,  distinct  both  from  prudence  and 
from  courage;  and  distinct  too  from  that  absence  of 
depressing  or  bewildering  passions,  which  (according 
to  my  favorite  proverb,  "extremes  meet,")  the  tool 
not  seldom  obtains  in  as  great  perfection  by  his  igno- 
rance, as  the  wise  man  by  the  highest  energies  of 
thought  and  self-discipline.  Luck  has  a  real  exist- 
ence in  human  affairs  from  the  infinite  number  of 
powers,  that  are  in  action  at  the  same  time,  and  from 
the  co-existence  of  things  contingent  and  accidental 


(such  as  to  us  at  least  are  accidental)  with  the  regu- 
lar appearances  and  general  laws  of  nature.  A  fami- 
liar instance  will  make  these  words  intelligible.  The 
moon  waxes  and  wanes  according  to  a  necessary  law. 
— The  clouds  likewise,  and  all  the  manifold  appear- 
ances connected  with  them,  are  governed  by  certain 
laws  no  less  than  the  phases  of  the  moon.  But  the 
laws  which  determine  the  latter,  are  known  and  cal- 
culable: while  those  of  the  former  are  hidden  from 

I  us.  At  all  events,  the  number  and  variety  of  their 
effects  baffle  our  powers  of  calculation :  and  that  the 

I  sky  is  clear  or  obscured  at  any  particular  time,  we 
speak  of,  in  common  language,  as  a  matter  of  acci- 

,  dent.  Well !  at  the  time  of  full  moon,  but  when  the 
sky  is  completely  covered  with  black  clouds,  I  am 
walking  on  in  the  dark,  aware  of  no  particular  dan- 
ger :  a  sudden  gust  of  wind  rends  the  cloud  for  a 
moment,  and  the  moon  emerging  discloses  to  me  a 
chasm  or  precipice,  to  the  very  brink  of  which  I  had 
advanced  my  foot.  This  is  what  is  meant  bv  lack, 
and  according  to  the  more  or  less  serious  mood  or 
habit  of  our  mind  we  exclaim,  how  lucky!  or,  how 
providential!  The  co-presence  of  numberless  phe- 
nomena, which  from  the  complexity  or  subtlety  of 
their  determining  causes  are  called  contingencies,  and 
the  co-existence  of  these  with  any  regular  or  neces- 
sary phenomenon  (as  the  clouds  with  the  moon  for 
instance)  occasion  coincidences,  which,  when  they  are 
attended  by  any  advantage  or  injury,  and  are  at  the 
same  time  incapable  of  being  calculated  or  foreseen 
by  human  prudence,  form  good  or  ill  lack.  On  a  hot 
sunshiny  afternoon  came  on  a  sudden  storm  and  spoilt 
the  farmer's  hay  :  and  this  is  called  ill  luck.  We  will 
suppose  the  event  to  take  place,  when  meteorology 
shall  have  been  perfected  into  a  science,  provided 
with  unerring  instruments  ;  but  which  the  farmer  had 
neglected  to  examine.  This  is  no  longer  ill  luck,  hut 
imprudence.  Now  apply  this  to  our  proverb.  Un- 
foreseen coincidences  may  have  greatly  helped  a 
man,  yet  if  they  have  done  for  him  only  what  possi- 
bly from  his  own  abilities  he  might  have  effected  for 
himself,  his  good  luck  will  excite  less  attention  and 
the  instances  be  less  remembered.  That  clever  men 
should  attain  their  objects  seems  natural,  and  we  ne- 
glect the  circumstances  that  perhaps  produced  that 
success  of  themselves  without  the  intervention  of 
skill  or  foresight,-  but  we  dwell  on  the  fact  and  re- 
member it,  as  something  strange,  when  the  same 
happens  to  a  weak  or  ignorant  man.  So  too,  though 
the  latter  should  fail  in  his  undertakings  from  concur- 
rences that  might  have  happened  to  the  wisest  man, 
yet  his  failure  being  no  more  than  might  have  been 
expected  and  accounted  for  from  his  folly,  it  lays  no 
hold  on  our  attention,  but  fleets  away  among  the 
other  undistinguished  waves  in  which  the  stream  of 
ordinary  life  murmurs  by  us,  and  is  forgotten.  Had 
it  been  as  true  as  it  was  notoriously  false,  that  those 
all-embracing  discoveries,  which  have  shed  a  dawn 
of  science  on  the  art  of  chemistry,  and  give  no  ob- 
scure promise  of  some  one  great  constitutive  law,  in 
the  light  of  which  dwell  dominion  and  the  power  of 
prophecy  ;  if  these  discoveries,  instead  of  having  been 
as  they  really  were  preconcerted  by  meditation,  and 

539 


530 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


evolved  out  of  his  own  intellect,  had  occurred  by  a 
set  of  lucky  accidents  to  the  illustrious  father  and 
founder  of  philosophic  alchemy ;  if  they  had  present- 
ed themselves  to  Professor  Davy  exclusively  in  con- 
sequence of  his  luck  in  possessing  a  particular  galvanic 
battery;  if  this  battery,  as  far  as  Davy  was  concerned, 
had  itself  been  an  accident,  and  not  (as  in  point  of  fact 
it  was)  desired  and  obtained  by  him  for  the  purpose 
of  ensuring  the  testimony  of  experience  to  his  princi- 
ples, and  in  order  to  bind  down  material  nature  under 
the  inquisition  of  reason,  and  force  from  her,  as  by 
torture,  unequivocal  answer  to  prepared  and  precon- 
ceived questions — yet  still  they  would  not  have  been 
talked  of  or  described,  as  instances  of  luck,  but  as  the 
natural  results  of  his  admitted  genius  and  known 
skill.  But  should  an  accident  have  disclosed  similar 
discoveries  to  a  mechanic  at  Birmingham  or  Shef- 
field, and  if  the  man  should  grow  rich  in  conse- 
quence, and  partly  by  the  envy  of  his  neighbors,  and 
partly  with  good  reason,  be  considered  by  them  as  a 
man  below  par  in  the  general  powers  of  his  under- 
standing; then,  "O  what  a  lucky  fellow! — Well, 
Fortune  does  favor  fools — that's  for  certain! — It  is 
always  so!" — And  forthwith  the  exclaimer  relates 
half  a  dozen  similar  instances.  Thus  accumulating 
the  one  sort  of  facts  and  never  collecting  the  other, 
we  do,  as  poets  in  their  diction,  and  quacks  of  all 
denominations  do  in  their  reasoning,  put  a  part  for 
the  whole,  and  at  once  soothe  our  envy  and  gratify 
our  love  of  the  marvellous,  by  the  sweeping  proverb, 
"  Fortune  favors  fools." 


ESSAY   II. 


Quod  me  non  movet  <estimatione  : 
Verum,  est  ytvrifioavvov  mei  sodalis. 

CATULL.  xii. 

( Translation.) — It   interested    not   by  any  conceit  of  its 
value  ;  but  it  is  a  remembrance  of  my  honored  friend. 


The  philosophic  ruler,  who  secured  the  favors  of 
fortune  by  seeking  wisdom  and  knowledge  in  prefer- 
ence to  them,  has  pathetically  observed — "  The  heart 
knoweth  its  own  bitterness ;  and  there  is  a  joy  in 
which  the  stranger  intermeddleth  not."  A  simple 
question  founded  on  a  trite  proverb,  with  a  discursive 
answer  to  it,  would  scarcely  suggest,  to  an  indifferent 
person,  any  other  notion  than  that  of  a  mind  at  ease, 
amusing  itself  with  its  own  activity.  Once  before  (I 
believe  about  this  time  last  year)  I  had  taken  up  the 
old  memorandum-book,  from  which  I  transcribed  the 
preceding  Essay,  and  that  had  then  attracted  my  no- 
tice by  the  name  of  the  illustrious  chemist  mentioned 
in  the  last  illustration.  Exasperated  by  the  base  and 
cowardly  attempt,  that  had  been  made,  to  detract 
from  the  honors  due  to  his  astonishing  genius,  I  had 
slightly  altered  the  concluding  sentences,  substituting 
the  more  recent  for  his  earlier  discoveries  ;  and  with- 
out the  most  distant  intention  of  publishing  what  I 


then  wrote,  I  had  expressed  my  own  convictions  for 
the  gratification  of  my  own  feelings,  and  finished  by 
tranquilly  paraphrasing  into  a  chemical  allegory,  the 
Homeric  adventure  of  Menelaus  with  Proteus.  Oh! 
with  what  different  feelings,  with  what  a  sharp  and 
sudden  emotion  did  I  re-peruse  the  same  question 
yester-morning,  having  by  accident  opened  the  book 
at  the  page,  upon  which  it  was  written.  I  was 
moved :  for  it  was  Admiral  Sir  Alexander  Ball,  who 
first  proposed  the  question  to  me,  and  the  particular 
satisfaction,  which  he  expressed,  had  occasioned  me 
to  note  down  the  substance  of  my  reply.  I  was 
moved:  because  to  this  conversation,  I  was  indebted 
for  the  friendship  and  confidence  with  which  he  af- 
terwards honored  me;  and  because  it  recalled  the 
memory  of  one  of  the  most  delightful  mornings  I 
ever  passed;  when  as  we  were  riding  together,  the 
same  person  related  to  me  the  principal  events  of  his 
own  life,  and  introduced  them  by  adverting  to  this 
conversation.  It  recalled  too  the  deep  impression 
left  on  my  mind  by  that  narrative,  the  impression, 
that  I  had  never  known  any  analagous  instance,  in 
which  a  man  so  successful,  had  been  so  little  indebted 
to  fortune,  or  lucky  accidents,  or  so  exclusively  both 
the  architect  and  builder  of  his  own  success.  The 
sum  of  his  history  may  be  comprised  in  this  one  sen- 
tence: Hecc,  sub  numine,  nobismet  fecimus,  sapientia 
duce,  fortuna  permittente.  (i.  e.  These  things,  under 
God,  we  have  done  for  ourselves,  through  the  guid- 
ance of  wisdom,  and  with  the  permission  of  fortune.) 
Luck  gave  him  nothing :  in  her  most  generous  moods, 
she  only  worked  with  him  as  with  a  friend,  not  for 
him  as  for  a  fondling:  but  more  often  she  simply 
stood  neuter  and  suffered  him  to  work  for  himself. 
Ah !  how  could  I  be  otherwise  than  affected,  by  what- 
ever reminded  me  of  that  daily  and  familiar  inter- 
course with  him  which  made  the  fifteen  months  from 
May,  1804,  to  October,  1805,  in  many  respects,  the 
most  memorable  and  instructive  period  of  my  life  ? — 
Ah !  how  could  I  be  otherwise  than  most  deeply  af- 
fected :  when  there  was  still  lying  on  my  table  the 
paper  which,  the  day  before,  had  conveyed  to  me  the 
unexpected  and  most  awful  tidings  of  this  man's 
death !  his  death  in  the  fulness  of  all  his  powers,  in 
the  rich  autumn  of  ripe  yet  undecaying  manhood  !  I 
once  knew  a  lady,  who,  after  the  loss  of  a  lovely  child, 
continued  for  several  days  in  a  state  of  seeming  indif- 
ference, the  weather,  at  the  same  time,  as  if  in  unison 
with  her,  being  calm,  though  gloomy  :  till  one  morn- 
ing a  burst  of  sunshine  breaking  in  upon  her,  and  sud- 
denly lighting  up  the  room  where  she  was  sitting, 
she  dissolved  at  once  into  tears,  and  wept  passionate- 
ly. In  no  very  dissimilar  manner,  did  the  sudden 
gleam  of  recollection  at  the  sight  of  this  memoran- 
dum act  on  myself.  I  had  been  stunned  by  the  intel- 
ligence, as  by  an  outward  blow,  till  this  trifling  inci- 
dent startled  and  disentranced  me:  (the  sudden  pang 
shivered  through  my  whole  frame :)  and  if  I  repress- 
ed the  outward  shows  of  sorrow,  it  was  by  force  that 
I  repressed  them,  and  because  it  is  not  by  tears  that 
I  ought  to  mourn  for  the  loss  of  Sir  Alexander  Ball. 

lie  was  a  man  above  his  age;  but  for  that  very 
reason,  the  age  has  the  more  need  to  have  the  mas- 
540 


THE  FRIEND. 


531 


ter-features  of  his  character  portrayed  and  preserved. 
This  [  feel  it  my  duty  to  attempt,  and  this  alone;  for 
having  received  neither  instructions  nor  permission 
from  the  family  of  the  deceased,  I  cannot  think  my- 
self allowed  to  enter  into  the  particulars  of  his  pri- 
vate history,  strikingly  as  main-  of  them  would  illus- 
trate the  elements  and  composition  of  his  mind.  For 
he  was  indeed  a  living  confutation  of  the  assertion 
attributed  to  the  Prince  of  Conde,  that  no  man  ap- 
jreat  to  Ins  valet  de  chambre — a  saying  which, 
I  suspect,  owes  its  currency  less  to  its  truth,  than  to 
the  envy  of  mankind  and  the  misapplication  of  the 
word,  great,  to  adieus  unconnected  with  reason  and 
free  will.  It  will  be  sufficient  for  my  purpose  to  ob- 
serve, thai  the  purity  and  strict  propriety  of  his  con- 
duct, which  precluded  rather  than  silenced  calumny, 
the  evenness  of  his  temper  and  his  attentive  and  af- 
fectionate manners,  in  private  life,  greatly  aided  and 
increased  his  public  utility;  and,  if  it  should  please 
Providence,  that  a  portion  of  his  spirit  should  descend 
with  his  mantle,  the  virtues  of  Sir  Alexander  Ball, 
as  a  master,  a  husband,  and  a  parent,  will  form  a  no 
less  remarkable  epoch  in  the  moral  history  of  the 
Maltese  than  his  wisdom,  as  a  governor,  has  made  in 
that  of  their  outward  circumstances.  That  the  pri- 
vate and  personal  qualities  of  a  first  magistrate  should 
have  political  effects,  will  appear  strange  to  no  re- 
flecting Englishman,  who  has  attended  to  the  work- 
ings of  men's  minds  during  the  first  ferment  of  revo- 
lutionary principles,  and  must  therefore  have  wit- 
nessed the  influence  of  our  own  sovereign's  domestic 
character  in  counteracting  them.  But  in  Malta  there 
were  circumstances  which  rendered  such  an  example 
peculiarly  requisite  and  beneficent.  The  very  exist- 
ence, for  so  many  generations,  of  an  Order  of  Lay 
Caflibates  in  that  island,  who  abandoned  even  the 
outward  shows  of  an  adherence  to  their  vow  of  chas- 
tity, must  have  had  pernicious  effects  on  the  morals 
of  the  inhabitants.  But  when  it  is  considered  too  that 
the  Knights  of  Malta  had  been  for  the  last  fifty  years 
or  more  a  set  of  useless  idlers,  generally  illiterate,* 
for  they  thought  literature  no  part  of  a  soldier's  ex- 
cellence ;  and  yet  effeminate,  for  they  were  soldiers 
in  name  only :  when  it  is  considered,  that  they  were, 
moreover,  all  of  them  aliens,  who  looked  upon  them- 
selves not  merely  as  of  a  superior  rank  to  the  native 
nobles,  but  as  beings  of  a  different  race  (I  had  almost 
said,  species,)  from  the  Maltese  collectively  ;  and 
finally  that  these  men  possessed  exclusively  the  go- 
vernment of  the  Island  :  it  may  be  safely  concluded 
that  they  were  little  better  than  a  perpetual  influen- 
za, relaxing  and  diseasing  the  hearts  of  all  the  fami- 
lies within  their  sphere  of  influence.  Hence  the 
peasantry,  who  fortunately  were  below  their  reach, 

*The  personal  effects  of  every  knight  were,  after  his  death, 
appropriated  to  the  Order,  and  his  books,  if  he  had  any,  de- 
volved to  the  public  library.  This  library  therefore,  which 
has  been  accumulating  from  the  time  of  their  first  settlement 
in  the  island,  is  a  lair  crilerion  of  the  nature  and  degree  of 
their  literary  studies,  as  an  average.  Even  in  respect  to 
works  of  military  science,  it  is  contemptible — as  the  sole  pub- 
lic library  of  so  numerous  and  opulent  an  order,  most  con- 
temptible— and  in  all  other  departments  of  literature  it  is  be- 
low contempt. 


notwithstanding  the  more  than  childish  ignorance  in 
which  they  were  kept  by  their  priests,  yet  compared 
with  the  middle  and  higher  classes,  were  both  in 
mind  and  body,  as  ordinary  men  compared  with 
dwarfs.  Every  respectable  family  had  some  one 
knight  for  their  patron,  as  a  matter  of  course  ;  and  to 
him  the  honor  of  a  sister  or  a  daughter  was  sacri- 
ficed, equally  as  a  matter  of  course.  But  why  should 
I  thus  disguise  the  truth?  Alas!  in  nine  instances 
out  of  ten,  this  patron  was  the  common  paramour  of 
every  female  in  the  family.  Were  I  composing  a 
state  memorial,  1  should  abstain  from  all  allusion  to 
moral  good  or  evil,  as  not  having  now  first  to  learn, 
that  with  diplomatists,  and  with  practical  statesmen 
of  every  denomination,  it  would  preclude  all  atten- 
tion to  its  other  contents,  and  have  no  result  but  that 
of  securing  for  its  author's  name  the  official  private 
mark  of  exclusion  or  dismission,  as  a  weak  or  suspi- 
cious person.  But  among  those  for  whom  I  am  now 
writing,  there  are,  I  trust,  many  who  will  think  it  not 
the  feeblest  reason  for  rejoicing  in  our  possession  of 
Malta,  and  not  the  least  worthy  motive  for  wishing 
its  retention,  that  one  source  of  human  misery  and 
corruption  has  been  dried  up.  Such  persons  will  hear 
the  name  of  Sir  Alexander  Ball  with  additional  reve- 
rence, as  of  one  who  has  made  the  protection  of  Great 
Britain  a  double  blessing  to  the  Maltese,  and  broken 
"  the  bonds  of  iniquity"  as  well  as  unlocked  the  fet- 
ters of  political  oppression. 

When  we  are  praising  the  departed  by  our  own 
fire-sides,  we  dwell  most  fondly  on  those  qualities 
which  had  won  our  personal  affection,  and  which 
sharpen  our  individual  regrets.  But  when  impelled 
by  a  loftier  and  more  meditative  sorrow,  we  would 
raise  a  public  monument  to  their  memory,  we  praise 
them  appropriately  when  we  relate  their  actions 
faithfully:  and  thus  preserving  their  example  for 
the  imitation  of  the  living,  alleviate  the  loss,  while 
we  demonstrate  its  magnitude.  My  funeral  eulogy 
of  Sir  Alexander  Ball,  must  therefore  be  a  narrative 
of  his  life ;  and  this  friend  of  mankind  will  be  de- 
frauded of  honor  in  proportion  as  that  narrative  is 
deficient  and  fragmentary.  It  shall,  however,  be  as 
complete  as  my  information  enables,  and  as  prudence 
and  a  proper  respect  for  the  feelings  of  the  living  per- 
mit me  to  render  it.  His  fame  (I  adopt  the  words  of 
our  elder  writers)  is  so  great  throughout  the  world 
that  he  stands  in  no  need  of  an  encomium  ;  and  yet 
Ins  wortb  is  much  greater  than  his  fame.  It  is  im- 
possible not  to  speak  great  things  of  him,  and  yet  it 
will  be  very  difficult  to  speak  what  he  deserves.  But 
custom  requires  that  something  should  be  said  ;  it  is 
a  duty  and  a  debt  which  we  owe  to  ourselves  and  to 
mankind,  not  less  than  to  his  memory ;  and  I  hope  his 
great  soul,  if  it  hath  any  knowledge  of  what  is  done 
here  below,  will  not  be  offended  at  the  smallness 
even  of  my  offering. 

Ah  !  how  little,  when  among  the  subjects  of  The 
Friend  I  promised  "Characters  met  with  in  Real 
Life,"  did  I  anticipate  the  sad  event,  which  compels 
me  to  weave  on  a  cypress  branch,  those  sprays  of 
laurel,  which  I  had  destined  for  his  bust,  not  his  mon- 
ument! He  lived  as  we  should  all  live;  and,  I 
541 


532 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


doubt  not,  left  the  world  as  we  should  all  wish  to 
leave  it.  Such  is  the  power  of  dispensing  blessings, 
which  Providence  has  attached  to  the  truly  great  and 
good,  that  they  cannot  even  die  without  advantage  lo 
their  fellow-creatures :  for  death  consecrates  their 
example;  and  the  wisdom,  which  might  have  been 
slighted  at  the  council-table,  becomes  oracular  from 
the  shrine.  Those  rare  excellencies,  which  make 
our  grief  poignant,  make  it  likewise  profitable  ;  and 
the  tears,  which  wise  men  shed  for  the  departure  of 
the  wise,  are  among  those  that  are  preserved  in  hea- 
ven. It  is  the  fervent  aspiration  of  my  spirit,  that  I 
may  so  perform  the  task  which  private  gratitude,  and 
public  duty  impose  on  me,  that  "as  God  hath  cut  this 
tree  of  paradise  down,  from  its  seat  of  earth,  the  dead 
trunk  may  yet  support  a  part  of  the  declining  temple, 
or  at  least  serve  to  kindle  the  fire  on  the  altar."* 


ESSAY   III. 


Si  partem  tacuisse  velim,  quodcumque  rclinquam, 
Ma.ju9  erit.    Veteres  actus,  primamque  juveritam 
Prosequar?    Ad  sese  mentem  prasenlia  ducunt. 
Narrem  justitian  ?    Resplendet  gloria  Martis. 
Armati  rcferam  vires?    Plus  egit  inermis. 

CLAUDIAN  DE  LAUD.  Stil. 

(Translation.) — If  I  desire  to  pass  over  a  part  in  silence, 
whatever  I  omit  will  sfle<n  the  most  worthy  to  have  been  re- 
corded. Shall  I  pursue  his  old  exploits  and  early  youth  ? 
His  recent  merits  recal  the  mind  to  themselves.  Shall  1 
dwell  on  his  justice?  The  glory  of  the  warrior  rises  before 
me  resplendent.  Shall  I  relate  his  strength  in  arms?  He 
performed  yet  greater  things  unarmed. 


There  is  something  (says  Harrington  in  the  Pre- 
liminaries of  the  Oceana)  first  in  the  making  of  a  com- 
monwealth, then  in  the  governing  of  it,  and  last  of 
all  in  the  leading  of  its  armies,  which  though  there 
be  great  divines,  great  lawyers,  great  men  in  all  ranks 
of  life,  seems  to  be  peculiar  only  to  the  genius  of  a 
gentleman.  For  so  it  is  in  the  universal  series  of  his- 
tory that  if  any  man  has  founded  a  commonwealth, 
he  was  first  a  gentleman.  Such  also  he  adds  as  have 
got  any  fame  as  civil  governors  have  been  gentlemen 
or  persons  of  known  descent.  Sir  Alexander  Ball  was 
a  gentleman  by  birth  ;  a  younger  brother  of  an  old  and 
respectable  family  in  Gloucestershire.  He  went  into  the 
navy  at  an  early  age  from  his  own  choice,  and  as  he 
himself  told  me,  in  consequence  of  the  deep  impression 
and  vivid  images  left  on  his  mind  by  the  perusal  of 
Robinson  Crusoe.  It  is  not  my  intention  to  detail  the 
steps  of  his  promotion,  or  the  services  in  which  he 
was  engaged  as  a  subaltern.  I  recollect  many  par- 
ticulars indeed,  but  not  the  dates  with  such  distinct- 
ness as  would  enable  me  to  state  them  (as  it  would 
be  necessary  to  do  if  I  stated  them  at  all)  in  the  order 
of  time.  These  dates  might  perhaps  have  heen  pro- 
cured from  the  metropolis:  but  incidents  that  are  nei- 
ther characteristic  nor  instructive,  even  such  as  would 
be  expected  with  reason  in  a  regular  life,  are  no  part 
of  my  plan ;  while  those  which  are  both  interesting 
and  illustrative  I  have  been  precluded  from  mention- 


♦Bp.Jer.  Taylor. 


ing,  some  from  motives  which  have  been  already  ex 
plained,  and  others  from  still  higher  considerations. 
The  most  important  of  these  may  be  deduced  from  a 
reflection  with  which  he  himself  once  concluded  a 
long  and  affecting  narration :  namely  that  no  body  of 
men  can  for  any  length  of  time  be  safely  treated  other- 
wise than  as  rational  beings;  and  that  therefore  the 
education  of  the  lower  classes  was  of  the  utmost  con- 
sequence to  the  permanent  security  of  the  empire, 
even  for  the  sake  of  our  navy.  The  dangers  appre- 
hended from  the  education  of  the  lower  classes,  arose 
(he  said)  entirely  from  its  not  being  universal,  and 
from  the  unusualness  in  the  lowest  classes  of  those 
accomplishments,  which  He,  like  Doctor  Bell,  regard- 
ed as  one  of  the  means  of  education,  and  not  as  edu- 
cation itself.t  If,  he  observed,  the  lower  classes  in 
general  possessed  but  one  eye  or  one  arm,  the  few 
who  were  so  fortunate  as  to  possess  two,  would  natu- 
rally become  vain  and  restless,  and  consider  them- 
selves as  entitled  to  a  higher  situation.  He  illustra- 
ted this  by  the  faults  attributed  to  learned  women, 
and  that  the  same  objections  were  formerly  made  to 
educating  women  at  all:  namely,  that  their  know- 
ledge made  them  vain,  affected,  and  neglectful  of 
their  proper  duties.  Now  that  all  women  of  condi- 
tion are  well-educated,  we  hear  no  more  of  these  ap- 
prehensions, or  observe  any  instances  to  justify  them. 
Yet  if  a  lady  understood  the  Greek  one-tenth  part  as 
well  as  the  whole  circle  of  her  acquaintances  under- 
stood the  French  language,  it  would  not  surprise  us 
to  find  her  less  pleasing  from  the  consciousness  of  her 
superiority  in  the  possession  of  an  unusual  advantage. 
Sir  Alexander  Ball  quoted  the  speech  of  an  old  admi- 
ral, one  of  whose  two  great  wishes  was  to  have  a 
ship's  crew  composed  altogether  of  serious  Scotch- 
men. He  spoke  with  great  reprobation  of  the  vulgar 
notion,  the  worse  man,  the  better  sailor.  Courage, 
he  said,  was  the  natural  product  of  familiarity  with 
danger,  which  thoughtlessness  would  oftentimes  turn 
into  fool-hardiness;  and  that  he  had  always  found  the 
most  usefully  brave  sailors  the  gravest  and  most  ra- 
tional of  his  crew.  The  best  sailor  he  had  ever  had, 
first  attracted  his  notice  by  the  anxiety  which  he  ex- 
pressed concerning  the  means  of  remitting  some  mo- 
ney which  he  had  received  in  the  West  Indies,  to  his 
sister  in  England ;  and  this  man,  without  any  tinge 
of  Methodism,  was  never  heard  to  swear  an  oath,  and 
was  remarkable  for  the  firmness  with  which  he  de- 
voted a  part  of  every  Sunday  to  the  reading  of  his 
Bible.  I  record  this  with  satisfaction  as  a  testimony 
of  great  weight,  and  in  all  respects  unexceptionable; 
for  Sir  Alexander  Ball's  opinions  throughout  life  re- 
mained unwarped  by  zealotry,  and  were  those  of  a 
mind  seeking  after  truth,  in  calmness  and  complete 
self-possession.  He  was  much  pleased  with  an  un- 
suspicious testimony  furnished  by  Dampier.  (Vol.  ii. 
Part  2,  page   89.)     "  I  have   particularly  observed,*' 


t  Which  consists  in  edueing,  or  to  adopt  Dr.  Bell's  own 
expression,  eliciting  the  faculties  of  the  human  mind,  and  at 
the  same  time  subordinating  them  to  the  reason  and  con- 
science; varying  the  means  of  this  common  end  according  to 
the  sphere  and  particular  mode  in  which  the  individual  is  like- 
ly to  act  and  become  useful. 

542 


THE  FRIEND. 


533 


writes  this  famous  old  navigator,  "  there  and  in  other 
places,  that  such  as  had  been  well-bred,  were  gene- 
rally most  careful  to  improve  their  time,  ami  would 
be  very  industrious  and  frugal  where  there  was  any 
probability  of  considerable  gain  ;  but  on  the  contra- 
ry, such  as  had  been  bred  up  in  ignorance  and  hard 
labor  when  they  came  to  have  plenty  would  extrava- 
gantly squander  away  their  time  and  money  in  drink- 
ing and  making  a  bluster."  Indeed  it  is  a  melancholy 
proof,  how  strangely  power  warps  the  minds  of  ordi- 
nary men,  that  there  can  be  a  doubt  on  this  subject 
among  persons  who  have  been  themselves  educated. 
It  tempts  a  suspicion,  that  unknown  to  themselves 
they  find  a  comfort  in  the  thought  that  their  inferiors 
are  something  less  than  men ;  or  that  they  have  an 
uneasy  half-consciousness  that,  if  this  were  not  the 
case,  they  would  themselves  have  no  claim  to  be 
their  superiors.  For  a  sober  education  naturally  in- 
spires self-respect.  But  he  who  respects  himself  will 
respect  others,  and  he  who  respects  both  himself  and 
others,  must  of  necessity  be  a  brave  man.  The  great 
importance  of  this  subject,  and  the  increasing  interest 
which  good  men  of  all  denominations  leel  in  the 
bringing  about  of  a  national  education,  must  be  my 
excuse  for  having  entered  so  minutely  into  Sir  Alex- 
ander Ball's  opinions  on  this  head,  in  which,  however, 
I  am  the  more  excusable,  being  now  on  that  part  of 
his  life  which  I  am  obliged  to  leave  almost  a  blank. 

During  his  lieutenancy,  and  after  he  had  perfected 
himself  in  the  knowledge  and  duties  of  a  practical 
sailor,  he  was  compelled  by  the  state  of  his  health  to 
remain  in  England  for  a  considerable  length  of  time. 
Of  this  he  industriously  availed  himself  to  the  ac- 
quirement of  substantial  knowledge  from  books ;  and 
during  his  whole  life  afterwards,  he  considered  those 
as  his  happiest  hours,  which,  without  any  neglect  of 
official  or  professional  duty,  he  could  devote  to  read- 
ing. He  preferred,  indeed  he  almost  confined  him- 
self to  history,  political  economy,  voyages  and  travels, 
natural  history,  and  latterly  agricultural  works:  in 
short,  to  such  books  as  contain  specific  facts,  or  prac- 
tical principles  capable  of  specific  application.  His 
active  life,  and  the  particular  objects  of  immediate 
utility,  some  one  of  which  he  had  always  in  his  view, 
precluded  a  taste  for  works  of  pure  speculation  and 
abstract  science,  though  he  highly  honored  those  w  ho 
were  eminent  in  these  respects,  and  considered  them 
as  the  benefactors  of  mankind,  no  less  than  those  who 
afterwards  discovered  the  mode  of  applying  their 
principles,  or  who  realized  them  in  practice.  Works 
of  amusement,  as  novels,  plays,  &c,  did  not  appear 
even  to  amuse  him:  and  the  only  poetical  composi- 
tion, of  which  I  have  ever  heard  him  speak,  was  a 
manuscript*  poem  written  by  one  of  my  friends,  which 
I  read  to  his  lady  in  his  presence.  To  my  surprise 
he  afterwards  spoke  of  this  with  warm  interest;  but 
it  was  evident  to  me,  that  it  was  not  so  much  the  po- 
etic merit  of  the  composition  that  had  interested  him. 
as  the  truth  and  psychological  insight  with  which  it 

*  Though  it  remains,  I  believe,  unpublished,  I  cannot  resist 
the  temptation  of  recording  that  it  was  Mr.  Wordswoith's 
Peter  Bell. 


represented  the  practicability  of  reforming  the  most 
hardened  minds,  and  the  various  accidents  which 
may  awaken  the  most  brutalized  person  to  a  recog- 
nition of  his  nobler  being.  I  will  add  one  remark  of 
his  own  knowledge  acquired  from  books,  which  ap- 
pears to  me  both  just  and  valuable.  The  prejudice 
against  such  knowledge,  he  said,  and  the  custom  of 
opposing  it  to  that  which  is  learnt  by  practice,  origin- 
ated in  those  times  when  books  were  almost  confined 
to  theology,  and  to  logical  and  metaphysical  subtle- 
ties ;  but  that  at  present  there  is  scarcely  any  practi- 
cal knowledge,  which  is  not  to  be  found  in  books : 
the  press  is  the  means  by  which  intelligent  men  now 
converse  with  each  other,  and  persons  of  all  classes 
and  all  pursuits  convey,  each  the  contribution  of  his 
individual  experience.  It  was  therefore,  he  said,  as 
absurd  to  hold  book-knowledge  at  present  in  contempt, 
as  it  would  be  for  a  man  to  avail  himself  only  of  his 
own  eves  and  ears,  and  to  aim  at  nothing  which  could 
not  be  performed  exclusively  by  his  own  arms.  The 
use  and  necessity  of  personal  experience  consisted  in 
the  power  of  choosing  and  applying  what  had  been 
read,  and  of  discriminating  by  the  light  of  analogy 
the  practicable  from  the  impracticable,  and  probabil- 
ity from  mere  plausibility.  Without  a  judgment  ma- 
tured and  steadied  by  actual  experience,  a  man  would 
read  to  little  or  perhaps  to  bad  purpose ;  but  yet  that 
experience,  which  in  exclusion  of  all  other  knowledge 
has  been  derived  from  one  man's  life,  is  in  the  pre- 
sent day  scarcely  worthy  of  the  name — at  least  for 
those  who  are  to  act  in  the  high  and  wider  spheres 
of  duty.  An  ignorant  general,  he  said,  inspired  him 
with  terror;  for  if  he  were  too  proud  to  take  advice 
he  would  ruin  himself  by  his  own  blunders ;  and  if 
he  were  not,  by  adopting  the  worst  that  was  offered. 
A  great  genius  may  indeed  form  an  exception;  but 
we  do  not  lay  down  rules  in  expectation  of  wonders. 
A  similar  remark  I  remember  to  have  heard  from  a 
gallant  officer,  who  to  eminence  in  professional  sci- 
ence and  the  gallantry  of  a  tried  soldier,  adds  all  the 
accomplishments  of  a  sound  scholar,  and  the  powers 
of  a  man  of  genius. 

One  incident,  which  happened  at  this  period  of  Sir 
Alexander's  life,  is  so  illustrative  of  his  character, 
and  furnishes  so  strong  a  presumption,  that  the 
thoughtful  humanity  by  which  he  was  distinguished, 
was  not  wholly  the  growth  of  his  latter  years,  that 
though  it  may  appear  to  some  trifling  in  itself,  I  will 
insert  it  in  this  place,  with  the  occasion  on  which  it 
was  communicated  to  me.  In  a  large  party  at  the 
Grand  Master's  palace,  I  had  observed  a  naval  officer 
of  distinguished  merit  listening  to  Sir  Alexander 
Ball,  whenever  he  joined  in  the  conversation,  with 
so  marked  a  pleasure,  that  it  seemed  as  if  his  very 
voice,  independent  of  what  he  said,  had  been  delight- 
ful to  him:  and  once  as  he  fixed  his  eyes  on  Sir 
Alexander  Ball,  I  could  not  but  notice  the  mixed  ex- 
pression of  awe  and  affection,  which  gave  a  more 
than  common  interest  to  so  manly  a  countenance. 
During  his  stay  in  the  island,  this  officer  honored  me 
not  unfrequently  with  his  visits;  and  at  the  conclu- 
sion of  my  last  conversation  with  him,  in  which  I  had 
543 


534 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


dwelt  on  the  wisdom  of  the  Governor's*  conduct  in 
a  recent  and  difficult  emergency,  he  told  me  that  he 
considered  himself  as  indebted  to  the  same  excellent 
person  for  thai  which  was  dearer  to  him  than  his  life. 
Sir  Alexander  Ball,  said  he,  has  (I  dare  say)  forgotten 
the  circumstance;  but  when  be  was  Lieutenant  Ball, 
he  was  the  officer  whom  I  accompanied  in  my  first 
boat  expedition,  being  then  a  midshipman  and  only 
in  my  fourteenth  year.  As  we  were  rowing  up  to 
the  vessel  which  we  were  to  attack,  amid  a  discharge 
of  musketry,  I  was  overpowered  by  fear,  my  knees 
trembled  under  me,  and  I  seemed  on  the  point  of 
fainting  away.  Lieutenant  Ball,  who  saw  the  condi- 
tion I  was  in,  placed  himself  close  beside  me,  and 
still  keeping  his  countenance  directed  toward  the 
enemy,  took  hold  of  my  hand,  and  pressing  it  in  the 
most  friendly  manner,  said  in  a  low  voice,  "  Courage, 
my  dear  boy,  don't  be  afraid  of  yourself!  you  will 
recover  in  a  minute  or  so — I  was  just  the  same,  when 
I  first  went  out  in  this  way."  Sir,  added  the  officer 
to  me,  it  was  as  if  an  angel  had  put  a  new  soul  into 
me.  With  the  feeling,  that  I  was  not  yet  dishonored, 
the  whole  burthen  of  agony  was  removed  ;  and  from 
that  moment  I  was  as  fearless  and  forward  as  the 
oldest  of  the  boat's  crew,  and  on  our  return  the  lieu- 
tenant spoke  highly  of  me  to  our  captain.  I  am 
scarcely  less  convinced  of  my  own  being,  than  that  I 
should  have  been  what  1  tremble  to  think  of,  if,  in- 
stead of  his  humane  encouragement,  he  had  at  that 
moment  scoffed,  threatened,  or  reviled  me.  And  this 
was  the  more  kind  in  him,  because,  as  I  afterwards 
understood,  his  own  conduct  in  his  first  trial,  had 
evinced  to  all  appearances  the  greatest  fearlessness, 
and  that  he  said  this  therefore  only  to  give  me  heart, 
and  restore  me  to  my  own  good  opinion. — This  anec- 
dote, I  trust,  will  have  some  weight  with  those  who 
may  have  lent  an  ear  to  any  of  those  vague  calum- 
nies from  which  no  naval  commander  can  secure  his 
good  name,  who  knowing  the  paramount  necessity 
of  regularity  and  strict  discipline  in  a  ship  of  war, 
adopts  an  appropriate  plan  for  the  attainment  of  these 
objects,  and  remains  constant  and  immutable  in  the 
execution.  To  an  Athenian,  who  in  praising  a  public 
functionary  had  said,  that  every  one  either  applauded 
him  or  left  him  without  censure,  a  philosopher  replied 
— "How  seldom  then  must  he  have  done  his  duty!" 
Of  Sir  Alexander  Ball's  character,  as  Captain  Ball, 
of  his  measures  as  a  disciplinarian,  and  of  the  wise 
and  dignified  principle  on  which  he  grounded  those 
measures,  I  have  already  spoken  in  a  former  part  of 
this  work,  and  must  content  myself  therefore  with 
entreating  the  reader  to  re-peruse  that  passage  as  be- 
longing to  this  place,  and  as  a  part  of  the  present 

*  Such  Sir  Alexander  Ball  was  in  reality,  and  such  was  his 
general  appellation  in  the  Mediterranean  :  I  adopt  this  title 
therefore,  to  avoid  the  ungraceful  repetition  of  his  own  name 
on  the  one  hand,  and  on  the  other  the  confusion  of  ideas, 
which  might  arise  from  the  use  of  his  real  tille,  viz.  "His 
Majesty's  civil  Commissioner  for  the  Island  of  Malta  and  its 
dependencies  ;  and  Minister  Plenipotentiary  to  the  Order  ofj 
St.  John."  This  is  not  the  place  to  expose  the  timid  and  un- 
steady policy  which  continued  the  latter  title,  or  the  petly 
jealousies  which  interfered  to  prevent  Sir  Alexander  Ball  from 
having  the  title  of  Governor  from  one  of  the  very  causes 
which  rendered  him  fitted  for  the  office. 


narration.  Ah !  little  did  I  expect  at  the  time  I 
wrote  that  account,  that  the  motives  of  delicacy 
which  then  impelled  me  to  withhold  the  name, 
would  so  soon  be  exchanged  for  the  higher  duty 
which  now  justifies  me  in  adding  it !  At  the  thought 
of  such  events  the  language  of  a  tender  superstition 
is  the  voice  of  nature  itself,  and  those  facts  alone 
presenting  themselves  to  our  memory  which  had 
left  an  impression  on  our  hearts,  we  assent  to,  and 
adopt  the  poet's  pathetic  complaint: 

"  O  Sir !  the  good  die, 


And  those  whose  hearts  are  dry  as  summer  dust 
Burn  to  the  socket." 

Thus  the  humane  plan  described  in  the  pages 
now  referred  to,  that  a  system  in  pursuance  of 
which  the  captain  of  a  man-of-war  uniformly  re- 
garded his  sentences  not  as  dependent  on  his  own 
will,  or  to  be  affected  by  the  state  of  his  feelings  at 
the  moment,  but  as  the  pre-established  determina- 
tions of  known  laws,  and  himself  as  the  voice  of  the 
law  in  pronouncing  the  sentence,  and  its  delegate  in 
enforcing  the  execution,  could  not  but  furnish  occa 
sional  food  to  the  spirit  of  detraction,  must  be  evi- 
dent to  every  reflecting  mind.  It  is  indeed  little  less 
than  impossible,  that  he,  who  in  order  to  be  effective- 
ly humane  determines  to  be  inflexibly  just,  and  who 
is  inexorable  to  his  own  feelings  when  they  would 
interrupt  the  course  of  justice;  who  looks  at  each 
particular  act  by  the  light  of  all  its  consequences, 
and  as  the  representative  of  ultimate  good  or  evil ; 
should  not  sometimes  be  charged  with  tyranny  by 
weak  minds.  And  it  is  too  certain  that  the  calumny 
will  be  willingly  believed  and  eagerly  propagated 
by  all  those,  who  would  shun  the  presence  of  an  eye 
keen  in  the  detection  of  imposture,  incapacity,  and 
misconduct,  and  of  a  resolution  as  steady  in  their  ex- 
posure. We  soon  hate  the  man  whose  qualities  we 
dread,  and  thus  have  a  double  interest,  an  interest  of 
passion  as  well  as  of  policy,  in  decrying  and  defaming 
him.  But  good  men  will  rest  satisfied  with  the  pro- 
mise made  to  them  by  the  divine  Comforter,  that  by 

HER   CHILDREN   SHALL   WISDOM   BE   JUSTIFIED. 


ESSAY   IV. 


the  generous  spirit,  who,  when  brought 

Among  the  tasks  of  real  life,    hath  wrought 
Upon  the   plan  that  pleased  his  childish  thought: 
Whose  high  endeavors  are  an  inward  light 
That  make  the  path  before  him  always  bright; 
Who  doom'd  to  go  in  company  with  Pain, 
And   Fear  and   Bloodshed,  miserable  train! 
Turns  his  necessity  to  glorious  gain; 
By  objects,  which  might  force  the  soul  to  abate 
Her  feeling,  render'd  more  compassionate. 

WORDSWORTH. 


At  the  close  of  the  American  war,  Captain  Ball 
was  entrusted  with  the  protection  and  convoying  of 
an  immense  mercantile  fleet  to  America,  and  by  his 
great  prudence  and  unexampled  attention  to  the  in 

544 


THE  FRIEND. 


535 


terests  of  all  and  each,  endeared  his  name  to  the 
American  merchants,  and  laid  the  foundation  of  that 
high  respect  and  predilection  which  both  the  Amer- 
icans and  their  government  ever  afterwards  enter- 
tained for  dim.  My  recollection  does  not  enable  me 
to  attempt  any  accuracy  in  the  date  of  circumstances, 
or  to  add  the  particulars  of  his  services  in  the  West 
Indies  and  on  the  coast  of  America.  I  now  there- 
fore merely  allude  to  the  fact  with  a  prospective 
reference  to  opinions  and  circumstances,  which  1 
s-lia.ll  have  to  mention  hereafter.  .Shortly  alter  the 
general  peace  was  established.  Captain  Ball,  who 
was  now  a  married  man,  passed  some  time  with  his 
lady  in  France,  and,  if  I  mistake  not,  at  Nantz.  At 
the  same  time,  and  in  the  same  town,  among  t lie 
other  English  visiters,  Lord  (then  Captain)  Nelson, 
happened  to  be  one.  In  consequence  of  some  punc- 
tilio, as  to  whose  business  it  was  to  pay  the  compli- 
ment of  the  first  call,  they  never  met,  and  this  trifling 
affair  occasioned  a  coldness  between  the  two  naval 
commanders,  or  in  truth  a  mutual  prejudice  against 
each  other.  Some  years  after,  both  their  ships  being 
together  close  off"  Minorca  and  near  Port  Mahon,  a 
violent  storm  nearly  disabled  Lord  Nelson's  vessel, 
and  in  addition  to  the  fury  of  the  wind,  it  was  night- 
time and  the  thickest  darkness.  Captain  Ball,  how- 
ever, brought  his  vessel  at  length  to  Xelson's  assist- 
ance, took  his  in  tow,  and  used  his  best  endeavors  to 
bring  her  and  his  own  vessel  into  Port  Mahon.  The 
difficulties  and  the  dangers  increased.  Nelson  con- 
sidered the  case  of  his  own  ship  as  desperate,  and 
that  unless  she  was  immediately  left  to  her  own  fate, 
both  vessels  would  inevitably  be  lost.  He,  therefore, 
with  the  generosity  natural  to  him,  repeatedly  re- 
quested Captain  Ball  to  let  him  loose  ;  and  on  Cap- 
tain Ball's  refusal,  he  became  impetuous,  and  enforced 
his  demand  with  passionate  threats.  Captain  Ball 
then  himself  took  the  speaking-trumpet,  which  the 
fury  of  the  wind  and  the  waves  rendered  necessary, 
and  with  great  solemnity  and  without  the  least  dis- 
turbance of  temper,  called  in  reply,  "  1  feel  confident 
that  I  can  bring  you  in  safe;  I  therefore  must  not, 
and,  bv  the  help  of  Almighty  God!  I  will  not  leave 
you  !"'  What  he  promised  he  performed  ;  and  after 
they  were  safely  anchored,  Nelson  came  on  board 
of  Ball's  ship,  and  embracing  him  with  all  the  ardor 
of  acknowledgement,  exclaimed — "  a  friend  in  need 
is  a  friend  indeed  !"  At  this. time  and  on  this  occa- 
sion commenced  that  firm  and  perfect  friendship 
between  those  two  great  men,  which  was  interrupted 
only  by  the  death  of  the  former.  The  pleasing  task 
of  dwelling  on  this  mutual  attachment  I  defer  to  that 
part  of  the  present  sketch  which  will  relate  to  Sir 
Alexander  Ball's  opinions  of  men  a;id  things.  It  will 
be  sufficient  for  the  present  to  say,  that  the  two  men, 
whom  Lord  Nelson  especially  honored,  were  Sir 
Thomas  Troubridge  and  Sir  Alexander  Ball  ;  and 
once,  when  they  were  both  present,  on  some  allusion 
made  to  the  loss  of  his  arm,  he  replied,  "  who  shall 
dare  to  tell  me  that  I  want  an  arm,  when  I  have 
three  right  arms  —  this  (putting  forth  his  own)  and 
Ball,  and  Troubridge." 
In  the  plan  of  the  battle  of  the  Nile  it  was  Lord 
Ww 


Nelson's  design,  that  Captains  Troubridge  and  Ball 
should  have  led  up  the  attack.  The  former  was 
stranded;  and  the  latter,  by  accident  of  the  wind, 
could  not  bring  his  ship  into  the  line  of  battle  till 
some  lime  after  the  engagement  had  become  general. 
With  his  characteristic  forecast  and  activity  of  (what 
may  not  improperly  be  called)  practical  imagination, 
he  had  made  arrangements  to  meet  every  probable 
contingency.  All  the  shrouds  and  sails  of  the  ship, 
not  absolutely  necessary  for  its  immediate  manage- 
ment, were  thoroughlv  wetted  and  so  rolled  up,  that 
t hex'  were  as  hard  and  as  little  inflammable  as  so 
many  solid  cylinders  of  wood ;  every  sailor  had  his 
appropriate  place  and  function,  and  a  certain  number 
were  appointed  as  the  firemen,  whose  sole  duty  it 
was  to  be  on  the  watch  if  any  part  of  the  vessel 
should  take  fire:  and  to  these  men  exclusively  the 
charge  of  extinguishing  it  was  committed.  It  was 
already  dark  when  he  brought  his  ship  into  action, 
and  laid  her  alongside  l'Orient.  One  particular  only 
I  shall  add  to  the  known  account  of  the  memorable 
engagement  between  these  ships,  and  this  I  received 
from  Sir  Alexander  Ball  himself.  He  had  previously 
made  a  combustible  preparation,  but  which  from  the 
nature  of  the  engagement  to  be  expected,  he  had 
purposed  to  reserve  for  the  last  emergency.  But  just 
at  the  time  when,  from  several  symptoms,  he  had 
every  reason  to  believe  that  the  enemy  would  soon 
strike  to  him,  one  of  the  lieutenants,  without  his 
know  ledge,  threw  in  the  combustible  matter  ;  and 
this  it  was  that  occasioned  the  tremendous  explosion 
of  that  vessel,  which,  with  the  deep  silence  and  in- 
terruption of  the  engagement  which  succeeded  to  it, 
has  been  justly  deemed  the  sublimest  war  incident 
recorded  in  history.  Yet  the  incident  which  follow- 
ed, and  which  has  not,  1  believe,  been  publicly  made 
known,  is  scarcely  less  impressive,  though  its  sub- 
limity is  of  a  different  character.  At  the  renewal  of 
the  battle,  Captain  Ball,  though  his  ship  was  then  on 
fire  in  three  different  parts,  laid  her  alongside  a 
French  eighty-four:  and  a  second  longer  obstinate 
contest  began.  The  firing  of  the  enemy  having  then  al- 
together ceased,  and  yet  no  sign  given  of  surrender, 
the  senior  lieutenant  came  to  Captain  Ball  and  in- 
formed him,  that  the  hearts  of  his  men  were  as  good 
as  ever,  but  that  they  were  so  completely  exhausted, 
that  they  were  scarcely  capable  of  liiiing  an  arm. 
lie  asked,  therefore,  whether,  as  the  enemy  had  now 
ceased  firing,  the  men  might  be  permitted  to  lie 
down  by  their  guns  for  a  short  time.  After  some 
reflection,  Sir  Alexander  acceded  to  the  proposal, 
taking  of  course  the  proper  precautions  to  rouse 
them  again  at  the  moment  he  thought  requisite. 
Accordingly,  with  the  exception  of  himself,  his  offi- 
cers, and  the  appointed  watch,  the  ship's  crew  lay 
down,  each  in  the  place  to  which  he  was  stationed, 
and  slept  for  twenty  minutes.  They  were  then 
roused  ;  and  started  up,  as  Sir  Alexander  expressed 
it,  more  like  men  out  of  an  ambush  than  from  sleep, 
so  coinsfantaneously  did  they  all  obey  the  summons! 
They  recommenced  their  fire,  and  in  a  few  minutes 
the  enemy  surrendered  ;  and  it  was  soon  after  dis- 
covered, that  during  that  interval,  and  almost  im- 
545 


536 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


mediately  after  the  French  ship  had  first  ceased 
firing,  the  crew  had  sunk  down  by  their  guns,  and 
there  slept  almost  by  the  side,  as  it  were,  Of  their 
sleeping  enemy. 


ESSAY   V. 


Whose  powers  shed  round  him  in  the  common  strife, 

Or  mild  concerns,  of  ordinary  life, 

A  constant  influence,  a  peculiar  grace; 

But  who  if  he  he  call'd  upon  to  face 

Some  awful  moment,  to  which  heaven  has  join'd 

Great  issues,  good  or  bad  for  human  kind, 

Is  happy  as  a  lover,  is  attired 

With  sudden  brightness  like  a  man  inspired  ; 

And  through  the  heat  of  conflict  keeps  the  law 

In  calmness  made,  and  sees  what  he  foresaw. 

WORDSWORTH. 


An  accessibility  to  the  sentiments  of  others  on  sub- 
jects of  importance  often  accompanies  feeble  minds, 
yet  it  is  not  the  less  a  true  and  constituent  part  of 
practical  greatness,  when  it  exists  wholly  free  from 
that  passiveness  to  impression  which  renders  counsel 
itself  injurious  to  certain  characters,  and  from  that 
weakness  of  heart  which,  in  the  literal  sense  of  the 
word,  is  always  craving  advice.  Exempt  from  all 
such  imperfections,  say  rather  in  perfect  harmony 
with  the  excellencies  that  preclude  them,  this  open- 
ness to  the  influxes  of  good  sense  and  information, 
from  whatever  quarter  they  might  come,  equally 
characterized  both  Lord  INelson  and  Sir  Alexander 
Ball,  though  each  displayed  it  in  the  way  best  suited 
to  his  natural  temper.  The  former  with  easy  hand 
collected,  as  it  passed  by  him,  whatever  could  add  to 
his  own  stores,  appropriated  what  he  could  assimilale, 
and  levied  subsidies  of  knowledge  from  all  the  acci- 
dents of  social  life  and  familiar  intercourse.  Even  at 
the  jovial  board,  and  in  the  height  of  unrestrained 
merriment,  a  casual  suggestion,  that  flashed  a  new 
light  on  his  mind,  changed  the  boon  companion  into 
the  hero  and  the  man  of  genius ;  and  with  the  most 
graceful  transition  he  would  make  his  company  as 
serious  as  himself.  When  the  taper  of  his  genius 
seemed  extinguished,  it  was  still  surrounded  by  an 
inflammable  atmosphere  of  ils  own  and  rekindled  at 
the  first  approach  of  light,  and  not  seldom  at  a  dis- 
tance which  made  it  seem  to  flame  up  self-revived. 
In  Sir  Alexander  Ball,  the  same  excellence  was  more 
an  affair  of  system  :  and  he  would  listen  even  to  weak 
men  with  a  patience,  which,  in  so  careful  an  econo- 
mist of  time,  always  demanded  my  admiration,  and 
not  seldom  excited  my  wonder.  It  was  one  of  his 
maxims,  that  a  man  may  suggest  what  he  cannot 
give:  adding  that  a  wild  or  silly  plan  had  more  lhan 
once,  from  the  vivid  sense,  and  distinct  perception  of 
its  folly,  occasioned  him  to  see  what  ought  to  be  done 
in  a  new  light,  or  with  a  clearer  insight.  There  is, 
indeed,  a  hopeless  sterility,  a  mere  negation  of  sense 
and  thought,  which,  suggesting  neither  difference  nor 


contrast,  cannot  even  furnish  hints  for  recollection. 
But  on  the  other  hand,  there  are  minds  so  whimsi- 
cally constituted  that  they  may  sometimes  be  profita- 
bly interpreted  by  contraries,  a  process  of  which  the 
great  Tycho  Brache  is  said  to  have  availed  himself 
in  the  case  of  the  little  Lackwit,  who  used  to  sit  and 
mutter  at  his  feet  while  he  was  studying.  A  mind 
of  this  sort  we  may  compare  to  a  magnetic  needle, 
the  poles  of  which  had  been  suddenly  reversed  by  a 
flash  of  lightning,  or  other  more  obscure  accident  of 
nature.  It  may  be  safely  concluded,  that  to  those 
whose  judgment  or  information  he  respected,  Sir 
Alexander  Ball  did  not  content  himself  with  giving 
access  and  attention.  No !  he  seldom  failed  of  con- 
sulting them  whenever  the  subject  permitted  any 
disclosure;  and  where  secresy  was  necessary,  he 
well  knew  how  to  acquire  their  opinion  without 
exciting  even  a  conjecture  concerning  his  immediate 
object. 

Yet,  with  all  this  readiness  of  attention,  and  with 
all  this  zeal  in  collecting  the  sentiments  of  the  well 
informed,  never  was  a  man  more  completely  uninflu- 
enced by  authority  than  Sir  Alexander  Ball,  never 
one  who  sought  less  to  tranquillize  his  own  doubts  bv 
the  mere  suffrage  and  coincidence  of  others.  The 
ablest  suggestions  had  no  conclusive  weight  with 
him,  till  he  had  abstracted  the  opinion  from  its  au- 
llior,  till  he  had  reduced  it  into  a  part  of  his  own 
mind.  The  thoughts  of  others  were  always  accept- 
able as  affording  him  at  least  a  chance  of  adding  to 
his  materials  for  reflection ;  but  they  never  directed 
his  judgment,  much  less  superseded  it.  He  even 
made  a  point  of  guarding  against  additional  confi- 
dence in  the  suggestions  of  his  own  mind,  from  find- 
ing that  a  person  of  talents  had  formed  the  same 
conviction  :  unless  the  person,  at  the  same  time,  fur- 
nished some  new  argument  or  had  arrived  at  the 
same  conclusion  by  a  different  road.  On  the  latter 
circumstance  he  set  an  especial  value,  and,  I  may  al- 
most say,  courted  the  company  and  conversation  of 
those,  whose  pursuits  had  least  resembled  his  own,  if 
he  thought  them  men  of  clear  and  comprehensive 
faculties.  During  the  period  of  our  intimacy,  scarcely 
a  week  passed  in  which  he  did  not  desire  me  to  think 
on  some  particular  subject, and  to  give  him  the  result 
in  writing.  Most  frequently  by  the  time  1  had  ful- 
filled his  request,  he  would  have  written  down  his 
own  thoughts,  and  then,  with  the  true  simplicity  of  a 
great  mind,  as  free  from  ostentation,  as  it  was  above 
jealousy,  he  would  collate  the  two  papers  in  my  pre- 
sence, and  never  expressed  more  pleasure  lhan  in  the 
few  instances  in  which  I  had  happened  In  light  on  all 
the  arguments  and  points  of  view  which  had  oc- 
curred to  himself,  with  some  additional  reasons  which 
had  escaped  him.  A  single  new  argument  delighted 
him  more  than  the  most  perfect  coincidence,  unless, 
as  before  stated,  the  train  of  thought  had  been  very 
different  from  his  own  and  yet  just  and  logical.  He 
had  one  quality  of  mind,  which  I  have  heard  attrib- 
uted to  the  late  Mr.  Fox,  that  of  deriving  a  keen  plea- 
sure from  clear  and  powerful  reasoning  for  its  own 
sake,  a  quality  in  the  intellect  which  is  nearly  con- 
546 


THE  FRIEND. 


537 


nected  with  veracity  and  a  love  of  justice  in  the 
moral  character.* 

Valuing  in  others  merits  which  he  himself  pos- 
sessed. Sir  Alexander  Ball  felt  no  jealous  apprehen- 
sion of  great  talent.  Unlike  those  vulgar  functiona- 
ries, whose  place  is  too  big  for  them,  a  truth  which 
they  attempt  to  disguise  from  themselves,  and  yet 
feel,  he  was  under  no  necessity  of  arming  himself 
against  the  natural  superiority  of  genius  by  factitious 
contempt  and  an  industrious  association  of  extrava- 
gance and  impracticability,  with  every  deviation 
from  the  ordinary  routine;  as  the  geographers  in  the 
middle  ages  used  to  designate  on  their  meagre  maps, 
the  greater  part  of  the  world,  as  deserts  or  wilder- 
nesses, inhabited  by  griffins  and  chimeras.  Compe- 
tent to  weigh  each  system  or  project  by  its  own  argu- 
ments, he  did  not  need  these  preventive  charms  and 
cautionary  amulets  against  delusion.  He  endeavored 
to  make  talent  instrumental  to  his  purposes  in  what- 
ever shape  it  appeared,  and  with  whatever  imperfec- 
tions it  might  be  accompanied;  but  wherever  talent 
was  blended  with  moral  worth,  he  sought  it  out, 
loved  and  cherished  it.  If  it  had  pleased  Providence 
to  preserve  his  life,  and  to  place  him  on  the  same 
course  on  which  Nelson  ran  his  race  of  glory,  there 
are  two  points  in  which  Sir  Alexander  Ball  would 
most  closely  have  resembled  his  illustrious  friend. 
The  first  is,  that  in  his  enterprises  and  engagements 
he  would  have  thought  nothing  done,  till  all  had  been 
done  that  was  possible : 

"Nil  actum  reputans,  si  quid  superesset  agendum." 

The  second,  that  he  would  have  called  forth  all  the 
talent  and  virtue  that  existed  within  his  sphere  of 
influence,  and  created  a  band  of  heroes,  a  gradation 
of  officers,  strong  in  head  and  strong  in  heart,  worthy 
to  have  been  his  companions  and  his  successors  in 
fame  and  public  usefulness. 

Never  was  greater  discernment  shown  in  the  se- 
lection of  a  fit  agent,  than  when  Sir  Alexander  Ball 
was  stationed  off  the  coast  of  Malta  to  intercept  the 
supplies  destined  for  the  French  garrison,  and  to 
watch  the  movements  of  the  French  commanders, 
and  those  of  the  inhabitants  who  had  been  so  basely 
betrayed  into  their  power.  Encouraged  by  the  well- 
timed  promises  of  the  English  captain,  the  Maltese 
rose  through  all  their  casals  (or  country  towns)  and 


*  It  may  not  be  amiss  to  add,  that  the  pleasure  from  the 
perception  of  truth  was  so  well  poised  and  regulated  by  the 
equal  or  greater  delight  in  utility,  that  his  love  of  real  accu- 
racy was  accompanied  with  a  proportionate  dislike  of  ilinl 
hollow  appearance  of  it,  which  may  be  produced  by  turns  of 
phrase,  words  placed  in  balanced  antithesis,  and  those  epi- 
grammatic points  that  puss  for  subtle  and  luminous  distinc- 
tions with  ordinary  readers,  but  are  most  commonly  translata- 
ble into  mere  truisms  or  trivialities,  if  indeed  they  contain  any 
meaning  at  all.  Having  observed  in  some  casual  conversation, 
that  though  there  were  doubtless  masses  of  matter  unorgan- 
ized, I  saw  no  ground  for  asserting  a  mass  of  unorganized 
matter;  Sir  A.  B.  paused  and  then  said  to  me,  with  that 
frankness  of  manner  which  made  his  very  rebukes  gratifying, 
"The  distinction  is  just-,  and  now  I  understand  you,  abun- 
dantly obvious;  but  hardly  worth  the  trouble  of  inventing  a 
puzzle  of  words  to  make  it  appear  otherwise."  I  trust  the 
rebuke  was  not  lost  on  me. 


themselves  commenced  the  work  of  their  emancipa- 
tion, by  storming  the  citadel  at  Civita  Veccbia,  the 
ancient  metropolis  of  Malta,  and  the  central  height 
of  the  island.  Without  discipline,  without  a  military 
leader,  and  almost  without  arms,  these  brave  peasants 
succeeded,  and  destroyed  the  French  garrison  by 
throwing  them  over  the  battlements  into  the  trench 
of  the  citadel.  Jn  the  course  of  this  blockade,  and  of 
the  tedious  siege  of  Vallette,  Sir  Alexander  Ball  dis- 
played all  that  strength  of  character,  that  variety  and 
versatility  of  talent,  and  that  sagacity,  derived  in  part 
from  habitual  circumspection,  but  which,  when  the 
occasion  demanded  it,  appeared  intuitive  and  like  an 
instinct;  at  the  union  of  which,  in  the  same  man,  one 
of  our  oldest  naval  commanders  once  told  me,  "  lie 
could  never  exhaust  his  wonder."  The  citizens  of 
Vallette  were  fond  of  relating  their  astonishment,  and 
that  of  the  French,  at  Captain  Ball's  ship  wintering 
at  anchor  out  of  the  reach  of  the  guns,  in  a  depth  of 
fathom  unexampled,  on  the  assured  impracticability 
of  which  the  garrison  had  rested  their  main  hope  of 
regular  supplies.  Nor  can  I  forget,  or  remember 
without  some  portion  of  my  original  feeling,  the  so- 
lemn enthusiasm  with  which  a  venerable  old  man, 
belonging  to  one  of  the  distant  casals,  showed  me  the 
sea  coombe,  where  their  father  Ball  (for  so  they 
commonly  called  him)  first  landed  ;  and  afterwards 
pointed  out  the  very  place,  on  which  he  first  stepped 
on  their  island,  while  the  countenances  of  his  towns- 
men, who  accompanied  him,  gave  lively  proofs,  that 
the  old  man's  enthusiasm  was  the  representative  of 
the  common  feeling. 

There  is  no  reason  to  suppose,  that  Sir  Alexander 
Ball  was  at  any  time  chargeable  with  that  weakness 
so  frequent  in  Englishmen,  and  so  injurious  to  our 
interests  abroad,  of  despising  the  inhabitants  of  oilier 
countries,  of  losing  all  their  good  qualities  in  their 
vices,  of  making  no  allowance  for  those  vices,  from 
their  religious  or  political  impediments,  and  still  more 
of  mistaking  for  vices,  a  mere  difference  of  manners 
and  customs.  But  if  ever  he  had  any  of  this  errone- 
ous feeling,  he  completely  freed  himself  from  it,  by 
living  among  the  Maltese  during  their  arduous  trials, 
as  long  as  the  French  continued  masters  of  the  capi- 
tal. He  witnessed  their  virtues,  and  learnt  to  under- 
stand in  what  various  shapes  and  even  disguises  the 
valuable  parts  of  human  nature  may  exist.  In  many 
individuals,  whose  littleness  and  meanness  in  the 
common  intercourse  of  life  would  have  stamped 
them  at  once  as  contemptible  and  worthless,  with  or- 
dinary Englishmen,  he  had  found  such  virtues  of  dis- 
interested patriotism,  fortitude,  and  self-denial,  as 
would  have  done  honor  to  an  ancient  Roman. 

There  exists  in  England,  &  gentlemanly  character, 
a  gentlemanly  feeling,  very  different  even  from  that, 
which  is  the  most  like  it,  the  character  of  a  well-born 
Spaniard,  and  unexampled  in  the  rest  of  Europe. 
This  feeling  probably  originated  in  the  fortunate  cir- 
cumstance, that  the  titles  of  our  English  nobility  fol- 
low the  law  of  their  property,  and  are  inherited  by 
the  eldest  sons  only.  From  this  source,  under  the  in- 
fluences of  our  constitution,  and  of  our  astonishing 
trade,  it  has  diffused  itself  in  different  modifications 
547 


538 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


through  the  whole  country.  The  uniformity  of  our 
dress  among  all  classes  above  that  of  the  day  laborer, 
while  it  has  authorized  all  classes  to  assume  the  ap- 
pearance of  gentlemen,  has  at  the  same  time  inspired 
the  wish  to  conform  their  manners,  and  still  more 
their  ordinary  actions  in  social  intercourse,  to  their 
notions  of  the  gentlemanly,  the  most  commonly  re- 
ceived attribute  of  which  character,  is  a  certain  gen- 
erosity in  trifles.  On  the  other  hand,  the  encroach- 
ments of  the  lower  classes  on  the  higher,  occasioned 
and  favored  by  this  resemblance  in  exteriors,  by  this 
absence  of  any  cognizable  marks  of  distinction,  have 
rendered  each  class  more  reserved  and  jealous  in 
their  general  communion,  and  far  more  than  our  cli- 
mate, or  natural  temper,  have  caused  that  haughti- 
ness and  reserve  in  our  outward  demeanor,  which  is 
so  generally  complained  of  among  foreigners.  Far 
be  it  from  me  to  depreciate  the  value  of  this  gentle- 
manly feeling :  I  respect  it  under  all  its  forms  and  va- 
rieties, from  the  House  of  Commons  to  the  gentlemen 
in  the  one-shilling  gallery.  It  is  always  the  ornament  of 
virtue,  and  oftentimes  a  support ;  but  it  is  a  wretched 
substitute  for  it.  Its  tvorth,  as  a  moral  good,  is  by  no 
means  in  proportion  toils  value,  as  a  social  advantage. 
These  observations  are  not  irrelevant ;  for  to  the 
want  of  reflection,  that  this  diffusion  of  gentlemanly 
feeling  among  us,  is  not  the  growth  of  our  moral  ex- 
cellence, but  the  effect  of  various  accidental  advan- 
tages peculiar  to  England  ;  to  our  not  considering 
that  it  is  unreasonable  and  uncharitable  to  expect  the 
same  consequences,  where  the  same  causes  have  not 
existed  to  produce  them  ;  and,  lastly,  to  our  proneness 
to  regard  the  absence  of  this  character  (which,  as  I 
have  before  said,  does,  for  the  greater  part,  and,  in 
the  common  apprehension,  consist  in  a  certain  frank- 
ness and  generosity  in  the  detail  of  action)  as  decisive 
against  the  sum  total  of  personal  or  national  worth  ; 
we  must,  I  am  convinced,  attribute  a  large  portion  of 
that  conduct,  which  in  many  instances  has  left  the  in- 
habitants of  countries  conquered  or  appropriated  by 
Great  Britain,  doubtful  whether  the  various  solid  ad- 
vantages which  they  derived  lrom  our  protection  and 
just  government,  were  not  bought  dearly  by  the 
wounds  inflicted  on  their  feelings  and  prejudices,  by 
the  contemptuous  and  insolent  demeanor  of  the  En- 
glish as  individuals.  The  reader  who  bears  this  re- 
mark in  mind,  will  meet,  in  the  course  of  this  narra- 
tion, more  than  one  passage  that  will  serve  as  its 
comment  and  illustration. 

It  was,  I  know,  a  general  opinion  among  the  En- 
glish in  the  Mediterranean,  that  Sir  Alexander  Ball 
thought  too  well  of  the  Maltese,  and  did  not  share  in 
the  enthusiasm  of  Britons,  concerning  their  own  supe- 
riority. To  the  former  part  of  the  charge,  I  shall  only 
reply  at  present,  that  a  more  venial,  and  almost  desi- 
rable fault,  can  scarcely  be  attributed  to  a  governor, 
than  that  of  a  strong  attachment  to  the  people  whom 
he  was  sent  to  govern.  The  latter  part  of  the  charge 
is  false,  if  we  are  to  understand  by  it,  that  he  did  not 
think  his  countrymen  superior  on  the  whole  to  other 
nations  of  Europe  ;  but  it  is  true,  as  far  as  relates  to 
his  belief,  that  the  English  thought  themselves  still 
better  than  they  are;  that  they  dwelt  on.  and  exag- 


gerated their  national  virtues,  and  weighed  them  by 
the  opposite  vices  of  foreigners,  instead  of  the  virtues 
which  those  foreigners  possessed,  and  they  them- 
selves wanted.  Above  all,  as  statesmen,  we  must 
consider  qualities  by  their  practical  uses.  Thus — he 
entertained  no  doubt,  that  the  English  were  superior 
to  all  others  in  the  kind,  and  the  degree  of  their  cou- 
rage, which  is  marked  by  far  greater  enthusiasm, 
than  the  courage  of  the  Germans  and  northern  na- 
tions, and  by  a  far  greater  steadiness  and  self-subsis- 
tence, than  that  of  the  French.  It  is  more  closely- 
connected  with  the  character  of  the  individual.  The 
courage  of  an  English  army  (he  used  to  say)  is  the 
sum  total  of  the  courage  which  the  individual  sol- 
diers bring  with  them  to  it,  rather  than  of  that  which 
they  derive  from  it.  This  remark  of  Sir  Alexander's 
was  forcibly  recalled  to  my  mind,  when  I  was  at  Na- 
ples. A  Russian  and  an  English  regiment  were 
drawn  up  together  in  the  same  square  —  "  See,"  said 
the  Neapolitan  to  me,  who  had  mistaken  me  for  one 
of  his  countrymen,  "  there  is  but  one  face  in  that 
whole  regiment,  while  in  that"  (pointing  to  the  En- 
glish) "  every  soldier  has  a  face  of  his  own."  On  the 
other  hand,  there  are  qualities  scarcely  less  requisite 
to  the  completion  of  the  military  character,  in  which 
Sir  A.  did  not  hesitate  to  think  the  English  inferior  to 
the  continental  nations:  as  for  instance,  both  in  the 
power  and  the  disposition  to  endure  privations;  in 
the  friendly  temper  necessary,  when  troops  of  differ- 
ent nations  are  to  act  in  concert ;  in  their  obedience 
to  the  regulations  of  their  commanding  officers,  re- 
specting the  treatment  of  the  inhabitants  of  the  coun- 
tries through  which  they  are  marching ;  as  well  as  in 
many  other  points,  not  immediately  connected  with 
their  conduct  in  the  field  ;  and,  above  all.  in  sobriety 
and  temperance.  During  the  siege  of  Vallette,  espe- 
cially during  the  sore  distress  to  which  the  besiegers 
were  for  some  time  exposed  from  the  failure  of  provi- 
sion, Sir  Alexander  Ball  had  an  ample  opportunity 
of  observing  and  weighing  the  separate  merits  and 
demerits  of  the  native,  and  of  the  English  troops  ; 
and  surely  since  the  publication  of  Sir  John  Moore's 
campaign,  there  can  be  no  just  offence  taken,  though 
I  should  say,  that  before  the  walls  of  Vallette,  as 
well  as  in  the  plains  of  Gallieia,  an  indignant  com- 
mander might,  with  too  great  propriety,  have  ad- 
dressed the  English  soldiery  in  the  words  of  an  old 
Dramatist — 

Will  you  still  owe  your  virtues  to  your  bpllies? 
And  only  then  think  nobly  when  y'  are  full? 
Doth  fodder  keep  you  honest  ?    Are  you  bad 
When  out  of  flesh  ?    And  think  you  't  an  excuse 
Of  vde  and  ignominious  actions,  that 
Y'  are  lean  and  out  of  likinp? 

CARTWRIGHT'S  Love's  Convert. 

From  the  first  insurrectionary  movement  to  the 
final  departure  of  the  French  from  the  Island,  though 
the  civil  and  military  powers  and  the  whole  of  the 
Island,  save  Vallette,  were  in  the  hands  of  the  pea- 
santry, not  a  single  act  of  excess  can  be  charged 
against  the  Maltese,  if  we  except  the  razing  of  one 
house  at  Civita  Vecchia  belonging  to  a  notorious  and 
abandoned  traitor,  the  creature  and  hireling  of  the 
548 


THE  FRIEND. 


539 


French.  In  no  instance  did  they  injure,  insult,  or 
plunder,  any  one  of  the  native  nobility,  or  employ 
even  the  appearance  of  force  toward  them,  except  in 
the  collection  of  the  lead  and  iron  from  their  houses 
and  gardens,  in  order  to  supply  themselves  with  bul- 
lets: and  this  very  appearance  was  assumed  from 
the  generous  wish  to  shelter  the  nobles  from  the  re- 
sentment of  the  French,  should  the  patriotic  efforts 
of  the  peasantry  prove  unsuccessful.  At  the  dire 
command  of  famine  the  Maltese  troops  did  indeed 
once  force  their  way  to  the  ovens,  in  which  the  bread 
for  the  British  soldiery  was  baked,  and  were  clamor- 
ous that  an  equal  division  should  be  made.  I  men- 
tion this  unpleasant  circumstance,  because  it  brought 
into  proof  the  firmness  of  Sir  Alexander  Ball's  char- 
acter, his  presence  of  mind,  and  generous  disregard 
of  danger  and  personal  responsibility,  where  the  sla- 
very' or  emancipation,  the  misery  or  the  happiness, 
of  an  innocent  and  patriotic  people  were  involved  ; 
and  because  his  conduct  in  this  exigency  evinced, 
that  his  general  habits  of  circumspection  and  delibe- 
ration were  the  result  of  wisdom  and  complete  self- 
possession,  and  not  the  easy  virtues  of  a  spirit  consti- 
tutionally timorous  and  hesitating.  He  was  sitting 
at  table  with  the  principal  British  officers,  when  a 
certain  general  addressed  him  in  strong  and  violent 
terms  concerning  this  outrage  of  the  Maltese,  re- 
minding him  of  the  necessity  of  exerting  his  com- 
manding influence  in  the  present  case,  or  the  conse- 
quences must  be  taken.  "  What,"  replied  Sir  Alex- 
ander Ball,  "  would  you  have  us  do  ?  Would  vou 
have  us  threaten  death  to  men  dying  with  famine? 
Can  you  suppose  that  the  hazard  of  being  shot  will 
weigh  with  whole  regiments  acting  under  a  common 
necessity?  Does  not  the  extremity  of  hunger  take 
away  all  difference  between  men  and  animals  ?  and 
is  it  not  as  absurd  to  appeal  to  the  prudence  of  a 
body  of  men  starving,  as  to  a  herd  of  famished 
wolves  ?  No,  general,  I  will  not  degrade  myself  or 
outrage  humanity  by  menacing  famine  with  massa- 
cre!  More  effectual  means  must  be  taken."  With 
these  words  he  rose  and  left  the  room,  and  having 
first  consulted  with  Sir  Thomas  Troubridge,  he  de- 
termined at  his  own  risk  on  a  step,  which  the  ex- 
treme necessity  warranted,  and  which  the  conduct 
of  the  Neapolitan  court  amply  justified.  For  this 
court,  though  terror-strieken  by  the  French,  was  still 
actuated  by  hatred  to  the  English,  and  a  jealousy  of 
their  power  in  the  Mediterranean  :  and  this  in  so 
strange  and  senseless  a  manner,  that  we  must  join 
the  extremes  of  imbecility  and  treachery  in  the  same 
cabinet,  in  order  to  find  it  comprehensible*     Though 


*  It  cannot  bo  doubted,  that  the  sovereign  himself  was  kept 
in  a  slate  of  delusion.  Both  his  understanding  anil  his  moral 
principles  are  far  better  than  could  reasonably  be  expected 
from  the  infamous  mode  of  his  education  :  if  indeed  the  sys- 
tematic preclusion  of  all  knowledge,  and  the  unrestrained 
indulgence  of  his  passions,  adopted  by  the  Spanish  court  for 
the  purposes  of  preserving  him  dependent,  can  be  called  by 
the  name  of  education.  Of  the  other  influencing  persona  in 
the  Neapolitan  government,  Mr.  Leckie  has  eiven  us  a  irue 
and  lively  account.  It  will  be  greatly  to  the  advantage  of  i he- 
present  narration,  if  the  reader  should  have  previously  pe- 
rused Mr.  J.eekir's  pamphlet  on  the  slate  of  Sicily  :  the  fuels 
which  I  shall  have  occasion  to  meniion  hereafter  will  recipro- 
W  w  2 


the  very  existence  of  Naples  and  Sicily,  as  a  nation, 
depended  wholly  and  exclusively  on  British  support ; 
though  the  royal  family  owed  their  personal  safety  to 
the  British  fleet  :  1  lion l: > i  not  only  their  dominions  and 
their  rank,  but  the  liberty  and  even  the  lives  of  Fer- 
dinand and  Ins  family,  were  interwoven  with  our 
success;  yet  with  an  infatuation  scarcely  credible, 
the  most  affecting  representations  of  the  distress  of 
the  besiegers,  and  of  the  utter  insecurity  of  Sicily  if 
the  French  remained  possessors  of  Malta,  were 
treated  with  neglect ;  and  the  urgent  remonstrances 
for  the  permission  of  importing  corn  from  Messina, 
were  answered  only  by  sanguinary  edicts  precluding 
all  supply.  Sir  Alexander  Ball  sent  for  his  senior 
lieutenant,  and  gave  him  orders  to  proceed  imme- 
diately to  the  port  of  Messina,  and  there  to  seize  and 
bring  with  liim  to  Malta  the  Bhips  laden  with  corn. 
of  the  number  of  which  Sir  Alexander  had  received 
accurate  information.  These  orders  were  executed 
without  delay,  to  the  great  delight  and  profit  of  the 
ship  owners  and  proprietors;  the  necessity  of  raising 
the  siege  was  removed  ;  and  the  author  of  the  mea- 
sure waited  in  calmness  for  the  consequences  that 
might  result  to  himself  personally-  But  not  a  com- 
plaint, not  a  murmur  proceeded  from  the  court  of 
Naples.  The  sole  result  was,  that  the  governor  of 
Malta  became  an  especial  object  of  its  hatred,  its  fear, 
and  its  respect. 

The  whole  of  this  tedious  siege,  from  its  commence- 
ment to  the  signing  of  the  capitulation,  called  forth 
into  constant  activity  the  rarest  and  most  difficult  vir- 
tues of  a  commanding  mind  ;  virtues  of  no  show  or 
splendor  in  the  vulgar  apprehension,  yet  more  infal- 
lible characteristics  of  true  greatness  than  the  most 
unequivocal  displays  of  enterprise  and  active  daring. 
Scarcely  a  day  passed,  in  which  Sir  Alexander  Ball's 
patience,  forbearance,  and  inflexible  constancy  were 
not  put  to  the  severest  trial.  He  had  not  only  to  re- 
move the  misunderstandings  that  arose  between  the 
Maltese  themselves,  and  to  organize  their  efforts ;  he 
was  likewise  engaged  in  the  more  difficult  and  un- 
thankful task  of  counteracting  the  weariness,  discon- 
tent, and  despondency  of  his  own  countrymen — a  task 
however,  which  he  accomplished  by  management 
ami  address,  and  an  alternation  of  real  firmness  with 
apparent  yielding.  During  many  months  he  remain- 
ed the  only  Englishman  who  did  not  think  the  siege 
hopeless  and  the  object  worthless.  lie  often  spoke 
of  the  time  in  which  he  resided  at  the  country-seat 
of  the  grand  master  at  St.  Antonio,  four  miles  from 
Vallette,  as  perhaps  the  mosl  trying  period  of  his  life. 
For  some  weeks  Captain  Vivian  was  his  sole  Eng- 
lish companion,  of  whom,  as  his  partner  in  anxiety, 
he  always  expressed  himself  with  affectionate  esteem. 
Sir  Alexander  Ball's  presence  was  absolutely  neces- 
sary to  the  Maltese,  who.  accustomed  to  be  governed 
by  him,  became  incapable  of  acting  in  concert  with- 
out his  immediate  influence.    In  the  out-burst  of  popu- 

cally  confirm  ami  !-i>  confirmed  by  the  documents  furnished  in 
that  must  interesting  work,  in  which  1  see  but  one  blemish 
of  importance,  namely,  that  the  author  appears  too  frequently 
to  consider  justice  and  true  policy  as  capable  of  being  con- 
tradistinguished. 

549 


540 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


lar  emotion,  the  impulse,  which  produces  an  insurrec- 
tion, is  for  a  brief  while  its  sufficient  pilot:  the  at- 
traction constitutes  the  cohesion,  and  the  common  pro- 
vocation, supplying  an  immediate  object,  not  only 
unites,  but  directs,  the  multitude.  But  this  first  im- 
pulse had  passed  away,  and  Sir  Alexander  Ball  was 
the  one  individual  who  possessed  the  general  confi- 
dence. On  him  they  relied  with  implicit  faith:  and 
even  after  they  had  long  enjoyed  the  blessings  of  Brit- 
ish government  and  protection,  it  was  still  remarka- 
ble with  what  child-like  helplessness  they  were  in 
the  habit  of  applying  to  him,  even  in  their  private 
concerns.  It  seemed  as  if  they  thought  him  made  on 
purpose  to  think  for  them  all.  Yet  his  situation  at  St. 
Antonio  W3S  one  of  great  peril :  and  lie  attributed  his 
preservation  to  the  dejection,  which  had  now  begun 
to  prey  on  the  spirits  of  the  French  garrison,  and 
which  rendered  them  unenterprising  and  almost  pas- 
sive, aided  by  the  dread  which  the  nature  of  the 
country  inspired.  For  subdivided  as  it  was  into  small 
fields,  scarcely  larger  than  a  cottage-garden,  and  each 
of  these  little  squares  of  land  enclosed  with  substan- 
tial stone  walls;  these  too  from  the  necessity  of  hav- 
ing the  fields  perfectly  level,  rising  in  tiers  above 
each  other;  the  whole  of  the  inhabited  part  of  the 
island  was  an  effective  fortification  for  all  the  pur- 
poses of  annoyance  and  offensive  warfare.  Sir  Alex- 
ander Ball  exerted  himself  successfully  in  procuring 
information  respecting  the  state  and  temper  of  the 
garrison,  and  by  the  assistance  of  the  clergy  and  the 
almost  universal  fidelity  of  the  Maltese,  contrived  that 
the  spies  in  the  pay  of  the  French  should  be  in  truth 
his  own  most  confidential  agents.  He  had  already 
given  splendid  proofs  that  he  could  out-fight  them ; 
but  here,  and  in  his  after  diplomatic  intercourse  pre- 
vious to  the  recommencement  of  the  war,  he  likewise 
out-witted  them.  He  once  told  me  with  a  smile,  as 
we  were  conversing  on  the  practice  of  laying  wagers, 
that  he  was  sometimes  inclined  to  think  that  the  final 
perseverance  in  the  siege  was  not  a  little  indebted  to 
several  valuable  bets  of  his  own,  he  well  knowing 
at  the  time,  and  from  information  which  himself  alone 
possessed,  that  he  should  certainly  lose  them.  Yet 
this  artifice  had  a  considerable  effect  in  suspending 
the  impatience  of  the  officers,  and  in  supplying  topics 
for  dispute  and  conversation.  At  length,  however, 
the  two  French  frigates,  the  sailing  of  which  had  been 
the  subject  of  these  wagers,  left  the  great  harbor  on 
the  21th  of  August,  1800,  with  a  part  of  the  garrison  : 
and  one  of  them  soon  became  a  prize  to  the  English. 
Sir  Alexander  Ball  related  to  me  the  circumstances 
which  occasioned  the  escape  of  the  other ;  but  I  do 
not  recollect  them  with  sufficient  accuracy  to  dare 
repeat  them  in  this  place.  On  the  15th  of  September 
following,  the  capitulation  was  signed,  and  after  a 
blockade  of  two  years  the  English  obtained  possession 
of  Valletta,  and  remained  masters  of  the  whole  island 
and  its  dependencies. 

Anxious  not  to  give  offence,  but  more  anxious  to 
communicate  the  truth,  it  is  not  without  pain  that  I 
find  myself  under  the  moral  obligation  of  remonstrat- 
ing anainst  the  silence  concerning  Sir  A  lexander  Ball's 
services  or  the  transfer  of  them  to  others.    More  than 


once  has  the  latter  roused  my  indignation  in  the  re- 
ported speeches  of  the  House  of  Commons  ;  and  as  to 
the  former,  I  need  only  state  that  in  Rees's  Cyclopae- 
dia there  is  an  historical  article  of  considerable  length 
under  the  word  Malta,  in  which  Sir  Alexander's 
name  does  not  once  occur!  During  a  residence  of 
eighteen  months  in  that  island,  I  possessed  and  avail- 
ed myself  of  the  best  possible  means  of  information, 
not  only  from  eye-witnesses,  but  likewise  from  the 
principal  agents  themselves.  And  I  now  thus  pub- 
licly and  unequivocally  assert,  that  to  Sir  A.  Ball  pre- 
eminently— and  if  I  had  said,  to  Sir  A.  Ball  alone,  the 
ordinary  use  of  the  word  under  such  circumstances 
would  bear  me  out — the  capture  and  the  preservation 
of  Malta  was  owing,  with  every  blessing  that  a  pow- 
erful mind  and  a  wise  heart  could  confer  on  its  docile 
and  grateful  inhabitants.  With  a  similar  pain  I  pro- 
ceed to  avow  my  sentiments  on  this  capitulation,  by 
which  Malta  was  delivered  up  to  his  Britannic  Ma- 
jesty and  allies,  without  the  least  mention  made  of  the 
Maltese.  With  a  warmth  honorable  both  to  his  head 
and  his  heart,  Sir  Alexander  Ball  pleaded,  as  not  less  a 
point  of  sound  policy  than  of  plain  justice,  that  the 
Maltese,  by  some  representatives,  should  be  made  a 
party  in  the  capitulation,  and  a  joint  subscriber  in  the 
signature.  They  had  never  been  the  slaves  or  the 
property  of  the  knights  of  St.  John,  but  freemen  and 
the  true  landed  proprietors  of  the  coiwitry,  the  civil 
and  military  government  of  which,  under  certain  re- 
strictions, had  been  vested  in  that  order:  yet  checked 
by  the  rights  and  influences  of  the  clergy  and  the  na- 
tive nobility,  and  by  the  customs  and  ancient  laws  of 
the  island.  This  trust  the  knights  had,  with  the 
blackest  treason  and  the  most  profligate  perjury,  be- 
trayed and  abandoned.  The  right  of  government  of 
course  reverted  to  the  landed  proprietors  and  the 
clergy.  Animated  by  a  just  sense  of  this  right,  the 
Maltese  had  risen  of  their  own  accord,  had  contend- 
ed for  it  in  defiance  of  death  and  danger,  had  fought 
bravely,  and  endured  patiently.  Without  undervalu- 
ing the  military  assistance  afterwards  furnished  by 
Great  Britain  (though  how  scanty  this  was  before  the 
arrival  of  General  Pigot  is  well  known,)  it  remained 
undeniable,  that  the  Maltese  had  taken  the  greatest 
share  both  in  the  fatigues  and  in  the  privations  con- 
sequent on  the  siege ;  and  that  had  not  the  greatest 
virtues  and  the  most  exemplary  fidelity  been  uniform- 
ly displayed  by  them,  the  English  troops  (they  not  be- 
ing more  numerous  than  they  had  been  for  the  great- 
er part  of  the  two  years)  could  not  possibly  have  re- 
mained before  the  fortifications  of  Vallette,  defended 
as  that  city  was  by  a  French  garrison,  that  greatly 
outnumbered  the  British  besiegers.  Still  less  could 
there  have  been  the  least  hope  of  ultimate  success  ; 
as  if  any  part  of  the  Maltese  peasantry  had  been 
friendly  to  the  French,  or  even  indifferent,  if  they  had 
not  all  indeed  been  most  zealous  and  persevering  in 
their  hostility  towards  them,  it  would  have  been  im- 
practicable so  to  blockade  that  island  as  to  have  pre- 
cluded the  arrival  of  supplies.  If  the  siege  had  pro- 
ved unsuccessful,  the  Maltese  were  well  aware  that 
they  should  be  exposed  to  all  the  horrors  which  re- 
venge and  wounded  pride  could  dictate  to  an  unprin- 
550 


THE  FRIEND. 


541 


cipled,  rapacious,  and  sanguinary  soldiery;  and  now  ] 
that  success  has  crowned  their  efforts,  is  this  to  be 
their  reward,  that  their  own  allies  are  to  bargain  for 
them  with  the  French  as  for  a  herd  of  slaves,  whom 
the  French  had  before  purchased  from  a  former  pro- 
prietor ?  If  it  be  urged,  that  there  is  no  established 
government  in  Malta,  is  it  not  equally  true,  that 
through  the  whole  population  of  the  island  there  is 
not  a  single  dissentient  I  and  thus  that  the  chief  incon- 
venience, which  an  established  authority  is  to  obvi- 
ate, is  virtually  removed  by  the  admitted  fact  of  their 
unanimitv  I  And  have  they  not  a  bishop,  and  a  dig- 
nified clergy,  their  judges  and  municipal  magistrates, 
who  were  at  all  times  sharers  in  the  power  of  the  go- 
vernment, and  now,  supported  by  the  unanimous  suf- 
frage of  the  inhabitants,  have  a  rightful  claim  to  be 
considered  as  its  representatives  I  Will  it  not  be  of- 
tener  said  than  answered,  that  the  main  difference  be- 
tween the  French  and  English  injustice  rests  in  this 
point  alone,  that  the  French  seized  on  the  Maltese 
without  any  previous  pretences  of  friendship,  while 
the  English  procured  possession  of  the  island  by  means 
of  their  friendly  promises,  and  by  the  co-operation  of 
the  natives  afforded  in  confident  reliance  on  these 
promises  ?  The  impolicy  of  refusing  the  signature  on 
the  part  of  the  Maltese  was  equally  evident :  since 
such  refusal  could  answer  no  one  purrose  but  that 
of  alienating  their  affections  by  a  wanton  insult  to 
their  feelings.  For  the  Maltese  were  not  only  ready 
but  desirous  and  eager  to  place  themselves  at  the 
same  time  under  British  protection,  to  take  the  oaths 
of  loyalty  as  subjects  of  the  British  crown,  and  to  ac- 
knowledge their  island  to  belong  to  it.  These  repre- 
sentations, however,  were  over-ruled  :  and  I  dare  af- 
firm, from  my  own  experience  in  the  Mediterranean, 
that  our  conduct  in  this  instance  added  to  the  im- 
pression which  had  been  made  at  Corsica,  Minorca, 
and  elsewhere,  and  was  often  referred  to  by  men  of 
reflection  in  Sicily,  who  have  more  than  once  said  to 
me, "a  connection  with  Great  Britain,  with  the  con- 
sequent extension  and  security  of  our  commerce,  are 
indeed  great  blessings :  but  who  can  rely  on  their 
permanence?  or  that  we  shall  not  be  made  to  pay 
bitterly  for  our  zeal  as  partisans  of  England,  when- 
ever it  shall  suit  its  plans  to  deliver  us  back  to  our 
old  oppressors  C 


ESSAY   VI. 


The  way  of  ancient  ordnance,  though  it  winds, 

Is  yet  no  devious  way.    Straight  forward  goes 

The  lightning's  palh;  and  straight  the  fearful  path 

Of  the  cannon-ball.    Direct  it  Hies  and  rapid. 

Shattering  that  it  mny  reach,  and  shatterins  what  it  reaches. 

My  son !  the  road,  the  human  bfing  travels, 

That  on  which  Blessing  comes  and   goes,  doth  follow 

The   river's  course,  the   valley's  playful  windings, 

Curves  round  the  corn-field  and  the  hill  of  vines, 

Honoring  the  holy  bounds  of  property  I 

There  exists 

An  higher  than  the  warrior's  excellence. 

WALLEXSTEIN. 


Captain  Ball's  services  in  Malta  were  honored 
with  his  sovereign's  approbation,  transmitted  in  a 
letter  from  the  Secretary  Dundas,  and  with  a  baron- 
etcy. A  thousand  pounds  *  were  at  the  same  time 
directed  to  be  paid  him  from  the  Maltese  treasury. 
The  best  and  most  appropriate  addition  to  the  ap- 
plause of  his  king  and  his  country,  Sir  Alexander 
Ball  found  in  the  feelings  and  faithful  affection  of 
the  Maltese.  The  enthusiasm  manifested  in  reveren- 
tial gestures  and  shouts  of  triumph  whenever  their 
friend  and  deliverer  appeared  in  public,  was  the  ut- 
terance of  a  deep  feeling,  and  in  no  wise  the  mere 
ebullition  of  animal  sensibility ;  which  is  not  indeed 
a  part  of  the  Maltese  character.  The  truth  of  this 
observation  will  not  be  doubted  by  any  person,  who 
has  witnessed  the  religious  processions  in  honor  of 
the  favorite  saints,  both  at  Vallette  and  at  Messina  or 
Palermo,  and  who  must  have  been  struck  with  the 
contrast  between  the  apparent  apathy,  or  at  least  the 
perfect  sobriety,  of  the  Maltese,  and  the  fanatical 
agitations  of  the  Sicilian  populace.  Among  the  lat- 
ter each  man's  soul  seems  hardly  containable  in  his 
body,  like  a  prisoner,  whose  jail  is  on  fire,  flying  mad- 
ly from  one  barred  outlet  to  another ;  while  the  for- 
mer might  suggest  the  suspicion,  that  their  bodies 
were  on  the  point  of  sinking  into  the  same  slumber 
with  their  understandings.  But  their  political  de- 
liverance was  a  thing  that  came  home  to  their  hearts, 
and  intertwined  with  their  most  impassioned  recol- 
lections, personal  and  patriotic.  To  Sir  Alexander 
Ball  exclusively  the  Maltese  themselves  attributed 
their  emancipation :  on  him  too  they  rested  their 
hopes  of  the  future.  Whenever  he  appeared  in 
Vallette,  the  passengers  on  each  side,  through  the 
w  hole  length  of  the  street,  stopped  and  remained  un- 
covered till  he  had  passed  :  the  very  clamors  of  the 
market-place  were  hushed  at  his  entrance,  and  then 
exchanged  for  shouts  of  joy  and  welcome.  Even  af- 
ter the  lapse  of  years  he  never  appeared  in  any  one 
of  their  casals.t  which  did  not  lie  in  the  direct  road 


*  I  scarce  know  whether  it  be  worth  mentioning,  that  this 
sum  remained  undemanded  till  the  spring  of  the  year  1F05  : 
at  which  time  the  writer  of  these  sketcnes,  during  an  exami- 
nation of  (he  treasury  accounts,  observed  the  circumstance 
and  noticed  it  to  the  Governor,  who  had  sufii-red  it  to  .scape 
altogether  from  his  memory,  for  the  latter  years  at  least. 
The  value  attached  to  the  present  by  the  receiver,  must  have 
depended  on  his  construction  of  its  purpose  and  meaning  : 
for  in  a  pecuniary  point  of  view,  the  sum  was  not  a  moiety 
of  what  Sir  Alexander  had  expended  from  his  private  fortune 
during 'the  blockade.  His  immediate  appointment  to  the 
government  of  the  island,  so  earnestly  prayed  for  by  the 
Maltese,  would  doubtless  have  furnished  a  less  questionable 
proof  that  his  services  were  as  highly  estimated  by  the  min- 
istry as  they  were  graciously  accepted  by  his  sovereign.  But 
this  was  withheld  as  lone  as  it  remained  possible  to  doubt, 
whether  great  talents,  joined  to  local  experience,  and  the 
confidence  and  affection  of  the  inhabitants,  might  not  be  dis- 
pensed with  in  the  person  entrusted  with  that  government. 
Crimen  ingrati  animi  quod  magnis  Ingeniis  baud  raro  objici- 
tur,  s;rpius  nil  aliud  est  quam  perspicacia  quaxlam  in  causam 
beneficii  collati. See  WALLEXSTEIN,  Part  I. 

t  It  was  the  Governor's  custom  to  visit  every  ca=al  through- 
out the  island  once,  if  not  twice,  in  the  course  of  each  sum- 
mer;  and  during  my  residence  there,  I  had  the  honor  of 
being  his  constant,  and  most  often,  his  only  companion, 
in  these  rides ;  to  which  I  owe  some  of  the  happiest  and 
551 


542 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


between  Vallette  and  St.  Antonio,  his  summer  resi- 
dence, but  the  women  and  children,  with  such  of  the 
men  who  were  not  at  labor  in  their  fields,  fell  into 
ranks,  and  followed,  or  preceded  him,  singing  the 
Maltese  song  which  had  been  made  in  his  honor,  and 
which  was  scarcely  less  familiar  to  the  inhabitants 
of  Malta  and  Goza,  than  God  save  the  King  to 
Britons.  When  he  went  to  the  gate  through  the  cili/, 
the  young  men  refrained  talking  ;  and  the  aged  arose 
and  s'ood  up.  When  the  ear  heard,  then  it  blessed 
him  ;  and  when  the  eye  saw  him,  it  gave  wil/iess  to 
him :  because  he  delivered  the  poor  that  cried,  and.  the 
fatherless,  and  those  that  had  none  to  help  them.  The 
blessing  of  them  that  were  ready  to  perish  came  upon 
him  ;  and  he  caused  the  widow's  heart  to  sing  for  joy. 

These  feelings  were  afterwards  amply  justified  by 
his  administration  of  the  government;  and  the  very 
accesses  of  their  gratitude  on  their  first  deliverance 
proved,  in  the  end,  only  to  be  acknowledgments  an- 
tedated. For  some  time  after  the  departure  of  the 
French,  the  distress  was  so  general  and  so  severe, 
that  a  large  proportion  of  the  lower  classes  became 
mendicants,  and  one  of  the  greatest  thoroughfares 
of  Vallette  still  retains  the  name  of  the  "  Nix  Man- 
glare  Stairs,"  from  the  crowd  who  used  there  to  as- 
sail the  ears  of  passengers  with  cries  of  "  nix  man- 
giare,"  or  "nothing  to  eat,"  the  former  word  nix  being 
the  low  German  pronunciation  of  nichts,  nothing.  By 
what  means  it  was  introduced  into  Malta,  I  know  not; 
but  it  became  the  common  vehicle  both  of  solicita- 
tion and  refusal,  the  Maltese  thinking  it  an  English 
word,  and  the  English  supposing  it  to  be  Maltese.  I 
often  felt  it  as  a  pleasing  remembrancer  of  the  evil 
day  gone  by,  when  a  tribe  of  little  children,  quite 
naked,  as  is  the  custom  of  that  climate,  and  each 
with  a  pair  of  gold  ear-rings  in  its  ears,  and  all  fat 
and  beautifully  proportioned,  would  suddenly  leave 
their  play,  and,  looking  round  to  see  that  their  parents 
were  not  in  sight,  change  their  shouts  of  merriment 
for  "nix  mangiare!"  awkwardly  imitating  the  plain- 
tive tones  of  mendicancy;  while  the  white  teeth  in 
their  little  swarthy  faces  gave  a  splendor  to  the  happy 
and  confessing  laugh,  with  which  they  received  the 
good-humored  rebuke  or  refusal,  and  ran  back  to 
their  former  sport. 

In  the  interim  between  the  capitulation  of  the 
French  garrison  and  Sir  Alexander  Ball's  appoint- 
ment as  his  Majesty's  civil  commissioner  for  Malta, 
his  zeal  for  the  Maltese  was  neither  suspended  nor  un- 
productive of  important  benefits.  He  was  enabled  to 
remove  many  prejudices  and  misunderstandings;  and 
to  persons  of  no  inconsiderable  influence  gave  juster 
notions  of  the  true  importance  of  the  island  to  Great 
Britain.  He  displayed  the  magnitude  of  the  trade  of 
the  Mediterranean  in  its  existing  state ;  showed  the  im- 
mense extent  to  which  it  might  be  carried,  and  the 
hollowness  of  the  opinion,  that  this  trade  was  at- 
tached to  the  south  of  France  by  any  natural  or  in- 
dissoluble bond  of  connection.     I  have  some  reason 

most  instructive  hours  of  my  life.  In  the  poorest  house  of 
the  most  distant  casal  two  rude  paintings  were  sure  to  be 
found  :  A  picture  of  the  Virgin  and  Child  ;  and  a  portrait  of 
Sir  Alexander  Ball. 


likewise  for  believing,  that  his  wise  and  patriotic  re- 
presentations prevented  Malta  from  being  made  the 
seat  and  pretext  for  a  numerous  civil  establishment, 
in  hapless  imitation  of  Corsica,  Ceylon,  and  the  Cape 
of  Good  Hope.  It  was  at  least  generally  rumored, 
that  it  had  been  in  the  contemplation  of  the  ministry 
to  appoint  Sir  Ralph  Abercrombie  as  governor,  with 
a  salary  of  10,000/.  a  year;  and  to  reside  in  England, 
while  one  of  his  countrymen  was  to  be  the  lieulenant- 
governor,  at  5000/.  a  year;  to  which  were  added  a 
long  el  cetera  of  other  offices  and  places  of  propor- 
tional emolument.  This  threatened  appendix  to  the 
state  calendar  may  have  existed  only  in  the  imagina- 
tions of  the  reporters,  yet  inspired  some  uneasy  appre- 
hensions in  the  minds  of  many  well-wishers  to  the 
Maltese,  who  knew  that — for  a  foreign  settlement  at 
least,  and  one  too  possessing  in  all  the  ranks  and 
functions  of  society  an  ample  population  of  its  own — 
such  a  stately  and  wide-branching  tree  of  patronage, 
though  delightful  to  the  individuals  who  are  to  pluck 
its  golden  apples,  sheds,  like  the  manchineel,  un- 
wholesome and  corrosive  dews  on  the  multitude  who 
are  at  rest  beneath  its  shade.  It  need  not  however 
be  doubted,  that  Sir  Alexander  Ball  would  exert  him- 
self to  preclude  any  such  intention,  by  stating  and 
evincing  the  extreme  impolicy  and  injustice  of  the 
plan,  as  well  as  its  utter  inutility,  in  the  case  of  Malta. 
With  the  exception  of  the  governor,  and  of  the  public 
secretary,  both  of  whom  undoubtedly  should  be  na- 
tives of  Great  Britain,  and  appointed  by  the  British 
government,  there  was  no  civil  office  that  could  be 
of  the  remotest  advantage  to  the  island  which  was 
not  already  filled  by  the  natives  and  the  functions  of 
which  none  could  perform  so  well  as  they.  The  num- 
ber of  inhabitants  (he  would  state)  was  prodigious 
compared  with  the  extent  of  the  island,  though  from 
the  fear  of  the  Moors-  one-fourth  of  its  surface  had 
remained  unpeopled  and  uncultivated.  To  deprive, 
therefore,  the  middle  and  lower  classes  of  such  places 
as  they  had  been  accustomed  to  hold,  would  be  cruel  ; 
while  the  places  held  by  the  nobility,  were,  for  the 
greater  part,  such  as  none  but  natives  could  perform 
the  duties  of.  By  any  innovation  we  should  affront 
the  higher  classes  and  alienate  the  affections  of  all, 
not  only  without  any  imaginable  advantage  but  with 
the  certainty  of  great  loss.  Were  Englishmen  to  be 
employed,  the  salaries  must  be  increased  four-fold, 
and  would  yet  be  scarcely  worth  acceptance;  and  in 
higher  offices  such  as  those  of  the  civil  and  criminal 
judges,  the  salaries  must  be  augmented  more  than 
ten-fold.  For,  greatly  to  the  credit  of  their  patriotism 
and  moral  character,  the  Maltese  gentry  sought  these 
places  as  honorable  distinctions,  which  endeared 
them  to  their  fellow-countrymen,  and  at  the  same 
time  rendered  the  yoke  of  the  order  somewhat  less 
grievous  and  galling.  With  the  exception  of  the 
Maltese  secretary,  whose  situation  was  one  of  inces- 
sant labor,  and  who  at  the  same  time  performed  the 
duties  of  law  counsellor  to  the  government,  the  high- 
est salaries  scarcely  exceeded  100/.  a  year,  and  were 
barely  sufficient  to  defray  the  increased  expenses  of 
the  functionaries  for  an  additional  equipage  or  one 
of  more  imposing  appearance.    Besides,  it  was  of  im- 

552 


THE  FRIEND. 


543 


portance  that  the  person  placed  at  the  head  of  that 
government,  should  be  looked  up  to  by  the  natives, 
and  possess  the  means  of  distinguishing  and  reward- 
ing those  who  had  been  most  faithful  and  zealous  in 
their  attachment  to  Great  Britain,  and  hostile  to  their 
former  tyrants.  The  number  of  the  employments  to 
be  conferred  would  give  considerable  influence  to 
his  Majesty's  civil  representative,  while  the  trifling 
amount  <>f  the  emolument  attached  to  each  precluded 
all  temptation  of  abusing  it. 

Sir  Alexander  Ball  would  likewise,  it  is  probable, 
urge  that  ihe  commercial  advantages  of  Malta,  which 
were  most  intelligible  to  the  English  public,  and  beet 
fitted  to  render  our  retention  of  the  island  popular, 
must  necessarily  be  of  very  slow  growth,  though 
finally  thev  would  become  great,  and  of  an  extent 
not  to  be  calculated.  For  this  reason,  therefore,  it 
was  highly  desirable,  that  the  possession  should  be, 
and  appear  to  be,  at  least  inexpensive.  After  the 
British  Government  had  made  one  advance  for  a 
stock  of  corn  sufficient  to  place  the  island  a  year  be- 
fore-hand, the  sum  total  drawn  from  Great  Britain 
need  not  exceed  25,  or  at  most  30,000/.  annually  ;  ex- 
cluding of  course  the  expenditure  connected  with  her 
own  military  and  navy,  and  the  repair  of  the  fortifi- 
cations, which  latter  expense  ought  to  be  much  less 
than  at  Gibraltar,  from  the  multitude  and  low  wages 
of  the  laborers  in  Malta,  and  from  the  softness  and 
admirable  quality  of  the  stone.  Indeed  much  more 
might  safely  be  promised  on  the  assumption,  that  a 
wise  and  generous  system  of  policy  were  adopted  and 
persevered  in.  The  monopoly  of  the  Maltese  corn- 
trade  by  the  government  formed  an  exception  to  a 
general  rule,  and  by  a  strange,  yet  valid,  anomaly  in 
the  operations  of  political  economy,  was  not  more 
necessary  than  advantageous  to  the  inhabitants.  The 
chief  reason  is,  that  the  produce  of  the  island  itself 
barely  suffices  for  one-fourth  of  its  inhabitants,  al- 
though fruits  and  vegetables  form  so  large  a  part  of 
their  nourishment.  Meantime  the  harbors  of  Malta, 
and  its  equi-distance  from  Europe,  Asia,  and  Africa, 
gave  it  a  vast  and  unnatural  importance  in  the  pre- 
sent relations  of  the  great  European  powers,  and  im- 
posed on  its  government,  whether  native  or  depend- 
ent, the  necessity  of  considering  the  whole  island  as 
a  single  garrison,  the  provisioning  of  which  could  not 
be  trusted  to  the  casualties  of  ordinary  commerce. 
What  is  actually  necessary  is  seldom  injurious.  Thus 
in  Malta  bread  is  better  and  cheaper  on  an  average 
than  in  Italy  or  the  coast  of  Barbary :  while  a  similar 
interference  with  the  corn  trade  in  Sicily  impover- 
ishes the  inhabitants  and  keeps  the  agriculture  in  a 
state  of  barbarism.  But  the  point  in  question  is  the 
expense  to  Great  Britain.  Whether  the  monopoly  be 
good  or  evil  in  itself,  it  remains  true,  that  in  this  es- 
tablished usage,  and  in  the  gradual  enclosure  of  the 
uncultivated  district,  such  resources  exist  as  without 
the  least  oppression  might  render  the  civil  govern- 
ment in  Y^allette  independent  of  the  Treasury  at 
nome,  finally  taking  upon  itself  even  the  repair  of  the 
fortifications,  and  thus  realize  one  instance  of  an  im- 
portant possession  that  cost  the  country  nothing. 

But  now  the  time  arrived,  which  threatened  to 
36 


frustrate  the  patriotism  of  the  Maltese  themselves  and 
all  the  zealous  efforts  of  their  disinterested  friend. 
Soon  after  the  war  had  for  the  first  time  become  in- 
disputably just  and  necessary,  the  people  at  large  and 
a  majority  of  independent  senators,  incapable,  as  it 
might  seem,  of  translating  their  fanatical  anti-jacobin- 
ism into  a  well-grounded,  yet  equally  impassioned, 
anti-Gallicanism,  grew  impatient  for  peace,  or  rather 
for  a  name,  under  which  the  most  terrific  of  all  war 
would  be  incessantly  waged  against  us.  Our  con- 
duct was  not  much  wiser  than  that  of  the  weary  tra- 
veller, who  having  proceeded  half  way  on  his  jour- 
ney, procured  a  short  rest  for  himself  by  getting  up 
behind  a  chaise  which  was  going  the  contrary  road. 
In  the  strange  treaty  of  Amiens,  in  which  we  neither 
recognized  our  former  relations  with  France  or  with 
the  other  European  powers,  nor  formed  any  new 
ones,  the  compromise  concerning  Malta  formed  the 
prominent  feature :  and  its  nominal  re-delivery  to  the 
Order  of  St.  John  was  authorized  in  the  mind  of  the 
people,  by  Lord  Nelson's  opinion  of  its  worthlessness 
to  Great  Britain  in  a  political  or  naval  view.  It  is  a 
melancholy  fact,  and  one  that  must  often  sadden  a 
reflective  and  philanthropic  mind,  how  little  moral 
considerations  weigh  even  with  the  noblest  nations, 
how  vain  are  the  strongest  appeals  to  justice,  hu- 
manity, and  national  honor,  unless  when  the  public 
mind  is  under  the  immediate  influence  of  the  cheer- 
ful or  vehement  passions,  indignation  or  avaricious 
hope.  In  the  whole  class  of  human  infirmities  there 
is  none,  that  makes  such  loud  appeals  to  prudence, 
and  yet  so  frequently  outrages  its  plainest  dictates, 
as  the  spirit  of  fear.  The  worst  cause  conducted  in 
hope  is  an  overmatch  for  the  noblest  managed  by 
despondence:  in  both  cases  an  unnatural  conjunction 
that  recalls  the  old  fable  of  Love  and  Death,  taking 
each  the  arrows  of  the  other  by  mistake.  When 
islands  that  had  courted  British  protection  in  reliance 
upon  British  honor,  are  with  their  inhabitants  and 
proprietors  abandoned  to  the  resentment  which  we 
had  tempted  them  to  provoke,  what  wonder,  if  the 
opinion  becomes  general,  that  alike  to  England  as  to 
France,  the  fates  and  fortunes  of  other  nations  are 
but  the  counters,  with  which  the  bloody  game  of  war 
is  played  :  and  that  notwithstanding  the  great  and 
acknowledged  difference  between  the  two  govern- 
ments during  possession,  yet  the  protection  of  France 
is  more  desirable  because  it  is  more  likely  to  endure? 
for  what  the  French  take,  they  keep.  Often  both  in 
Sicily  and  Malta  have  I  heard  the  case  of  Minorca 
referred  to,  where  a  considerable  portion  of  the  most 
respectable  gentry  and  merchants  (no  provision  hav- 
ing been  made  for  their  protection  on  the  re-delivery 
of  that  island  to  Spain)  expiated  in  dungeons  the 
warmth  and  forwardness  of  their  predilection  for 
Great  Britain. 

It  has  been  by  some  persons  imagined,  that  Lord 
Nelson  was  considerably  influenced,  in  his  public 
declaration  concerning  the  value  of  Malta,  by  minis- 
terial flattery,  and  his  own  sense  of  the  great  service- 
ableness  of  that  opinion  to  the  persons  in  office. 
This  supposition  is.  however,  wholly  false  and 
groundless.  His  lordship's  opinion  was  indeed  greatly 
553 


544 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


shaken  afterwards,  if  not  changed  ;  but  at  that  time 
he  spoke  in  strictest  correspondence  with  his  existing 
convictions.  He  said  no  more  than  he  had  often  pre- 
viously declared  to  his  private  friends:  it  was  the 
point  on  which,  after  some  amicable  controversy,  his 
lordship  and  Sir  Alexander  Ball  had  "  agreed  to  dif- 
fer." Though  the  opinion  itself  may  have  lost  the 
greatest  part  of  its  interest,  and  except  for  the  histo- 
rian is,  as  it  were,  superannuated ;  yet  the  grounds 
and  causes  of  it,  as  far  as  they  arose  out  of  Lord  Nel- 
son's particular  character,  and  may,  perhaps  tend  to 
re-enliven  our  recollection  of  a  hero  so  deeply  and 
justly  beloved,  will  forever  possess  an  interest  of 
their  own.  In  an  essay,  too,  which  purports  to  be  no 
more  than  a  series  of  sketches  and  fragments,  the 
reader,  it  is  hoped,  will  readily  excuse  an  occasional 
digression,  and  a  more  desultory  style  of  narration 
than  could  be  tolerated  in  a  work  of  regular  biogra- 
phy. 

Lord  Nelson  was  an  admiral  every  inch  of  him. 
He  looked  at  every  thing,  not  merely  in  its  possible 
relations  to  the  naval  service  in  general,  but  in  its 
immediate  bearings  on  his  squadron;  to  his  officers, 
his  men,  to  the  particular  ships  themselves,  his  affec- 
tions were  as  strong  and  ardent  as  those  of  a  lover. 
Hence,  though  his  temper  was  constitutionally  irrita- 
ble and  uneven,  yet  never  was  a  commander  so  en- 
thusiastically loved  by  men  of  all  ranks,  from  the 
Captain  of  the  fleet  to  the  youngest  ship-boy.  Hence 
too  the  unexampled  harmony  which  reigned  in  his 
fleet,  year  after  year,  under  circumstances  that  might 
well  have  undermined  the  patience  of  the  best-bal- 
anced dispositions,  much  more  of  men  with  the  im- 
petuous character  of  British  sailors.  Year  after  year, 
the  same  dull  duties  of  a  wearisome  blockade,  of 
doubtful  policy — little  if  any  opportunity  of  making 
prizes ;  and  the  few  prizes,  which  accident  might  throw 
in  the  way,  of  little  or  no  value — and  when  at  last 
the  occasion  presented  itself  which  would  have  com- 
pensated for  all,  then  a  disappointment  as  sudden  and 
unexpected  as  it  was  unjust  and  cruel,  and  the  cup 
dashed  from  their  lips ! — Add  to  these  trials  the  sense 
of  enterprises  checked  by  feebleness  and  timidity 
elsewhere,  not  omitting  the  tiresomeness  of  the  Med- 
iterranean sea,  sky,  and  climate;  and  the  unjarring 
and  cheerful  spirit  of  affectionate  brotherhood,  which 
linked  together  the  hearts  of  that  whole  squadron, 
will  appear  not  less  wonderful  to  us  than  admirable 
and  affecting.  When  the  resolution  was  taken  of 
commencing  hostilities  against  Spain,  before  any  in- 
telligence was  sent  to  Lord  Nelson,  another  admiral, 
with  two  or  three  ships  of  the  line,  was  sent  into  the 
Mediterranean,  and  stationed  before  Cadiz,  for  the 
express  purpose  of  intercepting  the  Spanish  prizes. 
The  admiral  despatched  on  this  lucrative  service 
gave  no  information  to  Lord  Nelson  of  his  arrival  in 
the  same  sea,  and  five  weeks  elapsed  before  his  lord- 
ship became  acquainted  with  the  circumstances.  The 
prizes  thus  taken  were  immense.  A  month  or  two 
sufficed  to  enrich  the  commander  and  officers  of  this 
small  and  highly-favored  squadron:  while  to  Nelson 
and  his  fleet  the  sense  of  having  done  their  duty,  and 
the  consciousness  of  the  glorious  services  which  they 


had  performed,  were  considered,  it  must  be  presumed, 
as  an  abundant  remuneration  for  all  their  toils  and 
long  suffering!  It  was  indeed  an  unexampled  cir- 
cumstance, that  a  small  squadron  should  be  sent  to 
the  station  which  had  been  long  occupied  by  a  large 
fleet,  commanded  by  the  darling  of  the  navy,  and  the 
glory  of  the  British  empire,  to  the  station  where  this 
fleet  had  for  years  been  wearing  away  in  the  most 
barren,  repulsive,  and  spirit-trying  service,  in  which 
the  navy  can  be  employed !  and  that  this  minor 
squadron  should  be  sent  independent  of,  and  without 
any  communication  with  the  commander  of  the  for- 
mer fleet,  for  the  express  and  solitary  purpose  of  step- 
ping between  it  and  the  Spanish  prizes,  and  as  soon 
as  this  short  and  pleasant  service  was  performed,  of 
bringing  home  the  unshared  booty  with  all  possible 
caution  and  despatch.  The  substantial  advantages 
of  naval  service  were  perhaps  deemed  of  too  gross  a 
nature  for  men  already  rewarded  with  the  grateful 
affections  of  their  own  countrymen,  and  the  admira- 
tion of  the  whole  world  !  They  were  to  be  awarded, 
therefore,  on  a  principle  of  compensation  to  a  com- 
mander less  rich  in  fame,  and  whose  laurels,  though 
not  scanty,  were  not  yet  sufficiently  luxuriant  to  hide 
the  golden  crown,  which  is  the  appropriate  ornament 
of  victory  in  the  bloodless  war  of  commercial  cap- 
ture! Of  all  the  wounds  which  were  ever  inflicted 
on  Nelson's  feelings  (and  there  were  not  a  few,)  this 
was  the  deepest !  this  rankled  most !  "  I  had  thought," 
(said  the  gallant  man,  in  a  letter  written  on  the  first 
feelings  of  the  affront) — "  I  fancied — but  nay,  it  must 
have  been  a  dream,  an  idle  dream — yet,  I  confess  it, 
I  did  fancy,  that  I  had  done  my  country  service — and 
thus  they  use  me.  It  was  not  enough  to  have  robbed 
me  once  before  of  my  West-India  harvest — now  they 
have  taken  away  the  Spanish — and  under  what  cir- 
cumstances, and  with  what  pointed  aggravations! 
Yet,  if  I  know  my  own  thoughts,  it  is  not  for  myself, 
or  on  my  own  account  chiefly,  that  I  feel  the  sting 
and  the  disappointment ;  no !  it  is  for  my  brave  offi- 
cers! for  my  noble-minded  friends  and  comrades — 
such  a  gallant  set  of  fellows!  such  a  band  of  bro- 
thers !    My  heart  swells  at  the  thought  of  them  !" 

This  strong  attachment  of  the  heroic  admiral  to  his 
fleet,  faithfully  repaid  by  an  equal  attachment  on  their 
part  to  their  admiral,  had  no  little  influence  in  at- 
tuning their  hearts  to  each  other;  and  when  he  died 
it  seemed  as  if  no  man  was  a  stranger  to  another:  for 
all  were  made  acquaintances  by  the  rights  of  a  com- 
mon anguish.  In  the  fleet  itself,  many  a  private 
quarrel  was  forgotten,  no  more  to  be  remembered  ; 
many,  who  had  been  alienated,  became  once  more 
good  friends;  yea,  many  a  one  was  reconciled  to  his 
very  enemy,  and  loved,  and  (as  it  were)  thanked  him, 
for  the  bitterness  of  his  grief,  as  if  it  had  been  an  act 
of  consolation  to  himself  in  an  intercourse  of  private 
sympathy.  The  tidings  arrived  at  Naples  on  the  day 
that  I  returned  to  that  city  from  Calabria :  and  never 
can  I  forget  the  sorrow  and  consternation  that  lay  on 
every  countenance.  Even  to  this  day  there  are  times 
when  I  seem  to  see,  as  in  a  vision,  separate  groups 
and  individual  facesof  the  picture.  Numbers  stopped 
and  shook  hands  with  me,  because  they  had  seen  the 

554 


THE  FRIEND. 


545 


tears  on  my  cheek,  and  conjectured,  that  I  was  an 
Englishman;  and  several,  as  they  held  my  hand, 
burst,  themselves,  into  tears.  And  though  it  may 
awake  a  smile,  yet  it  pleased  and  affected  me,  ae  a 
proof  of  the  goodness  of  the  human  heart  struggling 
to  exercise  its  kindness  in  spite  of  prejudices  the  most 
obstinate,  and  eager  to  carry  on  its  love  and  honor 
into  the  life  beyond  life,  that  it  was  whispered  about 
Naples,  that  Lord  Nelson  had  become  a  good  Catho- 
lic before  his  death.  The  absurdity  of  the  fiction  is 
a  sort  of  measurement  of  the  fond  and  affectionate 
esteem  which  had  ripened  the  pious  wish  of  some 
kind  individual  through  all  the  gradations  of  possi- 
bility and  probability  into  a  confident  assertion  be- 
lieved and  affirmed  by  hundreds.  The  feelings  of 
Great  Britain  on  this  awful  event,  have  been  de- 
scribed well  and  worthily  by  a  living  poet,  who  has 
happily  blended  the  passion  and  wild  transitions  of 
lyric  song  with  the  swell  and  solemnity  of  epic  nar- 
ration. 

Thou  art  fall'n  !  fall'n,  in  the  lap 

Of  victory.    To  thy  country  thou  cam'st  back, 

Thou  conqueror,  to  triumphal  Albion  cam'st 

A  corse  !    1  saw  before  thy  hearse  pass  on 

The  comrades  of  thy  perils  and  renown. 

The  frequent  tear  upon  their  dauntless  breasts 

Fell.    I  beheld  the  pomp  thick  gather' d  round 

The  trophy'd  car  that  bore  thy  graced  remains 

Thro'  arm'd  ranks,  and  a  nation  gazing  on. 

Bright  glow'd  the  sun,  and  not  a  cloud  distain'd 

Heaven's  arch  of  gold,  but  all  was  gloom  beneath. 

A  holy  and  unutterable  pang 

Thrill'd  on  the  soul.    Awe  and  mute  anguish  fell 

On  all. — Yet  high  the  public  bosom  throbb'd 

With  triumph.    And  if  one,   'mid  that  vast  pomp, 

If  but  the  voice  of  one  had  shouted  forth 

The  name  of  Nelson  :  Thou  hadst  passed  along. 

Thou   in  thy  hearse  to  burial   past,  as  oft 

Before  the  van  of  battle,  proudly  rode 

Thy  prow,  down  Britain's  line,  shout  after  shout 

Rending  the  air  with  triumph,  ere  thy  hand 

Had  lanc'd  the  bolt  of  victory. 

SOTHEBY  (Saul,  p.  80.) 

I  introduced  this  digression  with  an  apology,  yet 
have  extended  so  much  further  than  I  had  designed, 
that  I  must  once  more  request  my  reader  to  excuse 
me.  It  was  to  be  expected  (I  have  said)  that  Lord 
Nelson  would  appreciate  the  isle  of  Malta  from  its 
relations  to  the  British  fleet  on  the  Mediterranean 
station.  It  was  the  fashion  of  the  day  to  style  Egypt 
the  key  of  India,  and  Malta  the  hey  of  Egypt.  Nel- 
son saw  the  hollowness  of  this  metaphor :  or  if  he 
only  doubted  its  applicability  in  the  former  instance, 
he  was  sure  that  it  was  false  in  the  latter.  Egypt 
might  or  might  not  be  the  key  of  India  ;  but  Malta 
was  certainly  not  the  key  of  Egypt.  It  was  not  in- 
tended to  keep  constantly  two  distinct  fleets  in  that 
sea;  and  the  largest  naval  force  at  Malta  would  not 
supersede  the  necessity  of  a  squadron  off"  Toulon. 
Malta  does  not  lie  in  the  direct  course  from  Toulon 
to  Alexandria  :  and  from  the  nature  of  the  winds 
(taking  one  time  with  another)  the  comparative 
length  of  the  voyage  to  the  latter  port  will  be  found 
far  less  than  a  view  of  the  map  would  suggest,  and 
in  truth  of  little  practical  importance.  If  it  were 
the  object  of  the  French  fleet  to  avoid  Malta  in  its 
passage  to  Egypt,  the  port-admiral  at  Yallette  would 


in  all  probability  receive  his  first  intelligence  of  its 
course  from  Minorca  or  the  squadron  off' Toulon,  in- 
stead of  communicating  it.  In  what  regards  the 
refitting  and  provisioning  of  the  fleet,  either  on  ordi- 
nary or  extraordinary  occasions,  Malta  was  as  incon- 
venient as  Minorca  was  advantageous,  not  only  from 
its  distance  (which  yet  was  sufficient  to  render  it  al- 
most useless  in  cases  of  the  most  pressing  necessity, 
as  after  a  severe  action  or  injuries  of  tempest)  but 
likewise  from  the  extreme  difficulty,  if  not  impracti- 
cability, of  leaving  the  harbor  of  Vallelte  with  a 
EJi  W,  wind,  which  often  lasted  for  weeks  together. 
In  all  these  points  his  lordship's  observations  were 
perfectly  just:  and  it  must  be  conceded  by  all  per- 
sons acquainted  with  the  situation  and  circumstances 
of  Malta,  that  its  importance,  as  a  British  possession, 
if  not  exaggerated  on  the  whole,  was  unduly  magni- 
fied in  several  important  particulars.  Thus  Lord 
Minto,  in  a  speech  delivered  at  a  county  meeting 
and  afterwards  published,  affirms,  that  supposing 
(what  no  one  could  consider  as  unlikely  to  take  place) 
that  the  court  of  Naples  should  be  compelled  to  act 
under  the  influence  of  France,  and  that  the  Barbary 
powers  were  unfriendly  to  us  either  in  consequence 
of  French  intrigues  or  from  their  own  caprice  and  in- 
solence, there  would  not  be  a  single  port,  harbor,  bay, 
creek,  or  roadstead  in  the  whole  Mediterranean, 
from  which  our  men-of-war  could  obtain  a  single  ox 
or  an  hogshead  of  fresh  water  :  unless  Great  Britain 
retained  possession  of  Malta.  The  noble  speaker 
seems  not  to  have  been  aware,  that  under  the  cir- 
cumstances supposed  by  him,  Odessa  too  being  closed 
against  us  by  a  Russian  war,  the  island  of  Malta  it- 
self would  be  no  better  than  a  vast  almshouse  of 
75,000  persons,  exclusive  of  the  British  soldiery,  all 
of  whom  must  be  regularly  supplied  with  corn  and 
salt  meat  from  Great  Britain  or  Ireland.  The  popu- 
lation of  Malta  and  Goza  exceeds  100,000:  while 
the  food  of  all  kinds  produced  on  the  two  islands 
would  barely  suffice  for  one-fourth  of  that  number. 
The  deficit  is  procured  by  the  growth  and  spinning 
of  cotton,  for  which  corn  could  not  be  substituted 
from  the  nature  of  the  soil,  or  were  it  attempted, 
would  produce  but  a  small  proportion  of  the  quantity 
which  the  cotton  raised  on  the  same  fields  and  spun* 
into  thread,  enables  the  Maltese  to  purchase,  not  to 
mention  that  the  substitution  of  grain  for  cotton 
would  leave  half  of  the  inhabitants  without  employ- 
ment. As  to  live  stock,  it  is  quite  out  of  the  ques- 
tion, if  we  except  the  pigs  and  goats,  which  perform 
the  office  of  scavengers  in  the  streets  of  Vallette 
and  the  towns  on  the  other  side  of  the  Porio  Grande 


*The  Maltese  notion  is  naturally  of  a  deep  btirT,  or  dusky 
orange  color,  and  by  the  laws  of  ihe  island,  must  be  spun  be- 
fore it  can  he  exported.  I  have  heard  it  asserted,  by  persons 
apparently  well  informed  on  the  subject,  that  the  raw  mate- 
rial would  letch  as  high  a  price  as  Ihe  thread,  weight  fur 
weight :  the  thread  from  i's  coarseness  being  applicable  to 
few  purposes.  It  is  manufactured  likewise  for  the  use  of  the 
natives  themselves  into  a  coarse  nankin,  which  never  loses  its 
color  by  washing,  and  is  durable  beyond  any  clothing  I  have 
ever  known  or  heard  of.  The  cotton  seed  is  used  as  a  food 
for  the  cattle  thai  are  not  immediately  wanted  for  the  mar- 
ket ;  it  is  very  nutritious,  but  changes  the  fat  of  the  animal 
into  a  kind  of  suet,  congealing  quickly,  of  an  adhesive  sub- 
stance. 

555 


546 


COLERIDGE'S  PROSE  WORKS. 


Against  these  arguments  Sir  A.  Ball  placed  the  fol- 
lowing considerations.  It  had  been  long  his  convic- 
tion, that  the  Mediterranean  squadron  should  be  sup- 
plied by  regular  store-ships,  the  sole  business  of 
which  should  be  that  of  carriers  for  the  fleet.  This 
he  recommended  as  by  far  the  most  economic  plan, 
in  the  lirst  instance.  Secondly,  beyond  any  other  it 
would  secure  a  system  and  regularity  in  the  arrival 
of  supplies.  And,  lastly,  it  would  conduce  to  the  dis- 
cipline of  the  navy,  and  prevent  both  ships  and  offi- 
cers from  being  out  of  the  way  on  any  sudden  emer- 
gence. If  this  system  were  introduced,  the  objections 
to  Malta,  from  its  great  distance,  &c.  would  have 
little  force.  On  the  other  hand,  the  objections  to 
Minorca  he  deemed  irremovable.  The  same  disad- 
vantages which  attended  the  getting  out  of  the  har- 
bor of  Vallette,  applied  to  vessels  getting  into  Port 
Mahon ;  but  while  fifteen  hundred  or  two  thousand 
British  troops  might  be  safely  entrusted  with  the  pre- 
servation of  Malta,  the  troops  for  the  defence  of 
Minorca  must  ever  be  in  proportion  to  those  which 
the  enemy  may  be  supposed  likely  to  send  against  it. 
It  is  so  little  favored  by  nature  or  by  art,  that  the  pos- 
sessors stood  merely  on  the  level  with  the  invaders. 
Cffiteris  paribus,  if  there  12,000  of  the  enemy  landed, 
there  must  be  an  equal  number  to  repel  them ;  nor 
could  the  garrison,  or  any  part  of  it,  be  spared  for 
any  sudden  emergence  without  risk  of  losing  the 
island.  Previously  to  the  battle  of  Marengo,  the 
most  earnest  representations  were  made  to  the  go- 
vernor and  commander  at  Minorca,  by  the  British 
admiral,  who  offered  to  take  on  himself  the  whole 
responsibility  of  the  measure,  if  he  would  permit  the 
troops  at  Minorca  to  join  our  allies.  The  governor 
felt  himself  compelled  to  refuse  his  assent.  Doubt- 
less he  acted  wisely,  for  responsibility  is  not  transfer- 
able. The  fact  is  introduced  in  proof  of  the  defence- 
less state  of  Minorca,  and  its  constant  liability  to  at- 
tack. If  the  Austrian  army  had  stood  in  the  same 
relation  to  eight  or  nine  thousand  British  soldiers  at 
Malta,  a  single  regiment  would  have  precluded  all 
alarms,  as  to  the  island  itself,  and  the  remainder  have 
perhaps  changed  the  destiny  of  Europe.  What 
might  not,  almost  I  would  say,  what  must  not  eight 
thousand  Britons  have  accomplished  at  the  battle  of 
Marengo,  nicely  poised  as  the  fortunes  of  the  two  ar- 
mies are  now  known  to  have  been  ?  Minorca  too  is 
alone  useful  or  desirable  during  a  war,  and  on  the 
supposition  of  a  fleet  ofTToulon.  The  advantages  of 
Malta  are  permanent  and  national.  As  a  second 
Gibraltar,  it  must  tend  to  secure  Gibraltar  itself;  for 
if  by  the  loss  of  that  one  place  we  could  be  excluded 
from  the  Mediterranean,  it  is  dfficult  to  say  what 
sacrifices  of  blood  and  treasure  the  enemy  would 
deem  too  high  a  price  for  its  conquest.  Whatever 
Malta  may  or  may  not  be  respecting  Egypt,  its  high 
importance  to  the  independence  of  Sicily  cannot  be 
doubted,  or  its  advantages,  as  a  central  station,  for 
any  portion  of  our  disposable  force.  Neither  is  the 
influence  which  it  will  enable  us  to  exert  on  the 
Barbary  powers,  to  be  wholly  neglected.    I  shall  only 


add,  that  during  the  plague  at  Gibraltar,  Lord  Nel- 
son himself  acknowledged  that  he  began  to  see  the 
possession  of  Malta  in  a  different  light. 

Sir  Alexander  Ball  looked  forward  to  future  con- 
tingencies as  likely  to  increase  the  value  of  Malta  to 
Great  Britain.  He  foresaw  that  the  whole  of  Italy 
would  become  a  French  province,  and  he  knew  that 
the  French  government  had  been  long  intriguing  .in 
the  coast  of  Barbary.  The  Dey  of  Algiers  was  be- 
lieved to  have  accumulated  a  treasure  of  fifteen  mil- 
lions sterling,  and  Buonaparte  had  actually  duped 
him  into  a  treaty,  by  which  the  French  were  to  be 
permitted  to  erect  a  fort  on  the  very  spot  where  the 
ancient  Hippo  stood,  the  choice  between  which  and 
the  Hellespont  as  the  site  of  New  Rome,  is  said  to 
have  perplexed  the  judgment  of  Constantine.  To 
this  he  added  an  additional  point  of  connection  with 
Russia,  by  means  of  Odessa,  and  on  the  supposition 
of  a  war  in  the  Baltic,  a  still  more  interesting  rela- 
tion to  Turkey,  and  the  Morea,  and  the  Greek 
islands. — It  has  been  repeatedly  signified  to  the  Bri- 
tish government,  that  from  the  Morea  and  the  coun- 
tries adjacent,  a  considerable  supply  of  ship-timber 
and  naval  stores  might  be  obtained,  such  as  would  at 
least  greatly  lessen  the  pressure  of  a  Russian  war. 
The  agents  of  France  were  in  full  activity  in  the 
Morea  and  the  Greek  islands,  the  possession  of  which, 
by  that  government,  would  augment  the  naval  re- 
sources of  the  French  to  a  degree  of  which  few  are 
aware,  who  have  not  made  the  present  state  of  com- 
merce of  the  Greeks,  an  object  of  particular  atten- 
tion. In  short,  if  the  possession  of  Malta  were  ad- 
vantageous to  England  solely  as  a  convenient  watch- 
tower,  as  a  centre  of  intelligence,  its  importance 
would  be  undeniable. 

Although  these  suggestions  did  not  prevent  the 
signing  away  of  Malta  at  the  peace  of  Amiens,  they 
doubtless  were  not  without  effect,  when  the  ambition 
of  Buonaparte  had  given  a  full  and  final  answer  to 
the  grand  question :  can  we  remain  in  peace  with 
France  ?  I  have  likewise  reason  to  believe,  that  Sir 
Alexander  Ball,  baffled  by  exposing  an  insidious  pro- 
posal of  the  French  government,  during  the  negoti- 
ations that  preceded  the  re-commencement  of  the 
war — that  the  fortifications  of  Malta  should  be  en- 
tirely dismantled,  and  the  island  left  to  its  inhabit- 
ants. Without  dwelling  on  the  obvious  inhumanity 
and  flagitious  injustice  of  exposing  the  Maltese  to 
certain  pillage  and  slavery,  from  their  old  and  invete- 
rate enemies,  the  Moors,  he  showed  that  the  plan 
would  promote  the  interests  of  Buonaparte  even  more 
than  his  actual  possession  of  the  islands,  which  France 
had  no  possible  interest  in  desiring,  except  as  the 
means  of  keeping  it  out  of  the  hands  of  Great  Britain. 

But  Sir  Alexander  Ball  is  no  more.  The  writer 
still  clings  to  the  hope,  that  he  may  yet  be  enabled  to 
record  his  good  deeds  more  fully  and  regularly.,-  that 
then,  with  a  sense  of  comfort  not  without  a  subdued 
exultation,  he  may  raise  heavenward  from  his  hon- 
ored tomb  the  glistening  eye  of  an  humble,  but  evei 
grateful  Friend. 


556 


THE    END. 


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